Chanuka – When and what happened?

Chanuka is a unique festival in that it spans two different months. It starts on the 25th of Kislev and lasts for eight days lasting a few days into the month of Teves. Two main miracles happened. The Chashmoinoyim beat the superior Greeks, Yivonim, in battle and chased them out of the Holy Beis Hamikdosh which they had desecrated. When searching for pure oil to light the menorah, they only found one jug that was enough for one night. They could only produce more of such oil eight days later. A miracle happened that this oil of one night lasted for eight nights.

Chanuka celebrated nowadays

We celebrate chanuka nowadays by lighting the menorah for eight nights to remember the miracle of the oil. We also use oil in many other ways – like having doughnuts and latkes. To remember the miracle of the battle we have the minhag of playing with the dreidel. It has four letters on it that stand for נ’ס ג’דול ה’יה ש’ם\פ’ה meaning a great miracle happened there (or here when in Eretz Yisroel). This game was invented at the time of the Greeks, that the Jews learned Torah secretly, and when the enemy entered their houses they quickly switched to playing this game.