חנוכה: ימים נוראים בקבלה וחסידות Hanukkah: High Holy day in Hasidic and Kabbalistic Teachings

What is Hanukkah? The Sages taught On the twenty-fifth of Kislev, the days of Hanukkah are eight. One may not eulogize on them and one may not fast on them. When the Greeks entered the Sanctuary they defiled all the oils that were in the Sanctuary. And when the Hasmonean monarchy overcame and emerged victorious over them, they searched and found only one cruse of oil that was placed with the seal of the High Priest. And there was here to light only one day. A miracle occurred and they lit from it eight days. The next year they instituted those days and made them a Yom Tov with recitation of hallel and special thanksgiving in prayer and blessings.

As it is written in the Writings of the AR"I of Z"L, that the main end of the G'mar Tov, the final sealing (of how ones year will go), is on Hanukkah.

For the sake of the unification of the Holy One, Blessed be, and Their Shechinah (Divine Presence), with fear and love and love and fear, to unify the Name of Yud Hei with Vav Hei with a complete unity, in the name of all God Wrestlers (Yisroel). I am setting my intentions with this lighting of the Hanukkah candles to fulfil the commandments of my creator, as Our Rabbis of Blessed Memory have instructed us, to establish its roots in a High Place.

Reign over the entire world with Your glory, and be uplifted over all the earth with Your honor, and appear in the splendor of Your majestic might over all who dwell in the inhabited world of Your earth; so everything that has been made will know that You have made it, and it will be understood by everything that was formed that You formed it, And they will say, everyone who has breath in his nostrils (the Hebrew word for nostrils has the same numerical value as Hanukkah), “Adonoy, God of Yisrael is King and His Kingship rules over all.” May it be so forever and ever.

But for me, the inexperienced and insignificant, it appears to me according to its simple meaning: that behold, it's necessary to understand why it was made a Yom Tov and why Hallel was established and praise about the miracle of the eight days of Chanukah - and Purim was not made a Yom Tov, and the wars of Sisera, and the day of the wars of Sancheriv, which was a great miracle, that Blessed God wanted to make Chizkiyahu the Mashiach, etc, and with the excess of miracles which are every day. Rather, the miracle that our ancestors and the original prophets and men of the Great Assembly saw, that they also exerted force in our good deeds, that these kindnesses which are revealed every year and in every generation and illuminate these miracles, according to the greatness of their deeds which the original ones did...

And so, when they found - with the seal of the High Priest - one small jar of olive oil, and it only had enough oil to light the Menorah for one day, and a miracle happened and they were able to light with it for eight days. And so we find that in the beginning when they found the jar and it only had enough for one day, but they needed for eight day, and they didn't know that Hashem will cause a miracle for them. ...

Rem"a: ...We are accustomed to recite songs of praise at the festive meals that we multiply [on Chanuka], and then they become mitzva meals. There are those who say one should eat cheese on Chanuka because the miracle was performed with the milk that Yehudit fed to the enemy.

It is the practice for the poor to circulate to [people's] doors (to ask for charity) on Chanukkah. And in the book, Chanukkat HaBayit, [its author] wrote a reason for this. Women: Specifically women, since the miracle happened through them (Mateh Moshe).

And that's what it is written in Magen Avraham that it is customary for young children to go around on Hanukkah and collect money, and the custom of the Jewish people is Torah!

(13) I found that Wisdom is superior to folly As light is superior to darkness;

And you give life to them all (Nehemiah 9:6), you contract, as if it were possible, down to the lowest levels; and a portion of Divinity from above is placed within the darkness of materiality. For the whole essence of the intention is so that the lowest levels can rise above and have the advantage of light over darkness (Ecclesiastes 2:13). That is what is written the advantage of light, that enjoyment advances when it is lifted from within the darkness, from within the brokenness.

The mitzva of kindling the Hanukkah lights is from sunset until traffic in the marketplace ceases.

The Sages taught: When Adam the First saw the day was progressively diminishing, Adam said: Woe is me; perhaps because I sinned the world is becoming dark around me and will ultimately return to the primordial state of chaos and disorder. And this is the death that was sentenced upon me from Heaven, He arose and spent eight days in fasting and in prayer.

Once he saw that the season of Tevet, i.e., the winter solstice, had arrived, and saw that the day was progressively lengthening after the solstice, he said: Clearly, the days become shorter and then longer, and this is the order of the world. He went and observed a festival for eight days. Upon the next year, he observed both these eight days on which he had fasted on the previous year, and these eight days of his celebration, as days of festivities. He, Adam, established these festivals for the sake of Heaven, but they, the gentiles of later generations, established them for the sake of idol worship.