Happy Birthday!
On Monday evening, September 26, Jews and anyone else who follows the tradition set up in the Torah, are going to celebrate the birthday of the first man – Adam. He turns 5,783 and this day in the Jewish Calendar is called Rosh Hashanah, which translates to “head of the year”.
This holiday is the start of the cycle, which ten days later is followed by Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. And five days after that on the eve of October 9th, is the start of Sukkot. The holiday cycle ends with Simchat Torah, on October 18th. On that day, the last chapter of the reading from the Torah scroll is followed by the new one – Bereshit. “At the beginning of God’s creation of the heaven and the earth (Genesis 1:1)” the old cycle is followed by the new one. From the moment of the Creation of our world (some claim that this actually happened much earlier than 5,783, and the day in the Torah represents an epoch), Jews follow well established traditions.
One of them on Rosh Hashanah, is to eat a slice of an apple, dipped in honey and to wish each other Shana Tovah U’Metukah – A Good and Sweet Year!
I photographed these apples with my camera recently, at my friends’ house in Sebastopol.
Enjoy and Share!
