What Aliyah Looks Like (for My Family at Least) in 2020

In 2012 the state of Israel established a new holiday called “Yom Aliyah” (immigration day) to celebrate the ingathering of Jewish exiles and the contributions of these immigrants to Israeli society. Yom Aliyah takes place on the tenth day of the Hebrew month of Nisan: the biblical date on which Joshua led the Jewish people across the Jordan River and into the Land of Israel. (This year, it falls on April 5.) Since this date is just a few days before Passover, when Israeli schools are usually closed for the holiday vacation, Aliyah Day is also celebrated in the fall on the seventh day of Ḥeshvan, on which, according to tradition, God first told Abraham to enter the promised land.

Aliyah, which literally means “ascent,” derives from the Hebrew Bible, appearing first when Joseph tells Pharaoh that he wishes to “go up” (e’eleh) to the land of Canaan to bury his father Jacob (Genesis 50:5-6). In a later verse, Joseph, his family, and the rest of the funeral procession are described as olim, those who go up (singular, oleh)—the form of the word that in modern Hebrew means an immigrant to the Jewish state.

The word’s origin appears to lie in the fact that the Land of Israel, with its hills and mountains, is at a higher altitude than Egypt. But the term has long had moral as well as topographical connotations. The Talmud states that “the Land of Israel is higher than any other land,” citing a prophecy by Jeremiah (23:7-8) that God will bring the Israelites “up” to their homeland from the lands to which they have been exiled. Although the rabbis may have meant “higher” literally, it’s hard to understand the statement as about anything other than the land’s inherent sanctity. Notably, the very last word of 2Chronicles, the final book of the Hebrew Bible, is vaya’al, “let him go up”—said by King Cyrus of Persia to whoever among the exiles wished to return to the Land of Israel.