 Think, Tech, Hawaii. Civil engagement lives here. Unity matters, and this is the miracle of Hanukkah. Oh, this is one of my favorite shows. Rabbi Itchel Kresenjanski of Khabarro, Hawaii, welcome to the show, Rabbi. Thank you. Thank you for inviting me. And could you introduce the candles? What is the candles? Sure. This is the Hanukkah menorah, the Hanukkah candleabra in Hebrew. It's called the Hanukkah, and the festival of Hanukkah is an eight-day festival, and we'll soon talk about that. So today is the second day, and each day we light a candle for the corresponding day. So today, actually we lit it last night, two candles, tonight we'll light three candles, and until we get to eight candles. So here, these are the two candles. All right, there we go. And in Hebrew, a C-H is a chah sound, so it's not Hanukkah, it's Hanukkah. Hanukkah, okay. So for this discussion today, I'm going to call it Hanukkah. What about you, Manny? Can you call it Hanukkah? Hanukkah. Nice, nicely done. I'll go back to my roots, if I can, Hanukkah, right? That's good. Okay. That's Manny Matos. He's a local boy, as you can see on the screen, but he's also Jewish, because he has with him a DNA test that tells him he's Jewish, and he is sort of changing his persona these days to go from Portuguese to Jewish. This is good. Well, yeah, it's not totally Jewish. I have a lot. I have English, French, you know. So it's kind of a revelation for me as far as my background, but it's such an honor to be here with the Rabbi and being some Jewish blood. I want to have a little beard, so I cannot compete with him, because so I guess I'm a little beard, but not that much. So Manny, you want to just take your hat off so we can see your Judaism, take your ball cap off. Oh, wow. What do you got there, Manny? I wear this once in a while to hide my baldness, but it was a gift from a good friend of mine left. It's called, in Yiddish, this is called a yarmulke, the head covering is a yarmulke, because it's a Yiddish word, but it actually has its roots in Hebrew. Yarmulke means, it's two words, Yido, Malka, which means fear of heaven, the purpose for wearing this covering for Jewish people. So we're always reminded of God above us and have that fear and awe. Yeah, that explanation was explained to me by my good friend Lester because his son got married now and he's very cultured Jewish and all the men had to wear it. So this is one of the cherries that I have from him. He's there with us. Very nice. So we set this show up because it's Hanukkah, Hanukkah, and because Manny has been on the show a number of times to describe his discovery and his journey on this issue. And the rabbi comes down, and I'd like the rabbi to come down on a regular basis. There are so many wonderful Jewish holidays and culture points. I'm with you. Yeah. And so today is an opportunity to talk about Hanukkah and it's to make sure, make sure that Manny knows everything about Hanukkah, is part of his education, and there's so much about Hanukkah. It's a happy holiday. It's a holiday of success. It's a holiday that is unambiguous. Can you talk about it, Rabbi? Sure. Before, that's the answer, Rabbi. Can you give us kind of an opening prayer when you light the candle light? Nothing lengthy. It's something short that we can familiarize ourselves with. What I can tell you is that there are three blessings that we make the first night of Hanukkah when we light the menorah, and all the subsequent nights, as I said before, there are eight nights. The Hanukkah, all the subsequent nights we make two blessings. And the translation in English of these blessings, the first blessing is, blessed are you, God, our Lord, King of the world, who has sanctified us with his commandments and commanded us to light the Hanukkah candle. That's the first blessing. First blessing. The second blessing is, blessed are you, God. Our God, King of the world, that has performed miracles for our forefathers in those days in this time of the year. That's what Hanukkah commemorates. And then the third blessing is like a generic blessing that we say on many occasions, and it's blessed are you, God, our God, King of the world, shehechayanu, that has sustained us, the kimanu, and has given us life, hechayanu, and allowed us to arrive to this time. So it's a blessing of thanks to God for giving us life so that we can celebrate. Yeah, especially. And given in Hebrew, of course, man. Yeah. It's, I've heard a lot about it as a young man and to the years, but I've really never understood, you know, the truth. And that's what I've learned about the Jewish people and their faith is, really, their faith takes them on a continuous journey, you know, and it's, I think that's why it was able to keep the people together for thousands of years. Yeah. Yeah. Well, very, very, very true. From your lips. So if you want, I can share in the nutshell the story of Hanukkah and why. I love the story of Hanukkah. It's a beautiful story. And why we celebrate it. So first off, in the Jewish tradition, we have biblical holidays, meaning those special days, holy days that are mentioned in the Bible in the Old Testament, like Passover and the festival of Pentecost, as well as the Sukkot, which is in English referred to as the, when we have the huts. So that's in the fall and September, October? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It'll come to me soon, how it's said in English. So these are three biblical festivals. But in addition, there are two major rabbinic festivals, meaning that the rabbis enacted that these days should be special days, days of celebration and holidays. And Hanukkah is one of the two. Purim is the other one. Hanukkah commemorates a very, very special time, a very special event that happened in our history. It goes back to, before the destruction of the Second Temple, about 165 BCE, for the common era. That means before, that's the same thing as BC, right? Yeah, yeah. Right, yeah. Jesus was born, ostensibly. And it was a time when the Greek, Assyrian Empire that was led by Alexander the Great were conquering nation after nation and building this, you know, this superpower. And they also controlled Israel, biblical Israel, what we call today Palestine. It was a colony. It was a, yeah, there were Jewish people living there then. And the Greeks were very big into their culture. And they looked to spread their culture and their philosophy and their way of life. So in every country that they conquered, they assimilated the people into the Greek culture. Well, they had a problem when it came to the Jewish people. First of all, they had a problem with Judaism. And it's interesting that our sages note that they didn't have a problem with Jews. It wasn't like in our generation, the Nazis, Hitler, may his name be erased, hated Jews. He didn't care what kind of Jew you were. Even if you weren't aware that you're Jewish, he hated Jews and sought to annihilate the Jewish people. The Greeks were different. The Greeks had a problem with Judaism. They had a problem with the teachings of, and the way of life of the Jewish people because in many ways it was a clash to the values and the principles of the Greek culture. While the Greek culture deified man and the intellect, Hercules and science as being the highest that exists within this world, the Jewish people believe in God that's even higher than that, higher than man. And while the intellect is a very powerful tool, and we were meant to use it to understand, we also recognize that there are things that are beyond our understanding that are larger than what our minds can wrap themselves around. So we have faith. We believe in God, and we accept God even in times and in situations where it doesn't confuse us. This is a very age-old dichotomy, isn't it? Yes. Yes. So they came up against a stubborn people, and stiff-necked people. Stiff-necked people, stubborn people. Exactly. You'll find that, man. Your neck is stiff. It's not an orthopedic thing, either. I was reading, because in our religious faith, in our Bible, we have Maccabees, first Maccabees, second Maccabees, and it's a very beautiful piece of written material. That's it. That's what it's all about. Yes, and it described this great faith in these young people. Yes, I was getting to that. I'm sorry for interrupting. No, no, no. Go right ahead. The Greeks, they outlawed Jewish practice, and specifically, they outlawed those practices that did not fall in line with their world views. For example, circumcision for Jewish children, which is one of the earliest commandments in the Bible. God told Abraham to circumcise himself, and all of his children, when they become eight days old, they have a circumcision. The circumcision is referred to in the Bible as a covenant between God and the child. It's a statement of faith. It's a covenant. It is a statement of faith, but it's more of a covenant. Covenant is a lot more deeper, right? Deeper than agreement. So the Greeks outlawed that because in their understanding, you cannot enter into an agreement with an eight-year-old child. You cannot surely enter into a covenant with an eight-year-old child. You should wait until the child becomes 18 years old, and then you sit down and you talk it out and you explain, and if they agree, then it's a meaningful covenant. But to take a baby when it's eight days old, but in the Jewish tradition, it's precisely when the baby's eight days old, before it has a mind of understanding, we enter this child into this covenant, which is not based on rash unreason and logic and appreciation, based on reasonable logic. It's a much deeper connection, covenant. So things like that, the Jewish Sabbath, the practice of the Sabbath was something that they outlawed. So there was a group of Jews called the Maccabees. The Maccabees were, it's a Hebrew word, it's actually an abbreviation for a verse in the Bible where it says when the Jewish people crossed the Red Sea and Moses led the Jewish people in song, there's a verse there where Moses says, who like you amongst the strong is God? In other words, God is the strongest, the real strongest God. So in Hebrew, is the abbreviation for the word Maccabees. So they were called the Maccabees. So it's an acronym. It's an acronym. How interesting for, it's an acronym for a statement of faith in God, basically. And this faith in God enabled them to stand up against this powerful, mighty Syrian army. They were just a family and with some, you know, with some recruits, and they pushed back the Syrians in the city that they lived in, which was called Mauddin, which is not far from Jerusalem. And when they were successful, Mauddin, when they were successful... Is that in Israel now today? Yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. Yeah. It's a big city today. And one thing about Israel, maybe we should talk about it, one of your shows, maybe do a trip to Israel. When you walk on the streets in Israel, you're walking on history. Every part of Israel is a living history. Man, you want to come along on that trip? No, I would love to go. But when you mentioned Mauddin, is that the Jewish word they used for their secret service? Oh, oh. Is that any correlation between the Mauddin you were talking about, Andy and the Jewish... Yeah, the Shin Bet. Yeah. Well... Is that any relationship to that? No, but in Hebrew, Mauddin also has the meaning of information. So, yes, the agency that deals with it... There is a correlation and a meaning behind it. Okay, okay. That name came to my mind. So, the story goes that when they were successful in pushing back the Assyrian army in their little town, that emboldened them and they rallied more people to go up to Jerusalem and to push the Assyrians out of Jerusalem and to take the temple, the second temple, take it back because... The rebellion. It was an uprising against the Greek Assyrian army because when the Greeks entered into the temple, they, what's the word I'm thinking, they defiled, they defiled everything in the temple. Because it's holy. Exactly, because it's holy and they brought a pig, they brought it as a sacrifice because the pig... That's a defiling. Exactly. So, they led this war against the great Assyrian army, Greek Assyrian army, Assyrian, today it's not, it's different than Assyria, Assyria today is just one little country. Assyrian. Assyrian. Assyrian. Assyrian is not Assyria today. Exactly. And the great, there were two miracles that happened. First miracle was that they were victorious in this battle and as we say in the prayers when we thank God that even though that the Maccabees were few in number, even though they weren't trained soldiers like the Assyrian army was, but yet... All volunteers. Hmm. Yet, they had the... Minutemen. They had the ability to conquer and to drive the Assyrians out of Jerusalem. When they did that and they entered into the temple with the purpose of cleaning it up and rededicating the temple, which by the way, the word Hanukkah in Hebrew means to rededicate. To dedicate. Oh, how wonderful. That was the idea is to rededicate the temple. Now one of the services that were done in the temple by the priests, there was a... The Jewish priests. The Jewish priests, right? There was a menorah. A menorah means a candelabra. And every day it was an oil-based menorah and every day they would light this menorah, which actually had seven branches. The Hanukkah menorah we have has eight branches, eight candles, for eight candles. And they found the menorah and they cleaned it up, but they couldn't find pure oil, because all the oil that was there stored in the temple was defiled. It was defiled. In what way was it defiled? It was defiled because it was touched by the Greeks and anything that comes into contact with the corpse defiles it and there was dead people there, so everything was defiled. This is holy oil. Exactly. It doesn't take too much to defile. Holy olive oil. Yeah. Holy olive oil. So here we are. This is at a crux point. How are you doing, Manny? I'm learning a lot. Me too. I'm learning stuff I didn't know. We're going to take a short break. We're going to find out what they did when they found they didn't have enough good oil left to burn in the menorah. This is a very exciting time and it has been a study among the Jewish people for all these years and a celebration. We'll be right back after this break and you'll see what happened. Aloha. This is Winston Welch. I am your host of Out and About where every other week, Mondays at 3, we explore a variety of topics in our city, state, nation and world and events, organizations, the people that fuel them. It's a really interesting show. We welcome you to tune in and we welcome your suggestions for shows. You got a lot of them out there. We have an awesome studio here where we can get your ideas out as well. I look forward to you tuning in every other week where we've got some great guests and great topics. You're going to learn a lot. You're going to come away inspired like I do. I'll see you every other week here at 3 o'clock on Monday afternoon. Aloha. Aloha. My name is Andrew Lanning. I'm the host of Security Matters Hawaii airing every Wednesday here on Think Tech Hawaii, live from the studios. I'll bring you guests. I'll bring you information about the things in security that matter to keeping you safe, your co-workers safe, your family safe, to keep our community safe. We want to teach you about those things in our industry that may be a little outside of your experience. So please join me because security matters. Aloha. All right. It's Hanukkah here in Community Matters. We have Rabbi H. L. Kresnan-Chansky of Hawaii talking about Hanukkah. And we have a Jewish person who is also a local boy, Pushki's person, Manny Matos, who is studying with the rabbi today. And don't worry, Manny, there's no test at the end. You mean I'll get a quiz? No quiz. Not today. So, Rabbi, we're getting to the good stuff now. They couldn't find enough oil to burn. They needed enough oil to burn for eight days because that's what it requires. It needed enough oil to burn for eight days because it would take eight days to go where they had to go and to make new, press new olive oil. It was three days journey each way in one day to make the oil. But they searched and they searched and they finally found one jug of oil that was hidden in the ground that still had the seal of the high priest on it, meaning it wasn't defiled, it wasn't touched by the Greeks. So they used that one little jug of oil to light the menorah that night. But the problem was it would take eight days for the new pure oil to be replenished and brought back. And this is the miracle of Hanukkah that the oil that was only enough to burn for one night miraculously burned for eight nights. And this is why we celebrate Hanukkah. This is the celebration of lighting the menorah. That's why there's eight candelabras here. You know what? It strikes me it's more than one miracle. Oh. It's a miracle every day for eight days, every single day. Yes. My goodness, it's going another day. Watch this. What was the really significance of lighting each, you know, oil on each day? What? Where did? Because in the Old Testament it says Moses told Aaron, who was the high priest, that one of the services was every day that they, every day they lit a candelabra of seven branches. And when they rededicated the temple they resumed doing the service in the temple including the lighting of the menorah. So like I said, the miracle was that the little, the pure oil they had lasted for eight days. Belief in Moses was divinely inspired to do this, or is it something that he himself? Well the Jewish tradition, now we're going into another whole hour show, but basically in 10 seconds the Orthodox Jewish belief is that Moses was like a stenographer. He just wrote down what God told him. It wasn't his wisdom, it wasn't his inspiration, even though he was a great wise person. This is God's word, and that's why we believe that the Bible is eternal, just like God is eternal, so nothing has changed. And so how did they do in their rebellion? Did the oil have anything to do with the success of their rebellion? So actually that's a very interesting question because there are actually two separate miracles. One is the miracle of the battle, that they won against all odds, and the other miracle is the miracle of the lights. And there's a lot of discussion amongst the rabbis, why did they enact the holiday to be commemorated with the miracle of the lights, and not so much with the miracle of the military? It would seem that the candle, the menorah, was just like a sideshow. That was like the main miracle was that they were victorious, and God forbid not, then Judaism would have vanished. So the explanation is that, like we mentioned before, the battle between the Jews and the Greeks was not a simple battle they hated us and we were looking to defend ourselves. They were battling against the ideology that is represented by Judaism, which is represented by the menorah. Idea of pure oil and defiling the oil in the larger context represents, the Greeks wanted to defile Judaism. They wanted to keep the beauty of Judaism, but strip God out of it, because God to them was beyond understanding and they had no patience for anything that undermined their system. Exactly. Their total culture was at stake, and the menorah symbolized their total culture. Exactly. And the menorah symbolizes the victory of Judaism. I think that worked out very well though, because when you call it the festival of lights, it's an up thing, you know, it's memorable. And if you call it the miracle of the rebellion, I'm not so sure it would have been as memorable. So the festival of lights has lasted all this time, it's very robust, it's memorable, it's one of the most, one of two really popular, in fact it may be the most popular Jewish holiday year round, am I right? Because it's geared towards young Jewish kids. Also that's why one of the things I forgot to bring, I apologize Jay, Jay asked me, where's the dreidel? The dreidel is the top kind of thing that you spin. And the story behind, and that's what kids play, and they bet money on it, you know, cards, whatever. And the story behind the dreidel was that when Jewish children were gathered and studying, they had to look out that when the Greeks would come by, they had to quickly hide their study books and make believe they were just playing something. So they made believe they were playing the dreidel talks, the spinners. It's actually dedicated to Hanukkah. Exactly, because on the dreidel there's four sides of four letters that spell out, a great miracle happened there, meaning an Israel. So the way the game is played is you spin the dreidel and then where it falls out, and whatever letter it falls on, depends. If it falls on the letter Gimel, which is the big miracle, then you get to take all the money that's on the table. Beef. Exactly. Things like that, so also because the holiday is connected to the oil, so also the food and the celebration is connected to oil, so we eat what is called latkes, I don't know, like potato pancakes that's fried in oil. Yeah, I got to have some of that, that looks, that's all. That's really good. It is? As well as in Israel it became popular, it's like donuts, jelly donuts, which they fry in oil. So this is how we celebrate Hanukkah. But in the larger, on a more serious note, Hanukkah is a great celebration of this miracle. The idea, our faith in miracles, we believe that God intervenes. And a wise man once said, Ben-Gurion, who was the first Prime Minister of modern Israel, said that any Jew that doesn't believe in miracles is not a realist. That's wonderful. That's quotable. Maybe there will be a final exam. Well, I got one question for you, besides many more, but in the realm of all the different exodus and the miracles, where does the Hanukkah gauge in the hierarchy of miracles? Very good question. So one would think that the biblical holidays are up there, and the rabbinic holidays are like of second class, but the opposite is true, that all of, and this is one of the secrets of Jewish survival, that all of the rabbinic enactments are observed not only with the equal commitment, like the biblical commandments, but with even more, because there are hints in the Bible that we need to turn to our rabbis and sages for them to guide us and interpret for us the way forward based on the principles of the Bible. So when they enacted a holiday, it became accepted with equal fervor and dedication, like a biblical holiday. So Hanukkah is way, way up there. And especially because it's a holiday that commemorates such a great miracle. And for Jews, the idea of miracle, which God intervenes in our lives, is actually, like we just said, that's the reality of how we live our lives. Miracles are just obvious, godly interventions. But even that, which is natural, and just waking up every morning and going about miracles or where you find them. And I think, like how you're saying, is the actions of Jewish people and their determination is more of a miracle than God just reaffirms that miracle that they're creating every day. But like the Maccabees, they created the miracle by the human aspect of their relationship with God. So God just blessed them and kind of given me blessings with condoning their actions, I guess. Is that what I'm saying? Yes, exactly. And another aspect of Hanukkah, which resonates with many people today is, especially in our country, the freedom to practice religion, the constitutional right that we have to practice religion, and not to be coerced by any power. And that is the story of Hanukkah, that the Jewish people were being coerced by the Greeks. And we fought a war to free ourselves of that. So that freedom of religion? Freedom of religion. That was a war. A war. Two thousand years later. But we're a little wiser today. A lot wiser, I think. Thank you, Manny Manos. It's great to have you here in this conversation. Thank you for inviting me. If I can just invite our audience. Oh please. Tomorrow evening, Wednesday, we're having the Waikiki Gateway Park that's in Waikiki where Kohio and Kawakawa Avenue meet. We have every year, for the last 31 years, very large public menorah lighting where people gather and we light the menorah. And because the whole thing of Hanukkah is not only to commemorate the miracle, but to publicize the miracle, to be proud and publicize. And to have some latkes, too. To have latkes, too, for sure. Don't forget the latkes part. Thank you very much. Take care. Happy Hanukkah. Thank you. Happy Hanukkah. Can I end this with, is it shalom or shalom? Shalom. Yes. Shalom. In Hawaii they say shaloha. Shaloha. That's good. Thank you. Thank you.