WHERE TO LIGHT

The Gemara mentions 3 places to light the menorah.

First, על פתח ביתו מבחוץ, which according to the way we rule means at the entranceway going from your courtyard to the street.

Next, says the Gemara, if you live on the upper story of a building and so don’t have your own private entrance to light at, you should light in the window of your apartment that is visible to the public.

Finally, says the Gemara, if you live in a time of danger, you can light inside your house on the table. By lighting on the dining room table it would not be noticeable that the candles were being lit to perform the mitzvah as they would just look like they were being lit to eat by.

Based on this last statement, the custom throughout the millennia was to light indoors. Although lighting outdoors would not have posed any danger to life, the danger of increased anti-Semitism is already enough to be categorized as סכנה in this regard.

Indeed, this remains the custom in the Diaspora until today.

In Eretz Yisrael, however, where there is no longer such danger, the big question is where is the correct place to light.

R’ Elyashiv rules that lighting indoors when there is no longer any danger from non-Jews is wholly inappropriate and one who does so does not fulfill his obligation and must light again downstairs. The Steiplar, and others, however, maintained that since the custom throughout the generations was to light indoors, that remains the correct place to light, even though the original reason no longer applies. In fact, some poskim go as far as to say that one who lights outdoors does not fulfill his obligation!

So, to summarize so far, the first area of dispute is how to apply the custom of lighting indoors that was the norm throughout the millennia in the Diaspora to our situation today in Israel.

The next area of debate revolves around how to view the status of our stairwells.

We said that the menorah needs to be kindled at the entrance of the chatzar, the courtyard, leading to the street. The Chazon Ish held that our stairwells today don’t have the status of the courtyard mentioned in Chazal as those were used for private needs. People would cook there, eat there, do their laundry there; it was an extension of the house. Our stairwells, by contrast, are only used as passageways, but not for any private uses. According to the Chazon Ish lighting downstairs by the main entrance to the building would not be considered as lighting by the entranceway of the courtyard and would not be a fulfillment of the mitvzah. In fact, according to the Chazon Ish lighting downstairs would be a beracha levatala! One would either have to light by the window facing the street or by the front door of the house, depending on where there is more publicity. On the other hand, Rabbi Elyashiv and others, hold that the requirement to light by the entrance of the courtyard in regards to the laws of chanuka does not depend on the way the courtyard is used and so our stairwells – although not used like they were in previous times - still have the status of a courtyard and the menorah may be lit on the street.

Ok, so we’ve discussed the various opinions concerning whether the menora should be lit by the entrance on the street, the front door, or the window.

Now lets talk about where exactly within the window or entranceway the menorah should be placed.

The menora should preferably be placed within 10 handbreadths of the ground, which is about a meter, to demonstrate that we’re not lighting it in order for purposes of illumination but for the mitzva. The height in this regard, as well as for all the other measurements we will learn in this section, is measured by the height of the flames – not of the actual menora.

The menora, however, should not be placed too low, which is defined as within three handbreadths of the ground, or about 30 cm, as then it is considered like being on the ground itself, which again would not be clear it was being lit for the mitzva.

If your apartment is above twenty amos from the street, which is about 10 meters, then lighting in the window would not be publicizing the miracle, as at such a height people will not easily notice the menorah. In such circumstances, you are better off lighting it by the front entrance to your house. If, however, there are apartments across the street that are vertically within 20 amos of your apartment then that’s ok as the people across the street will see it. The people across from you would have to be close enough to be able to distinguish how many lights are being lit. If they are at such a distance that all they see is a blur of lights they would not count as your pirsumei nisa.

When lighting by a doorway the menora should be placed within a handbreadth of the entrance so that it is noticeable that it was placed for the mitzva of neros chanuka.

Finally, if there is a mezuza on the doorway, the menora should be placed on the opposite side of the mezuza so that as one walks through the door one is surrounded by mitzvos.