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Rabbi Areyah Kaltmann of Columbus, Ohio, lights the menorah in Bevelhymer Park on Dec. 18, 2022. Kaltmann is dressed as Judah Maccabee, the hero of the Hanukkah story. Picture by Harry Acosta Images
(RNS) — A whole lot of youngsters bundled in parkas and hats stood by in frigid temperatures because the helicopter swooped down into the snow-covered area exterior Columbus, Ohio. Seconds later, out popped an area rabbi in a burgundy cape and white headband, portraying Judah Maccabee, the Jewish insurgent who, in response to Hanukkah legend, cleansed the Jerusalem temple of Hellenizers.
The festivities, on the eve of the eight-day Competition of Lights that started Sunday (Dec. 18), was seemingly one of many nation’s most elaborate. It featured a sweet cannon that shot 8,000 items of Hanukkah gelt — chocolate cash in gold foil — and dreidels to youngsters who rushed out to gather them.
However the competitors is heavy this 12 months. Hanukkah, a comparatively unimportant vacation theologically, has been marked this December by very public and really flashy Hanukkah kickoffs. In cities reminiscent of Greensboro, North Carolina, and State Faculty, Pennsylvania, Hanukkah started with parades of vehicle convoys. Outdoors New York Metropolis’s Plaza Lodge, a 36-foot menorah — the world’s largest — was illuminated over the weekend.
A 36-foot menorah is assembled exterior the Plaza Lodge in New York Metropolis on Dec. 15, 2022, forward of the beginning of Hanukkah. Picture by Muli Berger/Lubavitch Youth Group
Sunday’s soccer match between the Washington Commanders and New York Giants featured a first-ever Hanukkah menorah lighting.
Hanukkah celebrates an historical army victory during which a band of Jewish rebels led by Judah Maccabee rose up in opposition to their Greek-Syrian oppressors who had defiled the Jerusalem temple with statues of Greek gods. The rebels rededicated the temple and lit the candelabra with a small flask of consecrated oil that miraculously lasted for eight days.
American Jews have sometimes marked the vacation at residence across the desk, lighting the menorah candles and consuming fried meals reminiscent of potato latkes and jelly doughnuts.
However within the face of antisemitism, many rabbis felt it was necessary this 12 months to point out a extra strong — even muscular — show of Jewish pleasure. They reminded congregants to not shirk from the commandment that they place a menorah within the window to point out the world that they’re Jewish and happy with it.
A sweet cannon is shot from a flatbed trailer in Bevelhymer Park on Dec. 18, 2022, throughout occasions for the beginning of Hanukkah in Columbus, Ohio. Picture by Harry Acosta Images
Rabbi Areyah Kaltmann, who performed Judah Maccabee on the Columbus occasion, mentioned surging antisemitism has demanded a robust, public assertion this Hanukkah.
“One of the best response is doing public occasions the place we convey our Jewish identification and pleasure and present the world that mild will overcome darkness and love and inclusion will overcome darkness and bigotry,” mentioned Kaltmann, of Columbus’ Lori Schottenstein Chabad Heart.
The identical day the Columbus celebration befell, the phrases “Jews Not Welcome” have been painted on an entrance signal at Walt Whitman Excessive Faculty in Bethesda, Maryland, solely the most recent in a months-long rash of antisemitic occurrences, which included statements from superstar artists and athletes, and former president Donald Trump’s dinner with the rapper Ye (previously Kanye West) and white Christian nationalist Nick Fuentes, each of whom have spoken adoringly of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.
“Collectively we should arise in opposition to the disturbing rise in antisemitism, and collectively we should arise in opposition to bigotry in any of its varieties,” Legal professional Normal Merrick Garland, who’s Jewish, mentioned at a menorah-lighting occasion on the Ellipse, simply south of the White Home, Sunday.
From left, Rabbi Levi Shemtov, Rabbi Abraham Shemtov and Legal professional Normal Merrick Garland take part within the annual Nationwide Menorah Lighting in celebration of Hanukkah, on the Ellipse close to the White Home in Washington, Sunday, Dec. 18, 2022. (AP Picture/Jose Luis Magana)
At Monday’s annual White Home Hanukkah celebration, President Joe Biden and first girl Jill Biden have been anticipated to debut the primary menorah to be added to the everlasting historic archive of the White Home.
On Sunday, Vice President Kamala Harris and second gentleman Doug Emhoff hosted the primary Hanukkah celebration ever on the vice-presidential residence at Washington’s Naval Observatory.
RELATED: Doug Emhoff hosts roundtable on antisemitism: ‘I’m going to talk out’
In keeping with Jewish custom, Hanukkah candles have to be displayed within the front-facing home windows within the early night hours when they are going to be most seen to passersby. “Hanukkah is about standing up for being Jewish and doing it when it’s laborious,” Rabbi Eric Solomon of Raleigh, North Carolina’s Beth Meyer Synagogue, mentioned in an Instagram publish.
Solomon mentioned he usually sees his job as displaying those that Judaism may be significant, joyous, enjoyable, even straightforward.
However Judaism isn’t all the time straightforward, he mentioned. And Hanukkah calls for that Jews stand as much as intolerance and bigotry and battle again.
A 36-foot menorah — the world’s largest — is lit in New York Metropolis on Dec. 18, 2022, to mark the beginning of Hanukkah. Picture by Yossi Soibelman/Lubavitch Youth Group
“That is the time to place it within the window,” mentioned Solomon, referring to the menorah, typically referred to as a hanukkiah. “If we wish to dwell in an America that honors range, then we’ve to place a hanukkiah within the window and invite others to place their identities within the window, too.”
In Columbus, Kaltmann had hoped to go even additional. He initially had a imaginative and prescient of a skydiving Judah Maccabee and filed for a allow from the Federal Aviation Administration. Ultimately, winds and chilly climate scuttled that plan. He hoped that fireplace sparklers and a fog machine made up for the magic.
RELATED: The Hanukkah dreidel and America’s playing downside
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