The Beis Yosef questions why we celebrate 8 days of Chanuka and not 7, seeing as there was enough oil for a day, meaning the extra benefit from the miracle was 7 days’ worth.
R’ Yaakov Hillel quotes Rashi on the pasuk where Leah gave birth to her fourth child, (29:35) that is based on a Midrash: הפעם אודה: שנטלתי יותר מחלקי, מעתה יש לי להודות – This time, I will thank: since I have taken more than my share. Consequently, I must offer up thanks.
The basic understanding of this would indicate that her rationale was that each woman would be mother to 3 of the tribes, and now that she had exceeded her fair share, she was grateful for the extra good G-d had done to her. R’ Hillel tells us this is not so.
The beauty of the Hebrew language is that it is hard to accurately translate as we don’t know always what the writer’s intent was. But we can interpret Rashi differently – I’ve exceeded my portion (3), now I realise I ought to have been thankful before, i.e. she realised that she was wrong to calculate at all; we can’t second-guess G-d. She realised she was wrong to have assumed that 3 was her “fair share”, that even what is natural and makes sense is a miracle.
This is a hard hitting idea.
Each breath we take – who says that all the mechanisms that enable us to breathe should in fact enable us to breathe? Why do we expect to be able to walk tomorrow, to see, to live? These may seem to be absurd examples, but that is exactly the point – we are so familiar with things we consider “normal” that we view the incredible as simply “natural”.
There is an amazing Gemara (Taanis 25a) about the righteousness of R’ Chanina ben Dosa that illustrates this point. He came home one Shabbos and saw his daughter weeping, and he asked why. She informed him that she had lit a lamp for Shabbos, that she had thought was filled with oil, but was in fact filled with vinegar, and she was weeping that they would have no light for Shabbos when the wick reached the vinegar, at which point it would extinguish. The reply: “מי שאמר לשמן וידלוק הוא יאמר לחומץ וידלוק” תנא היה דולק והולך כל היום כולו עד שהביאו ממנו אור להבדלה – “He who said that oil should burn will also say to vinegar to burn.” And the lamp burned the entire (night and following) day until they lit a Havdala candle with it. This story speaks volumes about how skewed our perceptions are: nature is not natural.
R’ Hillel explains that we celebrate the “extra” day of Chanuka to teach us something that seems so obvious that we don’t see it – that we must be thankful for every single thing we have and do.
The way of a Jew is “modeh ani” – to be thankful. The first thing a Jew is meant to do in the morning is thank Hashem that they woke up. Some people don’t wake up. Thank you Hashem. Some people can’t walk; paralysed suddenly, after a lifetime of mobility. Thank you Hashem. When we realise that not only are the “miracles” miracles, but everything in between – “nifle’osecha v’tovosecha sheb’chol es, erev v’voker, v’tzohoroyim” – then we’re really on our way to true praise of HaShem, and a better understanding of Hashem as the constant Creator.