Among the most familiar images of Chanukah is the menorah lit not only in private homes but at the front of the synagogue, its flames kindling during the evening service. The practice feels so established as to seem inextricable from Chanukah's original design. Yet, in legal terms, it stands apart from the core obligation. Unlike the home lighting—which constitutes the actual mitzvah—synagogue lighting is a later custom whose rationale and parameters are the subject of rich discussion among the early and later authorities.

In our own time, this communal dimension has expanded dramatically through the phenomenon of public menorah lightings—in town squares, at government buildings, on famous landmarks. These gatherings, championed most visibly by the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, have brought the flame of Chanukah into the most visible arenas of civic life. The atrocity at Bondi Beach has placed these public celebrations at the center of a profound question: In the face of hatred, do we retreat, or do we kindle more light?

Addressing this question requires a return to the source—the halakhic foundations that transformed Chanukah from a purely domestic observance into a public proclamation of faith.

The Basis for Synagogue Lighting

The Shulchan Aruch (O.C. §671:7) codifies the custom as follows: "In the synagogue, the menorah is placed along the southern wall (parallel to the Temple menorah). The candles are arranged from east to west, and one lights them with blessings in order to publicize the miracle (pirsumei nisa)." The Rama adds that this lighting does not exempt anyone from his personal obligation; each must return and light at home.

This is the form that endures today—widely practiced, publicly cherished, yet not without question. Already in the writings of the early authorities, we find voices of hesitation. The Shibolei HaLeket (185) records: "We too practice lighting in the synagogue, but we do not know the root and branch of this custom. My teacher, R. Yehudah, my brother, may his light shine, refrained from lighting and from reciting the blessing." His uncertainty captures the central tension: if every Jew already fulfills the mitzvah in their own home, what function does the synagogue lighting serve?

The Beit Yosef suggests that the custom arose from practical and communal sensitivity. Just as kiddush was recited in the synagogue for guests who ate there, the lighting was instituted for those without homes in which to perform the mitzvah. He further cites the Kol Bo (#44), who frames the matter more broadly: the synagogue lighting serves to magnify pirsumei nisabefore the entire community. The act itself—performed in public, accompanied by blessings—constitutes a collective sanctification of God's Name. Thus, the synagogue menorah is not merely a surrogate for the private one but a distinct, magnified communal expression of the original intent of the mitzvah.

The comparison to Friday night kiddush in the synagogue is instructive. Some of the Medieval commentators, such as Avudraham and the Ohr Zarua (Responsa I, 752:9), have posited that the synagogue kiddush is a separate institution from that performed in the home, one specifically added in order to publicize the sanctity of Shabbat. In this vein, the Chanukah candles in the synagogue represent a parallel institution: a practice added in tandem with the household lighting in order to publicize the precept, serious enough to justify its own berakhah.

What emerges from this comparison is a broader principle: the synagogue assumes a public responsibility that transcends the private fulfillment of mitzvot. Just as the community gathers to hear kiddush proclaimed aloud—ensuring that even the unlearned or the transient know that Shabbat has been sanctified, and to be included in that commandment to whatever limited extent possible—so too the menorah rises in the synagogue to teach the meaning of the miracle to all who enter, and to include them as well. The home lighting fulfills the individual's obligation; the synagogue lighting fulfills the community's responsibility to its members. The congregation becomes not merely a collection of individuals but a body with its own sacred charge.

The Historical Context: When Public Lighting Became Impossible

The Rivash (Responsa 111) offers a different historical lens. He describes the synagogue lighting as an ancient institution, a concession originally established precisely because Jews could no longer light outdoors. The Talmud's model—placing the candle at the doorway facing the street—had become unsafe under foreign rule. The synagogue thus became the arena in which the public element of the mitzvah could survive.

In that sense, the synagogue menorah does not come to replace or eclipse the home lighting; rather, it is an attempt to preserve the crucial social component of the mitzvah when political realities threaten to erase it. The Minchat Elimelech (II, §16) develops this approach further: when public lighting at home became impossible due to persecution, the Sages of the generation did not create a new ritual but transferred an existing one. The locus of pirsumei nisa shifted from the home's doorway to the community's synagogue. In this reading, the synagogue lighting does not supplement the original mitzvah but preserves it under changed circumstances.

The Biur Ha-Gra clarifies why one cannot discharge their personal obligation through synagogue lighting alone, pointing to the principle of avoiding perceptions of impropriety (mar'it ayin). If one fails to light at home, others may suspect him of neglecting the mitzvah entirely. He further notes the explicit enumeration of the mitzvah itself in the Talmud, “a candle for each man and his household”, suggests there was always intended to be a domestic component to the menorahlighting. The home remains the halakhic locus of the command. The synagogue lighting, therefore, serves a different purpose altogether: not personal fulfillment but communal proclamation. It expresses the public dimension of the miracle without replacing the private responsibility that defines the mitzvah's core.

The Logic of the Blessing

The discussion surrounding the synagogue lighting gives rise to a difficulty noted by the Chacham Tzvi (§88). The Shulchan Aruch rules that blessings are recited over the Chanukah lighting in the synagogue, even though this act is, strictly speaking, a custom. Yet elsewhere, the same authority rules that one does not recite blessings on the hallel of Rosh Chodesh—precisely because it is only a custom. If one does not bless over a custom, why is the synagogue lighting an exception?

One way to resolve the inconsistency is to suggest that the blessing over the synagogue lighting belongs to a different category altogether. Rather than a birkat ha-mitzvah—a blessing said over the performance of a command—it functions as a benediction over the publicizing of the miracle itself. Some authors propose precisely this: the blessing is not secondary to the act of lighting but part of its very expression, as the recitation itself amplifies the publicity of the miracle (see R.  Moshe Mendel Brus in Mevakshei Torah, pp. 49–50). The act and the declaration form a single ritual unit, whose purpose is not private fulfillment but collective remembrance.

R. Yaakov Emden, in his Mor U'Ketziah (§672), pushes this model further. He argues that the blessing on Chanukah candles is so integral to the mitzvah that even in cases of uncertainty, it should still be recited. Lighting without a blessing is incomplete; the verbal sanctification is essential to the mitzvah's identity. Although this view is not adopted as binding law, it illuminates an underlying intuition that the spoken acknowledgment of the miracle is an indispensable act of testimony. From this perspective, even the synagogue lighting, though born of custom, rightfully retains its blessing, for without it the act would fail to fulfill its expressive purpose.

The Communal Dimension

Once synagogue lighting is defined as a communal expression of pirsumei nisa, a practical question arises: must a quorum of ten be present at the time of lighting? The later authorities diverge, revealing deeper assumptions about what renders the act "public."

The Biur Halakhah (§671, s.v. "v'yesh nohagin") records the view of the Magen Avraham that the lighting may proceed even without ten present. His reasoning is significant: the requirement of publicity is nonetheless fulfilled, since members of the community will later enter and see the candles. Pirsumei nisa, in this view, is not limited to the moment of lighting but extends to the ongoing visibility of the flames. The menorah continues to proclaim the miracle as long as it burns; the act of kindling initiates a testimony that persists through the night. Others maintain a stricter standard. The Mor U'Ketziah insists that one should not light in the synagogue unless ten are physically present. For him, the presence of ten is not a formality but integral to the act's communal meaning—without a gathered assembly, the lighting loses its character as public proclamation.

The Minchat Asher records a telling custom of R. Chaim of Brisk: as Shabbat departed, R. Chaim would light the Chanukah candles before the recitation of Kaddish Titkabel. His reasoning was that as long as Kaddish Titkabel had not yet been said, the communal prayer was considered ongoing, and the lighting could thus be regarded as occurring within a live framework of communal worship. Once that final Kaddish was recited, the shared sanctity of the moment would disperse. In R. Chaim's view, synagogue lighting draws its meaning not simply from being seen by others, but from unfolding within the rhythm of tefillah be-tzibbur—the collective act of worship that binds individuals into a community of testimony.

This captures a larger question about what makes an act "public." The mitzvah of Chanukah lighting operates on two complementary planes: an individual dimension fulfilled within one's home, and a communal dimension fulfilled through collective proclamation. Each serves the same spiritual purpose through a different halakhic medium.

The Custom of Daytime Lighting

Each morning of Chanukah, many communities begin their prayers beside a second light—the menorah, kindled once more before the morning service. Though this practice is widespread, it is curiously absent from the Shulchan Aruch and its major commentaries. In earlier generations, it seems, there was no separate morning lighting at all. Rather, large candles were prepared in the evening so that their flames would still be burning when the congregation assembled for morning prayers.

The Otzar Machmadim finds support for this practice in the Rama's words in Darkei Moshe, who cautions against those who make their household Chanukah candles excessively large. "There is no proof from the synagogue Chanukah candles," the Rama writes, "for there the custom is to make them especially large, that they burn all day—and there it is different, for there is a mitzvah by lighting candles all day." From this, it emerges that the Rama recognized a unique dimension to the synagogue menorah: its purpose is not confined to the night's onset but woven into the rhythm of communal worship throughout the day.

The Magen Avraham in his Zayit Ra'anan (to Parashat Beha’alotekha) anchors this custom in a striking insight. The Beit Yosef asked: if the oil found in the Temple was enough for one day, why celebrate eight days of miracle rather than seven? The Magen Avraham answers that the miracle was not confined to the night at all. Each lamp of the Temple menorah held a half-log of oil—sufficient for the night's duration—yet the Torah forbade extinguishing the flames. Each morning, the priests found that the same oil still burned, radiating light throughout the day. The wonder was of a flame that refused to die, bridging night and day. In this perspective, the custom of daytime kindling is not an innovation but a remembrance—an echo of the menorah that truly never went out.

From Synagogue to Street: The Emergence of Public Lightings

If the synagogue menorah emerged when public lighting became impossible, what happens when public lighting becomes possible again? This is the question that animated the Chabad-Lubavitch movement's campaign for public menorah lightings. The Rebbe's vision drew directly from the original model of the mitzvah. The Talmud's ideal—lighting at the doorway, facing the public thoroughfare—was designed precisely for maximum visibility. When persecution forced Jews indoors, the synagogue preserved that communal dimension within protected walls. But in free societies, the original public character of pirsumei nisacould be restored—and extended even further.

The public menorah lighting thus represents not an innovation but a restoration and expansion. If the synagogue assumes educational responsibility for its congregation, the public menorah extends that responsibility to the broader society. The Kol Bo's language is instructive: the synagogue lighting serves "to magnify and sanctify His Name when they bless Him in assemblies." Public sanctification of God's Name, as Rosh teaches in Berachot (47b), is itself a distinct mitzvah, derived from the verse "I shall be sanctified among the Children of Israel." (See Resp. Lehorot Natan, VII, §50–51.) If the synagogue lighting fulfills this principle within the walls of the house of prayer, perhaps this is true as well when the menorah rises in the town square, before all who pass.

The massacre at Bondi Beach on the first night of Chanukah targeted precisely this phenomenon—not a synagogue behind walls, not a home behind locked doors, but the most visible, joyous expression of Jewish identity possible: a public menorah lighting at one of the world's most famous beaches. The terrorists sought to extinguish that light permanently.

The Response: More Light, Not Less

The response was swift and unanimous. That same night, synagogues across Australia filled to capacity. Planned public events continued—some relocated indoors, but none canceled. By the next morning, Chabad rabbis had returned to Bondi Beach itself, setting up tefillin and menorahs at a nearby pavilion; by nightfall, thousands had come. A banner flew beside them bearing the message Rabbi Eli Schlanger had given months earlier: "Be more Jewish, act more Jewish, and appear more Jewish."

And on this final night of Chanukah, the Jewish community has returned to Bondi Beach to kindle the eighth light at the very place where the massacre occurred. Australians were asked to place candles in their windows at 6:47 p.m., the precise moment when the first shots rang out—transforming a moment of horror into a nationwide affirmation of light over darkness.

The Halakhic Imperative of Public Witness

The response of Australian Jewry was deeply halakhic, if somewhat paradoxical. The Rivash taught that when outdoor lighting became dangerous, the synagogue preserved the public element of the mitzvah. The public lighting was never completely abandoned.

More fundamentally, the concept of pirsumei nisa itself demands visibility. The miracle of Chanukah was a public event—the rededication of the Temple, the defeat of the Seleucid empire, the restoration of Jewish sovereignty. To confine its commemoration to private spaces is to diminish its meaning. The Kol Bo's language—"to magnify and sanctify His Name when they bless Him in assemblies"—suggests that the more public the setting, the greater the sanctification.

The Chatam Sofer illuminates this point through a careful reading of the liturgy. In the Al HaNisim prayer, we say that the Hasmoneans "kindled lights in the courtyards of Your sanctuary". The Chatam Sofer explains that this language is precise: the Hasmoneans lit not merely inside the Temple sanctuary but in the courtyards—the outer, public areas of the sacred precinct—specifically to publicize the miracle. This was not a private act of Temple service but a public proclamation before all Israel.

The original Chanukah lighting was, by design, performed in the most visible location available within the holy space. The synagogue menorah, placed within the walls of the house of prayer, recalls the quiet continuity of the Temple's inner service. But the public menorah, rising in city squares and on famous beaches, restores the original character of the Hasmonean celebration in the courtyards—proclaiming before all who pass that the miracle endures.

Conclusion: The Light That Refuses to Die

The original miracle of Chanukah commemorated the will of the people to resist and to endure when the culture around them tried to extinguish their spiritual light. Despite overwhelming physical danger and enormous obstacles, the Jews of that era prevailed and found their willingness to light a flame reciprocated through divine embrace.

The Magen Avraham taught that the original miracle of Chanukah was of a flame that refused to die—oil sufficient for one night that burned through the day, bridging darkness and light. As he understood, the synagogue custom of daytime lighting commemorates precisely this: the persistence of the flame beyond its expected duration, the light that endures when by all natural reckoning it should have been extinguished. Perhaps that is the deepest meaning of the public menorah: it testifies not to a moment but to a persistence, not to a single miracle but to an unbroken chain of light across the centuries. Every public menorah declares: We are still here. The light still burns. And it will not go out.

We are commanded to speak that miracle loudly, to declare that the original endurance continues telling the ongoing story of who we are and the message we carry. Rabbi Soloveitchik taught that pirsumei nisa is itself a prayer; an expression that the miracles that have been bestowed in the past, are sought again in the present.

The power of that prayer, so desperately needed right now, is more than the sum of its parts. It is everything that had to be overcome so that it could be put into place. It is the scope of its reach, the souls that will be brought in to the majesty of the miracle’s effect. It is the hearts that are uplifted by the knowledge that the flame continues to glow, and therefore, theirs can as well.