Rav Yitzchak Breitowitz: In The Middle of The Battle - Do Not Give Up!!!

[Music] okay hi everybody Shalom and good to have you and the sh is dedicated for the following praying for victory of our soldiers in Gaza Lebanon Syria uh for the lasting Unity of am Israel and for all of those whose Health has been affected by the war Rua for Bor Ben feda Alat for Shalom Ben f y k Ben alzar uh the grandfather of ysep khi friend of mine ruen Ben y Aon Ben who is tonight toana Ben danil and B Miriam and tonight's class is dedicated again L nishmas Rabbi and Mrs Philip finlin by their children ephra and Naomi felstein again a major major influence in in my life and finally lives of many others and finally a special dedication the jakovic F siblings are sponsoring the shear in honor of their parents Shimon and Shaina jakovic kovic their wedding anniversary a new great grandchild they should have continued in gratitude for weekly inspiring words of Torah I just I always read what's in front of me okay uh finishing touches are being made for the new Yan Community Center as I said a few moments ago I was Z to see it this morning it is really really fantastic it'll be a beautiful beautiful place a special thanks to a few generous donors we were able to start the renovations uh because of that help please consider various ways to help complete the work as a special dedication list is on the Ebon website and general contributions can be made directly for this project using the link in the YouTube you YouTube description box and on the website again as I say it's a wonderful wonderful opportunity and uh will be a major mom of uh our basas Torah and AAS Hashem here in the in the neighborhood and because it's right next door to a good bagel shop you can get something to eat before or even I don't know how late they're over but even after this year maybe as as well so as say if there's no flow there's no Torah this is K and Torah so uh as just AEM uh we are entering Kaneka tomorrow night will be Kaneka uh a little strangely it corresponds with a big Goa holiday that's going on we don't pay that much attention to it but we're going to focus on Kaneka and I want to continue a little bit uh our discussion uh we were discussing last week I'm not going to elaborate on that too much that um the ER Isel for over a hundred years was being like a football between the Tomic Dynasty uh which was located in Egypt North Africa and the salusa dynasty which had Syria and turkey and thereo was going back and forth back and forth back and forth uh there were Wars these are called both of them are called Greek because both are successors to helenistic culture of Alexander Alexander of Macedonia uh and uh that's why we talk about them as Greek even though anoas didn't come from Greece the particular start of the Kaneka Story begins with a predecessor of the big bad antias and that was his father known as antias III antias the third is actually called in history antias the great he actually was a very successful military person and he succeeded in a major major war against the toic Dynasty in Egypt and he conquered ER Israel he rested ER Israel and the Jewish population from Tomy now that alone did not create any persecution because the truth of the matter is uh you know the toic dynasty were helist and the salusa dynasty were helist so so it almost made no difference where the Jews were so Antiochus III was like any other ruler pushing assimilation pushing heniz but there wasn't any particular coercion what happens then is antias the third dies and is succeeded by his son antios IV antios IV is if I can say it AR antios he is the villain of the Kaneka story uh he is known historically he gave himself the name antios epifanis which kind of means antios the Divine or the Magnificent behind his back his own people changed a a a letter instead of calling him anti epis anti the Divine he became known as antias EP Manus which means in Greek antios the insane his own people considered him to be crazy and he was mades a new way of expressing hatred towards the Jewish people that actually was unique he was the first king to make direct decrees against the practice of the Torah now this may sound very surprising to you because we had all sorts of bad guys before him but it's interesting let's take destroyed the bikes yeah obviously exiled the Jewish people that's are murdered tens of thousands maybe hundreds of thousands of Jews but this was actually political this was egotism this was power this was control nzar didn't care as long as you paid your taxes and as long as you honored him you know you could learn Torah keep chabas he really didn't care one way or the other same thing with pyro pyro enslaved us persecuted us pyro didn't care what you were doing in the privacy of your home the first king at least the first non-jewish king we may have had some we may have had some Jewish kings that tried to deliberately extinguish Torah for example it's interesting we see that from the Jewish Kings but the first non-jewish king who deliberately targeted the practices of Judaism was antias hon didn't do that right hamon didn't care from not from hon was like Hitler but antios did Target it Target the practices of Judaism chabas and kashus and rodes and there were even rules that a woman on her wedding night first had to have relations with a Greek official and they weren't allowed to go to the Mikvah all sorts of different stories of different types of persecution now what was antiochus's agenda so antiochus's agenda apparently was he wanted to speed up a process of assimilation and hellenization that was happening anyway meaning from the time of Alexander L Sanu more and more Jews were intermarrying more and more Jews were similar ating more and more Jews were abandoning the Torah just like we see today and antias didn't have to accelerate the process but he wanted to make it quick because there were still a few hold outs so he made all sorts of persecutions in which people who kept Mitzvah if they were found they would be killed and there were many many instances of Jews who died Al Hashem rather than give in but I do want to point out the very sad reality that a majority of the Jewish people were not keeping the Torah at this point meaning to say whether it's because of the acceler the assimilation that occurred before antias I 4 or whether would be it was because of the gazer of anti more and more Jews were abandoning the m so what you have is you have a small group of people and and the spiritual leader of the Rebellion against the yanim was a very very elderly person who died before the Kaneka story and that is Mattis yo and Mattis gathered his five sons and he said we have to fight this we have to stand up we have to establish the privacy of Torah in the Jewish people and they eventually assembled an army now let's look at at the Alan for a moment the Alan is the prayer that we recite on khah in Bening and Inon so the story of Kana occurred in the days of M the son of Y the Kain God so first of well I hope you can see right off the bat that there's a certain ambiguity in Hebrew if the word Cohen G is going back on Mao that Mato was the Coen or was his father yanan the Coen and the many mam say that there is no record that maio was ever coo he was a great great Sonic but he happened not to have that position so Bashas gal is referring to his father Yan and here we do have throughout k a number of references to yanan Coal but but again it's still very confusing because there are several different people that are called yanan Coen but there is at least one y in Coen that's a very fascinating figure and a very tragic figure mentioned a who served as a Coen godd for 80 years as a righteous person so he must have been over 100 because you know whatever it would be but 80 years as a Coen and then he became a saicy he denied tal and essentially his cultural uh his cultural Focus was Hellenism now there's a huge M most opinions actually say that this y anden was a descendant of maio not his father but there is a minority of view that actually says y was none other than maio's father now if you learn that way I hope you can see the poignancy here why was this aged Mao so adamant we got to fight this we have to uproot this because he saw the tragedy in his own father his father was a sadic his father was righteous but he got caught up in this fever or this cancer or whatever you want to call it and it destroyed him and maio saw that if even the sadim of clra could be destroyed we have to be willing to risk Our Lives to to stand up for Hashem stand up for the Torah so that's the but then it goes further and says so first of all let me point out a very interesting thing that that people don't don't realize there is a that actually reads in the days of according to that is another person meaning Al is actually describing two different leaders of the revolt against yavan one was a man called M and the other was a man called right the gear indeed there are some M andaz that actually say there was a man called but most if you look in standard translations there's no V so most understand that is a modifier of M that m is called the so why is that so what does Kash mean what what what does mean as a word so there are a few different interpretations some focus on a word inim called Asim are nobility fact if you if you remember the memory might be fading but then tomorrow night you'll be singing it again so Mo in the stanza about says uh the Greeks came against me in the days of so instead of and that is a word that appears into and it means nobility so is a Corruption of that word so it means Noble great that's one other of is that in saer yahushua one of the cities of the levim was called kashon orona so kashai refers to the ancestral place of origin they were in modan but but but originally they came from Kon so that's the second interpretation the third is offered by Josephus Josephus actually says was M great grandfather and that became the family name meaning M's father was yanan but if you go back a few more Generations okay now M died very very m died before there was an active campaign but basically his sons organized a makeshift Army which led a series of what you might call Guerilla Warfare against the Greeks now this was quite quite amazing because here's what you have to remember number one the Greek army under antias was the most powerful military force in the world at the time Rome was not yet as significant as it later later became the Jewish Army was untrained the Jewish Army was unarmed they did not have adequate supplies they did not have uh all that they needed and not only that this is critical a majority of the Jewish people did not support this Revolt a majority of the Jewish people looked at them as religious Fanatics a majority of the Jewish people were happy with Greek culture in fact in some perverted way you can even look at antias as a civil libertarian Antiochus was not anti-semitic antia said to the Jewish people you can be anything you want just get rid of your Torah again unlike H unlike hman hon is like Hitler Hitler didn't care from not from you could be a Jew converted to Christianity and you D in the concentration camps antias is exactly the opposite the only thing antias cared about was to take Jews away from Torah and if you abandon the Torah you're fine so here's the thing you have this Army which is small untrained and they don't even have the support of their own Nation but they persevered now from a secular standpoint this is quite remarkable and I understand that during the Vietnam war where the United States was facing you know Guerilla Warfare from a small rag tag collection of rice Patty farmers and it turned out that the rice Patty Farmers with the funny hats won essentially United States never declared that but but you know basically they had to withdraw without accomplishing what they wanted to accomplish so West Point looked to the book of the macbes to kind of understand military strategies as it were now at some point what antias did was as he's fighting he enters the Bas he I mean his army enters the basa mikdash he desecrates the temple and by desecration I mean real real desecration houses of prostitution were built in the basam Mikes itself altars were erected and statues were erected to aod Zora in the Bas of M itself Kaz pigs were sacrificed on the Altar and according to the book of the mbes and I'll talk about this what the book of the macbes is in a moment theim entered the bikash on the 25th of K the day that later became khaka they desecrated it on the 25th of klave and they were in possession of the mikdash for three full years it's fascinating that we were able to enter the mkes on the 25th of klave three years later according to the book of the mccabes that was in the year Well we convert it to Modern 265 BC obviously look back didn't know BC but 265 BCE right uh the Ian entered the mcdash 26 8 BCE we gained control of the mikdash 265 BCE on the 25th of KL and then the khaka story unfolding now let me just again a point of definition what is the difference between the term and the term maim maab ammonian what is the difference so putting aside the opinion that Kash was literally another person that's one thing but if you look at it in terms of a term from mat's family was the family designation of M soash can only be used for M his sons and their descendants so the monarchy that was established at the end of the Kaneka story was the malus of the Mak was originally a term that was only given to one of Mao's Sons the famous Yehuda hakabe and then it got extended to the whole Army so the revolt against antias is called the Maan Revolt okay so makabe in this sense is not a Health Service uh nor is it an AC capella Choir in the University uh so what does makab actually mean so there's a makus what makabi means some say that makabi is spelled with a K A K and uh the word maket means hammer and it's a reference to udah makabi who had was a tremendously powerful Warrior others say makabi is spelled with a and with a it uh is an acronym it's an abbreviation who is like you God this is in and it says that the abbreviation Mak was the banner they went into battle knowing that is the actually suggests another derivation that makab with a is benan M the Coen son of yan now you might ask me we I've been talking about saer hak the book of the mbes let me explain what the book of the mbes is the book of the mbes is not tanak because by the time the khaka story happened the period of Prophecy is over so there are no no no new books of n but it's in what is called the Apocrypha which is called the Jew the Hebrew name for it is the excluded books uh but it was written very shortly after the events of this war we don't know who wrote it but it is an account and the rim consider it a reliable account and it goes through antias gazerro and it goes through battle by battle by battle if you like military history it gives you more detail than um most people might be interested in but it really go that's why West Point West Point was not reading it for the spiritual messages they were reading it for the military strategies Etc this is safe for Hakim so you might ask me a question why is there a makus if makab is with a k or makab is with a how is it spelled in seabim whatever it says there is what it was the answer is we do not have the original book of makim in Hebrew now we don't know either it was not written in Hebrew originally or the Hebrew was lost we only have the book of the macbes in Greek now there are of course Hebrew versions of the book of the mccabes but they are translations from the Greek they are not an original in Greek the word makabe you don't really know what it means in Hebrew so as a result you don't know and that's why we have a a mlus it is fascinating a little counterintuitive in a sense that if the macabe Revolt is against yavan why would the book of the macbes be written in Greek but maybe that's the point maybe that was the K ofok idea that maybe the notion was that after we achieve this great glorious victory for Hashem we want our assimilated Brethren to also come back to Hashem so we write a book in Greek to bring them to bring them back now in truth some some people call the book of makabe sa forab sa for you'll see two titles but but it's it's it's real title is saer makim and what's interesting is in the Apocrypha there's four just like we have M there's Mak Mak makim Mak there are four books of the makab but in truth mbes three and four uh are not about khaka at all I mean they're they're about philosophical discussion so really I I don't even know why there were called books of the macbes but what's relevant to us is makim Al and makim B which has a lot of overlapping history but I want to point out an interesting nuda and that is if you read both mbes 1 and mbes 2 and we ask a very simple question why is there a holiday called Kaneka what is Kaneka commemorating what is the reason why are sages enacted Aug so most people instinctively say oh well there was this miracle that we found a jar of oil and it only had enough oil for one day and it lasted for eight days so that's why we have an 8- Day Festival that is not what the book of makab says the book of Mame says that when we finally entered the BAM mikash after 3 years and we were able to dedicate it purify it consecrate it we instituted an 8 day dedication ceremony and of course that's what the word khuk means dedic ceremony corresponding to the 8 day dedication ceremony of the mishkan in the time of mosha Raben so sa Al says the eight days of Kana ISAT Hab it the dedication of the temple so I just want to add a little by the way the moral says the moral who did not read does not have access to the book of babes says the same thing on his own Mahal of PR with m to the book of the mabes so I just want to add the following H it is true that the dedication of the Mish was an 8 day dedication but when schl built the first B mikdash the dedication was 14 days the book of MIM says that so why when the makes dedicate the B mikdash the second temple why did they do it eight days instead of 14 days or even maybe longer again why was it 14 days well that's I don't know I mean wanted wanted it to be two weeks to have two complete weeks of dedication including y KRA by the way because the the dedication concluded on andal tell us that year they ate Kipper because they were celebrating the dedication of the B so here's what I want to add a little bit there's a medish that says an interesting idea that when the Jewish people began constructing the mishun after yum Kipper they were actually finished in the month of KL and they could have dedicated the mishkan in K life but Hashem wanted to defer dedication of the mishkan until the month of Nissan which is when it was dedicated because that was that was the birth of Etc so as the MIM often say the month of kle was very upset that it lost the chance to be the month of dedication so Hashem promised the month of klave there will be a future Dedication that you will get in times of Kaneka so now it's very beautiful it turns out the dedication of kle was a makeup for KL missing the dedication of the mishkin that's why the number of days of that dedication is going to be eight days rather than 14 days because it corresponds to the Michigan now with sa for a makabe you actually have a wonderful wonderful answer to the most famous question of Kaneka famous question everybody knows this question this is known as the question of the Bas yfe although earlier people do ask him that is why is Kaneka 8 days if there was enough oil for one day and a miracle happened and it burned for eight days so the miracle is only seven days it's not eight days again the number of answers to this question literally grow every year uh when I was in yiva I think people said oh there are 50 answers to this question uh a few years ago a safer came out with 500 answers uh to this question now I saw a safer that has 1,000 answers to this question talk about answer inflation now to be fair you know a lot of what people are calling different answers are not really different answers like they change like they change a tiny little thing in an answer and they make it a different answer okay Bader um but as I say answers abound so obviously any answer I give you is one out of literally one out of a thousand or more but like the book of the mccabes it's galic the reason why Kaneka is 8 days is not because of the miracle of the oil it's eight days because the dedication of the B mikash was eight days just like the dedication of the mishkan so kanuka is 8 days because the kanuka was eight days you see so it doesn't depend on the Miracle of of the ne now makab number two gives another reason why Kan eight days and it says the following for three years the Jewish people did not have access to the B Mikes besides the war they didn't have access to the B Mikes that means they did not fulfill any of the mitzvos connected to the sh carbon pus and finally they have the ability to go to the Bas of mikash now the closest Rego that they missed right the last thing that they missed was the holiday of sukus now sukus is actually an 8-day Festival essentially because you have seven days of sukus followed the immediately by so they made as a makeup for the eight days of sukus that they missed now this is a non makeup because you can't make up if you if you miss PES you can't I mean there is PES Shen for the Corbin PES but if you miss the holiday of PES you can't make it up if you miss sukus you can't make it up well P sh is for the the Corb P but but you can't make the Y you don't have y it's not a yum you can't make up a yum uh you can't make up suus for sure and yet this exemplifies a yearning and a passion to be connected to a Mitzvah and they made eight days of Kan as a way of celebrating that the book of the makes 2 actually says the Jewish people spontaneously brought Lula and Esra in other words imagine they weren't able to celebrate suus like just 6 weeks before whatever now we can go let's bring our Lula vanra to the B Mikes so makab one connects the eight days to the dedication of the mishkan makab 2 connects the eight days to the holiday of sukus now since Hally there is no way to make up suus so this was a nonh makeup so there is no remes in K to such a concept you're not going to find Kaz connecting except one obscure reference and like a fossil it reminds us of the origin even though K do not make it explicit there's a famous M I know you've heard between B and B how do you celebrate the kanaka lights according to bill which is what we do of course excluding the shamish you start with one and you go up right one second night two according to B you start with eight and you go down as is always the case or or is most of the time the case we follow bill now the gar chabas says we understand basill because basill says you go up in Holiness and you don't go down but why would B Shi say you start with eight and you go down so the gamar in one of its answers says Ah because bami wants to connect the Kan lights to the pattern of the carbonos of sukus now if you remember the pattern of the carbonos of suus which equal the 70 nations of the world is you go down day one3 blls so Bashi says Ah the same way the carbonos of sukus go down the kanaka candles go down now the question is but what's the connection I mean all right suus goes down why is so I would suggest that b is a remnant of makab 2 that is telling us that the eight days of Kaneka are supposed to correspond to sukus in some ways so it survives there so even though kazal did not want to acknowledge the legitimacy of a makeup because there is no makeup for suus but at least according to Bam which is not the the connection to sukus got enshrined okay it's very interesting this is why I actually think um you know if you know in the isas they don't emphasize uh history at all so we learn gor Etc but but if you understand some of the historical background you actually understand the kazal much better if you understand the concrete history here now another point I want to point out is ma Al makab one and makab these two cover the same territory they describe the same rebellion and the dedication of the basam mikas but they have a different emphasis now I want to say both books are holy books they are not secular books both I mean I I don't mean they're holy like tanak but both books proceed from amuna in Hashem they are not secular in that way written by we don't know that it's really Anonymous we don't know who the author is but both books have a religious tone that this is a mil not for political Independence this is not a for Statehood or nationalism this is a war so we can keep the Torah both books have that same orientation but they emphasize a different nud maab one emphasizes the military heroism of theim it goes through every battle it talks about the courage of the Warriors it talks about their commitments to defeat the enemy for for Spiritual reasons right it's a song of praise to the military strength that Hashem had given the Jews makim too has a different emphasis there are many stories of martyrdom and it talks about the people who were murdered who died Al Hashem for example the very famous Story one of the most famous kanaka stories about KH a woman named KH and her seven children who were slaughtered by antias because they refused to bow down to idols and the young I mean and the youngest son the last son even antias felt pity for the last son and he said you don't have to worship the idol I'm going to throw my ring on the floor and if you pick just pick up the ring that'll be fine and this little kid who seems not to even have been Bar Mitzvah we don't know exactly says do not think that you are King there is no King but Hashem and there will be a time that you yourself will be judged before God and I will not betray my Creator and that child was killed as well and the Book of the mccabes goes into gruesome detail this was not simply a matter of execution which would have been bad enough this was torture this was amputation this was burning flesh it was horrific it was and at the end it actually mentions KH fell off a roof and there's a whole question what that means did she go crazy did she commit SU decide what exactly happened did she faint out of grief we don't know but those stories are and many other stories are in Mac bees too now which means the books go over the same territory but they have a different emphasis and I want to draw an interesting connection to Yum in Israeli culture we observe here in erus and and actually know really throughout the Jewish world uh a time in Nissan that's called Holocaust Memorial Day y has now you'd figure a holocaust commemoration day should not be controversial one would assume that all Jews would be in favor of it but in truth if you live in Israel you know this there's no such thing as anything in Israel that's not a matter of controversy and Y hasah particularly in the early years of the state was very very very controversial one reason why it was controversial is AIC reason it's in the month of Nissan and you're not supposed to do have sad events in the month of Nissan see you can't win right Y is not good because you're not supposed to have happy occasions during and is not good because you're not supposed to have sad occasions in the month of Nissan so maybe switch your to Y and then you know okay maybe that would work okay but be it as it may that was a technical reason why Yash was a problem there was another reason why was that date in Nissan chosen for y shwa it is the an it is the anniversary of the fall of the war Soto that was the date that was designed to commemorate the deaths of 6 million Jews okay well what's the problem with that here is the problem and again this memory kind of has faded because we don't have that many survivors of the Holocaust anymore but in the early years of the state there were many DieHard zionists who were actually ashamed of what they perceived as the paity of Jews who were LED like sheep to the slaughter why didn't they fight why didn't they uprise why didn't they get weapons and they said oh the state of Israel we're going to create a new Jew we're not going to have the frightened Gess Jew who is passive and ineffectual we're going to have an army we're going to be tough we're going to be the big guys no one's going to push us around and they actually were to some degree I'm not saying everybody got God forbid but there were some who were actually embarrassed about the wh or the nerdiness whatever word you want to use of those gulish Jews so when they wanted to commemorate the Holocaust they wanted to choose the one event and there weren't that many events the one event where Jews aggressively Rose against their oppressors which was the war sageta now without disparaging for one second the heroism of the war ghetto certainly but there were survivors of the Holocaust who considered this to be deeply deeply painful as if to say their experience didn't count so I want to suggest maybe that this tension between military courage and spiritual martydom which do you glorify the truth is you should glorify both but which are you is actually the tension between sa makim 1 and makim 2 makim 1 emphasizes the kak of the Jews in fighting against their enemies makim to symbolizes the nobility of spiritual resistance and dying Al kesem and as as a result therefore it's fascinating that these two books tell the same story from a different perspective and that actually reflects tensions that exist in society to this very day now the short answer is both are worthy of admiration this shouldn't be an either or but still some people are drawn to one more than more than the other now the big question is this and this is a huge question both mbes 1 and macbes 2 were written shortly after the Kaneka Story by Anonymous author mcab 1 is earlier mcab 2 is later but they were certainly written within within a 100 Years of the Kaneka story neither one even mentions a jar of oil being found that lasted 8 days they mentioned dedication of the temple for sure they mentioned purifying the temple they mentioned lighting the manora for sure there's no mention of the P so where is the first time that there is mention of the in a later well yeah that's yeah but that is L that's mentioned later than later than later but I'm saying the first time the story of the p is mentioned in a rinic source is in a safer called millas Tinus now millas Tinus is a little it's a misleading title millas Tinus literally means the scroll of fasting but actually it's a list it's a calendar of days that you're not allowed to fast because they're festive days and most of those days we don't observe today but Kaneka is on that list and millas Tinus in The Narrative of khaka mentions the miracle of the P now when was millas Tinus written millus Tinus was written after shortly after the destruction I'm I'm sorry not it was written shortly before the before the destruction of the second mikash now the second mikdash was let's say destroyed in the year 70 so again let me remind you the miracle of Kaneka occurred in what two BCE 265 millas Tinus is at least 250 years after that so the first mention of the is more than 250 years after the khaka story so what are the implications of that so if you're secular if you're academic if you're not religious you will see people say oh that means the p is a Bubba Misa didn't happen isn't true people will say that you'll come across that writing from our perspective as people who believe in Kaz we say of course that's not right of course there was a p of course there there was a miracle of course it happened but there is must be a reason why it was not mentioned and it was not the source of the Kaneka holiday and then the question is why is that meaning if you're not going to accept the Bubba Misa story which we cannot accept then you you are left with the question why was it so deemphasized so there are a few possibilities that are very interesting one is that it could be that the Kaneka Miracle of the candles was not necessarily well known it was a tradition that was preserved only by a small number of people because remember where is the manura located the manora is located in the temple building the he who goes into the he only kohanim going to you couldn't go in so the average Jew didn't even see the manura lighting couldn't see the manura lighting and if by chance he sees the manura lighting he doesn't he's not aware that oh it's been going for eight days or whatever it is because the manur is supposed to be lit every day anyway so you know it was lit so one possibility simply is that it was not a miracle that was yua so to speak that's one idea the other idea is expressed by the moral the moral says that we don't make holidays just because Hashem does Miracles we make holidays only when there's a Yeshua for CLA Israel so we can make a yum because of the B mikash being rededicated we can make a yum because of our victory over the yanim and being able to keep Torah you don't make a miracle just because the oil burnt 8 days it's a miracle it's a sign of love but that did not save us so we don't make a y well so it depends what the is the is left after the oil the is the war against y now maral suggests the following makab one that although the Y of KH is because of the victory over Yan and the dedication of the temple why do we celebrate it by commemorating the oil so he says like this he says Hashem gave us the miracle of the oil because to show us that our military Victory does not come from us the Torah warns us over and over again that when we are successful in M we are prone to the hazard of Ki so what Hashem does is after we achieve this tremendous success and there's a danger of uis and arrogance Hashem does a supernatural Miracle to convey to us the idea that it's not you that achieved the victory it's what I gave you in other words listen one day of oil inadequate but it burns for 8 days so you're inadequate too meaning don't think you have the kak right West Point got it wrong West Point reads the book of macbes to show how great the makabe Army was militarily moral says that's exactly the point in the other direction it's only through the light of Hashem so according to this we do celebrate we do commemorate the P by lighting the naos but the lighting of the naos is designed to give us our true perspective on the war that the of the is from hasem and that's why I should also add in the alanan prayer it's a famous question when the alanan prayer tells you about kanaka it does not mention the oil that burned for8 days it only mentions that God gave us victory in order to keep the Torah the many were defeated by the few the impure were defeated right and people ask the question it's a f another famous this is probably the second after the B's question this is the second most famous question in khah why does Allah not mention the and by the way some people will give you an answer but it's not a good answer well yeah it does mention it because it says they lit the manora come on it's not talking about the miracle of lighting the because it just says when they dedicated the temple they lit the manora there's no remes in those words to anything Supernatural the answer is p because Al says khah is about rededicating the temple and reestablishing the Torah it is not about the miracle of the P but as maral says the miracle of the pem and makes us realize that the military victories came from Hashem so we need the miracle of the naos to approach the in the proper perspective and that's why the alanam doesn't mention it because it's really augmenting the primary idea that Hashem gave us this Victory but now there's a final point I want to make that's I actually you think is an extremely powerful point so the yanim desecrated the b mikdash in the year 268 BCE 25th of Kiss Life 3 years later 265 BCE we reenter the temple and although the book of makab don't mention it but that's when we found the P that burned for eight days and we had the kanuka of eight days now now we also know that eventually the Jewish people established a monarchy ammonian monarchy and of so we tend to think that all of that happened the same time rededication of the mikdash getting into dependence in AR Israel establishing a monarchy it all happened the same time in reality if you look in the book of mbes the Kaneka story did not happen at the end of the war the War continued for more than 25 years meaning all we gained on Kaneka was the basa Mikes we were still in a state of War there was still persecution aricel was not liberated entirely for 25 years and Shimon the last surviving son of Mato was not proclaimed melik till 240 240 BC that's 25 years later meaning Kaneka was not the culmination of a mil Kana occurred three years into a war that would last another 25 years this is what the book of the mcabe says now you might ask okay why is that important is there any importance in moving the kanaka miracle to the beginning of the war instead of understanding it to be the culmination of a victory there actually is and that is the following if the miracle of the sheman would have been at the end of the process meaning we beat the we established our we have the Primacy of Torah we have the B MD and look God even showed us this miracle of the oil that would have been very nice that would have been a cherry on top of the Sunday that would have been frosting on the cake that would have been a Divine kiss in addition to everything else and that's what it would have been but when it's in the middle of the war towards the beginning of the war 3 years into the war that's going to last another 25 years the message is very different imagine if you're a makabe and every morning you wake up or maybe you don't sleep at night and you're going to spend the day fighting this war against the most powerful army in the world it outnumbers you and you don't have the support of your own people well at some point you might come to the conclusion it's impossible why should I keep on fighting what am I struggling for it's so hopeless it's so useless we get an inch of land today and we lose it tomorrow if we have to keep the Torah let's just go to the mountains let's go to the caves let's just hide out and keep whatever we can keep and we don't even have the support of our own people army Israel looks down at US Army Israel doesn't value what we're doing so if you're a makabe the big thing that you face is hopelessness despair a belief that the powers of evil are so deep are so encompassing the darkness is so great what is the use of doing the little thing that I can do which just won't accomplish anything so what does Hashem show them in the beginning of the struggle you know three years into the struggle he says here is a little bit of light it's only one day of light meaning it's going to burn one day and then it's going to go out but what happens you light the light that you're able to light and then has you do as much as you're able to do and then Hashem blesses your efforts beyond what you thought is possible now think of the message that's giving the macbes don't give up don't despair don't say that you're so ineffectual you're so weak you're so insignificant that what's the point look at the light of the one day that Hashem can make it burn for eight days but if you wouldn't have done what you could if you wouldn't have lit the one day nothing would have happened so positioning it in the middle of the war is enormously powerful it's Hashem giving him the message giving them the message of hope the message of Courage the message of not giving up you look at your life and you say what's the point now this is a message that is enormously important for all of us because there are many types of darkness in the world there is the darkness of violence and hatred there's the darkness of depression and despair there's the darkness of assimilation and ignorance and our job as jiden is is to try to bring a little light in that Darkness but we often feel the darkness is so great the darkness is so deep what little thing could I add to this I light a little candle it'll go out real soon my influence is not going to spread how can I fight this it's too much khaka says light the light that you can and then Hashem will bless it beyond what you thought is possible so here too history is not just history you know the issue did the Kaneka Miracle happen at the middle of the war or beginning of the war did it happen at the end of the war the rambam mm happened at the end of the war book of mabes implies it happened the beginning of the war no 3 years into the war so a person thinks it's just a matter matter of of history but no I think there's an enormously powerful message in the middle of the battle Hashem is telling you don't give up and all of us even if we're not we're fighting the Battle of life life in many ways is a battle and we got to fight it and we get discouraged and we feel helpless and we feel hopeless and kanaka says light the light that you can and then I will bless it beyond what you thought is possible that is the central message of what khaka is about now the notion of kanaka as being a dedication of the temple the tell us it also applies to dedicating the Temple of our souls because each one of us are supposed to be a place where God sh dwells so the is not just the dedication of the the is being our heart and our soul to be a Dwelling Place of the so we hope once again that the darkness of theim that that are still facing this darkness and the Darkness of our that are struggling should be replaced with the great great light of Kaneka and the great light of kanaka should also illuminate the darkness that all of us face in our own struggles on whatever level it is so [Music] there some here