Each of those Festivals, falling in Spring, Summer and Autumn, also remind the Jewish people of the agricultural episodes in the year in the land of Israel, where first the Sanctuary, and then the Temple, was the central place for public service to the Almighty. To that list there has been added, in our own day, Yom Ha atzmaut , the anniversary of Israel s independence, which was proclaimed on 14 May 1948, and Yom Yerushalayim , the anniversary of Jerusalem s unification in 1967, after nineteen years of division. Life begins, for a boy, with Brit Milah circumcision, the entry into the brit or covenant with God which Abraham, the first of the Patriarchs, inaugurated. For a girl, her entry is marked by a naming ceremony in the synagogue in the first public reading of the Torah when her father is present. A boy s name is pronounced as part of the brit .
Maturity is said to be achieved when a girl is twelve and when a boy reaches the age of thirteen.
Marriage is a sanctification, where bride and groom stand beneath a canopy and seal their life-partnership. Divorce, if sadly it must be effected, has its solemn ceremony too, where the compact of marriage is sundered and the couple freed to marry others, if they choose to do so. Life ends in death and Kever Yisrael , Jewish burial. A dead person deserves special respect and reverent attention, since she or he cannot return thanks for what is done for them. Jewish learning is life-long.