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Yom HaShoah, also known as Holocaust Remembrance Day, occurs on the 27th of Nissan, this year April 23 – 24. Shoah, which means catastrophe or utter destruction in Hebrew, refers to the atrocities that were committed against the Jewish people during World War II. This is a memorial day for those who died in the Shoah.

The Shoah, or Holocaust, was initiated by the members of the National Socialist (Nazi) Party, which seized power in Germany in 1933. The Nazis believed in a doctrine of racial superiority, centering around the idea that that people of Northern European descent were somehow better than members of all other races – especially the Jews, who were “unworthy of life.”

After taking power, the Nazis gradually restricted the rights of German Jewish citizens and encouraged their followers to commit acts of violence and destruction against Jews and their property. During World War II (1939-1945), the Nazis implemented their “final solution,” a plan to concentrate and annihilate all European Jews. Jews were first crammed together in ghettoes and slave-labor camps, where disease, brutality, and malnutrition ran rampant. Eventually, they were sent to death camps, where millions were murdered in special facilities designed to kill a tremendous number of people over a brief period of time. In addition to the six million Jews who died – two-thirds of the European Jewish population – the Nazis also killed millions of others, including Roma (Gypsies) and Slavs, political and religious dissidents, the handicapped, and gays and lesbians.

Today, many commemorate Yom HaShoah by lighting yellow candles in order to keep the memories of the victims alive.

(from the Union for Reform Judaism)

The Seder, which means “order” in Hebrew, is a lively tradition based on the Biblical verse commanding Jews to retell the story of the Exodus from Egypt. Families and friends gather to celebrate with special blessings, songs and rituals. Seder customs include drinking four cups of wine and eating matzo and other symbolic foods placed on the Passover Seder Plate. Jews perform the Seder in much the same way all over the world. You can read more about Passover traditions here.

Tu BiSh’vat or the “New Year of the Trees” is Jewish Arbor Day. The holiday is observed on the fifteenth (tu) of Sh’vat. Scholars believe that Tu BiSh’vat was originally an agricultural festival, marking the emergence of spring. After the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.C.E. this holiday was a way for Jews to symbolically bind themselves to their former homeland by eating foods that could be found in Israel. In the seventeenth century, Kabbalists created a ritual for Tu BiSh’vat similar to the Passover seder.

Today, Tu BiSh’vat has also become a tree planting festival in Israel, in which both Israelis and Jews around the world plant trees in honor or in memory of a loved one or friend.

This year, Tu BiSh’vat falls on February 10 – 11.

For more information, click here. 

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