Chanukah and Vulnerability

‎"When our hearts are open and our feelings are flowing as they're designed to do, we're all vulnerable to the divine." ~Candace B. Pert, Ph.D. 


I just finished setting up my family's menorahs for Chanukah.  Each first holiday without my Dad this year of avelut (mourning) was hard, but this one feels quite daunting.  Mainly because it is the last one of the year. 


Each first holiday this year brought its own intense emotions ranging from a sense of finality and confusion to a profound sense of sadness that I just felt on Thanksgiving. Now creeping up right behind is probably the most intense feeling of all, vulnerability.  I suppose it isn't a surprise that this feeling comes with this last holiday because it feels like vulnerability is an embodiment of all of the emotions that I felt during this entire year.


I also feel that it isn't an irony that with Chanukah comes vulnerability considering all the symbolism attached to Chanukah.  On www.aish.com I found this:  "It is said that the Chanukah Menorah symbolizes knowledge. In spiritual terms, light and oil symbolize the ability of Divine Wisdom [the light] to be expressed in terms of human knowledge [the oil]. The word for oil in Hebrew is shemen, which is a compression of the word shemona, the number eight, symbolizing the heavenly Sphere of Bina, or understanding. All human knowledge is an expression of the spark of Divine knowledge contained within it."

 May the light of Chanukah remind us that we are all vulnerable and may that vulnerability open us up to the Divine........