The days of Chanukkah were established in order to thank and praise G-d's great name for His miracles and wonders, and on these days we celebrate the victory of light over darkness. The Poskim (Maharam miRottenberg, quoted in Tur Shulchan Aruch 670, 2) wrote: The addition of seudot are seudot reshut (elective meals), since these days were established only for praise and thanksgiving, and not for feasting and rejoicing." And the Levush explains there, that they were not proclaimed as days of feasting and rejoicing like Purim, because the intent of the decree in the time of the Greeks was different from the decree in the days of Achashverush:

Since they wanted to avert us from our religion and to deny our faith, G-d forbid, and thanks to His help they did not succeed in their scheme and our hand prevailed, therefore the Sages established these days to commemorate and praise and thank Him that He was our Lord and did not abandon us from His service. But in the days of Haman, when the intent of the decree was to kill and destroy the bodies, which is the elimination of feasting and joy, and not the souls - since even had they changed their religion, G-d forbid, he would not have spared them - therefore when they were saved from him they established it (Purim) to exalt and praise HaShem through feasting and joy as well. Therefore the addition of seudot on Chanukkah is defined as only seudot reshut.

It is known that the entire goal of the Greeks was to destroy the spirit, and those who changed their faith and became Hellenized were left unmolested by the Greeks. Indeed, from the available historical accounts, we can learn that the Greeks had considerable "success'' – ֲ many of Am Israel, even of those who frequented the Beit Midrash, followed the Greeks and adopted their culture and intellect.

And we must ask: What really caused so many to leave the world of the Torah and be attracted to Greek intellect? What tactic did the Greeks use to accomplish this? When we examine what happened in those days, we can learn - for our times as well - how to cope with foreign winds which blow from outside and can sometimes can threaten the path of B'nei Torah. We must know the ways of the enemy in order to overcome him.

ֲ In the prayer "Al HaNisim" we recount the magnitude of the miracle and say: "You delivered the mighty into the hands of the weak… and the villainous (zeidim) into the hands of the adherents of Your Torah." Here a special epithet is given to the Greeks: the villainous. The Beit Yosef (ch. 682) quotes the book Orchot Chayim (Hilchot Chanukkah, 22) which raise the question: this entire list is made up of opposites: the mighty as opposed to the weak, the impure as opposed to the pure, etc. If so, how can we understand that "the adherents of your Torah" is the opposite of "villainous"? And the Orchot Chayim explains that that Chazal who formulated the tefillot based this on the verse in Tehillim (119:51): "The villainous ridiculed me exceedingly, I did not turn away from Your Torah." From this we see that the "villainous" attempt to lead astray the adherents of the Torah. Nevertheless there remains a question regarding the verse itself: why does it speak of a thing and its opposite?ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ  ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ ֲ 

In order to understand this, we must first define what characterizes the evildoer (zed) who is called "villainous."

In the book of Mishlei (21:24) it is said: "An arrogant villain, mocker is his name, he sins willfully with anger." Here we see that the defining characteristic of the villain is the scorn which results from arrogance. From our experience with the Greek empire, we can testify to the fact that this was the tactic which characterized its war against Israel: scorn, arrogance and mockery.

Psalm 80 speaks of the diasporas which Israel endured (Rashi at the beginning of the Psalm). Verse 7 says: "You have made us (the target of) contention to our neighbors and our enemies mock us." Rashi explains: "You made us contention to all our neighbors. And Greece provoked us." Additionally, in the Book of Daniel ch. 7, Daniel describes his dream in which he sees the four beasts which are likened to the four empires. The third beast was a leopard, and it represents the Greek empire: "After this, I looked, and behold another one, like a leopard." And the Maharal expounds in the book "Ner Mitzvah" (Part 1, on the subject of the four empires) that the nature of the leopard is boldness, as the Sages say (Avot ch. 5, 20) "Be bold like a leopard," and this attribute characterized the Greek empire.

We can see this also in Chapter 2, when Daniel is asked to reconstruct Nebuchadnezzar's dream and interpret it. Nebuchadnezzar saw in his dream an image made of several materials: its head was of gold, the upper part of its body was silver, its abdomen and thighs were brass, its (lower) legs iron and its feet were partly of iron and partly of clay. The part made of brass represented the third empire – the Greek empire, and this also indicates boldness: nechoshet (brass) is linked to the term metazch nechushah: impudence - literally "a brass forehead." (In English the double meaning holds as well: the word brazen means "made of brass" as well as "shameless.")

Chazal explain that the arrogance and brazenness of the Greek empire was expressed through mockery and derision of anything and everything holy. The following appears in Sanhedrin (46a): The Beit Din is permitted to punish (also) beyond the law in order to make a warning sign and a fence (before the Torah): "Tanya: Rabbi Eliezer Ben Yaakov says: I heard that the Beit Din punish, and give corporal punishment, beyond the punishments prescribed by the Torah - not (only) in cases of transgressions of Torah laws but in order to make a fence before the Torah. And there was a case in which a man rode on a horse on Shabbat in the days of the Greeks and the Beit Din sentenced him to death by stoning. And not because he was deserving of this but because the times demanded it. And Rashi explains: Because the committing of sins became widespread, and they (the Sages) saw the pressure that Israel was under because of the decrees that the Greeks forced upon them, and (therefore) the Mitzvot became contemptuous in their eyes."

Additionally, we saw in the end of Masechet Succah (46a-b) that the Cohenim belonging to the family of "Bilga" were penalized in three ways, and the Gemara explains the reason: "This is the story of Miriam the daughter of Bilga who changed her faith and went and married Sardiot, one of the Greek noblemen. When the Greeks entered the Temple she kicked her sandal on the altar and said: 'Wolf, wolf! How long will you consume the money of Israel, and you don't stand up for them in their hour of need!' When the Sages heard this (Rashi: after the victory of Beit Chashmonai) they closed their ring and they blocked up their window. And there are those who say (that the reason for the penalties is): his (Bilga's) shift was late in arriving." Whether we say that they were tardy or whether she kicked the altar, we see that in the Greek era, the Mitzvot were treated with disrespect.

What was it that the Greeks mocked? The Ramchal says (Derech HaShem, section 4 ch. 8, no. 3) that the main accusation of the Greeks was against "the subject of the Menorah according to the meaning behind it (and) that the accusations were against its essence." And therefore they defiled the oils, in order to damage the essence of the pure Menorah.

What is the essence of the Menorah? The Natziv says in his commentary HaAmek Davar (at the beginning of Parshat Tetzaveh):

It is important to know that the light of the Torah, which is the ultimate purpose of the Mishkan and the main foundation for the dwelling of the Shechinah (Divine presence) within Israel comes in abundance by means of two holy vessels, namely the Holy Ark and the Menorah, and they differ in their function: The purpose of the Aron is the written commandments as well as the directive regarding the oral tradition which is passed down through the generations, as is mentioned above (25:22). But this still lacks the power of the pilpul (sharp analysis) and the chiddush (innovation) which enable one to derive by himself a new aspect of Halacha which was not passed down in the tradition, and for (the purpose) of this marvelous power, which is called Talmud, was given the power of the Menorah, into which were incorporated seven wisdoms and all the powers needed for the pilpul of Torah. And all this is incorporated in the kaftorim and perachim ֲ (knobs and flowers) to the point that it is brought in Bereshis Rabbah (ch. 91) that when Rabbi Tarfon heard a proper d'var Torah, he would say "kaftor veperach."

Similarly, we say in the song Maoz Tzur: "B'nei Binah (men of comprehension) established eight days of song and joyousness." A man of comprehension is one who understands one thing through another, meaning that he has the strength of chidush and pilpul. This special power is represented by the Menorah. Similarly, we see the connection between the light of the Menorah and the Torah:

1. In the Gemara (Shabbat 23b): "Rav Huna says: one who regularly lights candles merits sons who are talmidei chachamim." Rashi explains: "As is written (Mishlei 6:23): As a mitzvah is a candle and Torah is light. By virtue of the mitzvah candle of Shabbat and Chanukkah comes the light of Torah."

2. One who desires to become wise – should go south… and the sign for this is … the Menorah is at the south (of the Mishkan).

3. He who sees olive oil in dream – can anticipate the light of the Torah, as is written: "And they will bring to you pure olive oil." (Brachot 57a)

From the fact that the Greeks attempted to assail the light of the Menorah, we see that the principal target of their derision was the light of the Torah, and specifically the realm of Talmud – the oral Torah and the pilpul of Torah.

Seder Olam Rabbah (Leiner, ch. 30) surveys history and reaches Alexander the Great: "He is Alexander the Great who ruled 12 years. Until then, the prophets received prophecy through Ruach Ha Kodesh (the Divine Spirit). From then onward, "Incline your ear and listen to the words of the Sages. (Mishlei 22:17)" We see that there was a significant change at the beginning of the Greek empire, and this was a turning point between the era of Ruach Ha Kodesh and that of Chachamim. The events under discussion occurred during this period, and the Greeks put all their energies into a "battle to the death" against the Sages of Israel - and as we said, their weapons were arrogance and contempt.

This is further clarified in light of the Gemara (Yoma 69b) in which anshei knesset hagedolah (the men of the Great Assembly) prayed for the elimination of the yetzer hara for idol worship and HaShem fulfilled their request. The Gr"a explains that (along with the gain - emancipation from avodah zarah) there was also a loss: since a balance is always kept between impurity and purity, when the power of impurity was reduced, so was the power of purity.

Rabbi Yonatan Eibeshitz (Yaarot D'vash, drush 3) explains: in the place of the yetzer for avodah zarah which was nullified, a new and even more difficult challenge came into being: minut (apostasy, defection) and apikorsut (heresy). This corrupt approach was initiated by the savants of Greece, who ridiculed everything which did not conform to their wisdom. Am Israel divided into three camps: the Prushim, the Tzedukkim and the Issiyim (Essenes). The Prushim kept the flame of the Torah burning, and continued to learn and teach the oral Torah according to the Jewish tradition. In contrast, a large part of Am Israel, the Tzedukkim, abandoned the wisdom of the oral Torah and denied the World to Come. The Essenes on one hand behaved with great self-denial, but their wisdom was not based on the Oral Torah; theirs was the wisdom of philosophy. All of these were the result of the influence of Greece. The philosophy injected the concept of denial of HaShem's providence, and from there it went on to completely deny the existence of G-d.

We can find an allusion to this in the words of the Rambam (Hilchot Yom HaKippurim 1,7): "In the days of the second Temple minut arose in Israel, and the Tzedukkim - may they be destroyed quickly – emerged, and they do not believe in the oral Torah, and they said that the incense of Yom HaKippurim is placed on the fire in the Tabernacle outside of the Parochet, and when its smoke rises it is brought into the Kodesh Kodeshim, and the reason is that the Torah says: "For in a cloud I will appear on the Kapporet" and they say that this is the cloud of the incense. And the Sages learned from the (oral) tradition that incense is only put (on the coals) in Kodesh HaKodeshim before the Aron, as it says: "And he put the incense on the fire before HaShem." And since in the second Temple they suspected that this Kohen Gadol may have heretical inclinations etc." Even the Kohen Gadol was suspected of minut in that period, and all the more so the general public.

The Rambam continues: "They obliged him with an oath on the eve of Yom HaKippurim and said to him: Esteemed Kohen Gadol, we are the shelichim (emissaries) of the Beit Din and you are our shaliach and the shaliach of the Beit Din. We bind you with an oath in the name of He whose name resides in this house that you will not change anything that we instructed you. He turns away and cries because they suspected him of minut, and they turn away and cry because they suspected one whose deeds are unknown, and perhaps there is nothing (improper) in his heart."

HaRav Yitzchak Huttner ztz"l explains that as a result of the elimination of the yetzer hara for idol worship, its place was taken by heresy and minut which was manifested by the appearance of the Tzedukkim and the Issiyim. They adopted the technique of the Greeks, and with this they were able to increase the number of their followers. The technique was to mock and to humiliate – and to claim that they have a monopoly on wisdom, and that everything else is emptiness and stupidity. In those days, defiance was already widespread: "You live in darkness, are the sons of darkness. We are enlightened, the sons of light." The Tzedukkim also followed this path of belittling everything which is holy and dear, as is said in the Gemara (Megillah 24b): "He who places it (the Tefillin) on his forehead or on the palm of his hand, this is the way of minut." Rashi says: "Since they belittle the Midrash of the Sages, and act according to their understanding (of the Torah), as per the literal (and incorrect) meaning: actually between your eyes, and actually on your hand."

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This too we can earn from the Rambam, that the Tzedukkim behaved like the Greeks, as he wrote in Hilchot Parah Adumah (1,14): "The Tzeddukim said that the service of the Parah could only be performed by those who (were purified) by the setting of the sun, therefore the Beit Din of Bayit Sheini would make the Kohen who burned the heifer impure by means of a sheretz or something similar and he would immerse and afterwards do the work of the Parah, in order to nullify the words of these villains who profess according to their caprices andֲ  not according to the tradition. Additionally, the vessels into which the ashes of the Parah Adumah are placed, they are all tevulei yom." The Rambam defines the Tzeddukim as "villains," and from what is said here, they are equated to the inventors of their technique – the Greeks – whose attribute was ridicule, rooted in arrogance and mockery.ֲ 

The Pri Megadim (in Mishbetzot Zahav, ch. 682) explains from the nusach of the prayer Al HaNisim that the Greeks operated in two ways:

1. To cause them to forget Your Torah: "Your Torah" – these are things which have reason and logic (comprehensible to humans). The envy of the Greeks the ֲ toward the wisdom of Israel was so intense - "as it is your wisdom and your astuteness in the eyes of the nations (Devarim 4,6)" ֲ - that they put all their energies into attempting to cause the Torah which has reason and logic to be forgotten.

2. To cause them to transgress the statutes of Your will: A hok (statute) is a law with no reason or logic (which we can understand) as in hukkat haTorah (the seemingly illogical law of the red heifer). They mocked Israel for their observance of the hukkim (according to Rashi, Bamidbar 19 on the mitzvah of Parah Adumah). The goal of the Greeks was "to cause them to transgress the statutes of Your will" – they attempted to thwart the observance of the hukkim which are beyond human logic.

Perhaps this is the reason that they specifically made a decree to prohibit the mitzvah of circumcision. The essence of this mitzvah is to instill in the child the power to keep the hukkim of the Torah and not to regard them with skepticism, as HaShem said to Avraham when He commanded him to perform brit milah: "Walk before Me and be tamim (whole, unblemished - particularly in faith)" (Bereshis 17,1). Therefore in the blessings of the milah we say: "And He placed a hok in his flesh." The literal meaning refers to hakikah (engraving) on the flesh, but this can also be interpreted as hok (meaning statute) because we circumcise the baby at the age of eight days, when his da'at (intellect) is completely unformed, and he doesn't know his right hand from his left. We bring the baby into the covenant between him and HaShem, at a time when this is a hok for the baby, in order to teach him that Torah study and the observance of the mitzvot do not depend on his understanding, but "na'aseh" (we shall do) and afterwards "nishma" (we shall hear, understand). This mitzvah is what gives every Jew the strength to perform the statutes of the Torah with complete obedience all the days of his life.

It was against this that the Greeks fought, and therefore when they entered the Temple they defiled the oils instead of spilling them or making use of them for themselves. Since their war concentrated against the hukkim, the concept of "impurity" is not tangible and is not understandable to human logic. Therefore they wanted to say to Am Israel that there is no difference between purity and impurity, and this was their way of mocking the laws of the Torah.

According to this, we can answer the well-known question: Why did they (the victorious Maccabees) require specifically pure oil? Impurity is allowed when all or most of the nation is impure! Certainly, they could have lit impure oil, but the Sages of that generation understood that this is exactly the point that the Greeks wanted to strike, to mock the concept of impurity which human intellect cannot understand, and it is considered "indiscernible damage." Therefore by searching for pure oil they demonstrated their adherence to hukkim. The struggle between the Jews and the Greeks was on this point exactly. We too uphold the words of the Torah without any reservations – "To do perform the statutes of Your will."

The Rambam wrote amazing things about this at the conclusion of Hilchot Me'ilah (8,8):

A man should examine the laws of the holy Torah according to his ability, to know their ultimate reason. And something that he doesn't find a reason for, and doesn't know its rationale, must not be taken lightly, and he may not arrogantly go up to HaShem lest He unleashes His wrath upon him. And his thinking on this subject cannot be like his thinking regarding other, worldly matters. We can see this from the severity which the Torah placed on me'ilah (misuse of sanctified items) … the Torah says "and you shall keep all My hukkim and My mishpatim and you shall do them."ֲ  The Sages said: this is to stress that the care we take to observe the hukkim must equal that of the ֲ mishpatim – namely those mitzvot whose rationale is revealed and their benefit in this world is known, for example the prohibitions to steal and murder, and the obligation to honor parents. And the hukkim are the mitzvot whose rationale is unknown – the Sages said "I decreed hukkim and you have no right to doubt them" and man's yetzer is attracted to them, and the nations of the world argue against their logic, for example the prohibitions of eating swine and meat with milk and the mitzvot of Parah Adumah and Eglah Arufah and the goat which is sent off (on Yom Kippur). And David had great grief from the minim and the goyim who argued against the hukkim, and the more they harassed him with false conjectures which they invented according to man's limited intelligence, he would cling more to the Torah, as he says (Tehillim 119): "Villains have besieged me with lies but I will keep Your commands with all my heart." And on the same subject it also says there: "All Your mitzvot are true, with lies they pursue me, help me."

Now we understand the nature of zeidim (villains), why the Greeks were given this epithet, and why zeidim is the diametrical opposite of the adherents of the Torah.

The words of the Bach are well known (Orach Chayim 47,3) regarding the nusach of the blessing "la'asok b'diveri Torah" – this blessing is not just on the diveri Torah but also on esek haTorah – the energy invested in the Torah, the light of the Menorah, the power of chidush and pilpul and the give-and –take of Halacha. As the Torah says: "If you will walk in my hukkim" and Chazal explained: "That you should exert yourselves over the Torah." And this is what the Greeks attempted to attack, and taking their example, also the Tzedukkim, by way of mockery. And we say: "The villainous ridiculed me exceedingly, I did not turn away from Your Torah!"

In every negative attribute there is a positive side. The positive side of ga'avah (pride) is ga'ava d'kedushah: "And his heart was raised in the ways of HaShem" (Divrei HaYamim 2, 17:6). This is the middah of Avraham Avinu, who called the place of the Mikdash by the name "har" - mountain (Pesachim 88a) and the Shem MiShmuel (Lech Lecha תרע"א) explains that the mountain represents strength and might, as it says: "Who are you, great mountain? Before Zerubavel you will become a plain" (Zechariah 4:7). Avraham Avinu is called "Eitan HaEzrachi (Tehillim 89:1). The Gemarah (Rosh HaShana 11b) says all the Avot were called Eitanim (the mighty), however Avraham was specifically called Eitan as the Rambam says in ch. 1 of Hilchot Avodah Zarah, halacha 3: "since this Eitan was weaned (from his mother)" – since Avraham Avinu was not deterred by all those who tried to prevent him from calling upon the name of G-d, and he stood like a mighty mountain against all who cursed and reviled him.

Today as well, Talmidei Chachamim and those studying in the Beit Midrash need to strengthen themselves on this point. Even if we sometimes hear offensive and condescending words, mockery against the words of Chazal etc, we must stand firm and know that this is a test in which G-d is trying us. To our great sorrow, the Greeks succeeded in their scheme of causing a large part of Am Israel to abandon the oral Torah which is passed down from generation to generation. In our generation as well are those who attempt to continue in the path of the Greeks, and against them we will be valiant and stand firmly, we will add strength in the study of all parts of our holy Torah out of the understanding that it is our wisdom and intelligence, and therefore our glory and pride.

Ashreinu ma tov helkeinu – how happy are we, and how good is our portion - that we merit to sit on the benches of the Beit Midrash, to delve in the Torah to innovate in it. May it be that the light of the Torah will dissipate much of the darkness of heresy and apostasy, and G-d willing may we merit the building of Beit HaMikdash, and the restoration of Aron HaBrit and the pure Menorah which radiates the light of the Torah.

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