Show Me the Light

Atlanta, GA — On Friday night at sundown, Jewish women around the world pause amid the hubbub of Shabbat preparations to light candles to welcome the Sabbath bride. The image of a woman kindling Shabbat candles is an age-old symbol of Judaism.

While men may light Shabbat candles, it is typically the woman’s responsibility for several reasons. Among them: The Jewish women, not the men, first agreed to accept the Torah at Mount Sinai, so women transmit the essence of our Jewish heritage into the home. One way to do that is by lighting Shabbat candles, bringing light into the home just as Israel was chosen by God to be a light among the nations.

Little girls love to emulate what Mommy does. Combine a daughter’s copycat actions with a Jewish education tradition and a midrash (Torah interpretation), and the stage is set for a 3-year-old girl to begin lighting a Shabbat candle of her own.

Formal Jewish education traditionally begins at age 3, when a child begins to understand concepts and can recite blessings. A midrash based on an analysis of the ages of Isaac and Rebecca when they married suggests that she was 3 at the time, according to Chabad Intown Rabbi Eliyahu Schusterman. “She brought light into the home through marriage,” he said.

As with the rabbi’s two older daughters, Rachel, 9, and Sara, 5, the family made a special occasion to honor Mira Schusterman, who turned 3 in January, when she began to light her own Shabbat candle.

Rabbi Schusterman and his wife, Dena, sent out some 150 invitations, along with a kit containing votive-type candles. Guests were not asked to go to the Schustermans’ home on the designated Friday night, March 9, but to light candles in their own homes at the same time Mira would light her candle.

The family obtained the kits through Friday Light (www.FridayLight.org), a grass-roots campaign started in California by Rabbi Avi Beitelman and spearheaded in metro Atlanta by East Cobb resident Janine Band.

The tie-in with Friday Light was inspired by Dena’s prayers for a friend who is hospitalized after childbirth complications and for a nephew who has cerebral palsy. According to Kabbalah (spiritual wisdom), Dena said, “there is a peacefulness at candlelighting time, even in the rush of Shabbat preparations. Prayers come from a place of peace, so it’s a very opportune time for any woman to pray.”

Months before her third birthday, Dena said, Mira asked when she could light her own candle. To practice, the toddler held her mother’s hand when she kindled Shabbat candles. Dena said she makes sure she and her daughters all light candles at the same time. She always helps the younger ones light the candles first because once she says the blessing herself, she has accepted Shabbat and cannot strike a match.

That is also why, she explained, Shabbat candles are lighted before the blessing is recited. Candles are lighted, the eyes are covered, and the blessing is said. When the eyes are opened, it’s as if the light is being seen for the first time.

As a Jewish woman, Dena said, candlelighting is a cherished ritual for her. As a mother, she said, she feels proud when she sees her daughters light the candles.

“It’s symbolic of my love for my children and the home we’re trying to create,” Dena said. “Love doesn’t dissipate as you pass it on. No matter how many flames you light from [another] flame, you can’t diminish the light. The more candles you light, the brighter the room gets.”

While there isn’t an exact count of how many guests lighted Shabbat candles March 9 in honor of Mira, Rabbi Schusterman said he and Dena heard from a number of people who said they did and thought it was a “great idea.”

Buckhead resident Kim Asher, a member of The Temple who said attending Chabad Intown occasionally gives her “my extra dose” of Judaism, said she made a conscious effort to light candles March 9. She said she liked knowing that she was making a connection with other Jewish women who were doing the same thing at the same time.

The Atlanta event had echoes April 20 in Israel when a Chabad rabbi, Danny Cohen, said tens of thousands of Jewish women were going to light Shabbat candles that evening at the request of Marlena Librescu, the widow of Liviu Librescu, the Israeli professor and Holocaust survivor who died saving his students during the Virginia Tech massacre April 16. Jewish Atlantans, including Chabad at Emory, picked up on the request.

Rabbi Schusterman said that teaching children Jewish traditions is “part of the agenda” of making a special occasion like Mira’s first candlelighting. It shows “the value of Jewish education,” the rabbi said.

He also views the occasion with the perspective of a father. “At 3, she wants to be like Mommy,” he said. “She’s always asking, ”Is today Shabbos?’ “

The Schustermans now turn their eyes to training another young woman, 7-month-old daughter Kaila, to light Shabbat candles. They also have a son, Mordechai, 10.

”I’m a lucky man surrounded by a bunch of wonderful, precious women and a darling son,“ said Rabbi Schusterman, adding that he hopes to ”continue to shep a lot of naches [derive pleasure] watching them grow.“

Like the joy of hearing his daughter ask on Friday night, ”Did you see my candle?”