by Paul R. Spitzzeri
Today marks the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah (Chanukah), also widely known as the “Festival of Lights,” and which lasts until next Monday, the 22nd. The festival celebrates the 2nd Century BC reclamation of the Temple in Jerusalem by a small force led by Judah the Maccabee in expelling the much larger army of the Seleucid (Syrian Greek) Empire, which tried to force Greek culture, including religion, on the Jews.
In the Temple’s rededication, it was discovered that there was just a small vessel of olive oil left for the lighting of its menorah, or a candelabra with seven parts, but, when it was lit, it was found that the oil, which should only have lasted for single day, continued to provide fuel for eight, after which a new supply that was ritually pure could be procured. Because of this miracle, the festival was established.
The core aspect of Hanukkah is the nightly lighting of the menorah, these placed in doorways and windows of houses, synagogues and other buildings and prayers are offered. Because of the miracle of the eight-day supply of olive oil, another important holiday element is the eating of oil-fried foods, such as the potato latke (pancake) or sufganya (doughnut). The playing of the game of dreidel, involving the spinning of a top with Hebrew letters that are an acronym for a phrase meaning “a great miracle happened here”, is also an important part of celebration.
Los Angeles’ Jewish community began in the Mexican era, when Jacob Frankfort, a tailor from what later became the unified Germany, arrived as one of the members of the Rowland and Workman Expedition, which reached the Angel City by the Old Spanish Trail from New Mexico. Frankfort remained in the pueblo for about a decade, running a clothing shop and tailoring business in Alexander Bell’s adobe building on the corner of Los Angeles and Aliso streets and, when merchant Henry Mellus bought the structure, Frankfort loaned the money for the purchase.
By the early 1850s, Frankfort was joined by a small group of Jewish migrants, including Felix Bachman, Morris Goodman and Philip Sichel, all of whom held political office on the Common (City) Council and/or the county Board of Supervisors. During that decade, the community grew with settlers from the Hellman and Newmark families and individuals with such surnames as Kalisher, Kremer, Lazard, Phillips, Schlesinger, Tischler and Wartenberg. By mid-decade, the newly established Hebrew Benevolent Society established a Jewish cemetery near the Catholic Calvary Cemetery at the base of the Elysian Hills.
The Orthodox Congregation B’nai B’rith was established in 1862 with Joseph Newmark as its lay leader, until that year, Abraham Wolf Edelman became the rabbi and held that position for almost a quarter-century. In 1873, the congregation’s synagogue, designed by Ezra F. Kysor (attributed with the remodeling of the Workman House a few years earlier) was built on Fort Street (renamed Broadway in 1890) between 2nd and 3rd streets.
With the onset of greater Los Angeles’ first boom, during the late 1860s and first half of the 1870s, the region’s demographics shifted dramatically to an Anglo majority and most new migrants were Protestants from other parts of the United States. This trend accelerated with the much bigger boom of the 1880s, which mostly occurred during the administration, from 1886 to 1888, of William H. Workman as mayor of the Angel City.
It was around this time that the first located references to Hanukkah were located in the Los Angeles press, nothing being found prior to 1885. At the end of November 1885, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad completed a direct transcontinental link to the region, this being an essential contributor to the boom. In its 2 December edition, the Los Angeles Herald informed readers about “Chanucah”, stating
This festival of light and liberty in memory of the Maccabees will be celebrated this evening, at 7:30 P.M., in the Synagogue. Twelve boys and girls of the Conformation [Confirmation] Class will recite the “History of Chanucah” and light eight candles with appropriate prayers. The children-choir will sing and Rev. Dr. Schreiber will deliver the sermon. All welcome.
Emanuel Schreiber (1852-1932) was born in what is now the Czech Republic, pursued his rabbinical studies there and in Germany, earned his doctorate in Nuremberg and was a rabbi in Germany until he came to the United States in 1881. He was a rabbi in Mobile, Alabama and Denver before migrating to Los Angeles, where he replaced Edelman and served, from 1885 to 1889, as the first Reform rabbi in the Angel City synagogue. It may be that, with his taking over the rabbinate at B’nai B’rith, the celebration of Hanukkah there was undertaken.
There were some issues as there remained many Orthodox Jews but it has been commented that “Schreiber brought needed life” to the Congregation B’nai B’rith as “the membership doubled, the Sunday school flourished, and the synagogue did well while good economic times” lasted during the Boom. Moreover, it was remarked that Schreiber “was very popular with the Christian clergy” as he was considered by them “their expert on Old Testament questions.” A Ladies’ Aid Society was established by him as part of the Congregation, while he was also involved in the creation of The Associated Charities of Los Angeles.
He went on to work in Little Rock, Arkansas; Spokane, Washington; Toledo and Youngstown, Ohio; and Chicago and wrote extensively, serving as editor of a Jewish publication in Germany and one in the Windy City during the 1890s and authored several works before coming to America and more in the U.S., including while in Denver, Spokane, Chicago and Pittsburgh. Late in life and after retiring, he returned to Los Angeles and assisted at the Reform Temple Emanuel.
The next day’s issue of the Los Angeles Times, spelling the holiday as “Chanuccah,” reported that “the Synagogue on Fort Street was so crowded last night that many people found standing room only.” It added that “the occasion was the celebration of the ‘feast of light’ in memory of the Maccabees.”
The article continued that “after the singing of the Chanuccah hymn by the children of the Sabbath School, the history of the Maccabees was brilliantly given” by Schreiber’s class, including six boys and seven girls. Student surnames included those of well-known families as Behrendt, Fleishman, Germain, Kalisher, Lowenthal and Praeger. Lastly, it was remarked that, “after the beautiful ceremony of lighting the candles” Schreiber “delivered an enthusiastic and highly instructive sermon” to end the ceremony.
The 1886 Hanukkah celebration was reported on rather perfunctorily in the press. The Herald of the 24th employed the spelling of the holiday of “Chanackahl,” while noting that “this festival, or feast of dedication” was to be held at the Synagogue and include “good music, the recital of the history of the Maccabees” by a dozen Sabbath School students and Rabbi Schreiber’s sermon. The Los Angeles Tribune of the same date repeated this information almost verbatim, while its mention the next day did not really vary at all, either.
For 1887, the Tribune of the 17th briefly remarked that the “Chanuccieh Feast of Dedication” or “this festival in commemoration of the Maccabees was celebrated” the prior night at the Synagogue. A baker’s dozen number of Sabbath School students, with surnames like Cohen, Fleishman, Hellman, Levy, Nordlinger and Weil, did their recitation of the history involved with the reclaiming of the Temple at Jerusalem, while Schreiber was to sermonize of “The Password of Jerusalem.” The Times of the previous day offered the same information under the title of “Chanuccah.”
The following day’s edition of the paper did somewhat extensively summarize the rabbi’s sermon, calling it “an eloquent lecture to a large and attentive audience” and that his remarks continually held the interest of the congregation. His focus was on how “the history of the patriarch Jacob is emblematic of the history of Israel” in that the roaming through the earth amid tribulation was characteristic of the Jewish experience and Schreiber asked what preserved Judaism and “gave to the Maccabees, small though they were in number, such courage, strength and invincible power?” His reply was,
It was the password of our religion, so fittingly expressed in the words of the prophet. This watchword has kept Israel and saved our religion from shipwreck and will sustain us in the final fulfillment of our mission of propagators of pure, undefiled, cosmopolitan humanity . . . Numerically, Israel has been and continues to be in the minority . . . And so let our generation take courage and inspiration from those heroes of old, in an age like ours, when it cannot be denied our religion is undergoing a dangerous crisis, when a foe . . . I mean indifference and materialism, are undermining the foundation of Judaism, when the old has lost its influence and the new has not gained sufficient ground.
Schreiber’s influence in Hanukkah celebrations is undoubtedly reflected in the fact that in 1888 he went on a lecture tour in Eastern states, including at temples in Chicago, Cincinnati, New York City, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh and it does not appear that any commemoration, the holiday being from 28 November to 6 December that year, was held by the congregation during his absence. In fact, when he returned, it was reported that he had several offers for a rabbinate and that he was leaning towards accepting one in Little Rock because its congregation was “thoroughly in accord with his reform principles”—he did, after all, accept that position by the time he returned and was elected rabbi by the Jews of the Arkansas capital.
In 1889, as it was reported that the Synagogue, with the new City Hall next door, was to be sold and a new temple built elsewhere (that happened in 1896 at Hope and 9th streets and this second temple stood for a little over 30 years), the Herald of 20 December briefly informed readers that “this being the anniversary of the feast of Maccabees, there will be special services this evening with a sermon.”
In its edition two days later, the paper published a “a short treatise on the Hebrew Feast of Light” under the name of Hanukkah, penned by Rabbi Edelman, who began by observing that
Tuesday night, December 16th, corresponding with the 24th day of Kislev, began the Hebrew feast of Hanukkah, or the Feast of Lights, which lasts eight days, and is commemorated in honor of the victory of the brave Maccabees over the hosts of the King of Syria.
The rabbi went on to discuss how the monarch returned from a war in Egypt and “the Jews were commanded to renounce the worship of Jehovah, the One, the invisible God, the God of their forefathers and of their children, and to adore Jupiter and all the other gods and goddesses of Greece. Edelman continued that “the Jews . . . were ready to become martyrs and to sacrifice blood and treasure for their holy creed” and “to lay down their lives, rather than to yield to his cruel decree.”
After an order that “the temple [was] to be desecrated and defiled” and its 1,800 talents of gold and items made of the precious metal taken away” as well as a crackdown on all Jewish ceremonies and services and “the books of the law were [to be] torn to pieces,” it was noted that “gloom and despair ruled in Palestine.” The Syrian king, Edelman recited, committed many atrocities and barbarities against the Jews, but “still the people would neither submit nor yield” and then the Maccabean resistance arose.
The victory over the Seleucids and the recapture of the Temple meant that the Maccabees “cleansed it from Syrian pollution and reconsecrated it to the holy mission of the God of Israel.” With this underway, Edelman concluded,
And while the song and the music filled the mighty temple Judah [Maccabee] ascended the platform and lighted the tapers in the candlestick. The people listened with the deepest devotion, and their hearty “Amen” resounded throughout the whole temple. For eight days were these festivities continued. And they were indeed of sincere joy; the people knew what they owed to their God and to the brave Maccabees. Let us then continue to burn the merry Hanukkah lights; let us remember the twenty-fifth day of Kislev, 164 B.C.E.; let us not forget to instruct our children in this glorious history, and above all, let us not forget to thank God and to say, “Thank ye, the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endureth forever.”
We will return with a second part of this post on some of the early commemorations of Hanukkah, so please come back for that.
Lastly, this post is written in the aftermath of today’s terrible tragedy involving the attack on participants of a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach in Australia, in which some fifteen persons were killed and dozens wounded. This makes Rabbi Edelman’s closing remark even more powerful and resonant.