Chanukah
Chanukah is the eight-day Jewish holiday celebrating the recovery and cleansing of the Jerusalem temple from Greco-Syrian contamination. This small glimpse of independence had come and gone a century and a half before Jesus was born.
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At this earlier point in Israel’s history, they were ruled by the Seleucids, the descendants of one of the generals of Alexander the Great. The ruler was Antiochus Epiphanes, or Antiochus, the god manifest. Where it was safe, the Jews called him Antiochus Epimanes, or Antiochus, the mad man. The persecution of the Jewish people was an attempt to destroy their worship of Yahweh. In the process, Antiochus converted the temple to the worship of the Greek gods. It was said that he had a pig sacrificed on the temple’s altar.
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In a fit of rage over the imposed idolatry, a Jewish man by the name of Mattathias revolted. He killed a priest conducting the pagan sacrifices in his hometown and called Israel to revolt against Syrian rule. Miraculously, he and his five sons cleared the land of its idolatry and Syrian rule. The son who led the revolt was Judas the Hammer, or Judas Maccabean.
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Upon recovery of rule, Judas and his followers cleansed the temple and set about to relight the temple candelabra. Their difficulty was that they only had oil for one night and it would take eight days to prepare the additional olive oil needed. Miraculously, the oil lasted eight days. To celebrate this, Chanukah, the Festival of Lights, came into practice.
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Never quite free of the greater powers of their day, Simon, the last of the Maccabean brothers to rule, sought Rome’s protection from Egypt and Syria. From that time forward, Roman interference in Jewish life increased until Rome totally ruled Israel. Roman intrigue in local politics eventually put Herod the Great in power.
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