Lights of Hiddur: The Love Behind the Miracle

1“What is Chanukah? The Rabbis taught … When the Greeks entered the Heichal, they defiled all the oils … They established those days and made them festive days with Hallel and thanksgiving.”¹ The commentators ask a question.² Surely the main miracle was the miracle of the cruse of oil, and for that Chazal established lighting for eight days. Why, then, does the Baraisa, the teaching of the Tanna'im quoted in the Gemara, not mention at all that they established lighting for eight days? Rashi's words raise the same difficulty. On “and made them festive days with Hallel and thanksgiving” he writes: “to recite Hallel and to say Al HaNissim in the thanksgiving blessing.”³ Why did he not also mention the mitzvah of lighting the Chanukah lamp?

2Al HaNissim raises the same puzzle. Why does it not mention that lighting was established? It says only, “and they established these eight days of Chanukah to give thanks and to praise.” Notice another phrase there: “And afterward Your children came …” Why does the prayer speak here of “Your children,” of all names, when elsewhere in our prayers we say simply “Your people Israel”?

3We can explain this through the words of the Pnei Yehoshua and the Chacham Tzvi.⁴ They asked: the law is that impurity is permitted in the service of the community,⁵ so they could have lit with impure oil. Why did they need a miracle with the cruse of oil? They answered that the Holy One, blessed be He, wanted to show how dear Bnei Yisrael are to Him. So He did the miracle of the cruse for them, so that they could perform the mitzvah in purity and holiness. Their words make clear that the mitzvah itself did not need the miracle; it came only for the sake of hiddur mitzvah, beautifying the mitzvah. On this basis the Chiddushei HaRim, the first Rebbe of Ger, zt"l, explained why only the mitzvah of Chanukah has a law of mehadrin min hamehadrin, “those who beautify it most of all,” beyond the other mitzvos.⁶ Since the whole miracle was for the sake of hiddur mitzvah, the mitzvah of the Chanukah lamp, which was instituted to commemorate the miracle, is beautified all the more. So Chazal instituted a law of mehadrin min hamehadrin. That is the gist of his words.

4This resolves our question: why does the Gemara not mention the mitzvah of lighting at all? Chazal teach that a slave whose master set him free and also gave him gifts owes great thanks and praise.⁷ Not only did his master free him; he gave him gifts besides. Now we have seen that the lighting of the Menorah did not need the miracle at all. It came only for the sake of hiddur, to show Hashem's love for His children. That is why Chazal made Hallel and thanksgiving the heart of the mitzvah, for we owe such great thanks for this miracle and for this hiddur. The lighting to commemorate the miracle itself is not mentioned, since it is not the heart of the matter.

5This is the intent of the words in Al HaNissim: “And afterward Your children came … and purified Your Mikdash.” As we said, the miracle of lighting the Menorah in the Beis HaMikdash came from the love of the Holy One, blessed be He, for Israel as His children, and so it says “Your children.” And it ends by saying that through this “they purified Your Mikdash,” meaning that they fulfilled the mitzvah in purity. Hashem did the miracle for Bnei Yisrael for precisely this reason: because they were dear to Him as children, and so that they could fulfill the mitzvah in purity. And because of this, “they established these eight days of Chanukah to give thanks and to praise.” Since the whole miracle was for the sake of hiddur, we must give thanks all the more, as we saw with the freed slave.

6a[We can also explain this in a somewhat different way. Chazal said: “They accepted it anew, out of love, in the days of Achashverosh, as it is written, ‘The Jews upheld and accepted’: they upheld what they had already accepted.”⁸ Rashi explains: out of love for the miracle that was done for them. We can learn from this that when the Holy One, blessed be He, bestows miracles on us, our love and fondness for the miracle bring us to serve the Creator out of love. So it was with the miracle of Purim: out of love for the miracle, they accepted the Torah with love. And so it was with the miracle of Chanukah. Out of love for the miracle and awe at its greatness, Bnei Yisrael were privileged to serve the Creator out of love. We know how great the difference is between one who serves out of fear and one who serves out of love. One who serves out of fear acts only out of duty and compulsion. So he takes care only to do enough to fulfill his obligation, and does not look for ways to beautify the mitzvah more and more. But one who reaches the level of love serves the Creator the way a son who loves his father serves him. He is always thinking up plans and ways to do his father's will and to make his deeds more beautiful in his father's eyes.]

6b[This can explain why only Chanukah has mehadrin min hamehadrin. Through the miracle they came to serve out of love, so they sought to beautify the mitzvos more and more, as one who serves out of love does. The words “And afterward Your children came to the inner chamber of Your House” are precise as well. They show that Israel was privileged to serve the Creator out of love, and came to the Beis HaMikdash to serve there as children. Chazal instituted mentioning this on Chanukah because at that time Israel's love for Hashem awakens, and our service is done out of love, for then we stand as children before the Omnipresent.]

7In these days the power of “in those days, at this time” awakens, and so we rise to the level of Hashem's children, as we have seen. May the Holy One, blessed be He, help us not to be shamed or disgraced in this world. May we be worthy that He do miracles for us “in those days, at this time,” with the coming of the righteous Redeemer. Amen, may it be His will.