You know I love your stuff...usually. But I'm sick to death of all this cutting-down-Hanukkah I'm seeing all over the web this year. And I know that all the hip intellectuals bringing down the Maccabees are still going over to mommy's house to light the menorah, exchange gifts, and eat latkes. So what's your point, that we shouldn't talk about what great heroes the Maccabees were? (Like that really comes up during your Hanukkah party.) And why is everyone suddenly waking up to the true history of the Hashmoneans now?

What we teach our kids about heroes has to be different than the full, unadulterated story -- otherwise there would simply be no heroes. I'm sorry but by any definition of the word, Judah Maccabee was a true Jewish hero, regardless of what his successors turned into. Bottom line: Did the Maccabean revolt save Judaism from a tyrant demanding Jews worship other gods? The answer is yes. If you like being Jewish, then you have to be thankful for that fact, and maybe even celebrate it. Did it turn ugly afterwards? Yes. (That doesn't stop the French from celebrating Bastille Day, nor should it, even though the French Revolution begat the Reign of Terror and Napoleonic Wars.)

There's all this cultural absolutism about how people 2,000 years ago should have behaved based on our own, cushy morals of 21st Century upper-middle-class sloth. Where's the context?

Or maybe I'm just not finding it funny.

I guess if this sparks Jewish adults to learn more about first- and second-century b.c.e. Jewish history so they can more fully disagree with your assessment, then I'm all for it.

Good art, though.