Abrahams family light up their house for Hanukkah
The past 12 months have often been punctuated by fear for the Australian Jewish community. But the Abrahams family won’t be hiding on Hanukkah. Their Sydney home, and their faith in God, will be a light in the darkness.
The Abrahams family will not be hiding on Hanukkah. Their Sydney home, and their faith in God, will be a light in the darkness.
Like previous years, there will be a giant inflatable dreidel in the second-storey window, an LED menorah on the porch, and a banner draped from the balcony that reads “Wishing you a Happy Chanukah”, using a traditional spelling of the holiday.
Rabbi Aycee Abrahams and his wife, Rebbetzin Sorella know this Hanukkah – the first time in 19 years it has started on Christmas Day – is not like every other year. The past 12 months have often been punctuated by fear for the Australian Jewish community.
A year in which a synagogue was firebombed, a Jewish MP’s office was attacked, campuses across the country were inundated by hate, and a community felt the government was abandoning them and the Jewish state for political purposes. But none of that will stop the family putting up their decorations – “lighting up the outside to even remind a Jew that drives past … we will not shy (away), we will not cower” as Sorella put it – and living the true meaning of Hanukkah.
Hanukkah is one of the only Jewish holidays that is meant to be celebrated in public.
“Hanukkah is one of the unique (holidays) where the main elements of the actual festival is to spread the light, spread the awareness, which is unique to that festival, where you’re supposed to light up the outside, put your menorah by the door, by the window, so people can see it and can be inspired to have hope and to spread light themselves,” Rabbi Abrahams said.
The holiday marks the rededication of the Temple of Jerusalem in the second century BC, where a small group of faithfuls defeated a mighty army. As their youngest children play dreidel at their feet, Sorella reflects on the meaning of the festival in their household.
“Hanukkah is all about hope and light, and I think that a lot of the community is feeling extremely vulnerable,” she said. “We see this in our local community and especially in the hospitals where we visit, where patients are feeling quite concerned to identify as Jewish and to share with others they are Jewish.”
The couple run Abrahams Tent, which supports patients, families, and carers of those in hospital.
“So I think for us, it’s really important to send a strong message, firstly to our own community to say, don’t hide, don’t shy away, be proud of who you are, stand up, share the light, and generally, light always outshines the darkness,” Sorella says. And that’s been our story, the Jewish people’s story, forever. And I think that’s also to the people that are haters and the people who don’t show so much love and light. It’s like, we won’t cower. We won’t hide, even though they wish we would. Because as long as we’re here, we’ll shine light. That’s our mission, all year, but on Hanukkah, we get to do that in a very physical way by shining our menorahs.”
At Newtown synagogue, the second oldest in NSW, Rabbi Eli Feldman and his family, will live out “the message of Hanukkah”, like they do each year. “If we take a step back, there’s a theme that’s run throughout Jewish history, that the light will always prevail. Good will always overcome,” he said. “So yes, we can be concerned, and we act on our concerns, and we try and be vigilant, but we are not going to melt down over it. We’re not going to completely fall apart. because if we take a look at the bigger picture, we see that through the 2200 years since the story of Hanukkah happened, we’ve been through a lot of ups and downs, but the light will always prevail.”
His wife, Rebbetzin Elka Feldman, said a lesson that all people could take from Hanukkah was to respect each others’ faiths and cultures.
“What we celebrate is ultimately (that) the Jewish people were able to fight back,” she said.
“They were able to rededicate the temple, and were able to continue to practice … What we celebrate is the freedom to practice, and to be true to ourselves, and that is a lesson that’s important for everyone. Everyone should feel safe to be themselves, and to be who they are as part of a homogenous society. And we’re very lucky that in Australia it is a multicultural society and for the most part, we have over the many years … there’s always been space and respect for Jewish people to be able to practice.”
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Alex Ryvchin called this Hanukkah the “most significant and meaningful Hanukkah the community has marked in generations”.
“It comes amid public displays of hatred from neo-Nazis and pro-Palestinians all intent on driving Jews from this country by making us fearful of displaying our identities,” he said. “It is also the second Hanukkah that the hostages will experience in their living hell of Palestinian terrorist captivity. Hanukkah is a festival defined by public lightings of candles which will test the resolve of both the community and wider society to stay true to who we are in the face of those determined to snuff out light.
“It’s critical we stand together and defeat the forces of darkness that loathe the Jews for their beliefs, their survival and their love of this country.”
Rabbi Abrahams said he wasn’t afraid to display his faith because he believed “most people are good”. “Most people see the lights and they like them and are inspired by them – even if it’s a different faith,” he said.
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