Double dates — October 7 and Tishrei 22
Tragedies mark the calendars, no matter which one is used
Ever since our move to Israel from Teaneck in 2007, I’ve celebrated two birthdays: Tamuz 22 on the Jewish calendar and July 28 on the Gregorian calendar.
I mean, why not? I live in the Jewish state, where the Jewish calendar is on equivalent legal footing with the Gregorian calendar. It’s perfectly acceptable to write the Jewish date on bank checks, and letters from government offices carry a double date on top.
Because the Jewish year is lunar and has about 10 fewer days than the Gregorian solar year, dates like Tamuz 22 and July 28 rarely coincide. A leap month, Adar II, is inserted seven times within each 19-year cycle to ensure that the Jewish holidays, which are tied to the agricultural/solar year, fall out in the correct season.
Which brings me to the excellent question posed to me last week by our dear editor, Joanne Palmer: When will Israel commemorate the start of the brutal war(s) we are still fighting: On October 7 or on Tishrei 22, otherwise known as Shemini Atzeret or Simchat Torah?
When I looked into the answer, I saw that it won’t be as simple as a double date.
October 7 is the date ingrained in everyone’s consciousness. At the same time, Simchat Torah will forever be associated with the massacre in the same way Israelis associate Yom Kippur — Tishrei 10, not October 6, 1973 — with the surprise attacks that started the Yom Kippur War. Similarly, Israel Independence Day is not celebrated on May 14 but rather on Iyar 5.
This year, October 7 coincides with Tishrei 4, during the 10 days of introspection and repentance between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Perhaps that makes it particularly appropriate for a solemn commemoration.
However, next year October 7 will fall on the first day of Sukkot, described biblically as “the time of our happiness.”
In light of these and other complications, the Israeli government — while planning an official state ceremony on October 7 this year only — chose neither date to enshrine as an annual commemoration of the Hamas attacks.
Instead, the government chose Tishrei 24, two days after Simchat Torah, in deference to the two-day observance of the holiday in the diaspora. (In the diaspora, Simchat Torah begins on the evening of October 24.)
But that didn’t end the complications: This year, Tishrei 24 falls on Shabbat, October 26. To avoid Sabbath desecration, the state ceremonies to honor soldiers and civilians who were killed during this war will be pushed off till the following day.
Are you still with me? Sorry, the situation gets even more complex.
This new lugubrious official holiday, with the terribly long-winded name “National Remembrance Day for the Disaster That Befell the State of Israel on October 7, and Swords of Iron War,” may not actually happen.
That’s because the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, among others opposed to the government and its policies, including some of the affected Gaza border communities, plan to boycott the Tishrei 25/October 27 state ceremonies. To avoid further inflaming public opinion, not to mention embarrassment, the government might cancel the whole thing.
Meanwhile, in the United States, the Orthodox Union has suggested that member synagogues consider marking both dates and especially the secular date, October 7, to be aligned with other ceremonies sure to take place on that infamous day.
In addition, OU executive vice president Rabbi Moshe Hauer wrote an elegy about the Simchat Torah massacre meant to be recited annually on Av 9 (Tisha B’Av). Indeed, there are those who advocate folding the commemoration of this most recent Jewish tragedy into Tisha B’Av altogether, rather than marking it on either October 7 or Tishrei 22 (or 24).
By now, I’m sure your head is spinning; I know mine is. So let’s take a step back and look at the bigger picture. What we see is a raw, unfinished painting.
The events of October 7/Simchat Torah last year are not history in the way that, say, Pearl Harbor Day (always on December 7; what a relief!) is history.
We are actively in the midst of a multiple-front war. We are actively mourning those murdered in the south, in the north, and in battle. We are aching for the return of our hostages. We are running for shelter, in some parts of the country, on a daily basis. Rehab centers are filled with soldiers struggling to adapt to a future with a missing limb or eye. Tens of thousands of internal refugees still cannot go home due to the extreme danger.
So the real answer to Joanne’s question is this: We will commemorate the catastrophe on October 7 and Tishrei 22, but not only then.
We don’t need an official date to remind us. Our awareness of the immense suffering triggered by the massacres, mutilations, destruction, and kidnappings on that Black Sabbath accompanies us every minute of every day, Jewish or Gregorian.
Although I believe that, with God’s help, we will prevail against the murderous hatred surrounding us, for now this all-too-real bad dream is one long, long night that has not yet ended.
Abigail Klein Leichman made aliyah from Teaneck in 2007.
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