Berlin is a holding a "wear a kippa" protest following the recent anti-Semitic attack in the city. Has wearing indicators of certain religions become dangerous in Germany? And what does the Jewish yarmulke stand for?
Image: picture alliance/dpa/W. Rothermel
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Yarmulke, mitra or veil: religious head coverings across the globe
Followers of various religions wear special head coverings to express their faith and show humility and dignity. Yarmulkes, mitras, veils and turbans are made of a great variety of materials.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/D. Dyck
Yarmulke
European Jews started wearing the yarmulke, or kippa, in the 17th and 18th centuries, turning the skullcap into a religious symbol. Pious Jews are expected to cover their heads, but the fabric isn't that important, and a hat or scarf is acceptable, too. Jewish Halacha law requires men and boys to cover their head when they pray, visit a synagogue or a Jewish cemetery or study the religion.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/W. Rothermel
Miter
The miter is the ceremonial headdress worn by bishops, mainly in the Roman-Catholic Church. It goes back to the 11th century, with the tall, peaked hat deeply cleft on the sides and adorned with two ribbons at the back symbolizing the Old and the New Testaments.
Image: picture alliance/dpa/P. Seeger
Dastar
Members of the Sikh faith, a monotheistic religion founded in India's northern Punjab region in the 15th century, wear a dastar. A dastar is usually worn by men, with orange being a popular color. Underneath the cloth headwear, which is re-knotted every morning, Sikh men let their hair grow freely.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/D. Dyck
Chador
In Farsi, the word chador means "tent," and that is what this garment worn by observant Muslim women in some parts of the Middle East resembles. Usually black, it covers a woman from the head down, hiding the shape of the body, revealing only the face. The chador is worn over a woman's regular clothing.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/M.Kappeler
Nun's veil
Nuns almost always wear a distinctive veil to complete their religious garment, the habit. Novices' veils are white, while professed nuns usually wear a black veil, or one in their habit's color. Depending on the religious order, veils come in different sizes and shapes. Some are elaborate and cover the woman's entire head; others are simply pinned to the sister's hair.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/U. Baumgarten
Headscarf
Is a woman's headscarf a religious headdress, or a symbol of oppression? In the West in particular, that continues to be a matter of heated debate. It is certainly the most well-known female head covering. Turkish women (as in this photo) tie headscarves differently from women in Arabic countries.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/G. Schiffmann
Sheitel
The ultra-Orthodox Hasidic Jewish community in New York has strict rules for married women, who are required to shave their hair and wear a wig, the "sheitel." In her 2012 bestseller memoir "Unorthodox," US author Deborah Feldman describes growing up in the ultra-religious group.
Image: picture-alliance/Photoshot/Y. Dongxun
Birett
A bit of cloth, strips of cardboard and a tassel — voila, the birett, a head covering worn by Roman Catholic priests since the 13th century. In the Netherlands, Germany, Britain and France, the hat has four corners. In many other countries, it has three.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/D. Ebener
Birett
A bit of cloth, strips of cardboard and a tassle — voila, the birett, a head covering worn by Roman Catholic priests since the 13th century. In the Netherlands, Germany, Britain and France, the hat has four corners. In many other countries, it has three. If you remember the character Don Camillo (played by French actor Fernandel in a series of films in the 1950s and '60s), you know the hat!
Image: Picture-alliance/akg-images
Tagelmust
The cotton scarf that can be up to 15 meters long is worn by Tuareg Berber Muslim men throughout western Africa. The tagelmust covers the head and is pulled over the mouth and nose against wind-born sand in the desert. The turban-style headdress is worn by adult men only. When indigo blue, the tagelmust's dye can rub off on the skin, hence the Tuareg being called the "blue men of the desert."
The Jewish shtreimel hat is made of velvet and has a wide fur trim, usually sable. Married men wear the hat on Jewish holidays and for religious festivities. The eye-catching headgear originated in Hasidic communities in southeastern Europe, a tradition that became nearly extinct in Europe after the Holocaust.
Image: picture-alliance/NurPhoto
Hats and bonnets
The Amish are a conservative Christian group in North America that originated in the tradition of the Anabaptist movement in Switzerland and southern Germany. The first Amish fled to the US in the early 18th century to escape religious persecution. They live simple lives, and shun modern technology and conveniences. The women wear plain bonnets; the men wear straw or felt hats.
Image: DW/S. Sanderson
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Wearing a yarmulke was an "experience," 21-year-old Adam said. He told DW he was not Jewish at all, but an Israeli Arab, and that he had wanted to show a friend that it wasn't dangerous at all to wear the head covering in public. He unluckily experienced an attack that same day.
In 2013, a Berlin Rabbi had said the city had "no-go areas for Jews." The Central Council of Jews has also warned Jews against wearing their traditional skullcap in neighborhoods with a large percentage of Muslims. Now Berlin is holding a "wear a kippa" demonstration on Wednesday in solidarity with the city's Jewish community.
What does the kippa stand for, what is the headgear's religious significance for Jews?
Kippa is Hebrew for head covering, usually a brimless cap made of cloth. Some kippot (the plural of kippa) are plain, others more ornate. The cap is also known as the yarmulke, a Yiddish word — the language of the Ashkenazi Jews from Eastern Europe.
In Israel, the yarmulke is a telltale sign of the specific religious movement the wearer adheres to.
Debated among Jewish religious experts
Jewish Halacha law requires men and boys to cover their head when they pray, visit a synagogue or a Jewish cemetery or study the religion. While the kippa has become a religious symbol, any other head covering, such as a hat or scarf, would do, too.
The kippa covering is common at Jewish festivities. All men, even if they are not Jewish, must wear a yarmulke when they enter a synagogue.
The yarmulke is obligatory at a Talmud Torah schoolImage: picture-alliance/dpa/D. Bockwoldt
Jews are not obligated to wear the skullcap outside of these religious services. Orthodox Jews, however, often wear their kippa at all times as a sign of reverence for God. To them, it makes sense to wear the yarmulke all day long as they often intersperse the day with blessings and thanksgiving.
Reform Jewish communities often don't even wear the kippa during prayer services but make it optional, as the tradition is not based on a biblical command or the Talmud, writings that are the primary source of Jewish religious law and tradition.
While Judaism developed more than 3,000 years ago, wearing a kippa is relatively new, and only asserted itself among European Jews in the 17th and 18th centuries.
Wearing it in public as an experiment
The "experiment" of wearing a kippa in public and documenting the reactions isn't new, either. In 2015, Israeli journalist Zvika Klein walked the streets of Paris for hours wearing a yarmulke and recorded people's reactions — spitting out, calling him names — with a hidden camera.
That same year, Amit Jacobi, an Israeli artist, walked through different neighborhoods all over Berlin, without encountering any aggressive reactions.