So far as I know, the text exists ONLY in Greek. The standard Rabbinic gloss "In the days of Mattathias, son of Yohanan, the heroic Hasmonean Kohen, and in the days of his sons, a cruel power arose..." (See Reuven Hammer: OHR HADASH, Rabbinical Assembly and United Synagogue, 2003, p. 160) is just that, a gloss. It is NOT source text. The Rabbis clearly wanted to preserve the "miracle of the oil" and, equally clearly, did NOT want to preserve the military history.
The Goldwurm, Zlotowitz, Scherman, CHANUKAH--ITS HISTORY, OBSERVANCE AND SIGNIFICANCE, ArtScroll Mesorah Publications, 1981...1998 see the matter somewhat differently (p. 13). ============================= As outlined in 'A History of the Chanukah Period' s later in this volume, the famous 'miracle of the lights,' when a one-day supply of pure olive oil burned for eight days, took place three years after the beginning of the Hasmonean revolt. That is the only miracle that the Talmud (Shabbos 21b) mentions in its brief description of the Chanukah events. The Al HaNissim liturgy, however, which recounts ... the festival's origin and which is inserted into the Chanukah prayers, tells a different tale. There, the eight-day miracle of the oil is not even mentioned. There, the emphasis is on the miracles of the military triumph. Al HaNissim tells how the Syrian-Greeks conquered the Jews and sought to wrest them from the Torah and commandments and how God came to Israel's defense, enabling them to overcome' the strong, the many, the impure, the wicked, and the wanton,' bringing about' a great victory and salvation. ============================= I have attached JPG of a longer section from p. 34 of the ArtScroll book. This argues that the texts were written originally in Hebrew (I think most scholars would agree.) but were not canonized because the canon had already been closed by that point (I think most scholars would DISAGREE sharply with this assumption. There are some who argue that the canon was finally sealed in response to the fact that the emerging Christian church had essentially closed its canon. Most scholars would agree that the Tanakh was closed around the years 90-100 CE in Yavneh. If that is so, there would be some other reason why Maccabees I and II were not included.) Chag sameach. P.S. I sent the following Chanukah greeting to a number of friends and want to share it. ------------ Happy Chanukah, Chanukah, Chanukka, Channukah, Hanukah, Hannukah...whatever. For a holiday which has no Hebrew texts and only a few Talmudic references, this is great! Here is the Gemara on the Rabbi Anon's mishnah: "They (Seleucid Greeks) tried to kill us. We won (at least through Shimon, circa 140 B.C.E.). Let's eat (latkes and sufganiot kosherdelight.com/Sufganiot.htm). Chag sameach!! ------------ _________________________________________________ Dr. Don Weinshank Professor Emeritus Comp. Sci. & Eng. 1520 Sherwood Ave., East Lansing MI 48823-1885 Ph. 517.337.1545 FAX 517.337.2539 http://www.cse.msu.edu/~weinshan ========================================================================== HaSafran - The Electronic Forum of the Association of Jewish Libraries Submissions for HaSafran, send to: Hasafran at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu SUBscribing, SIGNOFF commands send to: Listserver at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu Questions, problems, complaints, compliments;-) send to: galron.1 at osu.edu AJL HomePage http://www.JewishLibraries.org/
