Zot Chanukah This is Chanukahat least that is how this, the last day of the Festival Light is referred

to. In the Bible, the demonstrative pronoun (thats fancy grammar talk for the word: this), implies some sort of visible and palpable presence. That is easy to understand when we look at the Lights burning tonight, for now the chanukiah is full in all of its glory, blazing away with all eight Lights. I have always been a little uneasy about tomorrow however, when the Lights have burnt out by morning. That is until I had a very simple insight this year. Here we go: So it always seemed a little bit of a let-down that after building so much throughout the week, adding another Light each day, when we finally come to the eighth day of Chanukahtheres not much going on, and as the sun sets on the last day, Chanukah simply slips away without any ritual marking. I think the beginning of a good way to relate to this can come from the Talmud itself, as it writes about the story of the establishment of the holiday. Tractate Shabbat (21b) describes the events,
Our Sages taught: On the 25 of Kislev, [begin] the eight days of Chanukah wherein it is forbidden to fast and to eulogize, for when the Greeks entered the Temple, they contaminated all of the oil, and when the Hasmoneans [Maccabees] overpowered and conquered them, they sought out and only found one cruse of oil still sealed with the sign of the High Priest, and it was only enough for one day. It was a miracle that they lit it and it burned for eight days. The following year they established and made the holiday with songs of praise and thanksgiving.
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When we look to the model of establishing a holiday in the Jewish calendar, this is an interesting event. Only after a year has passed, when the same date arrivesbut this time without a miracleis the holiday established. When we look at the establishment of Purim, there was such a joyous outpouring from the victory that they began to celebrate the very year that the story occurred, and as a result, the holiday was established. Here with Chanukah, we have the awareness, recollection, and subsequent establishment of the holiday in the silence of the aftermath of the miracle. This is amazing! No palpable miracle, only a memory, a mere impression from a year ago, and from that the holiday is established! Now, this can help us understand why the day is also called zot Chanukah, and not only the night. The night is the obvious miracle, but the day is begging us to answer the question: How deep is the impression that the miracle had on us? Do we still feel it a day later? A whole year later? This simple name is issuing a deep challenge: can we really hold on to the Light? Can we really bring it into the year in a palpable way as if all eight Lights are burning in their full glory before our own eyes?? The answer should be a resounding YES! And if not, weve each got some work to do to make sure that we can carry that Light with us into the year and into our livesespecially when it looks like its not there anymore! I bless you, and I hope youll bless me back that we can draw deeply from these Lights tonight on the Eighth night, so that there is such a deep soul impression, that we can be living a life of the Chanukah miracle all year long. We should learn to hold on to those flashes of inspiration as if they are still unfolding. We should re-dedicate ourselves to those moments of illumination. Whether it is remembering how we first fell in love with our soul-mate, or when we first met our holy children, or

when we first started out on a particular career path, Chanukah is helping us to re-claim that inspiration, even long after the initial blast of light has dissipated! Happy Chanuka my dear friends. With you in Light.