ABOUT HANUKKA

Hanukkah which ends at sunset Monday is for everybody not only Jews.

 (not Howie's cat Harry)

This holiday season this year starts with the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah which “is a holiday that celebrates the liberation from oppression. It also provides a strong argument in favor of freedom of worship and religion. In spite of the human action that is commemorated, never far from the surface is the theology that the liberation was possible only thanks to the miraculous support of the Divine” (JEWISH LEARNING)

Hanukkah celebrates the Maccabean led 164BC revolt against the Seleucid empire which ruled Jerusalem and had turned the temple into a pagan temple. When the Maccabees recovered the temple, they found only 8 days of oil to relight the Holy Lamp over the Ark. That is why Hanukkah lasts 8 days. (Correction-It was 1 day's oil but burned for 8 days)

However about 70CE   after the Jewish revolt against the Romans there was the destruction of the 2^nd Temple and the exile of the Jews from Jerusalem.

About 90CE a rabbinical “Council of Jamnia” collated the Hebrew Bible for the diaspora Jews who no longer could worship in Jerusalem. The Books of the Maccabees were left out perhaps due to Roman pressure because it represented a successful revolt.

The 2 Books were included in the Septuagint bible written in Greek at a later date for the Alexandria Jews. This Bible became the basis of the Christian Bible's "Old Testament" where the story remains.

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