It is one of the three mitzvos given specifically to women. It is the way we usher in the day that transforms our week. It is an opportunity for tefillah, for beseeching our Father to bless His children. Throughout the generations, Jewish women have clung to the mitzvah of bentsching licht in the most challenging of times — even risking their lives to perform the mitzvah. Family First brings you a collection of touching stories about women and the flames they ignited.
We’ll never know how great is the zchus of our lighting candles but sometimes we’re given glimpses. The following story was asked to be kept anonymous but all details are true.
“It happened two summers ago on a Friday night in the bungalow colony. One of my sister’s Shabbos candles had gone out a short while after it was lit. On Motzaei Shabbos when my brother-in-law came back from shul he asked for the candle that had prematurely gone out. He wanted to light it so that it would finish burning and was chagrined to hear that one of his children had thrown it out. My brother-in-law was determined to find it and went through all the trash until he discovered it. He lit it and it slowly burned down.
“The next day my brother-in-law took the kids to a nearby duck pond while my sister went shopping. All of my nieces and nephews were running around and chasing after the ducks when my brother-in-law heard a big splash. Then his oldest daughter started shrieking her youngest sister’s name. My brother-in-law raced toward the lake and spotted his two-year-old’s head bobbing in the water. He jumped in and pulled my niece out by her hair. Baruch Hashem she started crying right away and everything was fine — aside for the two of them being covered in green gook!
“We’ll never know for certain if there was any connection between relighting the candle and the neis that happened but we couldn’t help but notice the juxtaposition of events.”
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