The calendar is divided into two pages from top to bottom. Each year we dedicate the top page to different subjects which are special to the Samaritan tradition. This page is divided into three sections. Each month this year we chose to show one of thirteen ancient contracts of marriage from different collections in libraries all over the world. You can see it on the left (above). Below is one of thirteen sayings of the Samaritan wise man, the late Ratson D. Benyamin Tsedaka (1922-1990), for the 80th anniversary of his birth. On the right side are details of special events in the Samaritan calendar for the month.

The other page of the calendar shows three different calendars. The first is the Samaritan calendar printed in red including the Sabbatths and the festivals coloured in the background. This calendar dates back to the first year of the entrance of the people of Isreal to the holy Land lead by Joshua bin Nun, the successor of Moses. On the top line of each square the colored characters to the right are written in ancient Hebrew, those to the left in modern Heberw. In black print on the bottom line to the right are the dates according to the Jewish Hebrew calendar that started on the first year of creation. To the left are the dates according to Christian civil calendar that started at the first year of the Christian era. This year is 3641 in the Samaritan calender, paralleling the year 5763 in the Jewish calendar and the years 2002-2003 in the civil calendar. The Samaritan and Jewish calendars are based mostly on the same system of calculation. Incorporating cycles of 19 years, 7 of the years are leap years, each consisting of 13 months in order to adjust the lunar year to the solar year of 365 days. However, the different starting points of the two calendars makes the leap years fall out of phase with each other. As a consequence the Samaritans celebrate the seven festivals of the Penteteuch a month later than the Jewish celebrations on those years. (The Samaritan festivals exclude Purim and Chanikah, which are Jewish festivals invented after the separation of the Samaritans and Jews from the Peoples of Israel.) For the remaining 12 years of the 19 year cycle, the Jews and Samaritans sometimes celebrate the festivals on the same days, sometimes two days apart. This is due to the fact that the Jews modified the rules governing their calendar for the sake of convenience. For example the first day of the seventh month that the Jews call the first day of the year will never fall on Sunday, Wednesday or Friday because the date is dependent upon three festivals of the seventh month - the Day of Atonement, Tabernacles (Succuth) and the Eighth Day of Succuth. On years in which each of these festivals would fall directly on the day after Sabbath, the Jews add one day to the 9th month - Kislev - in their calendar to move the festivals one day ahead. Sabbath restrictions which prevent proper prepartion for the festivals are thus circumvented by allowing an extra day before the festival. The Samaritans, however, have always kept the principle of celebrating the festivals on the days that they fall in the calendar, regardless of whether they directly follow the Sabbath or not.

Who is Man, That He Determines God's Appointed Feasts?