על הניסים

Shavua Tov and Chanukah Sameach. Well, we entered Chanukah knowing who our modern day Antiochus is in the person of Barak Obama. He ends his eight year reign showing his true colors of anti-semitism and disdain for the State of Israel.

I intended to write about the על הניסים prayer which now has even greater meaning with this shameful news. First of all, if one forgot to insert על הניסים in שמונה עשרה or ברכת המזון, he does not need to repeat the Shmone Esrei or the Benching.

The prayer celebrates the victory of the few over the many. In a book written by Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach about Chanukah, Reb Shlomo claims that there were only 70 Maccabees against 500,000 Greeks. When they saw Yehuda Maccabee riding on a lion, they fled in fear!

We are to recite this prayer with a great deal of gratitude and awe for the physical victory of the war, and the spiritual victory of overcoming the impurity of the Greeks and Greek culture. עם ישראל חי