Fill the Pit with Meaning
Yonina Grauer and Eli Yissar
Grade 11 students, Ulpanat Orot
Chanukah is the holiday where the Jewish people come together to remember the miracle of the oil that lasted eight days. We are taught from a young age that this small miracle was the reason that the Jewish people were able to make their way back to Hashem and the mitzvot. There isn’t much information about Chanukah that can be found in the Gemara, but the little that is, can be found in Masechet Shabbat. During the discussions around Chanukah, the Masechet quotes a pasuk from parashat Vayeshev when Yosef’s brothers throw him into a pit. The pasuk says, “וְהַבּוֹר רֵק אֵין בּוֹ מָיִם.” That seems a little obvious though, if the pit is empty, it is obvious that there is no water. Why then, would this information have to be included? The Gemara answers that the reason it specifies that there is no water inside the pit is due to the fact that there were snakes and scorpions inside that filled the pit instead. We saw an interesting dvar torah that was originally quoted in the name of Rabbi Soloveitchik who tries to explain why this Gemara is mentioned in connection to Chanukah. Perhaps, he says, the snakes and scorpions can represent the Greeks, the water is the Torah, and the pit is the Jewish people. If the pit is empty, and therefore not filled with water, then there will be space for the snakes and scorpions to come in, but if the pit is filled with water, snakes and scorpions will not have any space inside the pit. As Jewish teenagers it is often easy for us to keep our pit empty, that way we have less to focus on and we can feel less stressed about things, but if we do this then we will risk the chance of having snakes and scorpions invade our lives. Leaving space for the snakes and scorpions inside our pits may not have been our initial purpose, but the outcome becomes inevitable. We need to realize that if the pit is empty, something will always be there to fill it. Our job is to ensure that we are filling it with meaningful and purposeful activities. In Chanukah, we must remember to fill the pit with water because of how hard the Greeks worked to try to fill it with snakes and scorpions. Finally, this connects really well to one of the most famous arguments between Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai in that same Gemara relating to Chanukah. Beit Hillel argues that we should light one candle on the first night and add one each night. Beit Shammai disagrees and says that we should start with eight candles on the first night and take one away each night. But if we truly believe in the idea that Chanukah should remind us to always strive to be better, then it becomes clear to the reason we follow Beit Hillel, because by adding a candle every night we are showing our effort in doing better each and every night.
The Need for the Miracle of Pach Hashemen on Chanukah
Coby Cohen
Grade 11 student, Yeshivat Or Chaim
After the Jews defeated the Greeks, they went searching for pure oil around the Beit Hamikdash to use for the menorah. They spent time searching for the oil, however, there was no need for this, as we have the halacha of טומאה הותרה בציבור. This means that the Kohanim who do the Avodah and the ritual objects which are used in the Avodah, must be Tahor. If, however, the majority of the Kohanim are Tamei, or if the Korban itself became Tamei, or if no oil/flour/wine is available which is Tahor, then we invoke the rule of טומאה הותרה בציבור, which allows us to disregard Tumah issues and in this case, use the impure olive oil. If this is so, what was the need for the miracle of Pach Hashemen? Why did they need to find pure oil to light the menorah? Could they have not just used impure oil like the halacha states?
The menorah in the Beit Hamikdash represents the Torah, which brings light and provides clarity to the world. When it comes to the foundation of the Torah, we want it to be as pure as possible. We do not take any shortcuts with Torah. The Jews needed to use pure oil for the menorah in the Beit Hamikdash to teach us that the Torah must be kept to a certain level of purity. This means that we always have to keep Shabbat and always have to eat Kosher and should always observe the mitzvot in their purest form to the best of our ability.
A similar idea is said in the name of the Kotzker Rebbe, that while Tumah does not affect the Tzibur under normalcircumstances, by Chanukah, since this was a new beginning – a rededication of the Bais HaMikdash, it needed to be perfectly pure without any shred of Tumah, even though it would be permissible by Jewish law. The fact that the Jews took the time to search for pure oil, Hashem deemed it appropriate to perform a miracle.
