Chanukah: Understanding the Al Hanissim Prayer, on Five Levels

What’s said in this shiur

The opening of this shiur, in Rabbi Aaron L Raskin’s own words — taken from the captions, so names and Hebrew terms may be approximate.

on the holiday of chanukah we read the special alhanisim prayer a prayer instituted by our sages that is read in the amidah and again in the grace after meals it's invaluable we thank god for the miracles for the redemption for the mighty deeds et cetera et cetera and then we go on to say be me mathis yahoo when the wicked kingdom of yavan which is the syrian greeks they rose up against your people israel to make them forget your torah and violate the decrees of your will and then it goes on to say that a miracle took place that you waged their battles defended their rights and avenged the wrong done to them we go on to say you deliver the mighty into the hands of the weak the many into the hands of the few the impure into the hands of the pure and the wicked into the hands of the righteous and the wanton sinners into the hands of those who occupy themselves with your torah and he goes on to say that when the maccabees came into the temple then your children entered the shrine of your house now listen very carefully here cleansed your temple purified your sanctuary kindled lights in your holy courtyards and instituted these eight days of hanukkah to give thanks and praise to your great name so this is basically the prayer of the al-nisim that is recited again in the grace after meals and in the amidah three times a day and rosh or a day of shabbis is four times to understand this prayer on five levels of this on the level of the simple interpretation why does it mean that

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1. 0:00on the holiday of chanukah we read the special alhanisim prayer a prayer instituted by our…
2. 2:38after that after they won the war it says pinu they cleaned out your sanctuary with…
3. 5:11may be done by a non-cohen but how could a non-koen light the menorah if he…
4. 8:14the messianic era and that is according to the madrush it says all the holidays will…
5. 10:52they cleaned out the hecal which is the place where they lit the menorah and they…
6. 13:56the the service in the base amigos they were very thankful and therefore they lit all…
7. 16:31in kabbalah and siddhis we explain that these are two levels of god's unity what we…
8. 19:03according to the esoteric level of the torah and finally we have the the fifth level…
9. 22:10that they want to follow a religion they want to follow god and therefore they wanted…
10. 24:41our menorah we light up the candles we thank god for the spiritual victory that we…

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