12/16/2025
Dear Slifka family,
The rabbinic tradition is highly concerned that shabbat candles be lit with only the highest quality wicks and oils to ensure a pure, radiant, and, critically, steadily burning flame (see Mishna Shabbat 2:1-3). If the aim of the shabbat candles is to create a pleasant and tranquil atmosphere, an excessively flickering candle will elicit anxiety and an impulse to tinker illicitly with the candle. And the candle may go out entirely, leaving the celebrants suddenly in the dark. For shabbat, it is either the calming stability of a steady flame or nothing.
The matter is debated in the Talmud (Shabbat 21a), but the prevailing view is that on Chanukah this is not so: high quality materials are certainly preferable, but fundamentally any oils and any wicks may be used, no matter the quality of the resulting flame. The reason is that with regard to Chanukah candles, “Should they go out, one need not attend to them” (ibid). On Chanukah, that is, we are not responsible for ensuring that our candles stay lit, but only that we light them in the first place. We aim, hope, for a longlasting, radiant flame, but even a fleeting flicker is, on Chanukah, achievement enough.
Shabbat candles teach us that no matter what is happening in the world around us, we must secure one space and time, once per week, wherein we can enjoy a taste of the world as it ought to be – “an intimation of the world to come,” in rabbinic idiom. For those few hours in our homes on Friday night, we must ensure we are bathed in the reassuring glow and warmth of reliable light. This is essential to sustaining our spirits through the vagaries of profane time.
Chanukah candles say something different. There are times when we simply are not equipped with the materials necessary for dispelling the darkness around us with any reliability, where we can’t honestly achieve confidence in even an hour of stable illumination. Here the wisdom of the Jewish tradition says: light anyway. Find something that can serve as a wick, figure out something to use for oil, light them and hope for the best. If the candles go out earlier than you’d like, you n
