B”H
Listen to what the Chanukah Candles are saying
We have a custom that after candle lighting we sit by the menorah for at least a half hour. The Rebbe Rashab said “We need to listen to what the candles are telling”. During the days of Chanukah we try to listen to what the candles are telling us.
A candle is taking a cold physical object and heating it until it lights and illuminates for the one lighting and for his fiends who are with him. Anyone who will try to serve Hashem will find within the dust the desire to serve Hashem with love and enthusiasm.
The Shpolei Zeide relates that when he was a young boy the Bal Shem Tov placed his hand on his heart and blessed him that “It should be His will that you will always be a warm Jew”. And from that moment, he continues, I have been warm. Within each and every one of us is the potential to be hot in all realms of Holiness. However, in order to connect to this internal bonfire, we are required to give up completely the coldness of the intellect which causes objections, a general objection to the things that are truly most precious.
The influence of the Greeks on the nation of Israel was gradual; it came in a way that didn’t arouse doubts or disturbances. Little by little they influenced the Jews to introduce to their lives practices and behaviors which were strange until they came to the situation which went against the entire Torah, without event he slightest feeling of regret or awareness of the fermenting of anything in their lives.
In contrast to Purim and all other holidays and festivals whose tales are recorded in books or scrolls, the story of Chanukah is not written. One of the reasons for this is that the story of Chanukah is still continuing and it is still impossible to write the ending. On Chanukah each and every one of us must feel, at the first stage, the realm of foreign entities in our lives, which could possibly be present to the extent that they are, G-d forbid the ‘masters’ that through their demands things are fulfilled, while Holiness and the desire to study Torah, to keep mitzvoth, to purify and to go up are made, Sadly enough, foreign and separated.
Chanukah is the transformative power. It gives to us the strength from above to purge out the falsity from our lives and to dedicate a new Mizbaach on which we can draw our lives and the lives of our children close to solely to the will of Hashem which is revealed in our Holy Torah.
The lights of Chanukah are telling us and reminding us that even though the dirt and darkness is enormous, and that the change is seemingly impossible, Never-the-less, true faith will be victorious and redeeming, with G-ds help.
Part 2- The Idea of the Mizbeach in the soul
The main defilement and similarly the main miracle of Chanukah revolved around the service of the Holy Temple- the purification and dedication of the Mizbeach and the lighting of the Menorah with pure oil. We want to understand the idea of the sacrifices on the alter and their correspondence in the service of man. The main work in the Beis Hamikdash was the offering of sacrifices. A sacrifice in Hebrew- Korban comes from the etymological root Kiruv- To draw close. This means, drawing close all the powers of the body and soul to the supernal will.
The physical animal is a metaphor for the spiritual animal that we sacrifice, namely, the animal soul. This soul is rooted in the spiritual mountains but in its descent to enliven the body it tends to fall to the temptations of this world, for example: honor, sleep, eating and more. As is understood, all of these activities are necessary to live, they are not the sole purpose of mans existence. When a certain desire is transformed, it shows that His G-dly soul had dominion over him. Since this is not the main reason of his being created; he needs to correct his ways, in order to turn over his G-dly sol to be the ruler of the body, and the animalistic soul to a servant of its Spiritual mission. The un-rectified condition is called ‘Cheit’, which comes from the root word meaning lacking or missing the point/objective. Its rectification is the Teshuvah process to return his situation to its completion and to the right direction.
At the time that the Holy Temple was standing, the Teshuvah was accomplished by bringing a physical animal which imitated the animal soul of the one offering the sacrifice. The sacrificing of the animal and its usage in the holy services represents the dominion of the G-dly soul over the animal soul. This gave great strength to the internal returning of the one offering the sacrifice.
Chanukah, as it is know, gets its name from the Hebrew word meaning dedication, specifically, the dedication of the Mizbaach, the alter. The alter was the median through which the service of the sacrifices was carried out.
It is incumbent upon the meditator to find a place in his soul that he has to give up and that on it he has to give up in order not to separate from His unity and His will, even for a moment. That animalistic character trait, was created in order to test the person, that it should cause a person to move up as it says “You gave to those who fear You a test to be raised up” (as apposed to a situation which requires a birur- a refinement whose purpose is not only to refine the one working, but the object of his work as well. In the case of a test, it is merely upon the one being tested to push the bad away with both hands.) There are those things within ourselves which must be offered up which are animalistic according to all opinions such as jealously, hate, anger etc. These are similar to coarse the animals which were sacrificed- such as cows and bulls. But many times, the idea which has to be given up is, at the end of it, a feeling of ego which comes from the fulfillment of a necessary action which was fulfilled through straight logic without its intention being for the sake of Hashem. These things are liken to docile animal such as sheep and goat, which also were offered on the Alter.
We need to sacrifice, to draw close, these actions to their source by giving up our reliance on the genius of man and remaining only with reliance on our Father in Heaven and His holy Torah. This self sacrifice, even though it is difficult, has to be through Joy and trust in the merit to be emissaries of the Creator of the World.
The strength for this dedication comes from the part of the soul called the Yechidah. This is the point that is above understanding and reason. In its merit holiness is drawn down in all our ties of stress and hardship, spiritual or physical, which in the time period of the Greeks was at its hardest. This Holy spark within us must transform to rule over all the powers within us.
As our Holy Rebbe, The Alter Rebbe writes in Tanya: “ And that is what is written ‘This thing is very close to you etc’ That at every moment and at every time it is in mans hand to turn over the spirit of folly and forgetfulness within him and to remember and to awaken his Love to the One Hashem, which is surely hidden within his heart without any doubt . . . Which means he can not separate in any way from his blessed unity and oneness even with total self sacrifice without any reason or logical understanding rather with his G-dly nature . . . In order not to transgress His holy blessed will which would occur after he separated from his unity and essence” (chapter 25)
In Summary:
The idea of a sacrifice is the drawing close of all the souls powers in a way of self sacrifice that is beyond reasons or understanding for any idea in Holiness. Because of our sins the Beis Hamikdash was destroyed, however the existence of the service of the sacrifices must continue. In order to ensure this, our Rabbis instituted that we must pray to Hashem in order to arouse within our souls these hidden realms of the service of the sacrifices.
In the prelifory stages of the meditation, the meditator must see himself, as much as he is able to, bringing a physical sacrifice to the Beis Hamikdash. This animal contains clothed within it the characteristic that he needs to rectify. He needs to imagine how he enters unto Har Habayis, the temple mount, and how he walks and arrives next to the Alter and there he gives up his animal soul, be it coarse as a cow or a docile sheep to the priest and how, through the slaughtering and burning, there is aroused within him a feeling of Teshuvah which turns the hardships and trials which previously had separated him from his Creator, to a greatness and connection with Hashem with a greater strength and force.
Practical Meditation:
1) Relaxation next to the candles of the Menorah after they are light
2) While humming to the Chanukah niggun(preferably the Chanukah niggunim of Rabbi Ginsburg) one meditates on the idea of self sacrifice
He imagines in his mind that he is I the holy temple, bringing up his animal traits, embodied by the physical animal towards the Alter.
As he reaches the ramp of the Mizbeach he places his hands on the head of the animal and confesses. Through his confession, he passes over his undesirable and misdirected traits in a way that it is in-clothed in the animal that he brings.
The same thing is true in the silent amidah and the confession; the person must give up the feeling that “I know the truth” and be filled with the awareness that there is no truth except for Torah. Therefore he is ready and willing to change and to live with this new realization.
Within the meditation, while slaughtering the sacrifice, he must slaughter the animal soul which enables him to live and goes within the muscle of his heart. While he envisions the animal burning, he must meditate how specifically the giving up and the sacrificing draws him close to his true I that until now had been hidden.
The service of the sacrifices is not easy, but with it we must undergo this process with tremendous joy, that here, finally, I am living with my true soul.
