The God Squad: Sticky Wing Heather: A Hanukkah midrash
God thought hard about what Heather had to say. Then God said the word halacha in a voice so raw, "It means living by the law. Halacha is a law of life, for the man and for his wife, and for his kids who will come later, and do good things like inventing the elevator." "The elevator?" said Heather, who was quite confused, but God just smiled and acted bemused.
Shin was the final letter, and Heather said, "This could not be better! Look your Holy Oneness, while we were betting, we delayed your Creation till the sun was setting. Whatever shin means is absolutely fine, because, my God, you are outta time."
The angels cheered and said tee-hee and watched as the sun sunk into the sea. It sunk and sunk and sunk and sunk, but for some strange reason it was never dunked. It just sat there about to set, but never seemed quite ready yet. "My God, the angels said, "Oh, my God, the sun will not set! Oh my God, we lost our bet!"
Then they saw that walking at 'em was the first man who said, "Hi, guys. My name is Adam."
So down here on earth we think of Hanukkah as the holiday of lights, celebrating the Maccabees' heroic fights,
But up in the far reaches of the World To Come, Hanukkah is much more glum.
Up there it is called "The Holiday of Sticky Wing Heather's Terrible Loss to the Very Wise and Crafty Boss."
So Happy Hanukkah if you're down here loading latkes onto your table, or...
Happy Sticky Wing Heather if you are figuring out how to fix the next game of dreidels.
Happy Hanukkah!
(Send ALL QUESTIONS AND COMMENTS to The God Squad via email at godsquadquestion@aol.com. Rabbi Gellman is the author of several books, including “Religion for Dummies,” co-written with Fr. Tom Hartman.)
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