[Avodah] SEMI CIRCLE MENORAH

[Daniel Israel]

On Fri, 16 Nov 2007 09:08:14 -0700 Menachem Posner 
<menachemp at juno.com> wrote:
>Does anyone know of a definitive ruling as to whether a Chanukah 
>menorah may or may not be shaped in a semi circle? Or rather, why 
>is it that no orthodox Jews ever use such Menorahs since there is 
>no apparent reason why not to?

R' Seth Mandel posted an excellent discussion of the shape of the 
Menorah in the BhM on Avodah, you can find it in the archives:
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol12/v12n065.shtml#12

As far as the relevance to your question, the last Lubavitcher 
Rebbe held that (a) the menorah had straight arms, and (b) a 
Chanukah menorah should be the same shape as the one in the BhM.  
Based on this, I presume, many Chabad Chassidim light a straight 
armed menorah.

RSM goes on to make a strong argument for the curved arm menorah in 
the BhM; I would guess that someone who accepted RMMS's point (b), 
but not (a), could conceivably be makpid on curved arms.  However, 
RSM writes that he can find no source for (b) other than RMMS, and 
that historical evidence is that Chanukah menorahs were not 
constructed according to any shita of what they looked like in the 
BhM.

Interestingly, the RSM's post ends with a comment about a future 
posting regarding point (b), but if that essay was ever posted, I 
can't find it.

--
Daniel M. Israel
dmi1 at cornell.edu