Dear friends,

Taking place at the beginning of the school year, more precisely the tenth of Muharram, the feast of Ashura is eagerly awaited by all the Muslims. Here, in Morocco, this “Aid”, as we call it, brings, every year, happiness in our homes. In fact, the day of Ashura originate in the Muslim history. Indeed, this feast has been established by our prophet, Muhammad (s), following the implementation of the fast of Yom Kippur: Muslims had to fast two days contrary to the Jewish who had to fast only a single day. Since this era, the Ashura took different meanings according to the countries and the ethnic groups. In this article, we are going to see how is celebrated the feast of Ashura in Morocco.

In spite of the Day of Ashura is not officially a public holiday, the great majority of adults devote their time to visit their families and friends: indeed we gather all together, tasting traditional mouth-watering meals in a cozy atmosphere, to have fun trough several jokes and sets. However, it is especially the children who are delighted the most at the thought in this entertaining feast. Well-dressed, they go out in the streets and devote themselves to amusing games which consist most of the time in throwing water tanks or eggs on each other and lighting firecrackers. Moreover, these same children are showered with a lot of gifts by their closest relatives. Besides, we should point out that this festive spirit of Ashura is curiously similar to the Christmas convivial spirit.

All in all, nowadays, the feast of Ashura loses gradually its religious symbolism inasmuch as the two fast days don’t seem compulsory anymore but rather as honorable acts which purify the person of all its sins. Thus, besides religious resemblances with the Jewish feast of Yom Kippur, we saw that the Ashura are alike enormously with the Christian celebration of Christmas; because in fact we are the same. For centuries in Morocco, this day has been seen as a cheerful feast of childhood and family traditions. It is really pity that less and less persons take part in this event!

To finish, we hope that this article allowed you to understand a little bit more the feast of Ashura and tempted you to visit our dear country because it is really worth it. See you soon!

By HIFDI Othmane, OUDGHIRI Hamid and CHARAF Mehdi.