Hannukah’s Forgotten Lesson: How Cultural Identity Saves Us from Hellenistic Assimilation

Among all Jewish holidays, Hannukah—beginning last Sunday evening—has long held a special place in my heart. Even during my childhood, when I was less observant, I cherished its rituals: lighting the menorah, spinning the dreidel, and sharing potato latkes. My Hebrew name, “Maccabee,” honors Judah Maccabee, the hero whose nickname, “The hammer,” echoes the holiday’s narrative.

Hannukah’s timing aligns with corporate America’s annual Christmastime focus, making it the most commercialized Jewish holiday. While this trend is somewhat harmless, it masks a deeper issue: American politicians routinely distort Hannukah’s meaning for self-serving purposes. For decades, liberal leaders have invoked the menorah’s light to promote abstract universalist ideals—like justice and freedom—or, as former President Barack Obama once phrased it, “recommit ourselves to building a brighter future for our families, our communities, and our world.” Sometimes, they even misrepresent the holiday’s history. As the Jewish then-second gentleman, Doug Emhoff, did two years ago.

To me, Hannukah is Judaism’s quintessential particularist and nationalist holiday. It recounts the Maccabean revolt against the Greek-Syrian Seleucid Empire, which sought to Hellenize Judea—crushing Jewish identity physically and spiritually. The miracle of the oil lasting eight nights symbolizes resilience, but the more profound triumph was the military victory over the Seleucids and their assimilationist allies.

Hannukah’s core message is traditionalism and cultural preservation against forces that seek to erode it. It celebrates a people who refused to bend to Hellenistic universalism, insisting instead on the uniqueness of Jewish ethics, scripture, and connection to the Land of Israel. This pride in identity fueled their resistance—a lesson Western societies today must rediscover.

Recent tragedies underscore this urgency. The modern Maccabee martyrs slain last Sunday at Sydney’s Bondi Beach represent the latest victims of cultural erasure, a consequence of Hellenistic assimilationism gone awry. Yet Western nations can embrace pride without chauvinism or arrogance. True strength lies in recognizing that human societies, though all deserving dignity, are distinct—each with unique traditions and values impossible to reduce to universal templates.

As the Maccabees understood, cultural identity is nonnegotiable. To preserve it requires rejecting the false promise of interchangeable civilizations. Hannukah’s true lesson? We must cherish our heritage without apology—a truth that remains profoundly relevant in a world increasingly fractured by assimilationist forces.

Josh Hammer is the Senior Editor-at-Large of Newsweek, host of “The Josh Hammer Show,” and author of the weekly newsletter, “The Josh Hammer Report.” He writes as a syndicated columnist through Creators Syndicate and serves as a research fellow at the Edmund Burke Foundation.