Hanukkah Part1

by Joan Masterson

Hanukkah has many names: “The Festival of the Dedication of the Altar, “The Memorial of the Purification of the Temple” and “The Festival of the Lights.” Each name has historical and spiritual implications in our lives today. To fully present to you all that I have learned from my studies, I have decided to release a series of three articles.

The more I study about Hanukkah, the more I see how God is revealed through the history of the Jewish people. 

1 When you grasp that the Jews, as a people group, were created to reveal God’s heart, His ways, and eventually His Son to this planet, you can appreciate how great the war is between satan and God. 2 It becomes clear how much effort satan puts into trying to portray God as a liar and stop His eternal plan. This plan, which began before the earth’s foundation, was pronounced to satan in the Garden and declared in covenant language to Abraham. 3,4

In B.C. 170 the Syrian-Greek ruler Antiochus Epiphanies attacked Jerusalem and killed 80,000 Jews, selling many more into slavery. He destroyed the temple, stole the articles of worship, and at the altar, sacrificed to his foreign gods. He destroyed copies of the Law and prohibited all Jewish religion, making it a capital offense to have a copy of the Law or to circumcise a child. If a parent was found to have circumcised their son, they were crucified with the son hanging around their neck. In Dec. B.C. 168 he sent another 20,000 troops into Jerusalem, erected an Idol of Zeus, offered swine blood on the altar, and turned the chambers into brothels for his soldiers.

Violence was not the only method satan employed. He also engaged the pride of the Jews themselves to eliminate God’s ways in the lifestyle of the Jewish people. Antiochus wanted to impose the Hellenistic culture on the inhabitants of his Kingdom. Many Jews embraced that philosophy to gain political and economic stature. Hellenistic Jews wanted to preserve only the aspects of Judaism that fit with the Greek ideals. To accomplish this they chose to remove anything that separated the Jews from others. They rejected the very laws God sent down to reveal His ways to the world. Sabbath worship and circumcision were denied, and pagan sacrifice was incorporated into worship. Do you understand how important those two aspects of God’s laws are? Circumcision is the physical sign of covenant for the Jewish man with God. Shabbat, the covenant act of submission and trust, is so near to God’s heart that not keeping it was grounds for the death of an individual. Those who kept it were given the promise of blessings, whether Jew or foreigner.

Enter now the Maccabees, a family consisting of a priest and his five sons; a small band of lovers of God and His ways. The commentaries of this account show two opposite opinions. Some see them as liberators esteeming the Lord and His ways. Others see them as zealots taking the Law into their own hands and interpreting it for their interests. The same mindset identifies the remnant of believers who are lovers of God and His ways today.

History records that Mattathias, an old priest of the village of Modin, killed a Hellenist Jew who accompanied a royal commissioner of Antiochus as they offered heathen sacrifice in the temple. Mattathias and his five sons then fled to the hills. Mattathias and two of his sons died within a few months. The remaining sons were Judas, Jonathan, and Simon. Judas’ name was changed to  “Maccabee”, meaning hammer. By Dec of B.C. 164, under Judas’ leadership, a small band of Jewish Freedom Fighters reclaimed the temple. The temple was rededicated to God on Kislev 25 B.C., three years to the date after its desecration.

In the first book of “Maccabees”, found in the “Apocrypha”: “Judas Maccabaeus admonished the Jewish people, ‘The days of the dedication of the altar should be kept in their season from year to year, by the space of eight days, from the five and twentieth day of the Month of Chislev, with gladness and joy.’”

In my next article, we will discuss the 8 days of celebration. This is the story of the Oil and the revelation of the Menorah that they kept in the temple. There is so much richness to receive from that aspect of Hanukkah that I want to have time to unfold it in a separate release.

Are you puzzled as to why there was so much energy used to destroy the Jewish culture? My answer to that question is the following. From the day satan embraced the idea of elevating himself above his creator; his goal has been to establish his kingdom and to be worshiped as the supreme god. If there were no more Jews, Messiah could not come as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. There would not be a Son of David to sit on the throne as King of Kings forever. There would not be the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world. God’s word would not be fulfilled. Satan would prove that God is not sovereign but a failure. So I ask you, does the victory of the Maccabees become only a triumph for the Jewish people, or is that victory also part of the foundation of faith for every Gentile who believes in Jesus as their Savior and Lord?

Sadly, the universal church today is not far from the mindset of the Hellenistic Jews. A doctrine of love and acceptance, without boundaries of morality and integrity in the ways of God, is called God’s grace. A culture of pagan worship has crept into the church and created a place to satisfy the needs of the flesh above the ways of God. There is a culture today unwilling to acknowledge His sovereignty or understand that it is that very sovereignty that brought us the ultimate sacrifice of His only Son on the cross. All of this is because of His uncompromising love for us.

Antiochus, Haman, Herod, Hitler, and a host of others, used by the enemy of our King Jesus, have tried, to no avail, to thwart God’s plans by destroying the Jewish people.  Over and over again and against all odds, history shows that the hand of the Lord fights with and for the Jewish people. The miracle of the Six-Day War was fought on the same mountain as the Maccabees. As with the Maccabees, the Israeli army was seriously outnumbered. You need to realize, my friend, that against all odds, your God will also fight for you. It may not always look as you might expect but he promises that He will never leave you or forsake you. He stands firm, for He watches over His word to perform it.

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1 Gen 12:1-3 [1] Now the LORD had said to Abram: “Get out of your country, from your family and your father’s house to a land that I will show you. [2] I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. [3] I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you, and in you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

2 Gen: 3:15 And I will put enmity between you (Satan) and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.”

3 Rev. 13:8 All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. (NKJ)

4 The plan which began before the earth’s foundation was pronounced to Satan in the garden and declared in covenant language to Abraham.