In the Northern Hemisphere much of winter is lived in the dark. I remember when I lived in New England, I would wake up and leave for work in the dark and it would be dark again when I left to go home. Here in Arizona it's not so bad, partly because of the latitude and partly because we don't have Daylight Savings Time - but it still affects us. My dog often lets me sleep 'til seven o'clock or later - at seven the sky is still pretty dark - though I've had to make six the earliest I would feed her since most of the year she's up even earlier than that.
So it's no surprise that winter holidays all over involve light. Even when I was a Jewish child and Christmas was still a religious holiday, my father would pack us into the car to drive around to look at people's Christmas lights - in New York City. Chanukah is called the Festival of Lights and although it is a minor holiday, we not only are commanded to light candles, but to put them in our windows for all to see. And I always love to see when people put their Christmas trees in their windows so passersby can enjoy the lights. The primitive holidays celebrating the solstice, from which we all borrowed customs, involved lighting the dark.
Seasonal affective disorder is a hazard of winter as our bodies and spirits react to the lack of sufficient daylight. We gravitate towards light and warmth, one reason for lights in windows and for holiday gatherings. We speak of a child's face "lighting up" upon opening a special present so that giving presents can also be a way of adding to the light. Families gather, supposedly in the light of love, and when darker feelings predominate, it can feel even worse than at other times.
This year we have been experiencing another kind of darkness. Stories of police violence and the lack of making police responsible for their acts have felt like personal blows. I almost welcomed the move to stories of torture - somehow that seemed more distant than dead children. The movement sparked by the unresponsiveness of the justice system has felt like an enlightenment, and each new protest has added light to this persistent darkness on our soul.
It's no wonder that the rabbis several centuries after the Maccabee rebellion changed the story of the triumph of a band of rebels over an occupying empire to the story of a miracle of a small light burning for eight days. And it's no wonder that early Christians, seeking a time of year to celebrate Jesus' birth, chose the winter solstice. These miracles speak to something fundamental to our being - the need to light the darkness.