What Is Chanukah All About?
Happy Chanukah everybody! For those of you who think Chanukah is just an excuse for Jewish kids to get presents–well, not really, although presents are nice. Chanukah celebrates an interesting bit of history and of course, celebrates winter light–always precious.
I took a little journey through the Chanukahs of my childhood. First we’d light the candles and sing songs in a mixture of English, Yiddish, and German. We had a good meal–brisket and latkes. We opened presents (mostly socks and pajamas.) Then we’d have the fiercely competitive dreidel game (for poker chips or nuts-in-the-shell.) When my Mother got bored, she would start to eat her reserve, which was the beginning of the end.
For all of you who need a little course in dreidel, there is a Hebrew letter on each side of the dreidel (a top made of wood or plastic. I never made the ubliquitous clay dreidel.) The player spins the dreidel and if it falls with the Gimmel up, the player wins the whole pot. If the Hay is up, player takes half the pot. If the Nun is up, player takes nothing and if the Shin is up, player puts 2 in. Everyone antes up again and another player has a turn. The letters stand for the phrase nes gadol hayah sham, a great miracle happened there. The miracle was that the small amount of oil found for the eternal light in the temple lasted eight days until more could be refined. Religiously sanctioned gambling–how fun is that.
