Source: www.wnd.com - Tuesday, December 16, 2014 The story of Hanukkah is a story of defiance. Defiance by a people refusing to conform under immense pressure from a popular culture that had become hostile to the God of the Bible. Antiochus IV issued a decree in 167 B.C. that was pretty cut and dry. If you were an observant Jew, it was game over. You could no longer read the Torah, couldn’t observe the Sabbath, couldn’t circumcise your male offspring, couldn’t practice your faith. Antiochus, leader of the Seleucid Greek empire based in Syria, declared Zeus the new god throughout his empire, as Jonathan Cahn explains in his documentary film, “ The Hanukkah Endtime Mysteries, ” produced by WND Films. The penalty for disobeying this decree was death. Most Jews quickly conformed, trading their biblical culture for that of the pagan Greeks. They bowed to Zeus. But a small band of Judean “hillbillies” led by Mathathias Maccabee, who had seven sons, took umbrage at the king’s edict. “He refused,” Cahn said. “He said, ‘I am not going to abandon my God.’ He said, ‘If anyone wants to follow God, follow us.’ He said, ‘We have to fight,’ so he set up an army of his sons and said, ‘Anyone who wants to fight, come with us.’” They formed a ragtag army and waged a seven-year guerrilla war against Hellenistic oppression (167-160 B.D.), winning battle after battle that they were supposed to lose. By the end of 167 B.C., Antiochus had a pig slaughtered on the altar in the most sacred space of theAll Related
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