I was outraged by the accusation that Judah Maccabee, if alive today, would “likely want to kill Jewish parents who want to harmonize being Jewish and being American” (“Mel Gibson and Judah Maccabee? Not a Good Mix,” Opinion, May 25).
Judah Maccabee and his followers may have been “religious extremists” and “zealots,” but they successfully fought to remove the worship of Greek idols and sacrifices from the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and re-establish freedom to practice Judaism in Israel. The only Hellenist Jews they may have killed were those who demanded to “harmonize” Greek idolatrous worship with our Jewish worship.
The goal of the Maccabees was not to kill every non-Orthodox Jew in the world. What sinat chinam, what libel, by the recently praised intellectual Jewish leader, Daniel Libenson.
Teaneck, N.J.
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