Shabbat candles

file:Shabbat-Candles_blessing.jpg

According to Tobiah ben Eliezer, the custom is one "which Israel adopted from the time of Moses",{{Cite web |title=Midrash Lekach Tov, Exodus 35:3:3 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Midrash_Lekach_Tov,_Exodus.35.3.3 |access-date=2023-09-04 |website=www.sefaria.org}} while Genesis Rabbah relates that "For all the days that Sarah lived, the Sabbath lamp stayed lit until the next Sabbath eve, and for Rebecca it did the same . . ."{{Cite web |title=Bereshit Rabbah 60:16 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Bereshit_Rabbah.60.16 |access-date=2023-09-04 |website=www.sefaria.org}} According to Leopold Landsberg, the Jews adopted this custom from the Persians.{{Cite web |title=HebrewBooks.org Sefer Detail: חקרי לב - חלק ד -- לנדסברג, יהודה ליב בן ישראל איצק אהרן, 1848-1915 |url=https://hebrewbooks.org/46735 |access-date=2023-09-04 |website=hebrewbooks.org |page=82ff}} Jacob Zallel Lauterbach disagrees, arguing that it was instituted by the Pharisees to protest against superstition, or perhaps against (some predecessor of) the Karaitic refusal to have any light on Sabbath Eve, even were it lit before the Sabbath.{{Efn|Lauterbach claims (p. 456 and p. 458) that such was the Samaritan custom, but cites only sources describing Karaitic practice regarding light and Samaritan custom regarding the cooking of food. According to Geiger and Zunz (op cit.), the Sadducees held to this view, as shown by the (arguably) polemical tone in [https://www.sefaria.org/Midrash_Tanchuma%2C_Noach.1.2 Midrash Tanchuma] וקראת לשבת עונג זו הדלקת נר בשבת וא"ת לישב בחשך אין זו עונג שאין יורדי גיהנם נדונין אלא בחשך.}}{{Cite book |last=Lauterbach |first=Jacob Zallel |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RxEHAQAAIAAJ&pg=454 |title=Rabbinic Essays |date=1951 |publisher=Hebrew Union College Press |isbn=978-0-608-14972-1 |pages= |language=en}} According to standard halakhic literature, the purpose of lighting of Shabbat candles is to dignify the Sabbath; before the advent of electric lighting, when the alternative was to eat in the dark, it was necessary to light lamps to create an appropriate environment.{{Cite web|title=Rashi on Shabbat 25b:3:3|url=https://www.sefaria.org/Rashi_on_Shabbat.25b.3.3|access-date=2022-02-16|website=www.sefaria.org}} One early-modern Yiddish prayer asks for the candles to "burn bright and clear to drive away the evil spirits, demons, and all that come from Lilith".{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YceDuyuVCzQC&pg=PP1003 |title=סדר התפלות מכל השנה: כמנהג פולין, עם פרשיות ... יוצרות, סליחות, הושענות, מערבית, יום כיפור קטן, תהלים, תחינות, אקוראהט כמו דיא מר' ישראל גר ... [וגם] כוונת הפייטן אויף טייטש ... |date=1766 |publisher=דפוס יוסף ויעקב בני אברהם פרופס |language=he}}

The practice of lighting an oil lamp before Shabbat is first recorded in the second chapter of m. Shabbat, which already presupposes it as an old and undisputed practice. Persius (d. 62 CE) describes it in Satire V:

At cum Herodis venere dies unctaque fenestra dispositae pinguem nebulam vomuere lucaernae portantes violas . . . labra moves tacitus recutitaque sabbata palles.

But when the day of Herod{{Efn|Herod personifies the Jewish people; his "day" is the Sabbath. See Menachem Stern, Greek and Latin Authors vol. 1 p. 436; also Molly Whittaker, Jews and Christians vol. 6 p. 71. In Morton-Braund's edition (2004), pg. 110-113.}} comes round, when the lamps wreathed with violets and ranged round the greasy window-sills have spat forth their thick clouds of smoke . . . you silently twitch your lips, turning pale at the sabbath of the circumcised. (trans. Menachem Stern)

File:חורבת עוצה 9 - שבר של כן לנר שבת שעליו חרותה המילה שבת.jpg excavations east of Acre]]

The lighting is preferably done by a woman. Amoraic sources explain that "the First Man was the world's lamp, but Eve extinguished him. Therefore they gave the commandment of the lamp to the woman".Jerusalem Talmud, Shabbat 2:6; Genesis Rabbah 17:8, Tanhuma (Buber) Noah 1:1 Rashi adds an additional rationale, "and moreover, she is responsible for household needs."Talmud, Shabbat 32a s.v. hareni Maimonides, who rejects Talmudic rationales based on superstition,{{Cite book |last=Shapiro |first=Marc B. |title=Studies in Maimonides and His Interpreters |publisher=University of Scranton Press |year=2008 |isbn=978-1-58966-165-3 |location= |pages=136 |language=en |chapter=Maimonidean Halakhah and Superstition}} writes only: "And women are more obligated in this matter than men, because they are found at home{{Efn|Maimonides frowns on women leaving home more than once a month. (Ishut 13:11)}} and involved in housework."{{Cite web |title=Mishneh Torah, Sabbath 5:3 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Mishneh_Torah,_Sabbath.5.3 |access-date=2022-11-12 |website=www.sefaria.org}}

Yechiel Michel Epstein writes (cleaned up):

Sabbath lamps are just like Chanukah lamps, in that the obligation falls on the household. Therefore, even if a male member of the household has a separate room of his own, he need not light separately, because the woman's lighting accounts for every room of the house. If a married traveler has his own room, he needs to light separately, because his wife's blessing cannot account for another place entirely, but if he lacks his own room, he does not need to. A single traveler must light even if his parents are lighting on his behalf elsewhere, and if he lacks his own room, he must arrange matters with the proprietor.{{Cite web |title=Arukh HaShulchan, Orach Chaim 263:5 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Arukh_HaShulchan,_Orach_Chaim.263.5?vhe=Arukh_HaShulchan,_Orach_Chayim_--_Wikisource&lang=en&with=all&lang2=en |access-date=2024-02-11 |website=www.sefaria.org}}

Today, most Jews light at least two candles. Authorities up to and including Joseph Karo, who wrote that "there are those who employ two wicks, one corresponding to "Remember" and one corresponding to "Keep" (perhaps two wicks in one lamp, reflecting the Talmudic teaching "'Remember' and 'Keep' in a single statement"),{{Cite web |title=Rosh Hashanah 27a:2 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Rosh_Hashanah.27a.2 |access-date=2022-11-20 |website=www.sefaria.org}} advised a maximum of two lamps, with other lamps necessary for other purposes kept carefully at a distance to preserve the tableau.ספר ראבי"ה סי' קצט However, Moses Isserles added "and it's possible to add and light three or four lamps, and such is our custom",{{Cite web |title=Shulchan Arukh, Orach Chayim 263:1 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Shulchan_Arukh,_Orach_Chayim.263.1 |access-date=2022-11-20 |website=www.sefaria.org}} and Yisrael Meir Kagan added, "and there are those who light seven candles corresponding to the seven days of the week (Lurianics),{{Cite web |title=Ba'er Hetev on Shulchan Arukh, Orach Chayim 263:2 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Ba%27er_Hetev_on_Shulchan_Arukh,_Orach_Chayim.263.2 |access-date=2022-11-20 |website=www.sefaria.org}} or ten corresponding to the Ten Commandments".{{Cite web |title=Mishnah Berurah 263:6 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Mishnah_Berurah.263.6 |access-date=2022-11-20 |website=www.sefaria.org}} Starting with Yaakov Levi Moelin, rabbinic authorities have required women who forgot to light one week to add an additional lamp to her regular number for the rest of her life.{{Cite web |title=Mishnah Berurah 263:7 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Mishnah_Berurah.263.7 |access-date=2022-11-20 |website=www.sefaria.org}}

A recent custom reinterprets the two candles as husband and wife{{Efn|Elijah Spira [https://www.sefaria.org/Eliyah_Rabbah_on_Shulchan_Arukh%2C_Orach_Chayim.263.2 writes] (1757) that "some say that the lamps represent man and woman, as ner (lamp) in gematriya is 250, and a man has 248 bones while a woman has 252." However, this explanation is intended abstractly and Spira does not imagine that anyone should light more lamps to correspond to a larger family.}} and adds a new candle for every child born; apparently the first to hear of it was Israel Hayyim Friedman, though his essay was not published until 1965,{{Cite web |title=לקוטי מהרי"ח - חלק ב - פרידמן, ישראל חיים בן יהודה, 1852-1922 (page 29 of 201) |url=https://hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=41190&st=&pgnum=29 |access-date=2022-11-21 |website=hebrewbooks.org}} followed by Jacob Zallel Lauterbach, who mentions it in an undated essay published posthumously in 1951. Menachem Mendel Schneerson mentioned it in a 1975 letter.Likkutei Sichot, vol. 11, p. 289 (1998) Mordechai Leifer supposedly said, "The women light two candles before children but after their first child they light five, corresponding to the Five Books Of Moses . . . and so it is forever, irrespective of how many children" but this teaching was not published until 1988.{{Cite web |title=ספר גדולת מרדכי : סיפורים ושיחות ... מהרב ... מרדכי מנדבורנא-בושטינא ; וספר קדושת ישראל : תולדות ואורחות חיים ... מבנו ... ר' ישראל יעקב מחוסט / [היו לאחדים בידי והוצאתים לאור ברוך מאיר קליין מדעברעצין] {{!}} קליין, ברוך מאיר {{!}} {{!}} הספרייה הלאומית |url=https://www.nli.org.il/he/books/NNL_ALEPH001085938/NLI |access-date=2022-11-20 |website=www.nli.org.il |language=he}} Menashe Klein offers two interpretations: either it is based on Moelin's rule and women who miss a week because they were giving birth are not exempted (though all other authorities assume they are exempted) or it is based on comparison with Hanukkah candles, which some medieval authorities recommended be lit one per member of the household.{{Cite web |title=HebrewBooks.org Sefer Detail: משנה הלכות חלק ז -- מנשה קליין |url=https://hebrewbooks.org/1879 |access-date=2022-11-21 |website=hebrewbooks.org}}

In the Ashkenazic rite, after the candles are lit, a blessing is said (whereas, in the Sephardic rite, the blessing is said before the lighting). In order to avoid benefiting from the light of the candles before uttering the blessing, Ashkenazic authorities recommend that the lighter cover her eyes for the intervening period.{{Cite web |title=Shulchan Arukh, Orach Chayim 263:5 |url=https://www.sefaria.org/Shulchan_Arukh,_Orach_Chayim.263.5?lang=bi |access-date=2022-11-12 |website=www.sefaria.org}} Today, many Jewish women make an exaggerated motion, waving their hands in the air, when covering their eyes; there is no specific source for this in traditional texts.

MS ex-Montefiore 134 records that "I heard that [Rashi's granddaughter] Rabbanit Hannah, the sister of Rabbi Jacob, would warn the women not to begin the blessing until the second candle was lit, lest the women accept the Sabbath and then continue lighting candles."{{Cite journal |last=בר-לבב |first=Liora Elias Bar-Levav (1966-2006) ליאורה אליאס |title=מנהג יפה הוא לנשים שלנו : פסיקת הלכה על פי נשים בימי הביניים |url=https://www.academia.edu/25882125}}{{Cite web |title=ספר האסופות. |url=https://www.nli.org.il/en/discover/manuscripts/hebrew-manuscripts/viewerpage?vid=MANUSCRIPTS&docid=PNX_MANUSCRIPTS990000584860205171-1#$FL50583910 |access-date=2023-02-02 |website=www.nli.org.il |page=77a |language=en}}

The candles must be lit before the official starting time of Shabbat, which varies from place to place, but is generally 18 or 20 minutes before sunset. In some places the customary time is earlier: 30 minutes before sunset in Haifa and 40 minutes in Jerusalem, perhaps because the mountains in those cities obstructed the horizon and once made it difficult to know if sunset had arrived.

The blessing is never described by Talmudic sources, but was introduced by Geonim to emphasize rejection of the early Karaitic belief that lights could not be lit before the Sabbath. It is attested in a fragment in the St. Petersburg national library (Antonin B, 122, 2); it also appears in a plethora of Gaonic material, including the Seder of Amram Gaon, the responsa of Natronai Gaon, the responsa of Sherira Gaon, and others. Every source quotes it with identical language, exactly correspondent to the modern liturgy.

In the late 20th century, some apparently began to add the word kodesh ("holy") at the end of the blessing, making "... the lamp of holy Shabbat", a practice with no historical antecedent. At least two earlier sources include this version, the Givat Shaul of Saul Abdullah Joseph (Hong Kong, 1906)p. 251 and the Yafeh laLev of Rahamim Nissim Palacci (Turkey, 1906)p. 127 but authorities in the major Orthodox traditions were solicited for responsa only in the late 1960s, and each acknowledges it only as a new and alternative practice. Menachem Mendel Schneerson and Moshe Sternbuch endorsed the innovationIgrot Qodesh of 5735 p. 208; Tshuvot v'Hanhagot 1:271 but most authorities, including Yitzhak Yosef, ruled that it is forbidden, though it does not nullify the blessing if already performed.Yalkut Yosef 263:51 Almog Levi attributes this addition to misinformed baalot teshuva.M'Torato shel Maran p. 80 It has never been a widespread custom but its popularity, especially within Chabad, continues to grow.

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• B.M. Lewin, The History of the Sabbath Candles, in Essays and Studies in Memory of Linda A. Miller, I. Davidson (ed), New York, 1938, pp.55-68.

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Category:Shabbat

Category:Laws of Shabbat

Category:Jewish blessings

Category:Jewish ritual objects

Category:Candles