פרשת מקץ וענייני חנוכה

In this week’s Parsha, Yosef gets married to Potiphar’s daughter and has two sons.  The Torah tells us that he named his firstborn son “Menashe” – which according to Seforno means to forget – because Hashem caused him to “forget” all the difficulties he had been exposed to during his stay in Egypt.  Furthermore, Yosef testified about himself that he had forgotten all that he had learned in the house of his father.  The second reason seems a bit strange on two accounts.  Firstly, it was not true that Yosef had forgotten the Torah that he learned while he was in Egypt.  We have many indications that Yosef continued to study Torah diligently and in fact, when he was reunited with his father, the first thing he did was indicate that he remembered the Sugya that he was learning with Yaakov when they parted ways.  And secondly, even if he had forgotten some of his Torah, why would he name his son after that fact?  Is it appropriate to name a child after one’s downfalls?!

I once heard a very interesting explanation of this Chazal.  Although it is certainly true that Yosef Hatzadik studied Torah fervently during the years he was away from his father, he nevertheless felt that the fact that he was away must have had some kind of detrimental effect on his growth, and this slight lacking was cause enough for Yosef to have tremendous remorse.  Yosef felt that had he been in Yaakov’s house all these years, he could have been slightly more successful in his spiritual growth and he believed that this lack was a devastating failure, so much so that it was tantamount in his eyes as if he had forgotten all of the Torah that he had learned in Yaakov’s house.  And to show to all future generations how seriously one must take even a slight shortcoming in one’s growth, he named his son Menashe. 

Yaakov Avinu himself clearly agreed with Yosef’s outlook.  When Yaakov meets up with Yosef in next week’s Parsha, the first thing he verifies is whether or not Yosef had been consistent in his spiritual pursuits while he had been away.  This is shocking when one considers how much Yaakov loved Yosef, and how much he had missed him over the years, nevertheless, it is strongly implied in the verse that had Yosef been lax in his Torah study Yaakov would not have been happy to see him at all.  From here we see how imperative it is that one places his spiritual quests above all else and how important even a small fluctuation can be.

This message is clearly visible in the story of Chanukah as well.  There is a famous T”Z (Siman 670) who asks, why is it that on Purim we celebrate with a big feast, whereas on Chanukah, the only celebration is the praising of God and there is no gastronomical merriment.  He explains that on Purim, the primary sin which warranted the troubles that befell the Jews was done with the body, i.e. they partook of the feast of Achashverosh, and so the repentance and ultimate festivities are meant to be done with the body.  Whereas on Chanukah, the sin was done in the Jews’ service in the Beis Hamikdash, so the celebration is only spiritual.  This T”Z seems strange.  We never heard that the Jews had any problems with their service prior to the Chanukah story.  Shouldn’t such an important detail have been recorded somewhere?  How did the T”Z know this to be the case?  Perforce, we find that the Jews’ lack which the T”Z speaks of, was not a grandiose lacking in which they grossly stopped performing the service in the temple, but rather they must have had some kind of refined failure to perform their service in the Temple with full alacrity and excitement, and this was enough to warrant the complete cessation of all service in the Holy Temple.  This can also be seen if one observes when the service was reinstated.  We find shortly afterward that the Kohanim began to search for any oil that had remained uncontaminated.  But this extensive search was truly unnecessary because we know that the impure oils were valid to use for the lighting of the Menorah!  Yet the Jew went above and beyond what was called for and attempted to find some pure oil so that they could perform the service in a slightly more appropriate way.  This desire to serve God with perfection was what generated the restarting of the service in the Holy Temple so it stands to reason that God’s stopping the temple service was also on account of a lack of perfection in this arena of alacrity.  From here we see clearly how the T”Z was able to generate his principle that the Jews’ sin on Chanukah was a spiritual one, and how careful we must be in our service of God not only on the “big things”, but even on the subtle little points of our service to ensure that they are up to par in every way.

From all that we have seen, it is clear that one of the main points of Chanukah is to strengthen every aspect of our Torah observance continually.  Perhaps this is one of the reasons that Beis Hillel says that one must light an additional candle on each night of Chanukah – in order to show that we are constantly growing and striving in our spiritual service, and never God forbid falling backward.  It is well known that often when a couple approaches R’ Chaim Kanievsky with a heartbreaking story that they can’t have any children, he listens to their plight sympathetically, and then gently suggest that perhaps they take upon themselves some stringency in their service of God.  Clearly R’ Chaim believes that pushing forward in one area, even only slightly, can effect all of ones service of God, even in totally unrelated areas.

May Hashem bless us to continually strive toward him in our service and to truly understand the message of Chanukah!