Parshat Miketz (Shabbat Chanukah): The Dreidel

Isn't Chanukah wonderful?

We light our Chanukiyot to remind us of the miracle of the oil that lasted for eight days.

We eat latkes and donuts to remind us of the miracle of the oil that lasted for eight days (and wonder if the real miracle of Chanukah is the fact that after 2000 years of lining our arteries with cholesterol, we are still around as a living, breathing nation)!

We give presents to kids because of that other festival and that's partly why some people give Chanukah gelt, to differentiate it from its gentile neighbour.

And we spin a dreidel because?...now that's a very good question!

Why do we spin the dreidel?

Tradition tells us that the Jews used dreidels when they were suffering under the harsh rule of the Selucids in Ancient Syria led by the evil Antiochus IV known as Epiphanes (which means 'the illustrious one', a complete misnomer).  As they were forbidden from studying Torah Shel Baal Peh (the Oral Law) they used to keep these spinning tops handy in case one the guards raided their learning sessions.  If this happened, they quickly started spinning their dreidels.  This custom has been refined to the present day when your boss walks into the room and you hide the eBay page you've been watching over the last two hours with a complicated spreadsheet) - although you can't do that in teaching!

However, there is a school of thought that claims dreidels were in fact developed from spinning tops called Teetotums that were found in the Greek and Roman Empires and brought to England by the Romans.  They eventually found their way into Germany where the Jews adopted them as a Chanukah toy.

The Latin letters:

·        A for aufer (take from the pot);

·        D for depone (put into the pot),

·        N for nihil (nothing) and

·        T for totum (take all)

were Judaized with the letters Nun, Gimmel, Hay and Shin from the verse (Nes Gadol Haya Sham – A great miracle happened there) into Yiddish for:

·        Nun (Nisht or  you get nothing or put into the pot;

·        Gimmel - Gantz: the winner takes it all;

·        Hay, you only get halp/half

·        and Shin, stel ein - you need to put into the pot.

This was then developed into the more modern Israeli version where the Shin which represents Sham meaning ‘there’ was replaced 'Pay' to represent 'Po' meaning ‘here’ as the miracle took place in situ, ie ‘A great miracle happened here.’

However, I would like to add another dimension to the story by considering the dreidel as a very Jewish toy.  In fact, it is quite relevant to Chanukah and possibly to our history as a whole.

Look at the shape of the dreidel.  It is small and is operated by spinning on a point.  Round and round it goes appearing as though it is steady but as we know, it eventually loses its balance and lands on one side.  Is that not our story?  Look at how we have been spun throughout history, cast from country to country, made to lose our stability and yet still we continue spinning in the hope that if we fall, we will pick ourselves up and restart our journey.

Sometimes, we have become giddy from all the turning and shaking.  We feel as though we have lost our bearings but nevertheless, each generation starts again, faces an uncertain environment and moves on merrily, sticking to our ground, like a dreidel that spins and spins on the same point.  It might skip to another part of the table, but it still spins.

The Seleucids had no desire to physically wipe us out.  Instead, they tried to remove our spiritual centre, to Hellenize our culture and form us in their own beautiful Greek moulds.  They spun us around and around, trying to force us to assimilate into their culture by sullying our beloved Temple and removing the deep spirituality that kept us grounded.  They were our dreidel-meisters.

The Maccabees came along and stopped the 'dreidel', helped us to stabilize ourselves and remind us that for a while, we didn't need to spin any more.  We were in our own home, under our own leaders, reclaiming our Jewish heritage and consigning the spinning top from the receptacle that we had been imprisoned inside, to a child's toy.  Instead of being spun, we were now in charge of our own destiny.

The miracle of Chanukah, which means 'dedication' was our opportunity to transform ourselves from being the victims to dedicating ourselves to shining our light to the other nations.  That is why today, Chanukah is one of the most beloved festivals not only amongst Jews but throughout the world.

It is far more than the Jewish equivalent of Christmas.  In many ways, it is one of THE key festivals, certainly with regard to how our neighbours view our culture.

The latkes and donuts are tasty.  The gifts are delightful and the dreidel is still fun to play.  After we've stored them away for the year, it is the menorah, the symbol of our Temple and our worship of Gd and our oldest Jewish symbol which shines brightly - not only for these eight days but for the other 357 days of the year for it represents the very best of what is means to be Jewish.

Happy Chanukah, Rosh Chodesh and Shabbat Shalom!