Following the lighting this Hallalu can be recited:

We kindle these lights (to commemorate) the saving acts, miracles and wonders which You have performed for our forefathers, in those days at this time, through Your holy priests ( kohanim).  Throughout the eight days of Hanukkah, these lights are sacred, and we are not permitted to make use of them, but only to look at them, in order to offer thanks and praise to Your great Name for Your miracles, for Your wonders and for Your salvations.

This Song of Praise brings up another of the traditions.  The lit menorah was was not to be used in any utilitarian way, but was to be placed where others could see it – perhaps an entrance or window – in order that it would testify to the faithfulness of our God and His miracles.  There it can remind others of the holiday and the redemption and perhaps draw them back to God.  Followers of Messiah can easily see many parallels to Yeshua (Jesus) as the light of the world.  The blessings and praise songs can easily be expanded to include our faith in Yeshua.  Enjoy this celebration from your heart and give praise to the God who preserved his people Israel so that the whole world could have redemption through Yeshua!

And Some History

Tonight I want to expand a little on part of the history that I gave you last night.  Let me begin with a quote from the historian Josephus who lived at the time of the Apostles.  Writing of Antiochus’ commands to stop all forms of Jewish worship he says:

And indeed many Jews there were who complied with the king’s commands either voluntarily, or out of fear of the penalty that was denounced; but the best men, and those of the noblest souls, did not regard him, but did pay a greater respect to the customs of their country than concern as to the punishment which he threatened to the disobedient; on which account they every day underwent great miseries and bitter torments (256). For they were whipped with rods and their bodies were torn to pieces, and were crucified while they were still alive and breathed; they also strangled those women and their sons whom they had circumcised, as the king had appointed, hanging their sons about their necks as they were upon the crosses.  And if there were any sacred book of the law found, it was destroyed; and those with whom they were found miserably perished also.

(Antiquities of the Jews Book 12, Chapter 5)

Does this sound a little familiar?  Compare it with this.

Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life.  36Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment.  37They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated— 38of whom the world was not worthy— wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

39And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised,   Hebrews 11:35-39

The writer of Hebrews was writing of these Jewish martyrs.  Did you know that?  I really hadn’t ever given it much thought.  If we knew our Jewish history we would even know some of their names:  Eleazar, an aged scribe who was beaten to death rather than eat swine’s flesh – or even appear to do so, or Hannah and her seven sons.  She watched as each refused to disobey God and was put to a horrible death.  Then she herself was killed.  One son testified, “It is good, being put to death by men, to look for hope from God to be raised up again by him.” (2 Macc. 7:14)  And they could only look forward to Messiah by faith! 

Why am I writing about this?  Because we need to realize that long before the days of Christian martyrs, Jewish believers were dying for their faith.  With way less revelation than we have, they gave their lives so that Israel would not perish, so that God would have a people through whom he could bring forth Messiah to be the salvation of the whole world.  And yet how have we (the Christian church down through the centuries) treated this people?  We have despised and rejected and murdered and persecuted them.  Hounded them and driven them from their homes.  Made them live in terror of the next pogrom.  And these are Jesus’ own natural born family.  The ones God chose and selected to bring the Light into the world.  Yes, some of them were complicit in crucifying Jesus, but the Gentiles (represented by the Romans) were far more responsible.  We all crucified Jesus.   Friends,  Jesus’ heart is grieved.  If our hearts are to be burdened with what burdens Jesus then we need to understand that He longs for his Jewish brethren to come in and believe in him.  But the church’s hands are stained with blood.  Jews still often think of us as those who have labeled them “Christ-killers” and then persecuted them mercilessly.  

Yes, repentance has begun for these crimes and attitudes in some circles and thank God for that, but anti-semitism is still very much with us and a greater and deeper repentance and reaching out is called for.  The gospel is still “first for the Jew, then for the Gentile” (Rom. 1:19)   Only through us as believers can more Jewish people be reached and even saved from the physical death that many face in some parts of the world.  And how can we reach them if we don’t even acknowledge our own identity as grafted-in shoots to the olive tree, which is the faith of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob?  Believers need to memorize Romans 11 and Ephesians 2 and thank God every day for the Jewish people who gave us our Messiah.  Then we need to look and see how we have defiled our temples as we ignorantly and hatefully rejected our Jewishness and turned to accommodating pagan thought and promoting syncretism in our churches. 

My friends, when the church turned against the Jews she turned to a type of actual self-hatred that has become a cancer in the body.  We are fundamentally Jewish.  The Torah is the foundation of our faith.  Jesus said he came to fill the Torah full of meaning for us (Matt. 5:17), but we don’t even know the Torah or start our studying from its principles!  We have taken on many “Greek” ways and it is time to cleanse our temples and rededicate them.  It is time to start with a deep and heartfelt identificational repentance for the church’s historic hatred of the Jews.  It is time to have this cancer cut out of the Body of Christ and be healed of self-hatred.  It is time to humbly learn our Jewish roots and begin to practice those things that the Lord lays on our hearts.  These are not things done to receive salvation, but rather that salvation may be worked out in us because God has said, “This is the way, walk in it”  Our temples have been defiled, even as the temple in the days of the Maccabees.  The sad thing is that in some ways we are up to our armpits in swine flesh and don’t even know it!  Because we haven’t been taught.   In fact we have often been deceived by our leaders.  But now it is time to learn.

 The rest of this week I will focus on some different areas that I feel we need to examine and see what we might do differently if we were to take a serious look at what God really desires according to his Word.  I know I have been rather heavy-duty in this teaching tonight.  I am passionate about this because I feel God’s passion I believe.  I would suggest that we all simply pray, asking God to give us His heart for His Jewish people, for Israel, and for His holy city Jerusalem.  That way we can’t go wrong.  And as we identify with these we can easily enter into this blessing which is part of the daily prayers of observant Jewish people, with the special Hanukkah section included:

We thank you, for you, O Lord our God, are our fathers’ God for all eternity, our Rock, our Shield that saves through every generation.  We thank you and declare your praise for all your tender care.  We trust our lives into your loving hand.  We are always in your keeping; your wonders and miracles are with us daily, evening, morn and noon.  O you, who are all-good; whose mercies never fail us, Compassionate One, whose faithful love never ceases, we ever hope in you.

We praise you for the miracles, for redemption, for great deeds and victories, for the battles you fought for our fathers in those days at this time:

In the days of the Hasmonean, Mattiteyahu ben Yochanan, the High Priest, and his sons, when a wicked Hellenistic government rose up against Israel your people to make them forget your Torah and to break the laws of your will, you, with great mercy stood by them in the time of their distress.  You championed their cause, defended their rights and avenged their wrong.  You delivered the strong into the hands of the weak, and the many into the hands of the few, the impure into the hands of the pure, the ungodly into the hands of the godly and the arrogant into the hands of the students of Torah.  You made a great and holy name for yourself in the world, and for your people Israel you performed a great deliverance.  Whereupon your children entered your sanctuary, cleansed the Temple, purified your house, kindled lights in your holy courts and instituted these eight days of Hanukkah for thanksgiving and praise to your great name.

And for all these blessings, may your name be exalted, our King, forever and to all generations. All the living shall thank you and praise your name faithfully, the God of salvation and deliverance.  Blessed are you, O Lord, whose name is good, and to whom it is pleasant to give thanks.

Shalom,

Sarah McIlvaine

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-Sarah McIlvaine (2008)