About the Holy Days

Shabbat is a Holy Day that happens every week but it is not in this list. Click this link to view the candle lighting blessings of Shabbat.

Purim
Festival of Esther

The joyous festival commanded in the Book of Esther is marked by feasting, sharing with others, and a carnival-like atmosphere.

Pesach*
Passover

Passover, the season of our freedom, celebrates the redemption from Egypt, and includes the prohibition against eating anything with leaven. During Pesach we begin the counting of the omer, for 49 days until Shavuot.

Yom Ha Shoah
Holocaust Remembrance Day

Holocaust Remembrance Day honors the memory of the six million Jews who perished.

Yom Ha Atzmaut
Israel Independence Day

Israel Independence Day celebrates the renewal of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel in 1948.

Shavuot*
Festival of Weeks

The Biblical Festival of Weeks comes seven weeks after the beginning of Passover and celebrates the giving of Torah on Mount Sinai. It also is the same event also called Pentecost in Acts 2.

Tisha B’Av
Fast for Destruction of the Temple

A day of fasting in memory of the destruction of the Temple first by the Babylonians, and then by the Romans.

Rosh Hashanah*
Jewish New Year

Jewish New Year, Biblically termed Yom Teruah, a day of sounding the shofar, it begins 10 days of spiritual preparation culminating in Yom Kippur.

Yom Kippur*
Day of Atonement

The Biblical Day of Atonement is observed with fasting, prayer, and abstention from all ordinary activities.

Sukkot*
Festival of Booths

The festival of Booths is a joyous harvest festival of thanksgiving, during which families live in booths, or at least have their meals in them.

Shemini Atzeret*
Final Day of Sukkot

The final day of Sukkot is defined Biblically as a festival in its own right.

Simchat Torah*
Rejoicing in the Torah

The holiday of rejoicing in the Torah, when the annual cycle of readings is renewed for another year.

Chanukah
Festival of Lights

The Festival of Lights commemorates the rededication of the ancient temple in 165 BCE.

* One refrains from ordinary activities on these days, including the first two days of Passover.

The Jewish day begins at sundown, as in the account of the Beginning: “There was evening and there was morning, one day.” The day concludes the following sundown, or nearly an hour after sundown in the case of Shabbat and the holy days.