Holidays and Festivals

  You can see our 2011 list of  Sukkot services and events. The Festival of Sukkot begins on Tishri 15, the fifth day after Yom Kippur. It is quite a drastic transition, from one of the most solemn holidays in our year to one of the most joyous. Sukkot is the last of the Shalosh [...]

Click here for our Sh’mini Atzeret and Simchat Torah schedule. Tishri 22, the day after the seventh day of Sukkot, is the holiday Shemini Atzeret. The second day of Shemini Atzeret is Simchat Torah. These two holidays are commonly thought of as part of Sukkot, but that is technically incorrect; Shemini Atzeret is a holiday [...]

Chanukkah, the Jewish festival of rededication, also known as the festival of lights, is an eight day festival beginning on the 25th day of the Jewish month of Kislev. The story of Chanukah is not told in our scriptures, but rather in the book of Maccabees. It commemorates the rededication of the Holy Temple  (the [...]

At Beth Israel, Purim is one of the most joyous events of our year. We hold an annual “Purim Schpiel,”  a musical play that taps the incredible talents we have in our community.  Cantor Pamela Siskin and Natasha Ulyanovsky, our musical director, recruit over 40 congregants, young and old, to sing and dance and tell [...]

Pesach, known in English as Passover, is one of the most commonly observed Jewish holidays, even by otherwise non-observant Jews. Pesach begins on the 15th day of the Jewish month of Nissan. It is the first of the three major festivals with both historical and agricultural significance (the other two are Shavu’ot and Sukkot).  The [...]

Shavu’ot, the Festival of Weeks, is the second of the three major festivals with both historical and agricultural significance (the other two are Passover and Sukkot). Agriculturally, it commemorates the time when the first fruits were harvested and brought to the Temple, and is known as Hag ha-Bikkurim (the Festival of the First Fruits). Historically, [...]