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In case you still feel overwhelmed, here are some nice holiday rules of thumb I usually tell people who play Jewish characters:

- The BIGGEST holidays are the High Holidays, including Rosh Hashanah (literally, "head of the year", or New Years) and Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement). Observant Jews go to temple for very long services on these days, and on Yom Kippur there is a 24-hour fast from sundown to sundown. Rosh Hashanah often has a pretty happy, festive air to it, while Yom Kippur is more serious.

- The other big holiday that most Jews celebrate is Passover or Pesach, which just passed. It celebrates the biblical story of Exodus, first and foremost, which is the story of the Jewish people being freed from slavery in Egypt. You know, the one with all the plagues and "let my people go". Jews celebrate Passover primarily over two nights. Instead of a regular dinner on these nights we have a seder, which is a ritual that starts when everyone sits down at the table until after the meal. Usually most of the ritualistic stuff is done before the meal, and in very observant households this can last HOURS. Less observant households often do shorter seders though. But aside from the seder the big thing that will impact a religious Jewish character is that on Passover and the days following, the character will not be allowed to eat any leavened bread. This is everything from loaves of bread to oatmeal, and in some subgroups it also includes legumes. Instead of bread, we eat matzoh, which is a flat, crumbly unleavened bread.

- The last REALLY important holiday that you can't miss if you've got an observant Jewish character is just Shabbat (or Shabbos), or the Sabbath. This happens every week from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday. On Friday you light candles and do a few rituals before the meal, on Saturday morning you go to temple for the weekly service, and on Satuday night you close out the sabbath with havdalah, another set of rituals. Between these, very observant Jews aren't meant to do work. That includes going to your job, but it also includes weird things like turning on the lights or driving a car. This tends to be a bit tricky for orthodox people, but apparently we've managed for thousands of years.

- And finally, Chanukkah is NOT that important! It's the only holiday everyone knows about because it falls close to Christmas, but it's actually a newer holiday without a ton of significance. There's not too much ritual attached, but of course kids like it because we often get presents. This is a tradition that has blown up into a huge deal in the West because Jewish kids want to get gifts just like their Christian friends. But traditionally, presents were not the most important part of the holiday and mostly consisted of fruit or maybe a coin or two. Still, it's become a big deal here in the US and some people get big presents for their kids for all eight nights.

I hope this helps you sort out the most important stuff. There are a bajillion other holidays, like Purim, Sukkot, Tu B'Shevat, Simchat Torah, and so on. But these are a good place to start.

You sound fat

Not OP but another Jewish anon...