Light up these Dark Days – Hanukkah 5786 |
It was late in Kislev of 1196, in the Rhineland city of Worms, today in Germany. Photo credit: Canva
Rabbi Eleazar ben Judah — known as the Rokeah — was at his desk, learning quietly by lamplight.
From his diary, we know exactly where he was in the Torah: Parashat Va-yeishev, last week’s reading — studying the line that says, “Jacob settled,” a line about calm and security.
But outside his window, Europe was shaking with crusading zeal and the vitriol of hate being poured on the Jews.
Inside his home, he was doing what Jews have always done in uncertain times: studying, teaching, holding the thread of tradition, thinking about how to spread eternal ideas and values into the world.
Then his world broke.
His family was attacked. Photo: Public Domain
Two Christian crusaders attacked his home, murdering his wife, Dulcea, and their two daughters.
His world was shattered.
The Rokeah wrote a beautiful poetic eulogy for Dulcea — not only mourning her, but naming her kindness, her leadership, her devotion. He remembered the way she helped others, the way she held a household together so Torah could be learned.
Through his loss, through his tears, he lit the Hanukkah lights.
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And now, nearly a millennium later, we gather this morning during another difficult Hanukkah week. Photo credit: Flickr
Bondi Beach now means not only a beautiful stretch of sand, but the site of a horrific modern antisemitic pogrom.
And closer to home — different in nature, but still terrible — the attack at Brown University, another hard way to enter Hanukkah. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
Thank God, our Emunah family members who study there are safe.
We send consolation to all those who lost loved ones and strength and healing to the wounded, including those who are still carrying fear in its aftermath.
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I want to lift up Ahmed al-Ahmed — Syrian-born, Muslim, a father, a shopkeeper — who decided: I will not be a bystander.
In the attack on Bondi Beach, he ran forward, wrestled a gun away, and saved........