We are all used to this root having the meanings of “dedicate” and “educate.” Are these meanings related? How did this root come to have both these meanings?

The clue is found at Deut. 20:5: “The officers shall speak to the people, saying: Who is the man who has built a new house and not חנכו? Let him go and return to his house, lest he die in battle and another man יחנכנו.”

There is no evidence for dedication ceremonies of individual houses in ancient Israel. (And we are certainly not talking about “educating” the houses!) It is clear in this verse that our root means: “use for the first time.” This is how Rashi understands the verb here and elsewhere (see Rashi to Gen. 14:14). See also Radak, Sefer Ha-Shorashim. In modern times, many scholars agree that “use for the first time” is the basic meaning of the verb.

The verb is used in Tanach in various contexts: 1) the founding of the Mishkan, Numbers 7 (four times); 2) the founding of Shlomo’s Temple, I Kings 8:63 (and its parallel at 2 Chron.), 3) the rebuilding of the Second Temple, Ezra 6:16-17, 4) the completion of the wall around Jerusalem, Neh. 12:27, 5) Psalms 30:1, and 6) an image built by Nebuchadnezzar at Dan. chap. 3.

In English, “dedicate” typically has the implication of consecrate for sacred use. It is possible that the “use for the first time/initiate” meaning expanded to “dedicate/consecrate” in some of the above passages. But there is also an alternative view: the root never had such a meaning in Tanach, and always meant something like “use for the first time/initiate.” This view is advocated by Stefan Reif in Vetus Testamentum, vol. 22 (1972), pp. 495-501. (The article is humorously titled: “Dedicated to Ch-N-Kh.” Reif is a well-known scholar. From 1973-2006, he was the director of the Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit.)

Reif points out that קדש and משח are the verbs in Tanach that meant “dedicate/consecrate for a sacred use.” This suggests that חנך must have had a different meaning. He maintains that in Tanach it always meant to “initiate.” He writes that “such initiations would naturally represent ideal opportunities for celebrations and festivities but they are not to be confused with dedication or consecration ceremonies.” He argues, for example, that the meaning in Numbers is “an initiation gift for the altar.” Another similar translation word that Reif proposes is “inauguration,” which is something less than a dedication/consecration for sacred use.

Even if Reif is not correct, we can understand how a verb that started off meaning “use for the first time/initiate” expanded in Tanach to the meaning “dedicate/consecrate for sacred use.”

But what about the “educate” meaning? Where does that come from? The answer is that when you “initiate” someone into an activity, you are “training” him. From these, the verb expanded to “educate.”

Perhaps the “educate” meaning is found in Tanach. At Prov. 22:6, we have: “Chanoch la-noar al pi darko; gam ki yazkin lo yasur mi-menah.” Reif argues that our root can easily mean “initiate” here: “Start a boy on the right road…” But most others see a “train” or “educate” meaning here. This would be the only time in Tanach that the verb has an “educate” meaning.

As to the “train” meaning, at Gen. 14:14, Abraham is going off to rescue Lot and calls his 318 חניכיו to assist him. Reif first suggests “initiates” or “trainees” here, but then points out, as many scholars do, that this word may be of Egyptian origin and not relevant to our analysis.

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In Arabic, “chanaka” has the primary meaning of rubbing the gums of a newborn child with the juice of dates or oil. In this way, the parent “initiates” the newborn into eating. Since the noun חך in Tanach means “palate, roof of mouth, gums,” many scholars see a relation between the noun חך and the “initiate” verb חנך and postulate that perhaps the original meaning of the verb was “to rub the palate of a newborn child” with such items. But this custom is only attested to from Islamic times. It is hard to imagine that it existed in early Biblical or pre-Biblical times.

Nevertheless, the suggestion that חך = “palate, roof of mouth, gums” was originally חנך is reasonable. The Arabic cognate has that middle “nun.”

Another instance of a “nun” dropping from the name of a body part is the case of אף=nose, face. Here the original noun was אנף. These letters as a verb for “anger” appear many times in Tanach. See, e.g., Deut. 1:37, “hitanaf.” The nose/face is where one’s anger is revealed.

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What about the holiday of “Chanukah”? It certainly does not mean “educate.” (Although on a homiletical level, I would suggest that people need to educate themselves more about the holiday and read I and II Maccabees! If you do not own them, you can read them online.) Reif does not like the “dedication” meaning even here, post-Biblically. But I can accept that the meaning of חנך expanded to “dedicate/consecrate” even in Biblical times, and certainly by the second century B.C.E.

Is there a possible alternative translation? The fourth chapter of I Macc. tell us that Judah and his men tore down the defiled altar and built a new one and made new holy vessels. Then it continues (4:54-59, translation by J. Goldstein): “At the very time of year and on the very day on which the gentiles had profaned the altar, it was dedicated to the sound of singing and harps and lyres and cymbals. … They celebrated the dedication of the altar for eight days, joyfully bringing burnt offerings and sacrificing peace offerings and thank offerings. … The people were overjoyed as the shame inflicted by the gentiles was removed. Judas and his brothers and the entire assembly of Israel decreed that the days of the dedication of the altar should be observed at their time of year annually for eight days, beginning with the twenty-fifth of the month of Kislev, with joy and gladness.”

I Maccabees was originally written in Hebrew. But the Hebrew was lost early on. (The last person to mention the Hebrew was the church father Jerome. He lived around 400 C.E.) That English word “dedicate” is a translation of a Greek word that meant something like “renovate” or “reconsecrate.” Most likely, the Hebrew words used here were from the root חנך, as A. Cahana suggests in his Hebrew edition. Based on the above passages, are we being described a “dedication/consecration” story, or a mere “inauguration” story? On the one hand, it seems that many items were consecrated at the time. On the other hand, each time that חנך word was presumably being used, we could read it as meaning “inauguration.”

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I would like to acknowledge the article on Chanukah at balashon.com from Dec. 2006, which pointed me to many sources and ideas.

Mitchell First uses his initiative and dedicates himself to continually educating himself so he can provide his readers with new and interesting columns. He can be reached at [email protected]. Please visit his website at rootsandrituals.org.