Treasure Trove: David Matlow explains the significance of a rare 5-sided dreidel
The traditional dreidel is four-sided with each side having a Hebrew letter: nun, gimmel, hey and shin. These are the first letters of “nes gadol haya sham” meaning a “big miracle happened there”. In Israel, shin is replaced by the letter peh (for poh “here”) as the miracle of Hanukkah happened here, in the land […]
Moncton city councillors cancelled a 20-year tradition of lighting a Hanukkah menorah outside city hall
Why did New Brunswick’s largest city make this decision in 2023?
Happy Henukkah! Senator Paula Simons leads Edmonton on a festive wild-goose chase
Why did the chicken cross over into Hanukkah celebrations? A fair question. After all, chickens aren’t a traditional part of the festival of lights. Sure, chickens make excellent Shabbat soup stars, but they aren’t usually part of the Hanukkah table. (Not, at least, if you want to put sour cream on your latkes. And surely, […]
Why it’s Hanukkah until at least January in the Quebec town of Disraeli
Canada Post has brought Hanukkah to a small Quebec town named after a former Jewish prime minister of Great Britain. The only post office in Disraeli, with a population of about 2,500 people, is now the home of the first-ever permanent Jewish postmark to be created for mail in Canada, showing four dreidels and a […]
Zach Hyman, dreidel parachutes and a car menorah parade mark the 30th anniversary of Edmonton’s Hanukkah ceremony
When hockey star Zach Hyman left his hometown Toronto Maple Leafs to sign with the Edmonton Oilers earlier this year, he told interviewers he was planning to become a part of the Alberta capital’s Jewish community. And that’s how Hyman found himself strapped in to a cherry picker basket of a crane Sunday and lifted […]
Rabbi Avi Finegold’s hot take for Hanukkah: Maccabees, materialism and the middle path
Avi Finegold is the founder of the Jewish Living Lab in Montreal and the co-host of The CJN’s weekly current affairs podcast Bonjour Chai. I’m far from the first person to point out that there’s no history or meaning to attach to Hanukkah gifts. They’re clearly an idea borrowed from Christmas, and there are dozens of articles […]
