Assimilation no doubt played a role in making Hanukkah the commercialized holiday it is today. But other factors shaped the modern festival, too, a scholar of Jewish studies and gender explains.

Hanukkah — also spelled Chanukah or other transliterations from Hebrew — is Judaism’s “festival of lights.” On eight consecutive nightfalls, Jews gather with family and friends to light one additional candle in the menorah — a multibranched candelabra. In Hebrew, Hanukkah means “dedication,” and the holiday marks the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem in the 2nd century BC, […]

Hanukkah was instituted in 164 B.C. to celebrate military victory, but the meaning has changed over time with the circumstances of the Jewish people.