Wow, I am not ready for Thanksgiving.

[conuly]

Relatedly, I see that Hanukkah starts just after T-day this year, before December. But... didn't we have a late Rosh Hashanah? NYC public schools close for the holiday, so you gotta keep track of it.

Honestly, the way the Jewish calendar meshes with the solar calendar will never make sense to me.

Schools close for Eid now too. That's easy - Ramadan and Eid jump backwards a couple of weeks yearly in relation to the solar calendar. Nobody attempts to match them up again.

Comments

[sovay]

Relatedly, I see that Hanukkah starts before T-day this year.

Hanukkah starts at sunset on the 28th. That's after Thanksgiving, just not by much.

(We had an early Rosh Hashanah this year. It's usually one to two weeks later. I believe we skipped the intercalary month this year, but I'd have to check.)

[conuly]

Ah, I'll correct myself.

[sovay]

Ah, I'll correct myself.

Cool!

They overlapped dramatically in 2013, but it's not scheduled to happen again for something like another fifty years.

[zhelana]

hanukkah doesn't start until the sunday after Thanksgiving. :) Early, yes, but not before T day

[conuly]

Thank goodness for that, life is already confusing enough.

[zhelana]

 

Yes - actually I think Thanksgiving day is the earliest it can ever be and it won't do that again within our lifetimes

[agoodwinsmith]

I am so glad we do Thanksgiving in mid October. Christmas is bonkers enough without turning it into six weeks of festive shenanigans. The earlier Thanksgiving is also, really, the last decent weekend for travel until May 24th.

[conuly]

The earlier Thanksgiving is also, really, the last decent weekend for travel until May 24th.

That's what you get for living in the land of abundant snow and syrup.

[agoodwinsmith]

Mmmm surple.

[kengr]

Well, the Islamic calendar is strictly lunar. In fact, officially it's based on direct observation of the moon! (the first of the month is when you can see the barest sliver of light on the new moon at sunset).

So it drifts with respect to the solar year.

The Gregorian calendar is pretty much strictly "solar", though various things cause a slow shift of the quarter days.

The Jewish calendar is pretty much a lunar calendar with adjustments (mostly that intercalary month) to keep it from getting to far out of synch with the seasons.

[pauamma]

I've heard the Jewish calendar described as "lunisolar". Would you agree with that?

[kengr]

Yeah, that works.

Check this:
https://www.tondering.dk/claus/calendar.html

for more than you probably want to know about various calendars.

[pauamma]

Thanks for this. (I spotted 2 errors in its description of the Hijri calendar, which I just emailed the author about.)

[gwydion]

It really startled be when I looked it up a few days ago.

[pauamma]

Since you mentioned Ramadhan in the same sentence, I assume you mean Eid al-Fitr, not Eid al-Adha. (Also, it's not quite 2 weeks - closer to 10 or 11 days.)