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BY: ALAN MORINIS

Hanukkah: A Miracle of Trust

Hanukkah: A Miracle of Trust

What is the real reason we celebrate Hanuk

There are really two answers. We commemo

Temple after the Maccabees defeated the S

 As the letters on the four sides of the dreidel

Nes gadol haya sham, “A great miracle hap

What was this miracle? Was it the military vioccupying power—or something else?

When the rabbis established the Hanukkah

of the Temple in 165 B.C.E., they acknowled

was a very important historical event (Babyl

Maccabees’ victorious military strategy and prowess in battle alone did not merit a religious

entirely due to human action, without any aid from the Divine. Only if God’s intervention had

outnumbered Jewish fighters would there have been a miracle worthy of celebrating with a

Moreover, the rabbis did not view this battle as a war of ultimate necessity. In contrast to Pu

tyranny when the existence of all the Jews in the kingdom was threatened by royal decree, t

to a dire physical threat. True, the Syrian Greek occupiers prohibited Jews from o!ering sac

the people were not imperiled by annihilation.

What, then, was the miracle that warranted the creation of a new Jewish festival?

 A miracle of the spirit.

 As it is told in the Talmud (Shabbat 21b), when Judah Maccabee entered the desecrated Te

which had the seal of the Kohen Gadol (the High Priest) certifying it was sanctified for ritual

night, and yet it burned for eight.

 And that is why, three times daily during Hanukkah, we add the Al Hanisim—for the miracle

speaking of the military victory but ends by saying: “…Your children came to Your holy abo

lights in the courtyards of Your holy place. And they established these eight days of Hanukk

Your great name.”

 

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