Why do we Light Hannukah Candles?

 Parshat Miketz (Hannukah)

As popular culture's favorite Jewish holiday approaches, it's a good idea to ask the question of why we light Hannukah candles. Ask any Jew today, and a good many non-Jews, and you'll get an answer which is something like, "a flask of oil was found with only one days worth of oil and it lasted for eight days, long enough for new oil to be made." But, if you asked a Jew shortly after the victory over Antiochus, would they give the same answer? What about one several hundred years later, in the first century CE? What about the rabbis of the Talmud? This is the topic of this week's post.

Hannukah in the Book of the Maccabees

The best source we have about the events concerning Hannukah are in the book of the Maccabees. There are several versions online. Here's one in English. The English is just as good as Hebrew here, since the original Hebrew is lost, and both would be translated from the surviving versions in Greek. There are several books of the Maccabees, but the first one is the important one. Let's see what it says about the rededication of the temple, the original Hannukah.

The rededication is described in 1 Mac. 4:36-61 and is too long to quote here in full, but feel free to read it in the link above. The menorah is mentioned exactly once in the rededication in verses 49 and 50. (It's also mentioned earlier when it gets carted out along with everything else by Antiochus.)  The two key verses are:

49 And they made new holy vessels, and brought in the candlestick (menorah), and the altar of incense, and the table into the temple. 50 And they put incense upon the altar, and lighted up the lamps that were upon the candlestick (menorah), and they gave light in the temple.

As is obvious upon first reading, there is no mention about difficulties regarding lighting the Menorah.  No talk about kosher oil, and miraculous long burning oil.  They recaptured the menorah, brought it into the temple, and lit it.  C'est fini.

In addition to 1 Maccabees, there is also the book of 2 Maccabees, which describes the creation of the holiday. A version of the text in English can be found here. The orginal was written in Greek, probably in Alexandria, and like most of the works of the Egyptian Jews, it is not held in high regard by Jews today. Nevertheless, it also describes the events of Hannukah, and is one of our early sources for the observance of the holiday in the years immediately after the event. The purification is in chapter 10 and is similar to what is in 1 Maccabees. Some excerpts are given here.

3 They purified the sanctuary, and made another altar of sacrifice; then, striking fire out of flint, they offered sacrifices, after a lapse of two years, and they burned incense and lighted lamps and set out the bread of the Presence... 5 It happened that on the same day on which the sanctuary had been profaned by the foreigners, the purification of the sanctuary took place, that is, on the twenty-fifth day of the same month, which was Kislev. 6 And they celebrated it for eight days with rejoicing, in the manner of the feast of booths, remembering how not long before, during the feast of booths, they had been wandering in the mountains and caves like wild animals. 7 Therefore bearing ivy-wreathed wands and beautiful branches and also fronds of palm, they offered hymns of thanksgiving to him who had given success to the purifying of his own holy place. 8 They decreed by public ordinance and vote that the whole nation of the Jews should observe these days every year.

As you can see, there is no mention about the miracle of the oil in this one either. In both places the holiday seems to resemble Sukkot both in length and in practice.  As far as these books are concerned, the eight day length is chosen to mimic that holiday. If the writers of the books of Maccabees knew about this miracle, they declined to mention it at all. It's not clear when exactly the book of Maccabees was written, but it's certainly the earliest references we have to Hannukah.

Hannukah in the First Century CE

At this time, the holiday had already been established. We know this because of the writings of Josephus who testifies to the practice. He writes about it in Antiquities 12.7.6-7. Again some excerpts.

"So he chose some of his soldiers and gave them an order to fight the men that guarded the upper city until he has purified the Temple. When therefore he he had carefully purged it he brought in new vessels -- the menorah, the table and the incense altar, which were made of gold, and hung up the veils at the doors and restored the doors themselves. He also took down the altar and built a new one of stones that he gathered together, and such as had not been hewn with iron tools. And on the twenty-fifth day of the month Kislev, which the Macedonians call Apellaios, they lighted the lights that were on the menorah, and offered incense upon the altar, and laid the loaves upon the table, and offered whole burnt offerings upon the new altar...Indeed, they were so very glad at the revival of their customs and, after so long a time, having unexpectedly regained their right to worship, that they made it a law for their posterity that they should keep a festival celebrating the restoration of their Temple worship for eight days. And from that time to this we celebrate this, which we call the Festival of Lights, because, I imagine, beyond our hopes this right was brought to light, and so this name was placed on the festival. (my emphasis)

Josephus mentions that it was called the festival of lights, but makes no mention about the lighting of candles for the holidays, or indeed the miracle of the oil.  He even makes a guess as to why it's called the festival of lights, and the guess has nothing to do with the menorah that he mentions earlier!  Furthermore, Josephus was a sympathizer and supporter of Judaism.  If Josephus wanted to de-emphasize the insurrectionist nature of the holiday, which would prevent the Roman from cracking down on it, basing the holiday on a miraculous reestablishment of candle lighting seems like it could provide an innocuous reason for celebration.  It seems clear to me, Josephus did not know the story about the magical oil, or if he did, he didn't think much of it.

Hannukah in Talmudic Times and Later

The first reference we have to the miracle we all know about comes all the way in the 5th century CE. It is from the Hebrew commentary to Megillat Ta'anit, which can be read here.  There are a couple reasons mentioned for the Hannukah observance.  My translation from the Hebrew commentary is as follows:

"When the Greeks entered the temple, all the oil had been made impure, and when the Hasmoneans overcame them, and drove them out, they checked and did not find but one jar of oil that had the seal of the kohen gadol (high priest) that was not made impure and not used. It had but one day, but a miracle occurred and it lasted for eight."

So there we are, the origin of the stories. The same story appears, essentially verbatim in the Talmud (Shabbat 21b)  But there's more in the text of Megillat Ta'anit. It also asks again why eight days, and it gives a different answer. The answer (again, my translation):

"In the days of the Greek kings, the Hasmoneans entered the temple, and built he altar, and cleaned it, and built tools, and it took them eight days. And how did they light the candles? In the days of the Greek kings, the Hasmoneans entered the temple, with seven spears of iron in their hands and they grabbed wood with them and lit with them the Menorah."

Later on, in the 9th century CE, the Pesikta Rabbati (ch 2) asks the same question. My translation is as follows:

"And why do we light candles on Hannukah? In the time when the children of the Hasmonean high priest defeated the Greek kings, as it is written, "I will stir your sons, Israel against your sons, Greece (Zech 9:13). they entered the temple, and found eight iron spears and they fixed them and lit in them."

So it seems that even relatively late, at the end of the 1st millennium CE, it was unclear to people what was the correct reason for lighting candles!  The Pesikta Rabbati thinks that it should be eight days because they used eight iron spears as a makeshift menorah.

Where did the Practice of Lighting Candles Actually Come From?

Based on the above sources, it seems very unlikely that there was a tradition of lighting candles on the holiday immediately after the event.  It seems from the sources above, that the tradition of lighting candles came first, even though it's not explicitly mentioned in Josephus. The explanations of the practice in light of Hannukah miracles came later. But where could the practice come from? For this we turn back to the Gemara.

The section in masechet Shabbat mentioned above is the only section in the Talmud which clearly references Hannukah, but there's a passage in masechet Avodah Zarah that should catch your attention. Page 8a (my translation):

"Rav Hanan bar Raba said, Kalends is 8 days after the turning (solstice), Saturnalia is 8 days before, this is symbolized by, 'from the back and from the front you have afflicted me (Psa. 139:5).' Our Rabbis taught, when Adam saw that the days were getting shorter he said, "Oy vey, maybe because I messed up, the world is getting dark, and it will return to chaos, and this is the death, decided for me from heaven." He then made an 8 day fast, when he saw the turning of Tevet, and saw a day that was longer, he said, 'It's the way of the world', and he made an 8 day holiday. In the following years he made each of them festivals. He did it for God, but they (Romans) do it for idolatry."

This idea of a festival to mark the time when the days start getting longer is common. Many cultures have solstice festivals around the new year, and Romans were no exception. The Talmud's Rabbis were not quite accurate with their understanding of Roman culture. The Kalends were the first day of the new month, and there was one for every month. They were not an eight day holiday. Similarly, Saturnalia varied in length from three to seven days, but never eight. What was eight days long and at this time of year?  As we've seen earlier, the original Hannukah celebration was eight days. Why would the Rabbis make such an obvious connection between Saturnalia and Hannukah?

Perhaps we can glean some more info if we look at the Roman festival of Saturnalia itself. Fowler in his book "Roman Festivals" (p 272) describes the giving of gifts on the Saturnalia holiday. He says:

"...among [the gifts] the wax candles (cerei) deseve notice; as they are thought to have some reference to the returning power of the sun's light after the solstice."

So the Romans had a holiday, around the solstice, in which special candles played an important role. He also describes the holiday as incredibly popular quoting Seneca (p. 270) as saying, "All Rome would go mad on this holiday."

Now we can try to piece together the origin of the Hannukah candle-lighting custom, putting all the evidence together with a bit of reasonable speculation. Just like during the actual time of Hannukah under the Greeks, some Jews probably adopted some popular Roman cultural elements (we saw this earlier with the attempt to make fake foreskins).  It seems reasonable to assume that many Jews participate in the most popular holiday, Saturnalia. It's also possible that the Saturnalia celebration rivaled the normal Hannukah celebration, already established around this time. This, did not sit well with the Rabbis, as you might imagine. But, it would be difficult to abolish such a popular Saturnalia celebration by fiat. So instead, they merged it with Hannukah. Alternatively, it's possible that popular culture did the merging and the Rabbis just had to provide an explanation of why Jews are now lighting candles.

Nevertheless, having a holiday that originated among the pagan Romans was anathema to the Rabbis, so they produced their own stories about why candles are lit. This explains why the stories about finding a magical jar of oil or lighting eight spears are so much later than the rest of the Hannukah story. The Rabbis even went a step further, taking the Jewish version of Saturnalia and projecting it back to Adam, thereby justifying the observance of even that.  Also note that this reason for an eight day holiday has nothing to do with insurrection against a ruling power.  Something the Rabbis sitting under the thumb of Rome were definitely cognizant about.

Judaism has a long history of adapting stuff from the cultures around it. It was really only after the Talmud was written that things started being set. Even then there were changes, but they were lesser in magnitude. This adaption and merging, or to use the academic word, syncretization, of other cultures is one of the themes I've been attempting to bring out in this blog. And we'll see even more examples in the future, I'm sure.

Edit 10/23/18: A previous version incorrectly stated that Josephus mentioned the practice of lighting candles.