Ethnography of Ethiopian Sigd in an Israeli Reform Congregation

Abstract

Sigd is a holiday of the Ethiopian Jewish community, known as Beta Israel. The name of the holiday is derived from the Hebrew word for prostration (sgida). During Sigd, which is celebrated on the 29th of the Hebrew month of Heshvan – 50 days after Yom Kippur – the community marks the renewal of the covenant between the Jewish people, God and His Torah. On Sigd, Ethiopian Jews pray to God and plead for Him to return them to Zion.

Today, after most members of the Ethiopian Jewish community have made aliyah to the State of Israel, the holiday serves as an annual gathering of the entire Ethiopian community, and its members view it as an opportunity to strengthen the connection with their roots and culture. Indeed, non-Ethiopian communities, organizations and community centers celebrate Sigd in order to respect and support Ethiopian tradition.

In this article, I describe an innovative project of collaboration between the Israeli Reform movement and the Ethiopian community, while focusing on a shared celebration of Sigd in the Yuval congregation, an Israeli Reform congregation located in Gedera. The congregants’ responses to the Sigd, especially those of the women who organized it, demonstrates that not only does this collaboration emerge from a liberal landscape of cultural inclusion and gender recognition, it also embodies a criticism of attitudes that reject and resist non-Western values.