{"id":33879,"date":"2019-12-13T03:23:30","date_gmt":"2019-12-13T11:23:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=33879"},"modified":"2020-07-02T12:57:40","modified_gmt":"2020-07-02T19:57:40","slug":"spinning-joy-for-chanukah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2019\/12\/13\/spinning-joy-for-chanukah\/","title":{"rendered":"Spinning joy for Chanukah"},"content":{"rendered":"

The lights of chanukiyot could be seen in the neighbourhood windows. (photo by Neil Harris\/uberdox.aishdas.org<\/a>)<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

There once was a dreidel named Dreidelhead. Dreidelhead had three brothers and lived with his parents in Flushing, N.Y. His first name was Noon but everyone just called him Dreidelhead because his head and body were shaped like a big dreidel. His three brothers were named Gimel, Hay and Shin.<\/p>\n

Dreidelhead\u2019s parents taught all of the children how to sing, dance and, of course, spin. So, during the holiday of Chanukah, all four children would sing, dance and, of course, spin at Chanukah parties and celebrations in their neighbourhood. Noon, Gimel, Hay and Shin would link their arms together and dance around the chanukiyah, singing Chanukah songs. It was quite a sight to see, the four dreidel brothers dancing together and spinning around the table. Everyone, especially children, loved to watch them.<\/p>\n

Dreidelhead, like his brothers Gimel, Hay and Shin, was named after a Hebrew letter. Each brother had their letter stitched onto the front of their shirt, so that, when people saw them standing together, people would be reminded of the great miracle that occurred.<\/p>\n

Dreidelhead\u2019s letter, Noon, represented the word nes<\/em>, miracle. Gimel\u2019s letter represented gadol<\/em>, which means great. Hay\u2019s letter represented hayah<\/em>, which means happened, and, finally, Shin\u2019s letter, which is one of the last letters of the Hebrew alphabet, represented sham<\/em>, the Hebrew word for there. So, when Noon, Gimel, Hay and Shin stood together, they reminded people that Nes gadol hayah sham<\/em>, a great miracle happened there, in Israel, many years ago.<\/p>\n

On the first night of Chanukah, after lighting the candles and singing songs, and before they were about to eat the scrumptious latkes that their mother and bubbie had made, Dreidelhead\u2019s zaide would always tell the boys the story of the miracles that took place during the Festival of Lights. As their mom put down a plate of golden brown potato pancakes on the table and some sticky jelly doughnuts, their zaide recounted the tale of a band of Jewish rebels named the Maccabees, who were led by Mattityahu, a Jewish priest, and his five sons.<\/p>\n

\u201cA long time ago,\u201d Zaide began, \u201cthere was an evil king of Syria named Antiochus, who forbade the study of Torah and wanted Jews to bow down to idols and eat pork. He also put idols right in the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d rather eat latkes and jelly doughnuts than pork,\u201d Dreidelhead announced as he glanced hungrily at the plate of steaming latkes and sufganiyot.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, me too,\u201d chimed in Hay.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, you\u2019ll be eating some soon, just let your zaide finish his story,\u201d Dreidelhead\u2019s mom interjected.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut, we already know the story of Chanukah,\u201d Dreidelhead whined. \u201cWe learn it in Hebrew school every year.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI know you do,\u201d Zaide patiently replied. \u201cSo, nu, if you know the story, tell us what happened next.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, um, the Maccabees, who were led by Judah the Maccabee (the Hammer) overthrew Antiochus and came to the Holy Temple to light the menorah and to cleanse it of all of the idols that were placed in it. When they came to light the menorah, there was only enough oil to last one night, but a miracle occurred and the oil lasted for eight days and eight nights,\u201d Dreidelhead replied all in one breath.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd so what do we do to commemorate the miraculous victory and the miracle of the oil?\u201d Zaide asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell,\u201d replied Dreidelhead, \u201cuh, well, we light the candles for eight nights and put the chanukiyah in the window, we tell the story of Chanukah and eat potato latkes fried in oil. And we can also eat jelly doughnuts fried in oil. That\u2019s what they do in Israel. Oh, yeah, and dreidels like us spin on Chanukah!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDon\u2019t forget the part about the Chanukah gelt,\u201d Gimel said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOh, yeah,\u201d said Dreidelhead. \u201cWe also get money or Chanukah gelt.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s true,\u201d Zaide replied. \u201cBut, try to remember, boys, that the most important part of Chanukah is not getting money or presents, but lighting the candles, remembering the story and the miracles, and spinning for children during Chanukah. In fact, before your bubbie and I came to America, we would spin for all of the children in our little village in Russia on Chanukah.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYour zaide\u2019s right boys,\u201d Bubbie piped in. \u201cAnd, back in the Maccabees\u2019 time, according to an old legend, we dreidels were used to warn students studying Torah that Antiochus\u2019s troops were coming.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo our ancestors helped save people\u2019s lives \u2013 they were heroes!\u201d exclaimed Hay.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s right,\u201d Dreidelhead\u2019s father acknowledged. \u201cSo, you boys should be proud to be dreidels. Anyway, after you thank your bubbie and zaide for their wonderful Chanukah stories, I want you to wash your hands and then you can eat. You\u2019ll need lots of energy if you\u2019re going to dance for the boys and girls in the neighbourhood tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Later that evening, the dreidel brothers roamed the neighbourhood searching for Jewish families who were celebrating Chanukah. They were easy to find. The dreidels just looked for houses that had a chanukiyah displayed on the windowsill. They knocked at people\u2019s doors and announced in unison, \u201cHappy Chanukah! It\u2019s the dreidels!\u201d If there were any children in the household, they would jump up and down and shout at the top of their lungs, \u201cThe dreidels are here! The dreidels are here!\u201d The children would plead with their parents to invite the dreidels into their home. Once inside, the dreidels would spin and sing for the children, just as their parents and grandparents did before them.<\/p>\n

And so, during the eight nights of Chanukah, while the candles were burning, Dreidelhead and his brothers would dance and spin, bringing joy wherever they went.<\/p>\n

David J. Litvak<\/strong> is a prairie refugee from the North End of Winnipeg who is a freelance writer, former Voice of Peace and Co-op Radio broadcaster and an \u201caccidental publicist.\u201d His articles have been published in the <\/em>Forward, <\/em>Globe and Mail and <\/em>Seattle Post-Intelligencer. His website is cascadiapublicity.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The lights of chanukiyot could be seen in the neighbourhood windows. (photo by Neil Harris\/uberdox.aishdas.org) There once was a dreidel named Dreidelhead. Dreidelhead had three brothers and lived with his parents in Flushing, N.Y. His first name was Noon but everyone just called him Dreidelhead because his head and body were shaped like a big […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33880,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[781],"tags":[2517,2641,6133,218],"class_list":["post-33879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-holidays","tag-chanukah","tag-dreidel","tag-fiction","tag-judaism"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}