The Symbolic Meanings of Traditional Rosh Hashanah Foods

Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish holiday celebrating the Jewish New Year. It is the first of the Ten Days of Repentance or High Holidays. It is not like New Years celebrations on midnight of December 31^st but a time period of making amends for past sins and plans for a better "new year", a new beginning.

Certain foods and meals are associated with the celebration of Rosh Hashanah. After the prayer service a Kiddush or blessing is recited over wine. Bread is then dipped in honey and a blessing is said over the bread. This is then repeated with a slice of an apple also dipped in honey. While Rosh Hashanah is a time of repentance it is looked at hopefully with the belief in a merciful God.

Honey was the sweetener used in biblical times and is symbolic of wishes for a sweet new year. Honey is also symbolic of good living and Israel is often referred to as "the land of milk and honey" in the bible.

Fish, or the head of a fish, is eaten on Rosh Hashanah. Rosh Hashanah meaning "head of the year" and fish being symbolic of abundance and fertility.

On the second night of Rosh Hashanah a new fruit is eaten, one that has not yet been eaten that season. A blessing is said with this, thanking God for bringing us to this new season and our being alive to appreciate the fruits of the earth. Pomegranates are often used as the new fruit as Israel is praised in the Bible for pomegranates and we would like to have the good deeds we do be as abundant as the 613 seeds of the pomegranate.

Round shaped Challah is used as a symbol of the wish of a perfect year to come. The roundness represents an unending circle of life. Carrots, baked in honey, are symbolic of the hopes of increasing the good deeds done in the coming year. The Yiddish word meren means both to increase or more, and carrots. The green of spinach symbolizes a green year with good harvest. Sweetened chicken or a sweetened meat entrée is symbolic of the wishes of a sweet year. Rice is used as a symbol of abundance.

Leeks may be used in a menu to symbolically cut off enemies. The Hebrew word for leek is very similar to the Hebrew word for "cut off". Beets are used to symbolically remove adversaries. Again, the Hebrew word for beet is similar in sound to the word for "remove". At the same time many Jews will avoid eating nuts during Rosh Hashanah as the Hebrew word for "nut" has the same numerical value as the Hebrew word for "sin". During the time of Judgment it is felt best to avoid anything that could involve sin even if it is just in numerical language.