Sparks of Light: First Night

The Chanukah story is often described as a victory of Judaism over Hellenism. While the Maccabees certainly waged war to reclaim the Temple and Jerusalem from forced Hellenisation, the battle of ideas and influence within the streets of Jerusalem proved a bit more complicated.

The Hasmonean dynasty, established following the Chanukah victory, was itself heavily influenced by Hellenism. They also broke a key Jewish principle as old as the prophets, the separation of political and religious authority, insead serving as both kings and kohanim. Even the military victory, which took 20 years to secure, was undone within in a century when the Roman empire conquered Jerusalem.

At first blush, this closer look at history may seem to mitigate the pride and power that we associate with a miraculous event. But it would be a mistake to read our history as a zero-sum conflict between Jewish and Greek cultures. It is precisely the ability of Judaism to survive and thrive through global ideological changes that is our miracle. This doesn’t happen in isolation but in our ability to engage with foreign values and ideas, borrow and adapt where we can while remaining uncompromising in protecting our identity.

The Maccabees did not fight for cultural isolationism or some romanticized vision of the Jewish past. But they did fight against assimilation and to protect Jewish ideas from ever being replaced or deemed inferior. Today we have inherited this battle as we forge a path within a halakhic system that was brilliantly designed millenia ago to protect our core identity even as it selectively adapts and integrates with the changing world.