Trenton's Jews

Sukkot Sukkot commemorates the years that the Jews spent in the desert on their way to the Promised Land, and celebrates the way in which  God  protected them under difficult desert conditions. Sukkot is also known as the Feast of Tabernacles, or the Feast of Booths. You shall dwell in sukkot seven days...in order that future generations may know that I made the Israelite people live in sukkot when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I the Lord your God. Leviticus 23:42 The word sukkot mean huts (some translations of the bible use the word booths) and building a hut is the most obvious way in which Jews celebrate the festival. Every Jewish family will build an open-air structure in which to live during the holiday. The essential thing about the hut is that it should have a roof of branches and leaves, through which those inside can see the sky, and that it should be a temporary and flimsy thing. The Sukkot ritual is to take four types of plant material: an

10 Yiddish Words to Get You Through This Quarantine (and you don’t have to be Jewish) We’ve been self-quarantining for 40-plus days and, quite frankly, we’re running out of steam.   Here’s some helpful Yiddish vocabulary to help describe our current  situation…. 1. Tsedrayte adj. (tsuh-DRATE) All mixed up, confused. Before the Covid-19 virus, tsedrayte meant we couldn’t remember if we promised to meet a friend for lunch on  Thursday or Friday. Now we don’t know what day of the week it is. These  days, just getting the mail makes us tsedrayte. Do we leave  the letters on the floor for 24 hours? Do we wipe the package before we  put it on the floor or wash our hands and then wipe the package? And  what do we do after we open it? 2. Shpilkes (SHPILL-kiss) Impatience, restlessness. Before Covid-19,  when our young kids had “ants in their pants,” we’d tell them to go  outside and play. Now, however, we have to mask them up first, and watch  them carefully so they stay