Posts Tagged: history of Hanukkah
After Bondi, What Hanukkah Really Means This Year
Before Hanukkah (and before the Bondi Beach massacre), my son asked me what the holiday is really about. Not the gifts, not the latkes, not even...
Unearthing the Hasmoneans: The Hanukkah-Era Wall That Speaks to Israel’s Present
Archaeology rarely makes headlines. But every so often, a discovery surfaces that does more than illuminate the past -- it clarifies the present. The newly uncovered...
A Hanukkah Guide for the Perplexed
Ahead of this year's celebration of Hanukkah, here are eight important facts about the holiday: 1. Hanukkah is the only Jewish holiday that commemorates an ancient...
A History of Hanukkah and Jewish Survival
We like to think that Hanukkah was the great victory of Judah, the son of Mattiyahu the Priest (who initiated the resistance) against the mighty...
A Hanukkah Guide for the Perplexed, 2024
Here are eight things to know about Hanukkah, as the holiday begins tomorrow night: 1. A bust of Judah the Maccabee is displayed at West Point...
Remembering Hanukkah 1917 and the Liberation of Jerusalem
On December 9, 1917, British forces accepted the Turkish surrender of Jerusalem. Two days later, British forces officially entered the walls of the city. As the...
A Hanukkah Guide for the Perplexed, 2016
1. Hanukkah and Jewish immortality. In 1899, Mark Twain wrote: “Jews constitute but one percent of the human race…, [but] their contributions to literature, science, art, music,...
