Hannukah – what are we celebrating? (2)

JVL Introduction

This second piece questioning what we are celebrating at Hannukah notes that “(w)e usually tell Hanukkah as a straightforward story of good and evil: a small band of Jews defends their faith against an empire, and a miracle in the Temple affirms that steadfastness can overcome adversity. ”

However, Hannukah is also a story of force and questions whether this is still relevant when we are not powerless. The article notes that the legacy of  the rarely mentioned “John Hyrcanus, a later Hasmonean ruler and direct descendant of the Maccabees, …haunts the holiday. A generation after the revolt, Hyrcanus used the political power of the Hasmonean kingdom to forcibly convert the neighboring Idumeans to Judaism. A movement that began as resistance to assimilation ended in the coerced assimilation of others. The people whose story we tell as a fight for religious freedom became, in time, the ones taking that freedom away.”

So the Hannukah miracle also led to forced conversions. The stories we were told – and are still telling, are of  the plucky Jews who fought for their own religious freedom – and won – but did not respect the religious freedoms of others.  Is this an early example of failing to learn the lessons from our own history?

LL

This article was originally published by The Forward on Wed 10 Dec 2025. Read the original here.