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Were it not for its proximity to Christmas, Hanukkah would be unknown to most non-Jews and it would not be celebrated by most non-religious Jews. The proof is that the other post-Hebrew Bible holiday, Purim, while very popular in Israel, where it is sort of a Jewish Mardi Gras, is essentially unknown to non-Jews and largely ignored by most American Jews. Too bad. Hanukkah is actually of seminal importance both to Judaism and to the world. SNIP To understand why Judaism so bothered Antiochus, one needs to understand that no pagan religion completely rejected Hellenism. Judaism did. If Antiochus wanted...

We are in the midst of the Hanukkah season, the eight-day festival that commemorates the second century BC victory of Judah Maccabee and his family over the forces of the Seleucid king Antiochus Epiphanes. It was a remarkable, almost miraculous, victory. Antiochus was close to achieving the long-time Seleucid goal of recreating the empire of Alexander the Great. He and his predecessors had annexed Turkey, Mesopotamia, Persia and parts of India. They solidified their control of Judaea and came close to turning Egypt into a satellite kingdom as well. Like so many ancient rulers, Antiochus fixated on the idea he...

The discovery of the Acra last week is "a dream come true" for archaeologists, who have been speculating on the citadel's location for 100 years, the IAA said. The discovery of Acra comes at a delicate time, for it reveals the story of the Maccabees, Antiochus and the coming Antichrist. All this is understood once we connect the dots and see the parallels between the Grecian Empire at the time of the Maccabees harassing God's people and the Antichrist who is also from the same empire (Asia Minor) harassing God's people today.

On Monday afternoon, the Israeli Antiquities Authority (IAA) sent a newsbrief to reporters in Jerusalem, calling for a press conference the following day to announce the “solution to one of the greatest questions in the history of Jerusalem.” Tuesday’s announcement did not disappoint: On site, in Jerusalem’s City of David, archaeologist Doron Ben-Ami announced that the famed Akra (citadel) of Antiochus Epiphanes had been discovered. Up until that announcement, little had been found testifying to the massive Hellenistic intrusion into the city early in the second century B.C. Yet here, at the northwestern portion of the City of David, a...

A recent discovery by the Israel Antiquities Authority in Jerusalem’s City of David may reveal the answer to one of archaeology's most enduring mysteries: the location of the Greek Acra citadel. The exact location of the famous stronghold built by Antiochus IV, to control Jerusalem and monitor activity on the Temple Mount, has long been unknown due to the paucity of architectural remains that can be traced to the Greek presence in Jerusalem. Over the past 100 years of archaeological research in Jerusalem, numerous theories have been put forth identifying the location of the Acra, which was eventually overtaken by...

Is Russia Mentioned in Ezekiel? A careful and literal reading of Ezekiel 38 and 39 reveal that modern-day interpretations that allude to Russia are misleading, at best. Oddly, most of those interpretations seem to come from those who claim to be "literalists. As an example of the kind of misleading statements Christians have to contend with is this statement by Jennifer Rast in an article listed on the Contender Ministries website "As we read the headlines in the newspapers of today, and witness the conflict in the Middle East, it's not hard to imagine that this invasion prophesied over 2600...

Chanukah and International Pressure By Larry Domnitch December 13, 2005 What induced Antiochus Epiphanes to attempt to eradicate Judaism? Some speculate that he had his own political motives. However, he initially had good relations with the Jews who had helped him take Jerusalem from his rival, the Egyptian Ptolemy. The chronicler of that era, Josephus Flavius mentions that Antiochus initially granted Jews the right to keep their laws. (Josephus Flavius, Antiquities, Book XII, chapter 3:3) He had also decreed that the Temple of Jerusalem continue to be respected by all as a Jewish institution under Jewish auspices. Furthermore, the attempt...

He has portrayed the Crucifixion - now Mel Gibson has his sights set on the tale that led to Chanukah. "The Passion of the Christ" director told WABC's Sean Hannity yesterday that he's planning a movie based on a Jewish rebellion nearly 200 years before the birth of Christ. "The story that's always fired my imagination ... is the Book of Maccabees," Gibson said in the radio interview. "It's about Antiochus, the king who set up his religion in the Temple, and forced them all to deny the true God and worship at his feet and worship false gods. "The...