I just remembered that today is a Jewish fast day. Ta'anis Esther, or the Fast of Esther. It's normally the day before Purim, which is this Sunday. But when Purim is on a Sunday, it gets moved back to the prior Thursday. It commemorates, the Jews' three-day fast in the Book of Esther, which essentially tells the story of Purim.
There are six fast days in the Jewish calendar (seven for firstborn sons), of which two are major. A major fast is essentially the full day (according to the Hebrew calendar), which runs from evening to evening. The minor fast days, which include Ta'anis Esther, run from dusk until dawn.
As a nonpracticing Orthodox Jew, I don;t actually fast when a practicing Orthodox Jew would. But there have been times when I've realized, late in the day, that it's a fast day and I hadn't eaten yet. On those occasions, if there were just a couple hours to go and I felt like it, I would fast the rest of the day. But today I realized this morning. I haven;t eaten yet, so I can still keep the fast. But it's more than just a couple hours left.
So now I have to decide whether to fast. More likely, I'll decide when I'm hungry...
I would distinguish between the two major ones. Yom Kippur stands by itself as the most important, and Tisha B'Av stands by itself as the second most important. Sort of like Seaver and Koosman, l'havdil.
ReplyDeleteAlso two corrections: The full day fasts are generally observed as evening through nightfall, so about 25 hours. And the minor ones are dawn through nightfall; in the case of the 10th day of Teves that falls in either December or January, in New York that's less than twelve hours.
Thanks for the clarification.
DeleteThe figure 25 hours and nine minutes sticks in my head as the exact time of the Yom Kippur fast, but I'm not sure if that's right, so I elided the exact length.
I was trying to explain to someone why the Fast of Esther gets bumped back all the way to Thursday. I said that the Sabbath is important enough that minor fasts can never occur on it, which is why the fast gets moved back to Friday. But I wasn't so sure why it's moved back an extra day to Thursday. Is it to avoid a conflict between the beginning of the Sabbath and the end of the fast? To avoid starting the Sabbath too hungry? Something else?
Finally, if Yom Kippur and Tisha B'Av are Seaver and Koosman, what days are Harry Parker and George Stone? My best guess is the 25th of Sivan and the 3rd of Kislev.
Here's where your 25 hours 9 minutes comes from. There are different opinions as to the time interval between sunset and nightfall; a common practice is to assume it to be 50 minutes. It's also common to light the holiday candles and begin the holiday 18 minutes before sunset. So from candles to nightfall is an hour and eight minutes. Now during half the year, times might be a minute later from one day to the next, so from candles to nightfall the next day would be 25 hours and 9 minutes.
ReplyDeleteAs far as moving the fast, yes, I think it's basically to avoid fasting on erev Shabbos when we're busy preparing for Shabbos.