Students prepare for Rosh Hashanah

By Cyndi Loza

Rosh Hashanah, one of the most sacred Jewish holidays marking the first day of the Jewish calendar, Tishrei 1, begins Monday at sunset.

“Rosh Hashanah is about new beginnings, about renewal and about focusing towards a good year in the future,” said Rabbi Dovid Tiechtel of the Chabad Jewish Center at the University.

This holiday lasts two days and is the beginning of the Ten Days of Repentance, a period of reflection and penitence that leads up to Yom Kippur on Oct. 13, which is the Day of Atonement.

“Theoretically, on the last day, Yom Kippur, you’re sealed in the book of life for a good year,” said Melissa Cohen, Student Leadership Coordinator at the Hillel Foundation at the University. “So you have had this time from Rosh Hashanah to Yom Kippur to fulfill your repentance basically,”

During Rosh Hashanah, one of the customary traditions is to eat apples and honey to symbolize the desire for a sweet year.

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“Obviously, neither (apples and honey) are traditional foods in any sense, but the act of putting them together ensures that you have a sweet year,” Cohen said. “So traditionally, you eat apples and honey, sometimes people dip bread in honey if they don’t like apples, but the key is to provide sweetness for the year.”

Another custom of Rosh Hashanah is blowing the shofar, the ram’s horn. Cohen explains that the ritual is a symbolic call to worship and repentance. It is blown 100 times on each day of Rosh Hashanah with one long blast at the close of Yom Kippur.

“The highlight of Rosh Hashanah is the ram’s horn that’s blowing,” Tiechtel said. “It heralds in the new year.”

During Yom Kippur the main customary tradition during is to refrain from all food and drink to devote yourself to prayer.

“The fasting is symbolic of cleansing your body of all of your sins,” Cohen said. “It’s symbolic of a new start since that’s the culmination of all of these days of repentance. It is the begging, when you would start off with your clean slate, so it’s symbolic of that.”

Deborah Shub, freshman Jewish student in LAS, recalls a friend passing out Apple Jacks and Honey Nut Cheerios to substitute the traditional apples and honey in her residence hall, Illini Tower.

“It’s kind of hard in the dorms to follow a lot of the traditions,” Shub said.

To help accommodate students, the Hillel Foundation and the Chabad Jewish Center will hold services and dinners at different locations on campus throughout the week.

“Especially during the week, it’s difficult for students to leave to go home, and we encourage people . . . to stop in and out, and we’re sure they’ll be able to find some place for them to be here and feel like they are at home for the holidays,” Cohen said.