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=> Rabbi details Hanukkah history

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Rabbi details Hanukkah history

By Laura Pope
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To those outside the Jewish faith, the celebration of Hanukkah may seem like a revelry that resembles the Fourth of July and Thanksgiving rolled into one.

Though the themes of independence, reverence and thanksgiving are very much sentiments expressed in the observance of Hanukkah, an annual eight-day Jewish festival that begins this evening at sunset, the holiday also has very much to do with a historic battle won by an underdog guerrilla force against a formidable fighting machine.

"Hanukkah is the first battle for religious freedom in human history, a battle taking place in 168, before the Christian era," explained Rabbi David Mark of Temple Israel in Portsmouth.

The holiday is based on an ancient story rife with villains and heroes, challenges, miracles and celebration.

"This is a story about a family of temple priests, the Maccabees, who wanted to keep the old ways in the face of Hellenism," Mark said.

Jim Dricker, education director at Temple Israel in Portsmouth, prepares the menorah on Thursday. Tonight at sundown marks beginning of the Jewish celebration of Hannukah.

Staff photo by Rich Beauchesne

The family was headed by Mattathias, who had five sons - Simeon, Judas, Elazar, Yochanan and Jonathan. They lived during a time when Antiochus IV, an Assyrian, ruled the region on behalf of the Greek empire. Unlike previous Assyrian kings, Antiochus attempted to restrict Jews in the region from following their monotheistic religion and to force them to honor Greece’s pantheon of deities.

"So, here we have the Jews facing down a Greek way of living, not only in terms of religion, but in terms of philosophy, fashion, mythology and the role of the gymnasium," Mark said.

The spark that set off the Maccabean uprising of the Jews against the Assyrians centered on a messenger from Antiochus, who came to the town in which Mattathias held the role of local Jewish priest.

"This messenger came to the village of Modein," said the Portsmouth rabbi. "He came with small figures of Antiochus - rendered as Zeus - for the Jews to worship, and then was about to kill a pig (an unclean animal in the eyes of Jews) for all to eat at the worship, when Mattathias killed the messenger."

Realizing the trouble that would come from killing an emissary of the king, the Maccabees fled to the hills, and Antiochus sent an army to capture and kill them. Greatly outnumbered by the troops, Mattathias understood the only chance for him and his followers lay in fighting a guerrilla war.

During the years of fighting, Mattathias grew old, and his son, Judas, took on the mantle of leadership. And against all odds - and because Antiochus got into a war in another part of his area of control that forced him to divide his forces - the Maccabees were victorious.

They reclaimed the capital of Judea, Jerusalem, and decided to rededicate the Great Temple, the center of Jewish worship, which had been defiled by the Assyrians.

"The Syrians had not destroyed the temple," said Rabbi Mark. "They had statues of the king inside, and pigs had been (slaughtered as offerings to the Greek gods) there, but the Maccabees reconquered the temple and purified the (Great) Menorah (the holy candelabra)."

The Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot, an eight-day celebration, had been put aside during the war, so the Jews decided to rededicate the temple in an eight-day festival.

"(The Jews) found only a small container of unspoiled holy oil to burn in the menorah (which normally would have allowed the great light to burn for only one day), but it burned for eight days, and that is the miracle of Hanukkah," Mark said. "Today, Jews display in their windows their menorahs, with seven candles, or their Hanukkiyah, a branch of eight level candles, with a ninth, called a shammash (pronounced Sha-mas), which is used to light the (other) candles, (and is) raised above or below the row of eight candles.

"(The purpose is so that) passers-by will see what day of Hanukkah is being celebrated by seeing how many candles are lit," he said.

Rabbi Mark said he agrees that the holiday appeals to many cultures.

"The lighting of candles in winter is a ritual found in many cultures," he said. "The European tradition of eating potato latkes (pancakes) fried in oil during Hanukkah relates to many, as the potato was a food familiar to the Polish, Irish and many others.

"The tradition stems from the miracle of the small bit of oil burning for eight long days at the temple, so eating foods fried in oil is something we do at this time of year," said the rabbi.

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