“Boys Day” among Tunisian Jews

This Thursday, January 20th, we are in the week of Parasha Yithro, and this previous Thursday is the day of Saudat Yithro, an essentially Tunisian Jewish tradition. Also called the “Feast of the Boys”, it is fixed on the Thursday preceding the Shabbat reading of the Parashat Yithro) in the Torah at the synagogue. It celebrates several events:
1. The miraculous end of a mysterious epidemic in Tunis which affected only boys, just in the week before the reading of Jethro’s pericope, thanks to the consumption of a pigeon broth. Hence the traditional presence on the menu of pigeons accompanied by small green beans, served in small utensils and eaten with small cutlery. Knowing that the pigeon (or the dove, yona in Hebrew) symbolizes the People of Israel.
2. The commemoration of the festive meal offered by Jethro to Moses, Aaron and the Elders of the Israelites, which is rightly read in the parashah (Exodus XVIII:12).
3. The reading of the Decalogue, the “10 Commandments”) in the pericope
(Exodus XX:1-13). Opportunity to celebrate the event, because traditionally, young boys learned to read for the first time publicly in the Torah this small passage.