>>3411224After the Israeli civil war, the North started to follow the pagan ways of their ancient neighbors, including orgies and human sacrifice. God punished them by sending Assyria to destroy their civilization.
The South wasn't as bad, but they eventual fell into the same sin. God sent Babylon to take them into captivity, and He sent a vision to the prophet Ezekiel showing the spirit of God leaving the temple in Jerusalem.
God did not destroy the southern kingdom because of His promises to Abraham and David and the rest, so he sent the Persians to take over Babylon. King Cyrus then sent some of the Jews back to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple that the Babylonians had destroyed.
After all this, the prophet Malachi gave God's message of His love for Judah and rebuked the priests and the whole kingdom for turning away from God. He foretold the coming of the messenger who would pave the way for the Lord and of the Day of the Lord.
Christian teaching says this messenger is John the Baptist, who paved the way for the Messiah Jesus to begin His ministry. The Day of the Lord is the day when God will judge all the people of the earth for their sin.
Malachi was the last prophet before the coming of Christ.
In the mean time, the Greeks took over Judea, and ransacked the new temple, even sacrificing unclean animals on the alter.
Now what was left of Israel was suffering under Greek rule, they had received no word from God for like 200 years, and this was just the latest chapter of them getting almost destroyed.
Judas Maccabeus lead the Jews into the fight where the successfully pushed the pagans out of the temple.
After this they tried put the temple back the way it was supposed to be, but the menorah was out of oil. It was supposed to burn continuously, and there was only a day's supply of fuel left. They lit the flames and searched for more oil for 8 days until they found more.
God let the oil burn all 8 days, and the people saw the God was still with them.
