Hanukkah, the ancient Greeks, and wrestling |
The oldest coin in my coin collection is my Greek silver stater struck more than 2,300 years ago. Pictured on the obverse side of it are two unclothed wrestlers engaged in a match. No offense to the ancient Greeks, but despite their many wonderful philosophers, they were a pagan society, and under the kingship of Antiochus IV they excelled at intolerance when it came to the Jewish subject state of Judaea.
The Greeks did not invent wrestling but they did bring it to a whole new level. They made it into an art form with their wrestling schools and by integrating it into their Olympic Games.
While ancient Greeks wrestled amongst one another,........