By Lindsay Melvin
Rabbi Levi Klein could barely be seen behind the herd of children high on Star of David sugar cookies, watching him eke out a slow drizzle of oil from a heavy wooden olive press.
“Can you see the juice coming out?” he asked the waist-high audience closing in for a better look.
Though impressed, even the smallest knew it would take a miracle for the tiny glass of golden oil to keep a candle burning for eight nights.
But by the end of the evening, it did get the candles on the center’s giant 9-foot menorah kindled.
In celebration of the first night of Hanukkah, hundreds of parents and children from across Memphis and the region came Sunday to the Chabad Center for Jewish Life in East Memphis.
The eight-day festival of lights was kicked off with a Hanukkah Wonderland.
Jammed into the two hour free event was everything from crafts to cookie-making to photos with Hanukkah’s hero, Judah Maccabee.
Hanukkah celebrates the victory of the Maccabees over the Syrian Greeks more than 21 centuries ago.
Under the Greek empire, Jewish worship was forbidden.
Hanukkah, Hebrew for dedication, refers to the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem after the victorious Maccabees returned to the city.
But inside the temple they only found enough oil to light the eternal flame, which sits at the altar, for one day. Miraculously, the oil lasted eight days.
The lighting of the menorah for eight nights and eating oily foods like potato pancakes is the celebration of that miracle, said Klein.
Hanukkah is the perfect time for Jews to proudly unite in public to celebrate, Klein says: “It was a fight for freedom to practice their religion.”
From barely-observant Jews to the deeply faithful in yamulkas and prayer shawls with knotted fringes at the waist, Jewish families packed the parking lot of Chabad’s newly opened location on Kirby Parkway.
As her 9-year-old daughter pressed a dreidel cookie cutter into a slab of dough, Amy Winestone looked around at the collection of families from different synagogues and temples.
“Chabad welcomes everyone, and that’s what is so nice,” said Winestone, who attends the orthodox synagogue Anshei Sphard — Beth El Emeth.
As part of the international Chabad Lubavitch movement, with more than 2,700 institutions worldwide, Klein and his wife, Rivky, moved to Memphis to start a Chabad center 14 years ago.
The Kleins, who launched Chabad in the converted garage of their home, have been organizing the free celebration for the entire Jewish community ever since.
Each Hanukkah they set up gigantic metal menorahs across the Memphis area, from the terminals at Memphis International Airport to the Regalia Shopping Center at Ridgeway and Poplar.
“That’s the focus of Chabad, to bring people together,” said Klein. “That’s also the focus of Hanukkah.”
Memphis Commercial Appeal
