Rishon Rishon

Happy New Year

This morning I took the bigger kids (ages 4 and almost 3) to school. Then I put the baby in her stroller and walked over to the makolet (מכולת) - general store, to buy bread and wine. It was a beautiful day, warm and sunny, temperatures in the high 70s, I would say, atypical, though not particularly unusual for this time of year. People were going about their business.

After a while I remembered that it's New Year's Eve. New Year's, like Christmas, passes unremarked in Israel. A lot of people who aren't surprised that this is true of Christmas are surprised that it is of New Year's - usually considered a thoroughly secular holiday in the US. In Israel, however, it is not the case. Israelis call it Sylvester (New Year having been taken by Rosh Hashana), which I think is its name in Eastern Europe or Russia. (I don't have time today to research it on the Internet.) Though the calendar which begins January 1st is usually euphemistically referred to as haluah ha'ezrahi (הלוח האזרחי) - the civil calendar, it is well known that its origin is Christian, having been established by the Pope for the celebration of Christian holidays. (Yes, I know, it's based on the Julian calendar, which goes back to pre-Christian times.) This general feeling has not been diminished by the adoption of New Year's as a siba l'm'siba (סיבה למסיבה) - a reason for a party, among certain sectors of the population.

The first New Year's I spent in Israel (January 1st, 1985), I made a point of staying up till midnight to listen to the news. In those days, the government had a monopoly on all broadcast media, and all radio stations carried Qol Yisra'el (קול ישראל) - the Voice of Israel, every hour on the hour, for about 5 minutes of news. The newsreader gave the usual summary of the news that was going on at the time. Finally, at the end of the broadcast, he said: "Hayom Rosh Hashana shel hanosrim" (היום ראש השנה של הנוצרים) - "Today is the New Year of the Christians". And that was it.

Happy New Year!

UPDATE: For more on Sylvester, see here and here.

UPDATE: For another perspective, see here.