This year the members of KKSY will celebrate Rosh haShana, the Jewish New Year, on September 19 and 20. Rosh haShana is a day of remembrance and reckoning with our deeds in the past 12 months but also a day of celebration and joy. In the synagogue, the cantor blows the shofar or ram’s horn. This sound connects congregants with early Jewish history, reminding them that at Mount Sinai the Jewish people received the Torah to the shofar’s sound.
At meals after evening services, the custom is to eat foods that have special meaning, depending on the country and on what grows there. For instance, in Northern countries, many Jews eat apple, as the Hebrew word for apple is Tappūaḥ, which has the same letters as Potéaḥ (opening). Eating apple symbolizes the hope that God will open His hand in the new year and provide us with blessings and all the things we need. Especially Ashkenazi Jews often dip the apple in honey, which is sweet, as to wish for a sweet year.
In countries around the Mediterranean Sea, many Jews eat pomegranates because it has many seeds. The hope is that we all may perform many good deeds.
Abayudaya in Uganda can develop their own customs and express their special wishes with the foods that are available to them. I would propose that they eat sweet banana, which in Luganda is Mattooke. It sounds almost exactly like the Hebrew word for ‘sweet’, Matὸk, or Metukkā. What you would say while eating it is, “As we eat this Mattooke, may we be blessed with a Sweet Year, a “Shanā Metukkā”.
More Rosh haShana food-and-blessings option can be found here:
www.sjimondenhollander.com/rosh-hashana-eve-at-home.html
After a hard year with Corona virus lockdowns, the KKSY community looks forward to a new season of joy and plenty.
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