Jewish High Holidays 2021

 The Jewish High Holidays seemed to have come a lot earlier and  a lot faster this year.

It felt like we were celebrating a new holiday every other day.  

That's not far from the truth!   Four of the most important Jewish Holidays of the year, all fall back-to-back of one another within a month's time of one another the month of September. 

ROSH HASHANAH: The celebration of the Creation of the world and the new year as well as the Day of Judgement.

YOM KIPPUR: A fast day that is traditionally filled with prayer and collective confession and atonement. It is said that “on Rosh Hashanah, the Book of Life is written and on Yom Kippur it is sealed.”

SUKKOT: In ancient times when the Temple stood in Jerusalem, this was a pilgrimage holiday to celebrate the harvest. Rabbinic tradition now holds that this week-long holiday is when we remember the experience of the Israelites’ years of wandering in the desert.

SIMCHAT TORAH: It celebrates the end of reading of the year’s Torah cycle and starting it anew for the new year.

We celebrated all four of these this year, which has really kept us busy.  

Two of the Holidays Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, are about self-reflection and setting resolutions for personal growth.

We had Pomagranites everywhere during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur

While neither of these two holidays has a religious mandate for any external prompts to be used, I find it useful to decorate our great room with traditional plant species associated with some of the rituals of this holiday.  The special holiday foliage and fruits help to remind us that' time-is-a ticking' to make our New Year's resolutions. For Example, The pomegranate is one of the Seven Species mentioned in the Hebrew Bible as being native to the Land of Israel.many Jewish families serve the fruit on Rosh Hashannah (the Jewish new year) in the hope that the coming year will bring many blessings, much prosperity, and the opportunity to do good deeds.

Our 2021 Sukkah

Sukkot, on the other hand, mandates that we celebrate the holiday with the building of a Sukkah (a temporary shelter reminiscent of the portable makeshift building the Israelis lived in after they exited Egypt).  While the  Torah says to build it outside with a leafy cover open to the stars, there is no way our HOA would allow us to construct one outside. So this year, like last year, so we set our Sukkah up in our living room with paper stars.

It is incredibly peaceful inside and there is plenty of room for eating and dining.

But there was not enough room to leave the table set,  so I extended the Sukkot decorations out onto the dining room table where I would serve the food, before we carried our meal into the sukkah, to eat.

Sukkot tableware waiting for the meal to be served.