Join Hanukkah celebration Dec. 20 at The Centre of Elgin
Chabad Jewish Center of Elgin will light a 9-foot public Hanukkah menorah at The Centre of Elgin, on Tuesday, Dec. 20, the third night of the eight-day Festival of Lights, at 5:30pm. The community will be joined by Mayor Kaptain, who will share greetings.
Celebrants will witness a "Gelt Drop."
Local firefighters of the Elgin fire station will be climbing up on their ladders and showering down chocolate Gelt. Following the outdoor menorah lighting ceremony, participants will go indoors for a Hanukkah celebration including a buffet dinner, traditional latkes, donuts and arts and crafts.
The public Hanukkah celebration is being heralded as a response to the worrisome rise in antisemitic rhetoric online and elsewhere.
"Our response to hatred of any kind must never be to cower or hide our faith," said Rabbi Mendel Shemtov, who directs Chabad Jewish Center of Elgin with his wife Shterna. "The story of Hanukkah is the tremendous power of light to overcome darkness. We can have no better response to negativity we encounter than to gather together in even greater numbers and celebrate the light of the menorah in public."
This year's public menorah lighting carries added significance as Jewish communities worldwide celebrate the Year of Hakhel or "Gathering," a once-in-seven-years Jewish tradition. The marking of this special occasion is part of the reason Chabad Jewish Center of Elgin is having a performance by Rapper and Spoken Word Artist Ari Lesser and is expecting a record crowd at the menorah-lighting this year.
"Unity is what makes a strong community," said Rabbi Shemtov. "Hakhel is a time for us to tune in to this, because together we can accomplish great things. There is no greater display of the literal light it is in our power to bring into the world than to gather together and light the menorah. This is what the world needs.
RSVP at www.elginchabad.com/chanukah22
ABOUT HANUKKAH
Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights, begins this year on the evening of Sunday, Dec. 18 and concludes the evening of Monday, Dec. 26. It recalls the victory of a militarily weak Jewish people who defeated the Syrian-Greeks who had overrun ancient Israel and sought to impose restrictions on the Jewish way of life and prohibit religious freedom. They also desecrated and defiled the Temple and the oils prepared for the lighting of the menorah, which was part of the daily service. Upon recapturing the Temple only one jar of undefiled oil was found, enough to burn only one day, but it lasted miraculously for eight. In commemoration, Jews celebrate Hanukkah for eight days by lighting an eight-branched candelabrum known as a menorah. Today, people of all faiths consider the holiday a symbol and message of the triumph of freedom over oppression, of spirit over matter, of light over darkness. Additional information about the Hanukkah holiday is available at www.ElginChabad.com/Hanukkah.
ABOUT HAKHEL - THE JEWISH YEAR OF GATHERING
"Hakhel" is the Hebrew word for gathering or assembling, representing the biblical command for all Jews to gather in the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, once every seven years on the holiday of Sukkot. The king read selections from the Torah to inspire the nation to greater commitment to Jewish life and learning for the next seven years. The literal observance of Hakhel was only possible during the Holy Temple era.
The modern observance of Hakhel as a year of Jewish unity and inspiration, when people gather to study Torah and its observances, was established by the Rebbe - Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory, the most influential rabbi in modern history. Born in Ukraine 120 years ago, the Rebbe built back Jewish life there after the fall of Communism and led Judaism's global post-Holocaust renaissance.
ABOUT CHABAD JEWISH CENTER OF ELGIN
Chabad Jewish Center of Elgin offers Jewish education, outreach and social service programming for families and individuals of all ages, backgrounds and affiliations. For more information visit elginchabad.com.