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Dvar Torah: Chag Ha’Banot / “Eid Al Banat” - The Seventh Night of Chanuka [1]
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Date: 2022-12-24
In Yemen and North Africa, this night marks
.. Chag Ha’Banot (“Eid Al Banat” in Judeo-Arabic), or The Festival of Daughters, which celebrates one of the best things Judaism has given to the world: Jewish women. [This is a festival of] singing, dancing and lighting the hanukkiah in honor of Jewish women like Judith, the young widow-turned-heroine of the Hanukkah story — the Book of Judith is on par with the Book of Maccabees itself. Judith falsely told the Syrian Greek General Holofernes she’d help him and his army take the city of Bethulia, offering him salty cheese and wine and then, once he was drunk enough, beheading him. The sight of their headless general terrified enemy soldiers into fleeing and revived the morale of Maccabee fighters.
Judith Beheading Holofernes, by Artemisia Gentileschi -- Italian: Giuditta che decapita Oloferne. Date from 1614 until 1620 Object type: painting, genre religious art. Description: Two women (Judith and her maid-servant) pin down a man on a bed (Holofernes). With one hand, Judith holds his head; with the other, she slices his throat with a long sword (possibly his own — a suitable irony). The intensity of the scene is highlighted by the dripping blood soaking the white bed sheets and the man's eyes wide open — conscious, but helpless. The painter is more a champion of strong women than of a woman obsessed with violence and revenge h/t wmpmacm
..In countries like Libya and Tunisia, women traditionally went to synagogue on Chag Ha’Banot to touch the Torah and pray for their daughters’ health; young women and old women would dance together; girls who had turned their backs against one another would reconcile; and, in many communities, there was a dairy feast in honor of Judith.
..Jackie Barzvi, a North Carolina-based dance instructor and performer ... recently created the Mizrachi Dance Archive , a virtual catalog of information about Mizrahi dance traditions whose aim, according to its website, is to “help preserve, celebrate and bring a new light to the stories, cultures, and history of Mizrachi Jews...”
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