{"id":78466,"date":"2023-12-08T15:15:22","date_gmt":"2023-12-08T20:15:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=78466"},"modified":"2023-12-08T15:15:22","modified_gmt":"2023-12-08T20:15:22","slug":"rav-elations-the-great-chanukah-debate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/rav-elations-the-great-chanukah-debate\/","title":{"rendered":"Rav-Elations!: The Great Chanukah Debate"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By RABBI DAVID GERBER<\/p>\n<div>The great rabbis Hillel and Shammai didn&#8217;t agree on much, and Chanukah is no exception.<\/div>\n<div>&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/rabbi_david_gerber_-_talit_2016.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-38967 size-thumbnail lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/rabbi_david_gerber_-_talit_2016-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/rabbi_david_gerber_-_talit_2016-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/rabbi_david_gerber_-_talit_2016-350x350.jpg 350w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 150px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 150\/150;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-38967 size-thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/rabbi_david_gerber_-_talit_2016-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/rabbi_david_gerber_-_talit_2016-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/rabbi_david_gerber_-_talit_2016-350x350.jpg 350w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a>Shammai believed we should light our chanukah menorah with eight candles on the first night and diminish by one every night. His reasoning was that the Jews had the most oil on the first night and slowly diminished for the rest of the eight days. Furthermore, the descending number matches the style of the sacrificial offering of the recent holiday of Succot.<\/div>\n<div>&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div>Hillel, on the other hand, believed that even though Shammai&#8217;s method made practical sense, it was not in the spirit of the holiday. The light, he said, represents holiness. And in matters of holiness, we should always increase. As we light or candles according to Hillel, let us hope that holiness increases in our world.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div>&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><em>Rabbi David Gerber is the senior rabbi of the URJ\u2019s Congregation Gates of Prayer (Sha\u2019arai Tefillah) in Metairie.<\/em><\/div>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Rav-Elations%21%3A%20The%20Great%20Chanukah%20Debate\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[823,557],"tags":[8834,8790,8795,8788,9520],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78466"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78466"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78467,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78466\/revisions\/78467"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}