The Greeks and the Maccabees……. in the Sunflowers
The story of Chanukah and the holiday itself is such an exciting time for the Yehudim. Even though the Beit Hamikdash was destroyed by King Antiochus and the Greek army, Hashem comes forward and shows us that he is still able to be there when we need him.
King Antiochus told the Yehudim that they cannot daven to their Hashem. Yehudah the Macabbee and his army won over the Greek army but not before the Greeks destroyed the holy Beit Hamikdash. When the Maccabees walked into the Beit Hamikdash everything was such a mess! The Yehudim wanted to light the Menorah that was always lit in the Beit Hamikdash but they needed oil. They searched for oil and found a small pitcher of very little oil. “Not much oil”, the Yehudim thought but it was better than nothing. “Probably would last only a day”, they thought again. But a great Nes ( miracle ) happened! The flames on the Menorah lasted for eight days! The Yehudim could not believe it. That is the reason that we celebrate Chanukah for eight nights!
We talked about a Chanukiah and how the all eight candles are all on the same level. But the Shamash, the “Helper candle”, after you use it to light the other candles, has to be placed a little higher than the other candles. We always put the Chanukiah in front of a window to show everyone the miracle of Chanukah. On the first night of Chanukah we recite three brachot but the rest of the nights we only recite two. We have been practicing singing all the brachot as well!
We explored oil in the kitah since we have been talking about oil for […]