Sack!

A man innocently walks down Broadway and 93rd street with a hamburger and fries in hand. Suddenly out of nowhere 6 foot 9 inches 295 pounds of pure muscle comes charging towards him like an uncaged lion who hasn't eaten in 3 days and rams his helmeted head into the unexpecting man's back. The poor man goes flying until he hits the pavement and starts writhing in pain. From the force of the hit his hamburger and fries go loose whereupon the attacker grabs them and starts running in the opposite direction at top speed. The victim's spinal cord will never be the same...

Now, what happens to the attacker? If we catch him - five years in prison for assualt and battery.

OK - Substitute the word football instead of hamburger and fries and put the victim on a "football field". What happens to the attacker? He gets a STANDING OVATION from 70,000 screaming fans, he gets on the news and for a few more of those a new contract for millions of dollars.

Greece, "Sparta", sports, the Olympics. This chanuka as we battle the Greeks we can ask ourselves if the Western fixation on sports has a place in our Jewish lives.