Hanukkah basics?

Question

Clearly I'm not Jewish, but my boyfriend is. I celebrated the first night of Hanukkah with them and its always kinda uncomfortable because I don't know anything about it. Can someone please help me?

Answer 1

Long story short. The Maccabees defeated the Greek overlords who had defiled the second Temple. To re sanctify the Temple they need the holy and pure oil. (Kind of like holy water, but different). They only had enough oil to burn for one day, and it takes 8 days to sanctify the oil. The miracle is that the one day worth of oil is that it burned for 8 days. Common foods served are cooked in oil, preferably olive. Donuts, latkes etc. (French Fries would work too.) At my house, after day three we bet on which candle will burn out last. The fun of Hanukkah never ends.

Answer 2

Hanukkah is one of the "minor" Jewish Holidays, although it's proximity to Christmas and the materialistic nature of Americans has elevated it's observation. It means the most to children, as they typically receive eight (8) presents, one for each night of Hanukkah.

The dates for all Jewish Holidays vary from year to year, because they are based on a Lunar Calendar, and have to be transposed onto the Gregorian (Western) calendar. All Jewish Holidays actually begin the evening before (Erev) to the date posted on the calendar. This year December 5 is the first day of Hanukkah, so the first night of Hanukkah was actually December 4.

The modern observation starts with the lighting of a single Hanukkah candle, on the first night, and one additional candle on each successive night. The lighting of candles is based on the legend that the Maccabees needed oil as a light source, and what they thought was a small amount of oil lasted for 8 nights. I'll admit, I am butchering the exact story (such as why they needed oil, what time period, etc).

Other symbolic items are potato latkes (cooked in oil) and jelly donuts (also cooked in oil).

Children (and adults) delight in these food choices, and children love getting 8 presents. When I was growing up I remember my mother bought me a small record player (yes, records, they came before CD's and tapes). Then for the other 7 nights, she gave me a Sesame Street record.

Another interesting fact is that there are multiple spellings of the same word (Hanukkah, Chanukah or Hanukah)

For a much more complete explanation, I would go to Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanukah

For more Jewish-specific knowledge, go to Aish.edu, which is a school based in Israel, that caters to Jews that want to expand their knowledge.
http://aish.edu/

Chabad is also a outreach (and therefore source of knowledge)
http://www.chabad.org/

Answer 3

Btw to comment of the first guy, you don't have to give presents every night. You give a person a gift and that's it. If you have many relatives, they might all want to give a present. They may come on diff. nights