ATLANTA — For only the fifth time in more than 100 years, Christmas Day and the first night of Hanukkah, the Jewish festival of lights, will fall on the same day.

While Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are always the same dates, December 24th and 25th, the dates for Hanukkah change every year.

The reason for the different dates is that the Jewish calendar is based on a lunar cycle and not the secular Gregorian calendar. In some years, the eight-day festival can begin on Thanksgiving Day or even New Year’s Day.

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Previous years in which the holidays fell on the same day were 1910, 1921, 1959 and 2005. According to the calendar data, this will not happen again until 2027.

For the year 2024, Hanukkah begins on Christmas Day and ends on January 2nd. This means that families who celebrate both holidays experience both joyful traditions and New Year celebrations in the same eight-day period.

While families celebrate the holiday in different ways, there are certain similarities for Hanukkah.

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Families celebrating the festival usually light a so-called chanukiah or menorah, a multi-stemmed candelabra. There are nine candle places, a new one being lit each evening, although the first night actually begins with two candles.

One candle represents nights of the holiday one through eight, while the ninth is intended to be used as a “auxiliary candle” or shamash (shaw-MOSH).

The holiday itself means “dedication” in Hebrew and marks the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem after it was liberated from an invading force.

The lighting symbolizes a miracle of the holiday from ancient times, where tradition says the Jews needed enough oil to light a candelabra in a ruined temple, but the oil burned for eight nights instead.

Now, when families light the menorah on holidays, they place them so that the candlelight is visible from the windows and spreads throughout the world.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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