On the eve of the first night of Hanukkah, known as Judaism's "festival of lights," Coalition for Jewish Values Managing Director Rabbi Yaakov Menken told Newsmax that "Hanukkah is the holiday against wokeness."
The eight-day holiday celebrates God's faithfulness and the victory of light over darkness with the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem after the Maccabean revolt against the Greeks.
"It is a time for us to recapture what is holy and dear to us, and to realize the battle again," Menken told "Wake Up America" on Tuesday.
"Many Jews fell for it when the Greeks said, 'Look, we're in charge now. We're setting up our idol in the holy temple. We're going to have our Olympic Games competing in the nude' – as the original games were done. 'We're going to have our coliseums. These are your values now.' No, we resist that. We have thousands of years of experience with governments telling us our values are wrong, and we need to revise them, he continued. "That's really the message of Hanukkah, is that people of tradition and people of faith need to cling to that tradition and faith, because in the end, God is with you."
Menken explained that each of the eight candles on the Hanukkah menorah signify an "additional day of miracle" during the temple rededication.
"What happened was that in the middle of this military confrontation against the Greeks, the sign that God was with them is when they retook the holy temple," he said.
"They cleansed out the holy temple, removed the idols and replaced it again, but they only had enough kosher purified oil for one day of use," he continued. "They put it in and they said, 'We'll have to use inferior oil, I guess.' No, a miracle happened and that light continued to burn for eight days, until they were able to produce more of the purified oil."
Asked if the message of Hanukkah resonates with people 2,000 years after the original miracle, the rabbi said he thinks "very much so because, like I said, it's about a struggle against wokeness, people telling you your values are wrong."
"People are telling you that Israel, again, is a complete rewrite of history, the same way the Greeks did," Menken said. "Whoever controlled the government controlled history back in the day. Well, we're seeing the same thing happen now when people are insisting that a Jew living in the Holy Land of Israel is a European colonialist invader into Palestine. Ironically enough, Palestine is the Greek colonialist name for the Holy Land."
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Nicole Weatherholtz ✉
Nicole Weatherholtz, a Newsmax general assignment reporter covers news, politics, and culture. She is a National Newspaper Association award-winning journalist.
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