Seder Bakkashot (Aleppine Friday Pre-Dawn Cycle)
The Syrian-Jewish tradition of gathering before dawn on winter Shabbat mornings to sing sacred Arabic and Hebrew poetry.
In Syrian Jewish communities — originally from Aleppo and Damascus — winter Shabbat mornings begin long before the sun rises. Groups of men gather in the synagogue to sing the bakkashot: sacred poems and petitions set to traditional melodies, drawing on both Hebrew liturgical verse and Arabic musical modes. In the Aleppo (Syrian) tradition the same fixed collection of songs is sung every winter Shabbat from after Sukkot until Passover; the week-by-week rotating cycle belongs to the Moroccan tradition. This pre-dawn gathering, held by candlelight before the regular morning service, is one of the most distinctive and beloved customs of the Syrian Jewish world, transplanted to communities in Brooklyn, Mexico City, São Paulo, and elsewhere wherever Syrian Jews have settled.
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