JEWISH CALENDAR 2023
Festivals and other dates of note
27 January 2023 International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Commemorates the liberation of the Auschwitz extermination camp complex by Soviet troops on this date in the secular calendar in 1945. More…
Sunset 5 February 2023 to nightfall 6 February 2023: Tu B’Shvat (‘New Year of Trees’).
It has developed into an ecological holiday that reminds Jews of our connection to the earth and to our role as caretakers of the environment. Some modern practices include donating money to plant trees in Israel or planting trees locally. More…
Dawn to dusk 6 March 2023: Fast of Esther.
Commemorates the three-day fast called at Esther's behest before she risked her life to appear unsummoned before her husband King Ahasuerus, head of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, in order to save the Jewish people from Haman's evil decree (see next item – Purim). More…
Sunset 6 March 2023 to nightfall 7 March 2023: Purim.
Commemorates the saving of the Jewish people from Haman, the royal vizier to King Ahasuerus. Haman was planning to kill all the Jews, as recounted in the Book of Esther, which is recited on the occasion. More…
Sunset 5 April 2023 to nightfall 13 April 2023: Pesach (Passover).
A pilgrimage festival - commemorates the salvation of the Israelites from the Angel of Death during the tenth plague visited upon the Egyptians, and the Israelite departure from Egypt. Many of the themes of the Christian Easter are derived from those of Pesach. More…
Sunset 17 April 2023 to nightfall 18 April 2023: Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Memorial Day).
Commemorates the lives and heroism of Jewish people who died in the Holocaust between 1933 and 1945. More…
8:00pm 24 April 2023 to sundown 25 April 2023: Yom HaZikaron (Israeli Memorial Day).
Commemorates all the soldiers and people who lost their lives during the struggle to establish and defend the State of Israel. More…
Sundown 25 April 2023 to nightfall 26 April 2023: Yom HaAtzmaut (Israeli Independence Day). Commemorates the re-establishment of the Jewish commonwealth in Israel in 1948 after an interval of more than 1800 years. More…
Sundown 18 May 2023 to nightfall 19 May 2023: Yom Yerushalayim (Jerusalem Day).
Commemorates the reunification of Jerusalem in 1967 after 19 years of division, and the restoration of all of Jerusalem to complete Jewish sovereignty after an interval of almost 1900 years. More…
Sundown 25 May 2023 to nightfall 27 May 2023: Shavuot.
A pilgrimage festival. It marks the end of the counting of 50 days from the start of Passover, traditionally the time of the wheat harvest in Biblical Israel. Shavuot is sometimes called the Jewish Pentecost. The word Pentecost here refers to the count of fifty days after Passover. The Christian festival of Pentecost also has its origins in Shavuot. More…
Sundown 26 July 2023 to nightfall 27 July 2023: Tisha B’Av (9th day of the Hebrew month of Av). A fast day. The fast commemorates the destruction of both the First Temple and Second Temple in Jerusalem, which occurred about 655 years apart, but on the same Hebrew calendar date. Tisha B'Av is never observed on Shabbat. If the 9th of Av falls on a Saturday, the fast is postponed until the 10th of Av. More…
Sundown 1 August 2023 to nightfall 2 August 2023: Tu B’Av.
A minor holiday. In the days of the Temple in Jerusalem, it marked the beginning of the grape harvest. Considered an auspicious time for weddings. More…
Sundown 15 September 2023 to nightfall 17 September 2023: Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year). A solemn occasion marking the beginning of the 10 days of repentance, and the beginning of the Jewish high Holyday season. More…
Dawn to dusk 18 September 2023: Fast of Gedaliah.
Laments the assassination of the righteous governor of Judah of that name, which ended Jewish rule following the destruction of the First Temple. More…
Sundown 24 September 2023 to nightfall 25 September 2023: Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement). A day of fasting and prayer, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Marks the end of the 10 days of repentance. More…
Sundown 29 September 2023 to nightfall 6 October 2023: Succot. The Feast of Tabernacles, or the Feast of Booths (huts). A pilgrimage festival. It commemorates the 40 years spent by the Israelites living in makeshift dwellings in the wilderness on their journey from Egypt to the Promised Land of Israel. More…
Sundown 6 October 2023 to nightfall 7 October 2023: Shemini Atzeret (A day for assembly, or pause). The Hebrew word atzeret is generally translated as "assembly", but shares a linguistic root with the word atzor, meaning "stop" or "tarry". Shemini Atzeret is characterized as a day when the Jewish people "tarries" to spend an additional day with God at the end of Sukkot. More…
Sundown 7 October 2023 to nightfall 8 October 2023: Simchat Torah (Rejoicing in the Torah). Marks the end of the Jewish High Holyday season, and the completion of the annual cycle of reading from the 5 Books of Moses. A joyous festival. More…
9 November 2023: Kristallnacht (‘The Night of Broken Glass’).
The beginning of a State-sanctioned pogrom against the Jews of Germany and Austria in 1938. Considered by many as the beginning of the Nazi genocide against European Jewry. More…
29 November 2023 remembers the date on the secular calendar in 1947 when the UN General Assembly voted in favor of the partition of the Holy Land into a Jewish State and an Arab State. More…
30 November 2023. On this date Israel and the Jewish world remembers the fate of more than 850,000 Jews who were forced out of Arab countries and Iran in the 20th century. More…
Sundown 7 December 2023 to nightfall 15 December 2023: Hanukah (Festival of Lights).
It commemorates the re-dedication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire. More…