Does Chanuka have a happy ending? Tonight the thought occurred to me that it absolutely does not. Within a generation the Macabee successors were Hellenized complete with Greek names. John Hyrkanus was one. Alexander Yannai was another. They were corrupt, vicious, enemies of the Rabbis. Greek in every way. Very, quickly, they became the very sort of people the family founders had fought against.
All Judah and his band of brothers managed to do was delay the inevitable.
Sad that.
If you think about it, very little in Jewish history goes well for very long. . Yehoshua never completely conquered the land. The monarchy after David and Shlomo went to pot very quickly. So, Judah and co. didn't do so bad, as compared to the rest.
ReplyDeleteSo why exactly are we so eager to establish a messianic, Davidic, theocracy?
ReplyDelete