Showgirls! DJ! Open bar! Shots! How Gen Z and Millennials do Shabbat

Keep Manishevitz. This is not your Bubbe’s Sabbath.

Gen Z and Millennial New Yorkers are eschewing traditional Friday night Jewish dinners for raucous Shabbat-themed parties at trendy bars and restaurants with DJs, chef-driven food, booze and late-night dancing.

“If you want a traditional Shabbat dinner that’s great, there are a million synagogues that can do that,” said Rabbi Igael Gurin Malous, who goes by “Rabbi Iggy” and is the official holy man for Hot & Shabbat, a celebration of repeated held. in a different place several times a year. “But if you want something else, now you have that too. This is what Judaism is all about, constantly reinventing ourselves and discovering who we are.”

Hot & Shabbat’s mid-20s founder Liv Schreiber said she wanted to find a way to show young people the “love and light” of the holy day — on their terms.

Last Friday, she hosted about 300 cocktail-clad young professionals at Mesiba, a Williamsburg Mediterranean restaurant. Some present were not even Jewish.

“It’s about bringing people together,” Schreiber told The Post. “We as Jews have survived only because we have allies. We will continue to survive only because we have people who support us.”

Showgirls and a magician greeted attendees. Rabbi Iggy kicked off the night with a meditation to encourage people to leave the work week behind and welcome the weekend. There was an open bar, filming, a DJ and a buffet dinner with Israeli food.

Tickets for such events are $89 and, according to Schreiber, sell out in five to 10 minutes.

Edoardo Comazzi, 26, who lives in Hudson Yards and works as an interior designer, wasn’t sure exactly what he had bought a ticket for, but he was enjoying himself.

“I am not Jewish. In fact, this is the first time I’ve ever heard of the term Shabbat, so I don’t even know what it means,” he told The Post.

A group called Jew.York.City that collects information about Jewish events happening throughout the city listed almost 20 different Shabbat dinners and parties for Friday night.

Hot Girls Do Shabbat — a women-only dinner leading up to a co-hosted dance party — was having a party at members’ club Maxwell Social in Tribeca. Hot and Holy was throwing an open bar at the public hotel in Nolita that lasted until 4am.

“I think it’s a mix of Jewish people wanting community after Oct. 7 and the IRL event boom as a whole,” said Morgan Raum, a 27-year-old who works in tech and started her own event series, Shabbat Club, in . October 2023. “There are so many Shabbat groups now, and the best part of it is that sometimes we’ll all be waiting on the same Friday, and none of us have trouble filling the room.”

“There are so many competitive events,” added Jessica Brown, a 34-year-old who works for a nonprofit and lives on the Upper East Side. “None of them are in the shul nor run by the organization. They are like social clubs.”

Last Friday, Brown chose to go to Gertie, a hip Williamsburg restaurant that opened a Shabbat supper club in June. Guest chefs prepare a three-course dinner for $75.

Guests were wowed by the food and drink offerings – which included Moroccan Apricot Chicken Tagine, Malagasy Vegetable Salad, a Turmeric Negroni and a Baked Margarita with Honey and Pickle Brine.

“Normally when I think of Shabbat, I think of Manischewitz and I don’t think of food. But this is exciting,” said a 33-year-old entrepreneur from Boreum Hill, who attended the dinner alone and declined to give his name. “Who doesn’t want interesting cocktails and good wine on Shabbat or really any meal?”

Not all, apparently.

Raum said she has received “a lot of hate” for her group’s Shabbat-ish events, which have included bottomless schnitzel dinners, wine bar dates and blind date parties. Sometimes they are on the traditional Friday night, but other times they are not.

On TikTok, commenters have criticized it for holding events where phones are used, as electronic devices are traditionally not allowed to be used on the Jewish Sabbath.

“They drive me so crazy,” she said. “I’m catering to a non-religious crowd, and people who are religious or have issues with it have places they can go and feel included and do their thing.”

She continued, “I’m so happy for them to have those spaces and I’m so happy for people to have mine.”