by Sheldon Oberman
After writing The Always Prayer Shawl, I began speaking to groups about the value of family stories. I would show my grandfather's shawl and perform the story which is based on my grandfather's life.
I often followed this with a workshop on personal and family storytelling. One good story leads to another and soon everyone would be recalling and sharing wonderful tales, awakening a whole spectrum of feelings and insights.
When Boyds Mills Press asked me for another book, I wanted to write one that had the special feeling of personal and family stories. I began remembering the ones that moved me most.
One young man had shared a story of his grandfather, Samuel, who had survived the Buchenwald concentration camp. Samuel was walking out of Germany, confused and in despair when he stopped at a house to ask for water. There he saw a prayer shawl being used as a table cloth. He managed to barter for the shawl and by rescuing it, he was changed. He felt that somehow he had rescued himself and restored his identity.
Another person told of visiting a Spanish immigrant woman and discovering an old menorah, a Jewish ritual candle holder. It had been in the woman's family for centuries but she had not known what it was or that her ancestors were possibly Marranos, secret Jews who had hidden their religion since the Spanish Inquisition of 1492. As she learned more about Jewish traditions, she began to make sense of what she'd considered her grandparents' odd rituals and secretive ways. More than that, she began to make sense of her past and how it had shaped her.
Another story was about a chaplain during World War 11. He had dedicated himself to rescuing pieces of stained glass from bombed out churches. It was dangerous work, often near the front lines and during one of his missions the champlain was killed. A soldier kept up his work and the glass was eventually assembled into a commemorative window in the chaplain's home town church.
These stories were defining moments for the people who told them. At a personal level, they were like the great moments in history that shape a nation's identity. I began to think of the stories that the Jewish people recall on holidays like Passover and Hanukkah.
This all coalesced as I wrote By the Hanukkah Light. Rachel hears two tales from her grandfather; a tale of their people and a tale of their own family, both are miraculous tales of the Hannukah light.
The tale of Hanukkah recounts how the light of the Temple, the Jewish symbol of spirit and faith, was almost lost. Then it was rescued and miraculously restored. The grandfather's second story is in some ways parallel to that ancient one. He recalls being a child in Europe and his family being afraid because they were Jews; how they could not celebrate Hanukkah openly and how they fled, leaving behind their hanukkiah, the lamp of Hanukkah. He told how he returned later as an Allied soldier and fought "like the old Maccabees". Miraculously, at the end of the war, he recovered his hanukkiah in the ruins of his house, the same hannukiah that he and the grandchildren have just cleaned and lighted.
There is no such thing as a small miracle. Both stories become equally moving and meaningful to Rachel. Rachel promises her grandfather, "When I grow up and have children, I will tell them these stories, the story of our people and the story of our family as we gather by the Hanukkah light."
For me, these kinds of stories are heirlooms. Each is like a precious part of someone's life, offered as a gift. We need to treasure it and to pass the gift on to the next generation.