Carrying Tradition: Jewish students at East share their different ways of celebrating Rosh Hashanah.

Rosh Hashanah, a holiday that rings in the Jewish New Year, is coming up on Sept. 26. Though many people celebrate the holiday in similar ways, Jewish families everywhere — including at East — have different traditions when it comes to the celebratory activities they partake in.

Sophomore Anna Ravis celebrates with traditional foods, such as Challah.

“On Rosh Hashanah, we have circular Challah to represent the circular year,” Ravis said. “We also put raisins in the Challah to represent the sweet new year.”

Along with the circular bread, her family also has brisket, her grandma’s signature bundt cake and apples in honey to represent the sweetness of the new year. Jewish Student Union President and junior Eve Benditt also enjoys traditional foods with her family for Rosh Hashanah.

“My grandma usually gets food catered from Oakwood Country Club,” Benditt said. “It used to be an exclusively Jewish country club, and obviously it’s not anymore, but it’s still mostly Jewish people that go there.”

Her family also eats homemade Challah, from a recipe that has been passed down from her great grandmother, who Benditt says couldn’t teach her own son how to make it after he was killed in the Holocaust. Her mother has now passed the tradition on to her, so she gets to make it with her family every year.

This year is also the first year returning to in-person Rosh Hashanah traditions, according to Benditt and Ravis, so they are thrilled to see how this year will turn out being back together with their family and friends for the first time in years.

The first two days of the holiday are when most of the celebrations occur, although the holiday technically lasts until Yom Kippur which is 10 days after Rosh Hashanah.

The holiday is usually spent with family and friends from around the time of the sundown period on Sept. 25 until the sundown period of Sept. 26 which is the actual day of Rosh Hashanah, according to Ravis.

“We celebrate by having extended family members over, my grandparents, aunts and uncles come over and some of our Jewish friends come over too,” Ravis said. 

They attend services at the synagogue in the morning of the holiday and then proceed with a special dinner the night of to celebrate the New Year.

Sophomore Lucy Warner also celebrates with her family and friends.

“We usually have one dinner with my grandparents, their friends and their friend’s families,” Warner said. “It’s really fun to be with all of the generations. Then we have dinner with just our grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins and parents.”

Warner loves getting to see her family and friends on the holiday and experiencing all the celebratory activities that she only gets to do once a year.

While the holiday has elaborate days of celebration amongst most Jewish people, there are many non-Jewish people who don’t know about it.

Benditt says being a part of Jewish Student Union has given her friends and others, whether they’re Jewish or not, the opportunity to learn more about Rosh Hashanah, allowing them to know what she and many others are celebrating on the 26th and why she has to miss school for the holiday. She hopes that more students will be educated about the beautiful services of Rosh Hashanah.