B"H

Thursday, Tevet 2, 5784 / December 14, 2023

Happy 7th day of Chanukah.

Q.   The reason we celebrate Chanukah eight days is to commemorate the miracle of the oil in the Holy Temple, when a jar of oil which had enough oil for only one day lasted for eight days.  The obvious question is, if the jar contained enough oil to burn one day, then the miracle only occurred for seven days!  Why do we celebrate the miracle of Chanukah for eight days, when the miracle was only seven days?

A.   There are many answers to this question. One is that the first day of Chanukah we celebrate finding the one jar of oil, which was the only one not defiled.  On the other seven days, we commemorate the miracle of the burning of the oil.

The following parable explains the importance of the miracle of finding the oil, for without it the other miracle couldn’t take place.

A wealthy merchant traveled to the fair in the big city carrying eight sacks of money.  As he passed through a forest, he was held up by robbers. He prayed, "Oh G-d please perform a miracle and help me get back the money which was stolen and I promise to give 10% of it to charity." 

The robbers took seven sacks, but somehow overlooked one sack.  When the merchant came to the nearest city, he used the money from that one sack, to hire people to chase after the robbers.  They captured the robbers and returned all seven sacks of money.

When the merchant came home, he told the charity collectors his story and gave them 10% of the 7 sacks that were retrieved.

The charity collectors weren't satisfied. "You have to give charity from all eight sacks," they said to him.

"But one sack was never stolen from me!" protested the merchant. "Why should I give charity from this one too?"

"The fact that the robbers overlooked one sack," they answered, "is the greatest miracle. For this money enabled you to retrieve the other seven sacks.  If you wouldn’t have this sack of money with which you hired the people to chase after the robbers, you couldn’t have retrieved the others!   Therefore, you have to thank G-d even more for the sack that wasn't taken in the first place!"

The same is true with Chanukah.  Finding the jar of oil is as important a miracle as the burning of the oil because without it we couldn't have the miracle of Chanukah.  Thus, we celebrate the first day of Chanukah, the great miracle of finding one jar which was not defiled in the first place.

Another answer to the above question is that after the first day, they found that the oil in the Menorah was barely consumed. It burnt the entire night without consuming the full amount of oil. This miracle happened each night of Chanukah. Thus, there was a true miracle every night of the eight nights of Chanukah.

HAVE A VERY GOOD, HAPPY, HEALTHY AND SUCCESSFUL DAY & HAPPY CHANUKAH

WITH SPECIAL PRAYERS FOR OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS IN ISRAEL