Tales of the Feasts
The Hanukkah Story


A hanukkiah like this one is
the traditional symbol of Hanukkah


The Evil King

Long ago, even before the days of the Master, a new and evil king rose up over the people of Israel. His name was Antiochus Epiphanes, and he had no love for the Jewish people or for the God of the Jews.

Antiochus made new laws saying that everyone in his kingdom, even the Jews, would have to observe and worship the same way he did. They would have to bow down and pray to statues and idols. The Jews were told that they could no longer keep the Sabbath or study Torah or eat kosher or circumcise their sons.

Many Jews decided that they would not disobey Torah. They chose to break the King's new laws and keep the ways of God.

Antiochus became very angry. How dare the Jews disobey him!? He ordered his soldiers to put idols in the streets and to make the Jews worship the idols. The Jews would not.

Antiochus became even angrier. He ordered his soldiers to destroy the beautiful things in God's Temple, the menorah and the table and the altar. He took away all the treasure of the Temple and then put his idols in the Temple. He sacrificed pigs to his idols on the altar of God!

The Priest and His Sons

In the town of Modiin there lived an old priest named Mattityahu. He had five sons. There names were Yochanon, Shimon, Yehudah and Yonaton. One day the soldiers of King Antiochus came to Modiin. They set up a large idol right in the middle of the town and told Mattityahu to make a sacrifice to the idol. Mattityahu would not. Instead he took his knife and attacked the soldiers.

Mattityahu and his sons fled. They said, "Everyone who wants to keep the Torah, come with us!" They went to hide from the soldiers in the hills. Many Jews came to hide with them. They decided that they would rather fight the King's soldiers then obey the king's sinful laws.

Mattityahu was very old, and he died in the hills. His son Yehudah began to train the people to fight. Everyone called him the "Maccabee." Maccabee means hammer.

Yehudah the Hammer

Yehudah the Maccabee and his five brothers led the Jewish people to fight the King's soldiers. They were out numbered. They did not have many weapons. They were not trained soldiers. They would surely lose!

Yehudah prayed to the LORD. Then he told the people, "Don't be afraid. God is able to deliver the strong into the hands of the weak."

They fought many hard battles. Antiochus sent armies with powerful weapons and riding on war elephants to fight the little group of Jews. Some of Yehudah's brothers were killed in the fighting. But God was with them and gave them many victories.

The Temple and the Oil

At last they drove the enemy soldiers out of Jerusalem. They went up to worship the LORD in His Temple. What a mess! The curtains were torn, weeds were growing, the stones were cracked, rooms were burned, and idols were everywhere. They smashed the idols and cleaned the Temple.

They wanted to give the Temple back to the LORD. They wanted to re-dedicate it to him. Hanukah means dedication. It is a remembrance of the days when Yehudah Maccabee and the Jews rededicated the Temple of the LORD.

They went to keep the mitzvah of lighting the Menorah lamp, but they could find only enough olive oil to burn it for one day. It would be several days until they could make new oil for the Holy Temple.

What did they do? They decided to use the little bit of olive oil they found anyway. Better to keep the Mitzvah for just one day than not at all.

A miracle happened. The next day the menorah was still burning. The oil had not run out. It burned all day and all night and was still burning the next day too! It was still burning the next and the next and the next. One day's supply of oil burned for eight days until the priests could make new oil. Click here to learn about Olive Oil.

To remember the miracle of Yehudah Maccabee and his heroic fighters we burn the Hanukkiah for the eight nights of Hanukah.

Kehilat Sar Shalom

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