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Hebrew word of the week: “Mimouna”

The end of Passover was celebrated in various Jewish communities with local customs, often synthesizing old Jewish and non-Jewish traditions that are universally associated with spring
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April 27, 2016

The end of Passover was celebrated in various Jewish communities with local customs, often synthesizing old Jewish and non-Jewish traditions that are universally associated with spring. Passover itself is also known as Hag ha-Aviv, “Holiday of Spring,” and it falls in the middle of Nisan, the first month of the year in ancient calendars (Deuteronomy 16:1).*

Mimouna, the end-of-passover Moroccan celebration, which became an Israeli holiday as well, gets its name from Arabic for “the lucky girl,” since many weddings were held on this day (and were forbidden for several weeks before and after). This wedding tradition is similar to the custom from talmudic times of many marriages taking place on the day after Yom Kippur and on the 15th of Av, as well as to our “June brides” (originally Roman).

Many Muslims, who couldn’t visit Jewish homes during Passover for fear of carrying chametz, would visit on the evening of Mimouna, bringing bread and dairy dishes to “break” the “fasting” from bread.

*Jews of Iraq wished one another on this night sana khizrah, “Have a green year!” Compare to the Persian Nowruz “New Day” (of spring); “The First of Nisan” by Christian Assyrians; Seharane (a community picnic dance and music) by Kurdish Jews; and Rumpelnacht among Ashkenazi Jews.

Yona Sabar is a professor of Hebrew and Aramaic in the department of Near Eastern Languages & Cultures at UCLA.

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