Celebrate your Jewish birthday!
Who says no to a birthday?
Your Jewish birthday is the day G-d determined the world couldn’t continue another moment without you in it. Make it yours; make it meaningful; make the most of this special day!
Check out the resources and information below to get you started.
Invite Your Retreat
Friends
Celebrate your Jewish birthday with your friends—near and far!
Invite your retreat friends to join your birthday farbrengen virtually.
Jewish Birthday
FAQs
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A Jewish birthday calculator is available online at www.chabad.org/calendar/birthday.asp.
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The secular calendar year has a 365-day year (366 days in leap-years), in keeping with the annual solar cycle. The Jewish calendar is based on the lunar cycle, resulting in a twelve-month year of approximately 354 days, with an additional month added every two or three years to keep the Jewish year aligned with the solar seasons. This means that a particular date on the Jewish calendar will coincide with different secular dates on different years. In fact, your Jewish birthday will fall on or within a day or two of secular birthday only once in 19 years!
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Yes. On the Jewish calendar, the calendar day begins at nightfall and ends the following nightfall. So anyone born between nightfall and midnight will have his or her Jewish birthday one day later than someone born before nightfall on the same secular date.
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The Torah commands to “Love your fellow as yourself” (Leviticus 18:19), and the great Talmudic sage Rabbi Akiva proclaimed this “a great principal of the Torah.” So while a birthday is a time for introspection and self-assessment, also this intensely personal occasion should be utilized to engage with others and share the specialty of the day with them.
“There is something unique about wise Jewish thought, and it was a privilege to engage with the wisest Jewish minds of our time.”
Ben Spilg
McGill University