Miketz/Shabbat Chanukah
Genesis 41:1-44:17
Numbers 7:54-8:4
I Kings 7:40-50
Awakening calls to us in a thousand ways, a spiritual teacher once said. Often it requires painful realizations about ourselves and a journey we do not want to make into a place that is so narrow we feel we will be crushed. It involves threat and fear, but if we can persevere, we come away with new understanding and new vision.
This is the archetypal story of transformation, universally experienced and recorded in spiritual literature ranging from Plato’s Cave to Native American vision quests to the narrative of the Torah. The journey is one of rebirth and rededication, in which you leave your old life, your old ways, behind and follow a vision that appears with crystalline clarity.
Abraham and Sarah took this journey and became the parents of the Ivrim, the Hebrews, the ones who crossed over. Rebecca made the same journey from the Land Beyond the River to a new home, as did Jacob, Rachel and Leah. Isaac, who remained in the Land of Israel, experienced his new vision as he lay bound on the altar, suspended between life and death. For Isaac, the new vision is so powerful he ultimately goes blind from it.
Now, as the saga continues, it is Joseph who must transform. He begins his story as a callow youth. He has visions in his dreams, but he sees only himself. He is sent by his father to “see after the welfare of his brothers,” but he is blind to their jealousy and fury. Thrown into the darkness of the pit, he cannot see what will happen next, nor, once enslaved in Egypt, does he see his master’s wife’s designs on him.
This week’s parasha opens with the words “Va-yehi miketz shnatayim yamim” — “after two years’ time.” Chassidic teachers, fond of playing with words, note that the word “miketz” also has the meaning of “waking up, ” and the word “shnatayim” suggests the Hebrew word for sleep. The story is of Pharoah’s dreams — dreams that remain shrouded in mystery — yet it is Joseph, abandoned once again to the darkness of the pit, who has awakened and begins to see.
Kabbalists teach that the spiritual light of creation was seen for 36 hours before it was hidden away, to be used only by the righteously enlightened. In his narrow place (Mitzrayim, the Hebrew word for Egypt, also means “the narrow place”), Joseph accesses this hidden light and sees not just the years of plenty and of famine, but the solution as well. That is why Joseph offers Pharoah unsolicited advice: The clarity of light allows him to know not just the suffering of others, but a solution to that suffering.
Parshat Miketz is almost always read on the Shabbat of Chanukah, and this year it falls on the eighth day. If we are able to see beyond the children’s story, Chanukah becomes a celebration of battling through the darkness, purifying ourselves and our surroundings, and rededicating our holy space, the Temple in which dwells the true essence of the divine. This act of struggle and purification is sealed with the discovery of light, a light that never goes out. The light of clear vision and knowledge is symbolized by the lights of the chanukiah. Beginning with one light on the first night, we add a light each night, increasing our ability to see.
Unlike Shabbos candles, the lights of the chanukiah may not be used for mundane purposes. Their purpose is to illuminate our spirits so that we may see clearly. And, not coincidently, the total number of candles that will be lit on Chanukah, without adding in the shamashes, is 36.
The words of the Psalmist are true. There is a light hidden for us to find so that we might finally see clearly. Lighting our Chanukah lights on this eighth night with consciousness may help us to find it.
Rabbi Lavey Derby is the senior rabbi of Congregation Kol Shofar in Tiburon.