The bible defines five holidays: rosh hashana, yom kippur, pesach (passover), shavuot, and sukkot. So where did hanukkah come from?
According to the Bible, when the Jews settled in Canaan (now Israel) the first task was to build a temple to hold the Ark of the Covenant (of Indiana Jones fame), and lit an "eternal flame" that was never extinguished. After David (of Goliath fame) united Israel (Judea), his son Solomon (of wisdom fame) built the second Temple.
In 175 BCE, Judea was under the control of Syria but had religious freedom. Unfortunately it was also involved in a civil war between the Hellenizing Jews, who wanted to be like the Greeks, and the Ptolemaic Jews, who wanted to be like the Egyptians. The Hellenizing Jews were expelled, so they invited the king of Syria to intervene. Unfortunately the king went a little further than expected, captured Jerusalem, outlawed Judaism, ordered an altar to Zeus be erected in the Temple and called for pigs to be sacrificed there.
The Jews, who were never good subjects (just ask the Pharaoh), revolted. Mattityahu, a high priest, and his five sons led a rebellion which took two years but was ultimately successful. Judah Maccabee ('Judah the hammer') ordered the Temple to be cleansed, a new altar built, and the eternal light to be lit. However, they found only enough consecrated oil to last one day, and it would take eight days to press new oil. Miraculously, the oil lasted eight days, and this 8-day period is celebrated as Hanukkah.
However, as my rabbi pointed out, the real miracle was that a tiny little country was able to win its freedom against one of the greatest empires in history, and by comparison celebrating oil burning for eight days just seems ridiculous.
That said, a 'festival of lights' during the winter is common to many cultures, and the 'hannukiah' (the 9-branched candelabra) is supposed to be displayed in a front window to reinforce the Jewish 'differenceness' that has kept the culture alive for over four millennia.
Independence lasted until 63BCE, when the Romans conquered Israel. The Jews rebelled against them three times. In the first (66-70CE), a group of Jews holed up in Masada, on a mountain, for two years while the Romans laid siege and finally built a massive earthworks to breech the walls. (The Jews, known as Zealots, killed themselves rather than be captured.) In retaliation, the Romans destroyed the second Temple; the remains still stand as the Western Wall.
In the third rebellion (132–136 CE), Simon Bar Kokhba established an
independent state of Israel for two years, but the Romans sent six legions (30,000 soldiers!) to crush it, and then barred Jews from Jerusalem. Another effect is that as the Christians did not support the rebellion, Romans began to consider Christianity separate from Judaism. (Until then, Christianity was considered a sect of Judaism.)
