So here’s the scoop. Antiochus (he’s the bad guy) was a Greek king around the time 165 BCE. (That’s 165 years before the year 0). Antiochus wanted all the people in Judea (what we now know as Israel) to be hellenized – in other words, to start acting like Greeks. What with all the Greek gods and sacrifices, it’s not surprising that the Jews said, “No freaking way!” This made Antiochus furious, so he had his army make a huge mess of the temple in Jerusalem and to kill anyone who tried to stand in his way, which, of course, started a war…

The Jews who fought back were called the Maccabees, led by Judah Maccabee (a badass and also hot). It took a few years, and they were way outnumbered, but the Maccabees knew their way around the forests and were fighting ninja machines, so they eventually won. It was time to celebrate! 

One of the first things the Maccabees wanted to do was clean up the temple. When they got there, they discovered a major problem. Every temple has a light that never goes out, called the eternal light, which signifies God’s presence. Back then, since there was no electricity, oil was used to keep the flame lit. When the Maccabees got to the temple, they saw the eternal light was almost out of oil! They looked through the supply closet, but, you guessed it, all of the jugs of oil were smashed. They only found like a pint of oil left which was good to keep the light lit for about a day. BUT, the process for making oil took eight days, and unfortunately, there was no overnight delivery back then. They used that pint of oil and hoped for a miracle that the little bit of oil would last for eight days until the new oil was ready. And do you know what, they got one!

The eternal light never went out! That miracle is why we celebrate Hanukkah for eight nights and eat food fried in oil, like latkes and jelly donuts. And why many of us put on those nasty three pounds during this holiday.