As Dartmouth students get ready for another weekend of studying and partying, the College's Jewish population is preparing for Passover, an eight-day holiday that celebrates the freeing of the Jewish people from slavery many centuries ago.
College Rabbi Daniel Siegel said Passover, which begins tonight at sundown, is the annual remembrance and re-enactment of the founding moment of the Jewish people, when they were liberated from slavery in Egypt.
There are several events at the College to celebrate Passover, and many Jewish students will head home for the weekend. About 10 percent of the College's students are Jewish.
Typically the most popular method of celebrating the holiday is through the Passover dinners, called seders, which take place the first two nights of the holiday. Jews gather in groups, commonly with their families, to retell the Passover story.
The seder is centered around a table which contains various items, each of which represents an aspect of the Passover story. Another way Jews observe Passover tradition is by refraining from eating leavened bread and other starch products for the duration of the holiday.
Siegel said he estimates 50 to 75 percent of Dartmouth's Jewish population celebrate Passover in some way. He said Hillel, the College's Jewish organization, annually organizes seders on each of the first two nights of Passover.
This year, Siegel said Hillel will have two seders on the first night of Passover. Tonight, there is a large student-led public seder at Collis Common Ground and a smaller seder at the Hillel House. Traditionally the larger seder attracts 75 to 150 people while the smaller seder attracts 15 to 30 people, he said.
Tomorrow night, there will be a public seder at Home Plate in Thayer Dining Hall open to students and community members, Siegel said.
David Siff '95, one of the student leaders of tonight's seder at Collis, said he appreciates the group environment of the seders.
"Most Jewish rituals you have a programmed content and everyone just does it," he said. "The great thing about Passover to me is it involves us. I like the fact we're not just stuck into tradition."
