25 day of the ninth month

It lasts for eight days. It isn`t the Biblical moedim-time appointed by Jehovah. There is no Biblical dictation to observe this feast. However, Jesus used to celebrate it when he lived on the earth.

John 10:22-30, Then came the Feast of Dedication at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was in the temple area walking in Solomon`s Colonnade, v.22-23.

This feast reminds us of the events from the history of Judah-the Jews, when the Kingdom of Israel, the other ten tribes lived in dispersion for a long time.

When Judah was under control of the Greek, Antioch Epiphanes, ungodly Greek ruler grabbed treasures of the Temple in Jerusalem. It was the crowning achievement of the whole process of changing Jews to the Greek- we have experienced the similar process of attempt of Russification and Germanization.

At the end he ordered to sacrifice a pig at the altar in the Temple, which he earlier had changed to the temple of the Greek god Zeus, contaminating the Tabernacle of God.

He issued an edict forbidding all Jewish rituals and habits. The war broke out, called Maccabees. In 164 B.C. Jewish insurgents under the leadership of Judas Maccabaeus conquered Jerusalem.

However the Temple couldn`t function until it was cleaned.

Then the legend was created, that God himself was keeping the lights burning for eight days until the oil was prepared. It is not the truth.

The Jews always wanted the fire to descend in the Temple in the supernatural way. So the rabbis invented a fairy tale about the miraculous burning lamps. And they still use to burn nine lamps in this feast. Hence the 9-arm chandelier, other than 7-arm Menorah.

The fire from heaven fell four times on the sacrifices in the Temple. In the times of Moses, David, Solomon, Elijah and for the fifth time during the Feast of Shavuot, when the Holy Spirit came like the fire from heaven to fill the believers gathered in the Temple. Acts 2. The fire from heaven comes only when 12 tribes of Israel are present. In unity.

In the times of Judah the fire didn`t descend for Ezra or Nehemiah, when the Jews returned from the Babylonian captivity and rebuilt the Temple nor at the time of Maccabees.

The feast of Hanukkah teaches us how to resist the influence of this ungodly world on our lives. Sometimes the pressure is very high. Sometimes, like the Jews at the times of Maccabees, one must give his life in the fight for freedom. Freedom- not to live like the world- the Greek, but to live as the children of God-the Israel.

And when the House of Judah and House of Israel gather together in one place, the fire from heaven will come again and the last outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the earth will take place.