Chanukah: The Dreidel's Hidden Meanings

Some may try to dim the lights of the world, they try to control the birth, death, and life of the Jews, they enact multitudinous laws and 'non-laws', even the air you breathe. However, we believe in the Miracle of Light, the Light of Chanukah, and soon it will shine throughout the world, for all to see the Glory of Hashem. Presented below are excerpts of a special Chanukah Shiur given by Rav Ginsburgh. If you like this, it is available as an eBook, very reasonably priced, the proceeds of which enable the Galeinai Publication Society to bring us truly great spiritual enlightenment. There is also a beautiful Meditative Melodies CD which is a collection of authentic melodies sung in various Chassidic courts while lighting the Menorah (adding a deep spiritual experience to the glow of the Chanukah licht).

Chanukah and the Dreidel:

Uniting the Supernatural and Natural*

We light Chanukah candles to publicize the miraculous power of God who intervened on behalf of the Maccabbees. The eight days of Chanukah commemorate the miraculous lighting of the seven-branched Menorah in the Holy Temple for eight days, thus connecting the numbers 7 and 8 together. In Jewish tradition, the number 7 represents a state of natural perfection (for example, Shabbat, is the seventh day of the week), but the number 8 represents a state of supernatural perfection (for example, circumcision is done on the child’s eighth day). Thus, Chanukah unites the natural with the supernatural, the finite with the infinite.

The Ba’al Shem Tov, the founder of the Chassidic movement, possessed a special love and affinity for Chanukah more than all the other holidays of the year. This is because the Chanukah candles represent the innate gift of the Jewish soul for spreading light and illuminating the whole world (even the non-Jewish world). The Ba’al Shem Tov’s message spread by the Jewish soul stresses both that God creates nature anew at every moment and at the same time permeates it with supernatural power. Because of its ability to unite the natural with the supernatural, the light of the Chanukah candles will eventually bring about the true and complete redemption.

The Dreidel

A very popular Jewish custom is to play dreidel on Chanukah. Adults together with children gather around the lights of the menorah, spinning to discover which letter falls on top. What is the deeper significance of this act, and what meaningful thoughts can we have in mind while playing dreidel this Chanukah? As we will see, by spinning the dreidel in front of the Chanukah lights, we are bridging the gap between the finite realm and the infinite.

The Dreidel’s Four Letters

By tradition, the dreidel has four faces. The

first thing one notices about the dreidel is that each of the dreidel’s four faces has one of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet inscribed on it. The four letters are nun (נ ), gimel (ג ), hei (ה ), and shin (ש ), the initials of the phrase, “A great miracle occurred there” (נֵס גָדוֹל הָיָה שָׁם ).

The first thing to note is that the numerical value of these four letters together, נגהש , is 358, also the numerical value of Mashiach (מָשִׁיחַ )! The recurring motif found in the dreidel’s hidden meanings is that of the Mashiach and redemption—changing the world and making it a worthy dwelling place for the Almighty. [....]

When a Square Becomes a Circle

The dreidel is shaped like a top, with a pointed bottom edge on which it can be spun. Spinning the dreidel causes its square contours to fade-out, making it seem like a round top.

Conceptually, the dreidel’s square faces and features represent the mathematical and syllogistic logic of the ancient Greeks, over whom the Maccabbee’s were victorious, both materially and spiritually. The Maccabbee’s, true to our faith in one God, believed and indeed practiced their belief that a view of nature and life that is based on human rationalism alone is lacking, for it is the infinite God, who has no bounds that brings all of reality into being. Thus, the round contours revealed by the dreidel when it spins represent the realm of the Divine, which manifests as miracles —events that cannot be understood, and sometimes even perceived—by the rational human mind. [....] By meditating on the act of spinning our own physical dreidel, we connect and identify with the Divine and show our willingness to see beyond the square and logical face of nature and believe and tap into the infinite, circular realm of God’s infinite space. In effect, meditating on the dreidel’s spin has the power to open our eyes to miracles.

What’s in a Name?

To gain a deeper appreciation of this charming little toy, let us continue by analyzing its name. As is well known, the name of an object (particularly in Hebrew) reveals its essence. The dreidel has three names that we are going to look at it. First, in Hebrew it is called a sevivon (סְבִיבוֹן ); obviously, this is the most sacred name of the three. In Yiddish, it is called a dreidel, the name that it is most commonly known by around the Jewish world. Finally, in English, we would call it a “top.”

Rules of the Game

The most common game played with the dreidel is with nuts or almonds. Each of the players is provided with an equal quantity of nuts and play commences by placing one nut each in the pot. Each child spins the dreidel on turn. The traditional rules are that if the dreidel lands with the letter shin revealed the player who spun the dreidel has to add another nut to the pot (in Yiddish, the shin stands for “shtel,” meaning “put in“). If the result is a hei (halb, “half,” in Yiddish), the child receives half the pot (with the additional nut when there are an odd number of nuts in the pot). If the result is the gimel (gantz, meaning “all“), he wins the entire pot (and subsequently a new pot is made). And, if the result is the nun (nisht, meaning “nothing“), he does nothing and the dreidel is passed on to the next player. And so the game revolves and revolves until one of the players has won all of the nuts.

Equipped with our understanding of the dreidel’s four faces we can delve deeper into the symbolism hidden in these rules.

Shin: Possessions and Ego

The shin requires the player to lose a nut.
To understand why this is so, we need to translate the loss into the psychological realm. The shin as we saw corresponds to kingdom about which the Zohar says, “She has nothing of her own.” We all possess a faculty of kingdom, which is usually characterized as our ability to relate with our surroundings. When in its rectified state, our faculty of kingdom knows that all that we have been given comes from Above (in the case of sefirot, per se, “above” refers to the sefirot above kingdom). An individual with a rectified faculty of kingdom experiences a sense of lowliness in the psyche. [....]

Nun: Beating Entropy

The nun represents a neutral state in which nothing is gained, yet nothing is lost and the game continues with the next player. The experience associated with the nun is that things progress naturally. [....]

Yud and Hei: A Whole and a Half

Both the yud and the hei yield a profit for the player. Since these two letters correspond to wisdom and understanding, the intellectual sefirot, the lesson is that when one is able to attain a state of mindfulness, there is real profit to be made. The difference is only in the amount.

Mindfulness indicates a state in which a person is wholly connected and guided by awareness of the Creator and His will as manifest through the Torah. When a person can sustain such a state, many good things come to him so that he may utilize them as part of his Divine service. [....]

Dreidel Entropy

To explain the rule that spinning a nun results in nothing, we used the physical concept of entropy. As it turns out we can extend this analogy further to explain the rules pertaining to all 4 letters.

We noted that the nun inspires us to look at the miraculous aspect of nature. The greatest miracle in nature is its continual recreation ex nihilo, something form nothing (nisht, beginning with the letter nun, as above). In fact, our ability to recognize the origin of nature’s being in the Divine nothing and to then manifest this power of transforming the nothing into something is what allows us to truly and permanently overcome entropy. Translating this into the less philosophical realm of playing dreidel, to make a profit you first have to recognize nature’s miraculous origin in the Divine. So, the two letters gimel and hei make the player a profit because they represent an inspired outlook on nature. [....]

Notes:

1. Zachariah 6:12.
2. Since God creates nature anew at every moment, in effect even what we deem natural is actually an ongoing miracle, clothed in the guise of natural laws. As explained in length by the Lubavitcher Rebbe, the highest form of miracle is actually the type that can alter the course of nature while appearing to follow its laws.
3. אוֹר הַסוֹבֵב כָּל עַלְמִין
4. אוֹר הַמְמַלֵא כָּל עַלְמִין
5. As stressed by the Lubavitcher Rebbe, to connect with God’s infinite aspect one should perform mitzvot from a place of infinite devotion. The more scholarly an individual is in the teachings of the Torah, the more inclined he or she is to act out of knowledge and understanding. But, dedication to the Almighty’s will has to set these aside and act out of a pure aspiration to do nothing but perform His will. This is called acting out of self-sacrifice (מְסִירוּת נֶפֶשׁ ) and above reason (לְמַעֲלָה מְטַעַם וְדָעַת ), the two great virtues of the Maccabbees.
6. Zohar II, 215a.
7. Pesachim 68b.

*Brought to you by Authentic Jewish Mysticism and Thought, and Harav Yitzchak Ginsburgh, Shlit"a of Gal Einai. Please visit his site, which is also in French, Spanish, Italian, as well as English. There are wonderful shiurin (in Science, Law, and Medicine, Kabbalah), Chanukah Melodies you can download