Why isn’t the miracle of the oil mentioned in the Hanukkah prayer “Al Hanissim”?

Whew. I had no idea that the story of Hanukkah was so complicated. My previous posts about this Jewish holiday have for the most part focused on the eight days that the menorah in the Temple at Jerusalem burned from a flask of oil that should have lasted only one day, with the ensuing symbolism of lights and candles, feasting and celebration. (Latkes, anyone?) But the actual Hebrew prayers, including “Al Hanissim”¹ recited as part of the celebrations, say nothing about the miracle of the long-lasting oil. Why is that, and when did the oil miracle become part of the story? I will say up front that there are no completely definitive answers to be found here. It’s been fascinating, though, to dig through quite a few sources and see how the subject is handled. Here’s an overview about the holiday as a whole and also what I’ve found out about this particular prayer.²

To begin with, “Hanukkah” or “Chanukah” or sometimes even “Hanouka” (all are transliterations from the Hebrew which of course uses a completely different system of writing than the alphabet) means “dedication.” This holiday is not mentioned in the Jewish Bible as one of the feasts ordained by God. Instead, its origins go back to what is often called the “intertestamental period,” the 400 or so years between the end of the Jewish Bible and the beginning of the Christian New Testament. We get the original story from the apocryphal³ books of I and II Maccabees and also from a Jewish-Roman historian named Josephus. We know from general history that when Alexander the Great died in 323 BC his kingdom was divided up among his four generals, one of whom was Seleucus, who eventually ended up ruling the area that included Israel. By 167 BC a branch of the Seleucid descendants named Antiochus was in charge, and the fourth in that line decided to call himself “Antiochus Epiphanes,” or “Antiochus the manifest god,” a choice that may give a hint about his personality. The idea that there were Jews who remained loyal to their own God irritated him, to say the least, and he stepped up his persecution. His most heinous act was to desecrate the Temple in Jerusalem in 167 BC by sacrificing a pig to Zeus on the main altar. This action was absolutely the final straw in a long series of Seleucid outrages and precipitated the “Maccabean Revolt.”

So now we enter the world of the Maccabees, from a Hebrew word that means “hammer.” This term was originally the middle name (or perhaps better termed the nickname) for Judas, one of the five sons of Mattathias the priest who initially led the Jewish rebellion against Antiochus.⁴ Because Judas became such a leader in the fight against the Seleucids, taking over after the death of his father in 166, his middle name came to designate the whole family of fighters and then indeed the uprising itself.⁵ Fighting continued, and in 164 the Jews were able to retake control of Jerusalem and to cleanse and rededicate the Temple; this is the event that Hanukkah (which means “dedication”) commemorates. Here’s how the actual passage from 2 Macabbees tells the story:

They purified the Temple and built a new altar. Then, with new fire started by striking flint, they offered sacrifice for the first time in two years, burned incense, lighted the lamps, and set out the sacred loaves. . . .The happy celebration lasted eight days, like the Festival of Shelters, and the people remembered how only a short time before, they had spent the Festival of Shelters wandering like wild animals in the mountains and living in caves. But now, carrying green palm branches and sticks decorated with ivy, they paraded around, singing grateful praises to him who had brought about the purification of his own Temple. Everyone agreed that the entire Jewish nation should celebrate this festival each year.⁶

Notice some fascinating details here. First of all, as mentioned earlier, there’s no mention of anything about a miraculous bottle of oil that lasted for eight days instead of one. We’re just told that the Maccabeans carried out some sort of purification ritual and then, as it’s implied, destroyed the altar that had been so desecrated by Antiochus and built a new one. They then offered a sacrifice, burned incense, and lighted the lamps. With whatever oil was at hand, apparently. And why did the celebration last for eight days? Well, look at the text: “The happy celebration lasted eight days, like the Festival of Shelters.” When I read this passage just now as I was in the act of writing this post (how’s that for recursiveness?), it was as if a spark exploded in my brain. Oh, right! It’s the Feast of Tabernacles, or Booths, or Sukkot.⁷ (Follow the footnote if you want info on that holiday.) The celebration has nothing to do with how many days the oil lasted at all.

If you’re clutching your head right now in bewilderment, don’t worry. We’re now, finally and at last, going to get to the miracle of the oil. Sort of. There’s a long, long gap between the book of 2 Maccabees and the story of the oil. We have to go forward in time around 600 years to the Babylonian Talmud, a set of commentaries on the Jewish Torah. Here’s one major passage that describes what was believed to have happened:

When the Greeks entered the Temple, they polluted all the oils in the Temple, and when the Hasmonean Dynasty [the Maccabees] overcame and defeated them, they checked and they found but one cruse of oil that was set in place with the seal of the High Priest [of the Temple], but there was within [only enough] to light [the Menorah for] a single day.  A miracle occurred, and they lit from it for eight days, (The Talmud–Mosechet Shabbat 21b).

There’s no hint of what the Greeks did to “pollute” the oils, and there isn’t any particular ritual associated with the oil for the Temple lamps given in the actual Jewish Bible. The lamps of the Temple were to burn “pure, clear, fresh olive oil” made from “beaten olives,” but those seem to be the only prescriptions. When the forerunner of the Temple, the tentlike Tabernacle, was built, ordinary Israelites were commanded to donate oil for the lamps. So you didn’t have to be a specialized oil preparer in order to participate in keeping the lamps burning. The wording of other commentaries seems to be deliberately ambiguous; here’s one such passage:

When, on the twenty-fifth of Kislev, the Jews had emerged victorious over their foes and destroyed them, they re-entered the Temple where they found only one jar of pure oil, enough to be lit for only a single day; yet they used it for lighting the required set of lamps for eight days, until they managed to press olives and produce pure oil.⁸

It’s been pointed out that this passage, by the great medieval rabbinical scholar Maimonides, seems to hedge a bit. It doesn’t really say that the lamps burned for eight days straight, but only that the triumphant Jews lit them for eight days, perhaps just for a short time in the evening, in order to eke out the time until they had plenty of oil. And there’s always been an argument about the number of days that the miracle represents. After all, some rabbis have said, the miraculous part of the story covers only seven days, not eight, since there was enough oil for that first day. The real miracle, many say, was the victory of the Maccabees over the Seleucids. We should celebrate that event, in which the hand of God is clearly seen, and not some disputed matter that wasn’t even referenced at the time.

I take no personal position on the matter, only saying that God was and is certainly capable of performing whatever miracles he chooses. It’s interesting that there is indeed an oil-based miracle in the Jewish Bible: the “widow’s cruse of oil” in the book of 2 Kings. Elisha the prophet is asked for help by a penniless widow who has just one little pot of olive oil. Elisha tells her to gather up as many empty jugs, bottles and bowls as she can and to pour out the oil into them, which she does. The oil keeps flowing until she’s filled up every vessel, and then it stops. Elisha then tells her to sell the oil, pay her debts, and live on the rest. I’ve heard this story used as a sermon illustration many times: that the flow of oil only continued for as long as it took to fill up the vessels; if the widow had had more faith, it’s said, she could have collected even more vessels and gotten more oil.⁹

One last ancient source, the Christian New Testament, seems to reference Hanukkah. Here’s the verse, from the Gospel of John:

And it was at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication, and it was winter. And Jesus walked in the temple in Solomon’s porch.¹⁰

Since the word “Hanukkah” literally means “dedication,” there’s seemingly no other feast that this could be. Dates vary from year to year, since the Jewish calendar is lunar, but it’s almost always in late fall/early winter. This year, 2024, Hanukkah is unusually late, starting on Dec. 25 and going through Jan. 2.

But now to the present. Anyone reading this post and seeing the date is going to know that Israel has been at war since the terrorist attacks of October 2023. Hanukkah that year was, and indeed for many years to come will be, more a time of sadness than of celebration. But one more hopeful theme I’ve seen a number of places online are from last year’s holiday, in which modern-day Jews have done exactly what the Maccabees did in 164 BC: they’ve pulled menorahs from the wreckage and relighted them. Here’s just one such image:

And here’s the commentary from a specific source using the image above:

Tamir Hershkovitz lit his family’s menorah in the ruins of his childhood home in Kibbutz Be’eri on the first night of Hanukkah, Dec. 7. His parents, Maayana and Noah Hershkovitz, as well as his grandmother Shoshana Karsenty, had all been killed in the massacre.

The menorah belonged to his late grandfather, Yosef, who was a Holocaust survivor and partisan during World War II. An artist from Tamir Hershkovitz’s community created a large, golden replica of the family menorah and presented it to him and his sisters ahead of the candle-lighting in Be’eri, but they used the original that night.¹¹

As I’ve said before, we’re always having to pull treasures out of the mess and keep on lighting the candles. That’s true this year, and every year.¹²

The text of the prayer “Al Hanissim” forms part of the daily Hanukkah celebrations. Since Hanukkah isn’t one of the seven official feasts laid out in the Jewish Bible it’s celebrated more in homes than at the synagogue, although it seems that there are/can be special Hanukkah services depending on the congregation and its traditions. Fascinating fact about this prayer: the opening section is used as a prelude both for the verses describing the events of Hanukkah and for a second set of verses that concern another holiday, that of Purim, which celebrates yet another deliverance of the Jewish nation from almost certain death. But if you want to find out about Purim you’ll have to read the Book of Esther in the Jewish Bible.¹³ It’s quite a story!

Here’s a reading of the text from a member of my choir who is a cantor at his synagogue:

On to some musical settings of this prayer. I’ll include first the version that my own choir is singing in its concert for December 2024, by J. A. Kawarsky, an extremely energetic performance by a college choir:

And another setting, by another stellar choir, the Angel City Chorale, with a setting by Dov Frimer. You’ll see and hear that, while in spirit this version is very similar to the one above and also uses a clarinet in the accompaniment, it’s clearly a different tune. I wanted to emphasize that the original text is a prayer, not a song.

And a totally fun video using just the initial lines with this great, great group Six13 and many versions from others:

1. This piece will be performed at the December 2024 concert of my choir, the Cherry Creek Chorale; link is to the ticketing page. ↩︎
2. To read a full version of the lyrics, with Hebrew, transliterated Hebrew, and English, as well as some excellent commentary, go to Al Hanisim: Concerning the Miracles. ↩︎
3. These books, along with others dated to the intertestamental period, are not considered part of the Scriptural canon, that is, books inspired by God, by Jews and Protestant Christians. They are accepted as canonical by the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches. ↩︎
4. Curious about the other four sons and their nicknames? They were John Gaddi (“fortunate” or “lucky”), Simon Thassi (“wise” or “zealous”), Eleazar Avaran (perhaps “piercer” in reference to the story of his death, here quoted from Wikipedia: “According to 1 Maccabees 6:43–46, during the Battle of Beit Zechariah, Eleazar identified a war elephant that he believed to carry the Seleucid King Antiochus V, due to the special armor the elephant wore. He decided to endanger his life by attacking the elephant and thrusting a spear into its belly. The dead elephant then collapsed upon Eleazar, killing him as well.”), and Jonathan Apphus (usually translated as “dissembler,” perhaps because of his role in an ambush carried out to avenge his brother John’s death.) Scholars think that Mattathias chose these nicknames for his sons. ↩︎
5. So, just to get completely wonky here, “Maccabee” is not a last name or family name. We think that the family name for Mattathias was “Hasmonean,” from a Hebrew word meaning “wealthy.” ↩︎
6. 2 Maccabees 10:3, 6-8 Good News Translation, from BibleGateway. ↩︎
7. Observant Jews even today celebrate this feast as set out in the Jewish Bible, Here’s the relevant passage from The Message: “Live in booths for seven days—every son and daughter of Israel is to move into booths so that your descendants will know that I made the People of Israel live in booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt. I am God, your God.” (Leviticus 23:43) The “booths” were little outdoor huts made of branches, commemorating the time that Israel wandered in the desert for 40 years after leaving Egypt and before entering the Promised Land of Canaan. The feast is eight days and not seven because it starts out with a special Sabbath service, then lasts for the seven days after that, ending with another Sabbath. Here’s a nice short article about how at least one branch of Judaism incorporates this festival into modern life and includes a fun Lego-themed video: “Sukkot 101.” ↩︎
8. Shabat 21b—Was There a Chanukah Miracle? ↩︎
9. I absolutely could not resist including here a passage from one of my favorite books, Disciplines of the Beautiful Woman by Anne Ortlund:
   “Let me tell you a story that illustrates the difference high expectation can make. Do you remember the widow in 2 Kings 4 who had a big debt to pay, and got the news that her creditor was going to take her two sons to be slaves as payment of the debt? The poor woman was beside herself, and she cried to Elisha, the man of God. His answer was, ‘Go borrow from your neighbors every container for oil that you can get. Don’t borrow just a few. Really get out there and round them up!’ The woman borrowed containers from her neighbors, and Elisha began pouring from her scanty little supply. He poured and he poured, and when all the containers were full he said, ‘Come on, where are some more?’ ‘That’s all I got,’ she said–and with that the oil stopped. Now the oil poured so far was enough to sell and completely pay her debt, and keep her and her sons for life, as well. Talk about a godsend! But it was up to the woman how literally she took Elisha’s instructions to get lots of containers. If she had taken his words even more seriously, she could have tramped over the countryside and rounded up thousands of pots! The oil would have filled them all, and the rest of her life she could have fed the other poor, donated huge sums to the temple, lived in a larger house, given her sons every educational advantage . . . Her expectation-level of God’s ability to provide determined the quality of her lifestyle, forever afterward.” ↩︎
10. John 10:22-23 KJV, accessed via Bible Gateway ↩︎
11. ]“From Kibbutz Be’eri to the White House, menorahs retrieved from Oct. 7 wreckage light up for Hanukkah” ↩︎
12. Did you find yourself wondering, as I did, whether or not the fabulous solid-gold menorah that was in the original Temple of Solomon could possibly have been in the temple that the Maccabees restored? After all, that first temple had been destroyed by the Babylonians at the siege of Jerusalem in 587 BC. But it’s perfectly possible that it was indeed there: the book of Ezra in the Jewish Bible catalogs the items that Cyrus King of Persia took out of the pagan temple in Babylon and gave to the Jews who were returning to their homeland after he granted their request to do so in 539 BC. Then Herod came along after Israel/Palestine was conquered by Rome and made the temple much more magnificent as part of his own self-aggrandizement. Alas, though, that so-called “Herodian” temple was destroyed by the Emperor Titus in 70 AD, with only one wall still remaining—what is now called the “Wailing Wall” in today’s Jerusalem. ↩︎
13. The Book of Esther is easily accessible in multiple translations at Bible Gateway; I’ve linked specifically to The Message, a great modern version. ↩︎