Ken Spiro

                                The Four Questions of Hannukah

Ken Spiro – December 2022

 

        -Is there a reason why Hanukkah and Christmas happen at the same time of  the year? 

 Growing up as a young Jewish kid in New York with a very limited after-school, Hebrew school education, I came up with my own theory as to why Hannukah and Christmas always fall out aroundthe same time in December. By the age of 9, I figured out that smart rabbis must have thought that if    Jewish kids saw Christian kids getting presents and they didn’t get presents too, they might not stay Jewish. An interesting theory, even if it was far from the truth. 

The reality is very different. As for the date of the holiday, the Talmud explicitly states:  

        “The Sages taught: On the twenty-fifth of Kislev, the days of Hanukkah are eight.”  (1) 

  The Book of the Maccabees, which tells the story of Hannukah, also     mentions the exact same date:

“Early in the morning of the 25th day of the ninth month which is the month of Kislev...they [the priests] rose and offered sacrifices, as the law directs, on the new alter of burnt offerings which they had built...it was dedicated with songs and harps and lutes and cymbals...So they celebrated the dedication of the alter for eight days...” (2)

 

So Hannukah REALLY did happen in the month of Kislev, which always falls out around December and which are, in the northern hemisphere, the shortest days of the year.  The question is, why is Christmas also in December?

 

The connection of Christmas (the traditional day of Jesus’s birth) to the same time of year happened sometime in the 4^th century C.E. when the early church fathers fixed the date as December 25^th, but there is no reference to this date in the Christian Bible and there is much historical speculation as to why this date was chosen.

 

  One possible explanation is that much of Christian ritual has its origins in the paganism of the Roman Empire.  Late December, which the Romans also recognized as the Winter Solstice was traditionally a time of several major pagan holidays-Saturnalia-Celebrating Saturn, the god of agriculture and also that of Sol Invictus/Helios-the sun god.  It could well be that the early church fathers deliberately placed Jesus’s birthday in December to de-paganize the season and give it a Christian ” flavor “and focus.

 

2-Why isn’t the Book of the Maccabee’s in the Hebrew Bible?

 

There are actually 8 separate works that have the title Book of the Maccabees.   By far, the best-known books are Maccabees 1 and 2. Maccabees 1 was written in Hebrew by a royal chronicler of the Hasmonean Dynasty (The Hasmonean Dynasty is the family of the Maccabees) sometime in the late 2nd century BCE and Maccabees 2 was probably written in Greek by a Jew living in Egypt, also around the same time.  We do not have the original Hebrew version of Maccabees 1 nor the original, unabridged version of Maccabees 2.

 

Both the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches consider the Books of the Maccabees to be canonical (included in the list of sacred books officially accepted as genuine.) and are included in their versions of the Bible.  The question is why doesn’t Judaism consider these books to be holy?

 

Jewish tradition teaches that the different books that comprise the Tanach-the twenty-four books of the Hebrew Bible, designated as holy - were compiled by the Men of the Great Assembly (the 120 spiritual leaders who led the Jewish people approximately 2,500 years ago during the Babylonian Exile). Two criteria were used by these great sages to decide which books to include in the Bible:

 

1-The book had to be authored by a prophet

2-The book had to contain a message relevant for all time.

 

All the books of the Maccabees were written centuries after the completion of the Hebrew Bible and none of the authors of any of these books meet the above criteria. While the books of the Maccabees are a tremendous source of information and even inspiration, they are not considered by Judaism to be holy.

 

3-What happened to the Maccabees?

 

The story of the Maccabees is not only one of great heroism and sacrifice but also one of corruption and tragedy.  The five sons of Matisyahu (Mattathias) led a struggle against the Greeks that lasted for 25 years. During this protracted conflict, four of the five brothers either died in battle or were murdered.

 

The sole surviving brother, Simon, finally gained independence from the Greeks and established a dynasty, known as the Hasmonean Dynasty that would last for 103 years. For about a century Israel had independence and Simon’s descendants assumed the roles of high priests and rulers of Israel.  As descendants of Moses’s brother, Aaron, they could lay claim to the priesthood, but they had no right to kingship as that position could only be claimed by a descendant of King David.

 

Tragically, later Maccabean rulers not only became corrupted by their power but ended up persecuting the rabbinic leadership that their ancestors had sacrificed their lives to preserve. Internal power struggles within the family eventually degenerated into civil war which opened the door to  the Roman conquest of Israel in 63BCE and ultimately the end of the Hasmonean in 37BCE when the Romans made Herod the Great the king of Israel.

 

Coming from non-Jewish ancestry, Herod had even less claim to kingship than the Maccabees. To compensate for his lack of legitimacy Herod married the last surviving Maccabean female, Miriam. Obsessively paranoid, jealous, and impulsive, the historian Josephus writes that Herod eventually had her executed. He also put to death the two children that she bore him as well as Miriam’s brother, the high priest, Aristobulus. And so, the Maccabees ceased to exist. (3)

 

The Talmudic account of the end of the Hasmonaeans differs in that it doesn’t mention Herod’s marriage to Miriam or her murder, but rather that the last Maccabean female committed suicide rather than marrying Herod. (4) Regardless of which version you choose to follow the family of the Maccabees came to a tragic end over 2,000 years ago.  The Talmud concludes:

 

“Whoever says that he is from the household of the Hasmoneans is surely a slave.” (5)

 

4-Why do we focus on the small miracle of the oil?  Wasn’t the military victory a far greater miracle?

 

There is only one very short reference to Hannukah in the Talmud:

 

“When the Greeks entered the Sanctuary, they defiled all the oils that were in the Sanctuary by touching them. And when the Hasmonean monarchy overcame them and emerged victorious over them, they searched and found only one cruse of oil that was placed with the seal of the High Priest, undisturbed by the Greeks. And there was sufficient oil there to light the candelabrum for only one day. A miracle occurred and they lit the candelabrum from it eight days. The next year the Sages instituted those days and made them holidays with recitation of hallel and special thanksgiving in prayer and blessings.”

 

The military victory of tiny Israel over superpower Greece was certainly a more impressive achievement, but the symbolism of the light of the menorah goes to the heart of the true victory:

 

  Hannukah was history’s first religious/ideological war-It was paganism’s battle against humanity’s only monotheistic faith. The Greeks tried to destroy not Jews but Judaism.

 

Despite the beauty and sophistication of Greek culture, their objective was to snuff out the light of Judaism.  With that in mind, we now understand why it’s truly fitting to focus on the miracle of the oil and not the military victory. The military victory gained Israel brief independence, but that didn’t last long.  The Hannukah lights that continue to shine brightly during the darkest time of the year truly represents the real miracle-The survival of a faith and a people and the power of that people’s faith to transform humanity and truly bring light to the world.

 

 

 

 

(1)    Babylonian Talmud,  Shabbat 21:b

(2)    I Maccabees 4:52-56

(3)    Josephus The Jewish Wars

(4)    Babylonian Talmud, Bava Batra 3:b

(5)    Babylonian Talmud, Kiddushin 70:b