After WWII when reports of Auschwitz and Dachau filtered through to Australia, a number of Jewish people who had survived the Holocaust (the Shoah in Hebrew) found refuge in Australia. It was a place of safety as far away from Europe that you could get. They found, like so many of our forebears, independence and a welcome, and have given so much to the Australian way of life. And we on our part promised that a persecution of the Jews – so often a mark of European history, would never, under any circumstances happen on our soil.
Well, last Sunday it did. The unthinkable happened and fifty five people at a Jewish festival were deliberately shot – fifteen slaughtered and forty injured by someone else who had found refuge here, plus his Australian born son. It was designed for maximum horror at a place where we were most relaxed, to mark a Jewish feast when they are happiest. Hanukkah is a festival of light and freedom.
The Talmud tells us that late in the second century BC, when Jews successfully revolted against the foreign oppressor Antiochus IV and had – most crucially – cleansed the Temple, they found that there was only a single container of oil certified by the High Priest to keep the Menorah alight. That would last only one night. The Menorah was the seven-branched candlestick that symbolised God’s divine wisdom, knowledge and the creation of the world in seven days.
However, miraculously the Menorah remained alight for eight days, the time necessary to sanctify new pure oil for the lamp in the inner Temple.
Today Hanukkah is the feast in memory of the miraculous lamp and the freedom that it achieved. It is a feast marked by joyous games and gifts. The Hanukkah lamp (above) is a small copy of the original and was brought near the site of the Temple in Jerusalem forty years ago; it has eight candles which are – one by one for eight days – lit nightly from that central candle to recall that miracle and the enduring spirit of Judaism.
The youngest victim last Sunday was ten, the eldest in their eighties. Some who survived that gathering asked that anyone who could, light their Hanukkah lamp to recall and represent Jewish endurance. We did. And we must continue to pray with and for our Jewish brethren with whom we share so much. And once more promise ‘never again’.
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Tina says:
Thank you Sandy for this explanation We stand in solidarity with our Jewish brethren and light our candles to disperse the darkness that has fallen on us all in Australia through this heinous act