Jerusalem, 4 November, 2021 (TPS) — Israel’s Ethiopian Jewish community celebrates the holiday of Sigd on Wednesday. The holiday is a commemoration of their commitment to preserving the Tora and their Jewish identity throughout thousands of years of exile in Africa.

Over many generations, the community did not even have a Tora scroll of its own and relied only on what is written in the book of Nehemiah to maintain its Jewish traditions. In the middle ages, they resisted attempts to convert the community to Christianity and remained a part of the Jewish people. Sigd is, in part, a celebration of this.

The word itself is from the Aramaic word “sged” which means to prostrate oneself, as in prayer. It was once celebrated on the 29th day of the Hebrew month of Kislev, during the week long holiday of Hanukah, which usually falls out in December. But at one point in the recent past, its observance was moved forward and is held 50 days after Yom Kippur.

Sigd celebrates the acceptance of the Torah. One of the holiday’s traditions is for people to retreat into the wilderness to appeal to God for His mercy.

In July 2008 the Knesset officially added the Sigd holiday to the list of State holidays.

And to celebrate today, countless Ethiopian Israelis gathered in an area in Jerusalem that provides a direct view of the Temple Mount: the promenade outside of the neighborhood of Armon Hanatziv and adjacent to Talpiot. This promenade sits on a hill top above a small valley that separates it from the Temple Mount.

An Ethiopian Jewish religious leader is known a Kahen, from the Hebrew word Cohen, which means priest. A married Kahen is known as a Qes. One Qes at the ceremony, named Qes Samay, explained to TPS that, “this is a day of prayers, a day of reading from the Tora. In this way we preserve and continue our traditions from Ethiopia.”

“Today is a day of soul searching,” he added. “A day of renewing the covenant, between God and the people of Israel. This tradition began here in Israel, was continued in Ethiopia, and bless God has been returned to be observed here in Israel.”