Op-Ed: Chanukah at a Hockey Rink
The Coyotes vs Panthers hockey game last Tuesday was no ordinary game. Chabad of Florida performed a menorah-lighting ceremony on the ice during the first period intermission. The event looked nothing short of a huge Hanukka party. But the event itself was really quite ironic. How odd, I thought, to celebrate Hanukka in a sports arena, given that the concept of sports is emblematic of Greek culture.
Besides placing a great emphasis on rational thought with thinkers like Aristotle and Plato, the Greek and Hellenist culture glorified masculine physical strength and sports. The story of Hanukka is about opposing the Greek idea that we are just soulless material beings whose bodies are ends in themselves, devoid of the divine spark and human dignity which transcends our physical appearance.
The Book of Maccabees recounts how the Greek-culture Seleucid Empire provoked a revolt in part due to the Greek-style gymnasium built in Jerusalem. The gymnasium represented the glorification of the body.
On the other hand the Maccabees, too, are a symbol of physical strength, both as ancient warriors fighting for religious freedom and in the modern-day “Jewish Olympics” held in Israel every four years. Perhaps hosting a Hanukka party at a hockey rink is quite appropriate after all.
It not only symbolizes the physical prowess of the Maccabees but is also a message of sanctifying and harmonizing the mundane Greek culture for a Godly purpose. Infusing the spiritual with the physical. Focusing on physical strength and health is a very Jewish concept, so long as the human body is not seen as an end in itself but part of the eternal soul endowed to every person. Prohibitions against mutilating the body are based on the principle that we are required to maintain our health because a healthy body is a healthy soul. Our bodies are not ours to harm.
In deciding whether a public display of a menorah outside a government building violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, the US Supreme Court, in Allegheny vs. ACLU, ruled that a holiday display with a menorah was constitutionally permissible because in the context of other holiday symbols such as the Christmas tree, the menorah served as a secular symbol with universal significance. Despite the fact that the menorah also has a deep spiritual and religious significance, the court’s ruling indicates there is a secular, universal dimension to the menorah as well.
The Supreme Court is right: the message and struggle of Hanukka are universally applicable to all people at all times. Although it has deeply religious origins, there is also a secular message to Hanukka. We must strive to combine the health of the physical body with the sanctity of the soul. By lighting a menorah in a sports arena, we combine these two aspects of life.
Ultimately, the story of Hanukka reflects on the struggle of the poor, oppressed and colonized over the long span of human history seeking to achieve freedom and liberty. The very fact that a menorah lighting would be accepted in a sports arena, the place that was once a symbol of Jewish oppression, is a sign of ultimate conquest of freedom over tyranny.
Also, what better way is there to fulfill the mandate of publicizing the story of Hanukka then to broadcast it to tens of thousands of people watching hockey? The Maccabees would be proud.
The writer is an executive at an e-commerce company. He graduated law school in New York, where he served as an executive editor of the law review. He received his rabbinical training at the Mayanot Institute and Rabbinical College of America.
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hockey
you need to bring the light and light up the “EMBLEMATIC” greek thing which is sport and light it up
Jonathan
I wonder what the great one, Wayne Gretzky, from the Coyotes thought about this?
CR
Perhaps so. But the NY Islanders jerseys at a game between Florida and Arizona teams was simply in bad taste. I’m just saying…
sum guy
This is the same sick thinking of the other idiots who make menorah lighting’s at similar hockey games – and football games, etc.
Who are you emulating? The greek culture – that wanted L’HASHKICHOM TORESECHA?!
Anonymous
I think #4 missed the whole point of the article.
lyr: attn #4
If the lubavitchers there really cheer inside or get upset, depending on the game turn out, then your right. but if they are there altz “nebech there are yidden here too”, then your wrong. The Rebbe once said, “if there is a christmas party somewehere with 1 jew, its my inyan that the food there should be glatt kosher”
To #3
The pic is not from that event. It was taken from another one (@ an Islander game). If you look at the original jpost article you will see it. But yes, that would be very offensive and that would be the last thing you would do when trying to inspire..
To #3
The pic is from last year’s lighting at an Islanders’ game, thus the “Illustration photo” caption beneath it.
to 6
Which SICHA, when was it said – and how would the Rebbe ever say “cratzmoch” or any reference thereof?
What the Rebbe DID INDEED SAY is; “…oihaiv es ha’briois, U’MEKARVON l’torah”! You bring the student UP TO THE LEVEL of the teacher – but YOU NEVER DRAG THE HOLY TORAH down to the level of the student!
You don’t go into a bais z’nus (a bar, a saloon etc.) to ask yidden if they put on teffillin – you stand outside, and you ask them BEFORE (OR AFTER) they go in.