Love of the Land: The war on Hanukka

The war on Hanukka

Michael Freund
Fundamentally Freund/JPost
16 December 09

For more than 2,000 years, Jews around the world have been faithfully celebrating Hanukka, the annual festival of lights which commemorates the miracles performed for our ancestors during the great Hasmonean revolt against the Seleucid tyrant Antiochus Epiphanes.

It is a holiday rife with meaning for young and old, which in part explains its popularity among all sectors of Jewry, from the most estranged to the most observant. Who, after all, does not draw inspiration from the heroism of the Maccabees? Guided by divine providence, they restored our national and religious sovereignty, defeated the Syrian-Greek invaders and purified the Temple in Jerusalem.

What a stirring example of Jewish faith and fortitude!

AND YET, in recent years, a deeply troubling phenomenon has taken root, as the festival and its underlying themes have come under attack. By defacing and distorting its meaning, a growing number of pundits have essentially declared war on Hanukka, seeking to hijack the holiday to advance their own personal or political agendas.

For the most part, the assault on this beloved holiday has largely been led by devotees of the left, who have sought to shear away Hanukka's historical, religious or even cultural content, and transform it into a vehicle for promoting entirely unrelated issues.

Take, for example, an article in last week's Philadelphia Inquirer, which proclaimed the advent of "Hanukka with a climate-change message," It quoted Arthur Waskow of the Shalom Center, who said regarding the holiday: "Can there be a more perfect occasion to focus on energy conservation and breaking our dependence on fossil fuel?" Somehow, I doubt that when Judah the Maccabee and his brothers made their valiant stand two millennia ago, they did so to promote awareness of global warming.

The fact of the matter is that the Maccabees fought to salvage Judaism, not to save the oceans or even the whales. To suggest otherwise is to misrepresent the holiday and its message.

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Related: Hanukkah's Scrooge

Love of the Land: The war on Hanukka