THE MARTYRS OF BONDI BEACH, AUSTRALIA

On December 14, 2025, the first day of Hanukkah, the global Jewish community was heartbroken and shocked today as twelve Jewish people, including the Chabad rabbi, Rabbi Eli Schlanger, husband and father of four children, when they were shot down and killed and twenty-nine were wounded on Bondi Beach, Australia, by two Islamist terrorists for simply being Jewish. But Jewish martyrs who died defending their faith has long been a part of Jewish history. What is unfortunate is that it takes times like these for us to remember the martyrs For example, on the feast of Hanukkah, we oftentimes remember “the miracle of the oil,” or “the victory of the Maccabees over the Seleucid-Greek army,” but we unfortunately forget the Jewish men, women, and children who were killed in the events that led up to what we call “Hanukkah.”

FROM THE BOOK OF I MACCABEES

In the book of I Maccabees, we are reminded how the Seleucid-Greeks,

They shed innocent blood all around the sanctuary
and defiled the sanctuary itself.
The citizens of Jerusalem fled because of them,…
Her sanctuary became as deserted as a wilderness,
Her feasts were turned into mourning,
Her sabbaths into a mockery,
her honor into reproach. (I Maccabees 1:37-41)

What we see records what was done by Antiochus Epiphanes and the Seleucid-Greek army to try and destroy Judaism and assimilate the Jews into the Greek culture.  How many others have tried to do the same, even into modern times, such as the Persians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Christians, the Muslims, and during the Inquisition, various Pogroms, and the Holocaust of World War 2?  It breaks my heart to include Christians in this list, but the facts of history cannot be ignored.  There are many modern Christians who will argue that these were “not true Christians,” but if that were the case, then many Apostolic Fathers and even the Father of the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther, were “not true Christians.”

But also, the Antiochus and the Seleucid-Greeks did the following:

Any books of the Law that came to light were torn up and burned. Whenever anyone was discovered possessing a copy of the covenant or practicing the Law, the king’s decree sentenced him to death…Women who had their sons circumcised were put to death according to the edict with their babies hung around their necks, and the members of their household and those who performed the circumcision were executed with them. (I Maccabees 1: 56-57)

And why were they killed?  For being Jews who kept the Torah of God, and like these ancient martyrs that died for their faith, those at the Bondi Beach Hanukkah celebration were persecuted, wounded and killed for their faith.

CHANA & HER SEVEN SONS

One of the stories that’s told during the Hanukkah season is that of Chana and her seven sons.  According to the account, Chana and her seven sons were devout Observant Jews who were captured and tried for being Torah-observant.  They were then found guilty by Antiochus Epiphanes and the Seleucid Greeks and then sentenced to die. Their graves are located in a cave in the northern part of Israel.

First, Antiochus and his Seleucid-Greek soldiers tortured her first-born son in front of Chana and her other sons, but he refused to recant his faith in God.  So they killed him.  Then they took her second son.  He stood for his faith and said he was as faithful as his older brother.  He too then was tortured and killed.  Then they did the same to the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth.

Finally, it came time for her youngest son to die.  The soldiers asked Chana to reason with him, so that she might keep at least one of her sons alive.  She pretended to comply, but instead, she encouraged him to be strong in his faith in God.  The youngest then went forward and proclaimed his faith in God and in His Torah.   The soldiers were so angry that they tortured him more than the others, killing him as well.  However, before they killed him, Chana yelled out to him, “When you meet Father Abraham, tell him that he was told to offer one son on the altar, but I have offered seven.”

Then according to the online article “The Inner Lights of Chanukah,” by Chana Katz, she writes, “after the last of her seven sons was tortuously killed, she went to the roof and jumped to her own death, and as the story is related in the Gemara, a heavenly voice called out that she was an “Eim Simaicha” (“a joyful mother”).  Other Jewish people were also killed during this time for various acts of obedience to God, such as circumcising their boys or in studying the Torah.

MARTYRS – “A WITNESS OF DEVOTION TO GOD”

It is hard for me to imagine the amount of devotion to God and His Torah that Chana and her sons, the Jews during the Inquisition, the Pogroms, the Holocaust, had to the point where they would rather be tortured and killed than to disobey God’s commandments.  Was the faith of those who were horribly killed on October 7, 2023, or even today at Bondi Beach, Australia, any less because they didn’t have a choice about being killed for practicing their Jewish faith?

All of these men, women, and children were demonstrating the same type of love and devotion we see in Hananiah (Shadrach), Mishael (Meshach), and Azariah (Abed-nego), who would rather be thrown into a fiery furnace than to bow down to Nebuchadnezzar’s golden image (Daniel 3:12-18), or even Daniel, who would rather be thrown to the lions than to stop praying for thirty days (Daniel 6:10-11).  Yet all of them were willing to sacrifice their lives than to disobey God.

THE COST OF LOVING GOD

The difference, of course, is that Daniel and his three companions were delivered from death, but Chana and her seven sons, as well as those who were killed throughout the centuries and even today, were not delivered from death but died as Jewish martyrs, or we could say that they are our modern reminders that to “love God with all of our soul” may be the actual cost of our devotion and love for God.

OUR RESPONSE: “BE LIGHTS IN THE DARKNESS”

As the people of God, let us respond to the darkness of antisemitism and persecution by being proud of our God, His Torah, and of Israel. Rather than submitting to the darkness, let us fight back by lighting our Hanukkiahs and proudly placing them in prominent places, so that all may see the declarations of our faith, and as we light them, let us boldly declare, “Am Yisrael Chai” (“The people of Israel Live”)!

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