Yom HaMishpacha - Family Day

“In the beginning there was Mother’s Day. In pre-school we drew pictures for Ima (mom), we overbaked cookies, and we woke her up in the morning with a special kiss".  Israel’s Mother’s Day was established in pre-independence Palestine in 1947, on the anniversary of Henrietta Szold's death, the thirtieth of Sh’vat. Szold, who was dubbed ‘the Children’s Mother’, had no children of her own, but she raised many children as a result of her intensive involvement known as the Youth Aliyah (Aliyat HaNoar).  

In the 1980s the day became Family Day, dictated by social and cultural changes in Israel. What underlies the decision to transform Mother’s Day into Family Day was the feeling that the entire family should be celebrated.

Family Day is an opportunity to give some thought to the topic of families, to different ways of sharing tasks and roles, and to the changing gender roles within the family… and the varying models of families.

In recent years we are increasingly witnessing new models of families: single parents, families with two parents of the same sex, blended families, and multigenerational families.

The thirtieth of Sh’vat, Family Day, is an excellent opportunity to look around at the people sitting at our tables, give thanks for what is, and hope for even better things to come. Family Day gives us a chance to reflect in a fresh new way of what family actually is and to consider how we can be less dogmatic, more inclusive and more enabling - it is a positive challenge and opportunity to live according to our values”
(Dalia Marx, From Time to Time, Journeys in the Jewish Calendar, p.139-140).

Though Family Day is not something that we are very aware of here in the UK, it is a wonderful coincidence that it falls this year on the Shabbat where we are exploring and celebrating the diversity of families, in all its forms, no matter the number of people in the household, from one to many.