yahrzeit

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Yiddish יאָרצײַט (yortsayt). Cognate to German Jahreszeit (season), which heavily influenced the spelling and pronunciation once the word was borrowed into English.

Pronunciation

Noun

yahrzeit (plural yahrzeits)

  1. (Judaism) The anniversary of a person's death, often of a parent's.
    • 1892 February, “The Jews in New York--II.”, in The Century Magazine, volume 43, number 4, page 516:
      "Yahrzeit" (year's time) is the anniversary of the parent's death.
    • 1930 August 1, Leon Spitz, “Tisha b'Ab-The Yahrzeit of Every Jew”, in The Canadian Jewish Chronicle, page 1:
      Sad to say, the Yahrzeit of every-Jew is fading away from the memory of the average Jew in America.
    • 2002 September 2, Leon Wieseltier, “A Year Later”, in The New Republic:
      The yahrzeit is here, and the least lachrymose country on earth is devising its rituals of commemoration.
    • 2016 August 10, Irwin Cohen, “Hank Greenberg’s 30th Yahrzeit”, in The Jewish Press:
      Let’s remember Hank Greenberg’s yahrzeit, the 30th of Av, which falls this year on Sept. 3.

See also

This article is issued from Wiktionary. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.