

Add blessings to welcome those who are not Jewish.įor some ideas, check out this article. Other popular greetings are “chag sameach", which translates to “happy festival”, or "chag Pesach samech", to make it more Passover specific.4. "Happy Passover" and "Happy Pesach" are the most popular greetings for Passover. This year, it begins on the evening of April 5 and goes on until April 13. In the Hebrew calendar, that falls on the 14th day of Nisan, or the month of spring, which changes every year on the Gregorian calendar. The book of Exodus prescribes that Passover be celebrated "from the evening of the 14th day of the first month" of spring.

When does the Passover holiday fall this year?

It is believed that in their hasty escape from Egypt, the Israelites did not have time to let their bread rise and therefore only took unleavened bread for sustenance on their journey. There are varying accounts of why the sixth item, an egg, is included in the seder plate, but many believe it to represent the circle of life - of birth, reproduction and death.ĭuring Passover, Jewish people also only eat unleavened bread. Jewish community in UAE celebrates new year festival of Rosh Hashanah The items include bitter herbs, which represents the bitterness of enslavement charoset or a sweet, brown mixture representing the mortar and bricks used to build Egyptian structures vegetables for hope and renewal a lamb shank to represent the lamb's blood used to mark the doors and matzo or unleavened bread. Usually held on the first night, the Passover seder is set around a dinner table where families gather to eat, pray, drink, sing religious hymns and read the Haggadah, a Jewish text that sets the order of the seder and tells the story of the Passover.Ī seder plate is usually placed on the table, which consists of up to six food items each symbolising the journey of the Israelites. Traditions include the Passover seder, a ritual that blends food, song and storytelling. While a joyous time for family gatherings, the Passover is still a deeply religious festival. Members of the Samaritan community pray at sunrise while marking the end of Passover on top of Mount Gerizim, above the West Bank city of Nablus. It's after this and after untold grief spreads across Egypt, that the pharaoh allowed Moses to lead his people to freedom. To escape the coming catastrophe, God instructed Israelites to mark their doors with lamb's blood so the angel of death will pass over their homes. The 10th plague, in which God kills every firstborn in Egypt, was the deadliest.
#Make a pass over free#
Each time the pharaoh, King Ramses II, rejects Moses's appeal to free his people, God sends a plague on Egypt, inflicting it with everything from lice to boils and cattle disease. It tells of how the prophet Moses was chosen by God to lead his people from slavery. The Passover gets its name from the Biblical story from the book of Exodus in the Old Testament, which recounts the freeing of Israelites from slavery in Egypt. The Passover, a major Jewish holiday also known as Pesach, is a week-long festival celebrating the Biblical story of the Israelites' escape from slavery in Egypt.Īlthough it has deeply religious connotations, the festival also marks the arrival of spring and the beginning of the agricultural season.
