My wife’s grandfather, Rav Moshe Aaron Poleyeff, zt”l, a rosh yeshiva of Rabbeinu Yitzchak Elchanan Theological Seminary for 46 years, passed away in 1966. Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik spoke at the end of his shloshim, which took place shortly before Chanukah. At the hazkarah, he shared the following insights about the laws of Chanukah as found in the Rambam’s Mishneh Torah.
The Rambam strangely lists the laws of Purim before those of Chanukah. One might think that he obviously did this because, historically, that is the correct chronological order. However, throughout the rest of Mishneh Torah, the holidays are arranged according to the sequence in the calendar year, in which Chanukah comes before Purim. So why does the Rambam place Chanukah after Purim?
The Rav explains that Purim gets precedence because it is what allows us to have Chanukah to celebrate.
Mordechai and Esther had pleaded with the leading chachamim of their generation to establish Purim as an official holiday. Never before in all of Jewish history had such a thing been done, creating a new holiday outside of those commanded by Hashem.
The rationale of the request to create Purim was through the reasoning of a kal v’chomer. Pesach is celebrated each year, commemorating our freedom from the enslavement of Pharaoh. Isn’t it logical then that we should certainly celebrate our being saved from the evil plans of Haman and Achashverosh who tried to kill and completely annihilate us all?
Many opposed this request, as indicated in the final verse of Megillat Esther:“v’ratzoi l’rov echav,” Mordechai found favor with most (but not all) of his fellow Jews. Nevertheless, the majority ultimately accepted the proposal and Purim was instituted.
The Mishneh Torah places Chanukah after Purim because without the standard set by Purim to have a new non-biblical holiday instituted by our rabbinic leaders, there would be no license to create Chanukah.
The Rav proposed another difficulty about these halachot in the Mishneh Torah. Why does the Rambam choose to include details about the story of Chanukah? He includes information about the Jews’ victory against the Greeks, the miracle of the oil, etc.
He does not tell us why we celebrate any other holiday. *The Mishneh Torah is not a sefer composed to teach the reasons behind our mitzvot. It was exclusively compiled to be a halachic handbook that tells a Jew what to do. He believed that if a Jew only owns a Tanach and the Mishneh Torah, he has everything he needs to live a good and virtuous Jewish life.
So why does Rambam specifically make an exception here? Why does he uncharacteristically teach us details of the story behind Chanukah?
The Rambam felt it necessary to give the context of Chanukah because, unlike all of the other holidays, it is not included anywhere else in all of kitvei kodesh, the holy writings of Tanach. Purim was canonized with its Megillat Esther but Chanukah does not have any such sefer to explain the reason behind why we observe its halachot.
This Chanukah, may we all come to find greater appreciation in the joy and meaning behind this wonderful holiday.
By Rabbi Zechariah Senter
Rabbi Zecharia Senter is the founder and president of KOF-K Kosher Supervision, one of the largest kosher certification agencies serving the Jewish community worldwide. He was a talmid of Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik, z”l, and received semicha from Yeshiva University’s RIETS.
