What is "Hanukkah" all about? what are we reminded of?
GENESIS 41:1-44:17.................2 CHRONICLES 7:1-11.......JOHN 10:22-33
A SPECIAL HANUKKAH PARASHA, (yet making a connection with this week's Parasha, "Miketz"
We start out with the dreams of Yosef, but where does Hanukkah come in? well, later it does, it leads up to it, sort of.. Dreams and visions are 2 ways in which G-d speaks to us, other than through the Torah and the Ruach HaKodesh, (Holy Spirit) I am sure we have all had dreams, many times, we can't remember them when we awake, but other times we do,
Yosef was in the right place at the right time, even though he might not have realized it Adonai was in control, prison seemed gloomy, yet there in prison, G-d used Yosef. Had he not been in the prison he would not have been able to interpret the dreams of the baker and cup bearer,, and had he not done those things, Pharaoh would not have heard of Yosef.
Sometimes, G-d gives dreams to heathen rulers, for a specific purpose, in this case, to save the world of famine, thus, Joseph came to the palace at the right time, there was darkness before the light, storm before the calm, an inmate before vice-King of Egypt. His role was to save the then known world of future starvation. Yosef was a type of Messiah, who saved the world of physical starvation, while Messiah Yeshua saved the world of spiritual starvation, Yosef saved physical lives, while Yeshua saved Spiritual lives,
Daniel also received a special revelation, when we go to the book of Daniel, chapter 8 we see that G-d reveals things that would happen about 500 years later, the vision of the goat and horns, the vision revealed the arrival of Alexander the Great, the broken horn, would be his death at the young age of 30, the 4 horns, the 4 kingdoms that would follow Alexander and gain power, besides Greece we have Rome, Persia, and Babylon, from Greece, we see the arrival of the Seleucid Empire, a Greek-Syrian power that would produce the tyrant “Antiochus Epiphanes, He stopped all worship of Adonai, proclaimed himself “Zeus Incarnate” put to death anyone who would dare study Torah, he sacrificed pigs in the temple,
This tyrant had to be stopped, and the high Priest Mattathias had the chutzpah to do it, He and his 5 sons, John Jonathan, Judah, Simon, and Eleazar went to war against Antiochus, a war of about 10,000 soldiers under Mattathias, and when he died, passing the command to Judah, against 100,000 soldiers and more under Antichus, just like the Revolutionary war in 1776, some 10,000 troops under Gen Washington, against many more thousands of crack, professional British troops, yet the colonists won, and we gained independence from Britain, 3 years later, Judah and his troops drove Antichus out of Jerusalem, that was the “Great Miracle that Happened There (Nes, Gadol, Haya, Sham) but it was G-d who gave the victory, not by the might of man, but by “HaYad HaShem” The Hand of God, (through the perseverance of Judah and his gallant men)
He entered the temple and found it in shambles, the Holy furniture gone/stolen by Antichus, the temple bloodied by swine blood, a statue of Zeus, Well, Judah set to work washing, cleaning up the temple, took down the statue of Zeus, he found the stolen items, and returned them to the temple, set up the Menorah and lit it. Now was the time for celebration, it would be just like in good Old King Solomon's time, and now we come to 2 Chronicles 7:1-11 ____________________________________________ ____________________________________________ _______________________2 CHRONICLES 7:1-11
King Solomon finishes the temple, and gives a two week party to celebrate, I mean, enough roast beef and lamb chops to feed all of Israel, 22,000 bulls, and 120,000 sheep, and probably bread, wine, figs, etc. A week of festivity, and then, the dedication (Hanukkah) 7 days during the Feast of Tabernacles, (Sukkot) in the 7th month, the culmination was on the 8th day, Shemini Atzeret, and afterwards, Solomon sent everyone home.
Judah the Maccabee knew this, as he studied scripture under his father, Mattathias. So, just as old King Solomon celebrated the dedication of the temple for 8 days, he would also, do the same thing, for 8 days in the month of December, (he could not do it in October, during Sukkot because he had not yet won the war against Antichus at that time)
So now we have it, 8 lights, 8 days, to commemorate the dedication of the temple again to the service of YHVH, just as it was done in the days of old King Solomon.
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JOHN 10:22-33
Yeshua is in temple and walking along Solomon's promenade during the time of Hanukkah, he also celebrated Hanukkah, and was confronted by his fellow Jews, “Are you or are you not Messiah?” was the question, It is just like seeing a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat, making doves come out of a cane, and many other tricks, and still ask, “hey. Are you a magician?” Many still had hard hearts, Yeshua said plainly, “I have done so many things, that only the Messiah can do, and yet you still do not believe!” What else can the Messiah do? And even today, the works of Messiah are recorded in Torah, and in the Brit Hadasha, and still, many still do not believe. “I and the Father are ONE (Echad) not three gods, ONE God, revealed in three forms, the Father (Av) the Son (Ben) and the Holy Spirit (Ruach HaKodesh) will you believe? Just as the woman of Samaria believed?
JACOB BEN AVRAHAM
