Shemini Atzeret: Returning to Normal

Take a week or two off work and out of your home. Spend it doing things you never do the rest of the year. When you come back from your vacation, it may be hard to resume your usual life. How do you return to normal?

This is the question Jews have faced for millennia in the month of Tishrei, the lunar month that falls in September or October in the Gregorian calendar.

1 & 2 Tishrei: Rosh Hashanah, a new year observance with two days of services.
10 Tishrei: Yom Kippur, a full day of fasting and praying for our misdeeds of the past year to be forgiven, and for God to enroll us for a good life in the new year..
15-21 Tishrei: Sukkot.
21 Tishrei: Hoshana Rabbah, the last day of Sukkot. (Friday, October 6 in 2023.)
22 Shemini Atzeret.
23 Simchat Torah.

And then, suddenly, life as usual resumes.

Sukkot Elaborations

Examining the Lulav, by Leopold Pilichowski, 1890’s

The Torah describes Sukkot both as a week for making animal, grain, and wine offerings at the altar in Jerusalem,¹ and as a week for living in a sukkah (a temporary hut with a porous roof of branches or straw) and doing something unspecified with an etrog (a yellow citrus fruit) and branches from palm, myrtle, and willow trees (later bound together and called a lulav).² (See last week’s post, Sukkot: Rootless.)

The Talmud reports that during the time of the second temple in Jerusalem, many people brought their lulav and etrog to an additional festivity at the temple: the pouring of a water libation every evening.

One who did not see the Celebration of the Place of the Drawing of the Water never saw celebration in his days. (Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 51a)³

An elaborate procession brought a large golden jug of water from the Siloam Pool at the southern end of Jerusalem to the top of the temple mount and up the ramp to the altar, while Levites played flutes and priests blew the shofar. There were so many oil lamps on poles in the temple courtyards that the whole city was lit up.

And the Levites would play on lyres, harps, cymbals, and trumpets, and countless other musical instruments. The musicians would stand on the fifteen stairs that descend from the Israelite [Men’s] Courtyard to the Women’s Courtyard. (Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 51a)

The high priest poured the water into a basin as a libation for God. Men danced and juggled flaming torches.

One time a Sadducee priest intentionally poured the water on his feet, as the Sadducees did not accept the oral tradition requiring water libation, and in their rage all the people pelted him with their etrogim.⁴ (Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 48b)

The water-pouring celebration, as well as the offerings at the altar, ceased when the Romans razed the second temple in 70 C.E. But to this day, many Jews continue to spend the week of Sukkot eating and even sleeping in a festively decorated sukkah, and ritually shaking a lulav and etrog in six directions, an ancient ritual to encourage the rainy season to begin.

Hoshana Rabbah

In the Torah there is nothing special about the seventh day of Sukkot except a change in the number of animals to offer at the temple altar.⁵ But the Talmud relates an additional change in observance. The Talmudic rabbis recall that at the start of Sukkot, cut willow branches were placed upright on the platform of the altar, so they leaned over the edge at the top. On each of the first six days of Sukkot, priests blew signal on the shofar, and people walked in a circle around the altar, chanting two lines from Psalm 118:

I beg you, God, hoshiyah, na!

I beg you, God, make us prosper, na! (Psalm 118:25)

hoshiyah (הוֹשִׁיעָה) = Rescue! Save! (An imperative hifil form of the verb yasha, ישׁע = help, save, liberate.)

na (נָא) = please!

On the seventh day of Sukkot, people circled the altar not once, but seven times.⁶ This practice became incorporated into an additional morning prayer on Sukkot that begins with and repeats the words hosha na (הוֹשַׁע נָא), an Aramaic version of hoshiyah na. While chanting this prayer, congregants holding a lulav make a circuit around the sanctuary (at least in congregations that hold daily morning services during Sukkot).

The last day of Sukkot is called Hoshana Rabbah, when people circle seven times, and then strike the floor with willow branches until the leaves fall off—perhaps evoking either the change of season, or the final discarding of the old year’s misdeeds.

Shemini Atzeret

The last day of Sukkot is Hoshana Rabbah. Yet both Leviticus⁷ and Numbers mandate an eighth holy day. The Torah gives no explanation for this day, but merely lists the required offerings at the temple.

On the day of Shemini Atzeret, you must not you must not work at your occupations. And you must present a fire-offering, a soothing smell for God: one bull, one ram, seven yearling lambs, unblemished; your grain-offerings and your libations for the bull, the ram, and the lambs, by the legal count; and one hairy goat [for a] guilt-offering, aside from the perpetual rising-offering and its grain offering and libation. (Numbers 29:35-38)

shemini (שְׁמִינִי) = eighth.

atzeret (עֲצֶֶרֶת) = holding back; festive gathering while refraining from work. (From the verb atzar, עָצַר = hold back, detain, retain, be at a standstill.)

The Talmud paints Shemini Atzeret as a quieter day than any day of Sukkot, since there was no water-pouring, and people were not even required to sit in a sukkah or hold a lulav and etrog.⁸ All they did was remain in Jerusalem for one more round of offerings at the temple.

Then what could Jews do to observe Shemini Atzeret after the second temple was razed in 70 C.E?

19^th-century rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch considered Shemini Atzeret a day of reflection. “Its purpose is to keep us before God … in order to strengthen our grasp of perceptions we have already gained, so that they remain with us for a long time. … on this day we gather up and hold fast to all the spiritual treasures that we have collected during the festival. Thus they will truly enrich us; thus we can integrate them into everyday life, which recommences at the end of the seventh day.”⁹

But for the last millennium, Shemini Atzeret has also been a day to pray for rain. Israel is a land with parched summers and few year-round rivers, so life depends on winter rains. The famines in the Hebrew Bible are the result of winter droughts. Winter is when fields are green, when barley and wheat grow so they can be harvested in the spring.

Nobody wants the winter rains to begin until we have moved out of the sukkah and back into our watertight homes. Nevertheless, we shake the lulav during Sukkot to evoke the sound of rain. On Shemini Atzeret, our liturgy includes two direct prayers for rain.

1) The second Amidah (standing) prayer begins:

You are powerful forever, God; bringing life to the dead, you are abundant in hoshiya—

hoshiya (הוֹשִׁיעַ) = helping, saving, rescuing. (An infinitive hifil form of the verb yasha.)

From Shemini Atzeret in the autumn to Pesach/Passover in the spring, we add the phrase:

—bringing back the wind and bringing down the rain.

2) On Shemini Atzeret only, this praise of a God who brings rainstorms is preceded in some congregations by a prayer addressing “Af-bri”, and followed by a poem begging God to send us water. The prayer spoken on this day only begins:

Af-Bri is the name of the angel of rain, who thickens and shapes clouds to empty them and to make rain, water to crown the valley with green. May rain not be withheld from us because of our unpaid debts. May the merit of the faithful patriarchs protect those who pray for rain.

Sukkot is a celebration of the final harvest of the year, with gestures that anticipate rain for a new growing season. Shemini Atzeret is a plea for normal winter rain.

Simchat Torah

But that is not the end of our vacation from our usual lives. In the diaspora, a one-day holiday often lasts for two days.¹⁰ The second day of Shemini Atzeret has become Simchat Torah (“Rejoicing in the Torah”), an observance not of the agricultural cycle, but of the cycle of Torah readings. Rabbis from the 6^th to the 11^th century C.E. established the Torah portions for every week of the year, completing the book of Deuteronomy this week. For the last thousand years or so, Jews read the final passage about Moses’ death on the evening of Simchat Torah, then start reading about the creation of the world in the book of Genesis.¹¹

Before we begin reading, we circle the sanctuary seven times, as on Hoshana Rabbah, but without the lulav; the leader holds a Torah scroll. At the start of each circuit, the congregation begins chanting the same verse people chanted on Hoshana Rabbah when they circled the altar of the second temple. When the circuit is complete, everyone sings and dances with the Torah scrolls. The holiday is as joyful as the water-pouring during Sukkot at the temple.

Then unrolling the Torah and reading about the end of Moses’ life in Deuteronomy is only a prelude to the birth of the whole world in Genesis.

How do you return to normal after a vacation? Especially if your vacation is a holy celebration?

I suggest that after the life-and-death solemnity of Yom Kippur, people need the seven (or eight) days of intense festivity called Sukkot. But after Hoshana Rabbah, the Israelites were not emotionally ready to simply go home and go back to work the next day. So they took an extra day, Shemini Atzeret, to hold back from normal life and let the holiness of their proximity to God sink in. Many centuries later, Jews found that this eighth day was not enough; they needed a final celebration to mark the end of an old life and the beginning of a new one. And Simchat Torah fit the bill.

Simchat Torah begins at sunset on October 7, 2023—the 23^rd day of the holiday-packed month of Tishrei. Whether we are dancing with the Torah or sitting in our own homes thinking about going back to work, may we step lightly into a new year and a new season, and savor the small joys that ordinary life brings when we are in touch with our inner selves, the natural world, and the people around us.

Numbers 29:12-34.
Leviticus 23:39-43.
A shofar is a natural trumpet made from the horn of a ram or goat. It is blown in the Hebrew Bible to announce certain holy days, or the start of a battle. Talmudic descriptions of the water pouring during Sukkot can be found in Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 48a, 50a, 51a, and 53a. Quotes from tractate Sukkah follow the William Davidson translation in www.sefaria.org.
Etrogim is the plural of etrog.
In the Torah reading for Hoshana Rabbah, the seventh day of Sukkot: Numbers 29:29-34.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 45a.
Leviticus 23:37.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 47a.
The Hirsch Chumash, Sefer Vayikra Part 2, translated by Daniel Haberman, Feldheim Publishers, Jerusalem, 2000, pp. 820-821.
“The diaspora” refers to all Jews living outside Israel. When a holiday that lasts one day in Israel is observed for two days in the diaspora, Jews can start the holiday at sunset in their own location even when it is morning in Jerusalem.
The entire first Torah portion is not read until the following week.

Sukkot: Rootless

The hut

Any makeshift shelter is called a sukkah in the Hebrew Bible. When Jacob settles for a while somewhere between the Yabok River and the city of Shekhem, he throws together makeshift shelters for his animals:

… he built a house for himself and he made sukkot for his livestock; therefore the name of the place is called Sukkot. (Genesis 33:17)

sukkah (סֻכָּה) = hut, shack, “booth”; temporary shelter. (Plural: sukkot, סֻכּוֹת.)

Jonah, after he has finally delivered God’s prophecy to Nineveh, makes a hasty sukkah for himself on a vantage point east of the city so he can sit and see whether God destroys it or not.¹ A flimsy shelter for harvesters in the field, or for a watchman guarding a ripening crop, was also called a sukkah.²

In biblical poetry, God makes sukkot out of thunderclouds, which are also temporary and flimsy. Dark and dense at first, they evaporate when the storm is over.³

from Sukkot Customs, English woodcut, 1662

The holiday

Sukkot is also the name of a seven-day harvest holiday that Jews still celebrate today; this year it begins at sunset on September 29. The Torah readings for the first day of Sukkot are Leviticus 22:26-23:44 and Numbers 29:12-16. The festival is also mandated in Deuteronomy 16:13-17. But the three passages in the Torah do not agree on where Sukkot should be celebrated.⁴

In Numbers and Deuteronomy, Sukkot is one of the three annual pilgrimage festivals in which all men (often accompanied by their families) must come to Jerusalem and make offerings at the temple.⁵

The reading from Leviticus initially requires people to refrain from working at their jobs on the first day, and to bring offerings to God on all seven days.⁶ Next comes a two-verse conclusion to the list of holy days in the year, followed by an extra passage about Sukkot which was probably inserted later by a redactor.

In this insertion, God mandates a harvest celebration ritual suitable to conduct at home.

And on the first day you must take for yourselves fruit of the citrus tree, open hands [palm-branches] of date-palms, and branches of the myrtle tree, and willows of the creek. And you must rejoice before God, your God, seven days. (Leviticus/Vayikra 23:40)⁷

The flexible branches from the three kinds of trees (date palm, myrtle, and willow) are bound together into a lulav, which is shaken to encourage the rainy season to begin. Shaking a lulav makes a sound like rain.

Then the God in Leviticus issues a further order:

In sukkot you must dwell seven days; all the natives in Israel must dwell in sukkot, so that your generations will know that I made the children of Israel dwell in sukkot when I brought them out from the land of Egypt. (Leviticus 23:42-43)

Leviticus does not tell Israelites to dwell in sukkot in Jerusalem, where they are supposed to make the animal offerings. The book of Nehemiah, set in the mid-fifth century B.C.E., gives people two options for dwelling in sukkot: they can do it on their own property, or in the courtyards of the temple in Jerusalem. Nehemiah reports that the Jerusalemites went out to hills to collect branches of olive, pine, myrtle, and palm trees, as well as other leafy trees.⁸

And the people went out and brought them, and they made themselves sukkot, each man on his roof, and in their courtyards, and in the courtyards of the House of God … (Nehemiah 8:16)

Holiday huts

The tractate Sukkah in the Babylonian Talmud recommends that every household build a sukkah as a temporary residence for the seven days of Sukkot. (However, it is permissible to use someone else’s sukkah, as long as you have your own lulav.⁹) Most sukkot were built on the flat roofs of houses, but they could also be built on the ground, or even on a wagon or ship if someone was traveling.¹⁰

With a few exceptions, all men must eat meals and sleep in a sukkah; women and children are welcome, but not required, to join them. But if rains ruins the food, or prevents people from sleeping, everyone can go back into their permanent house to finish the meal or the night’s rest.¹¹ After all, sukkot is supposed to be a happy holiday.

The sukkah must be constructed expressly for the festival, not for any other use.¹² It must have two complete walls and a third wall that is at least a handbreadth wide; the fourth side of the structure can be open.¹³ The walls can be made out of almost anything, as long as the sukkah is a temporary structure; you can even use an elephant as part of a wall, as long as the elephant is securely tied!¹⁴ But the Talmud recommends beautifying the sukkah with colorful sheets and other ornaments, and using your best dishes and bedding when you eat and sleep in it.¹⁵

The roof is especially important. It must provide more shade than sunlight¹⁶, yet it must include some gaps through which you can see the sky. The roof cannot include animal skins or anything else that could become ritually impure.¹⁷ The framework of the roof can be made of boards, or even metal skewers.¹⁸

But something that grew from the ground should be laid over the roof frame.¹⁹ According to the Talmud,²⁰ the best kinds of roofing are straw from which grain was winnowed on the threshing floor, and vines from which the grapes have been stripped for the winepress—because the Torah says:

The festival of the Sukkot you must make for yourself seven days when you gather from your threshing floor and from your winepress. (Deuteronomy 16:13)

What if someone trained vines to grow over a potential sukkah frame? The Talmud answers:

If one trellised the grapevine, the gourd, or the ivy, climbing plants, over a sukkah while they are still attached to the ground, and he then added roofing atop them, the sukkah is unfit, as roofing attached to the ground is unfit. If the amount of fit roofing was greater than the plants attached to the ground, or if he cut the climbing plants so that they were no longer attached to the ground, it is fit.” (Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 9b)²¹

The roof of a sukkah includes plant material that grew from the ground, but is no longer attached to the ground. Similarly, during Sukkot we are supposed to uproot ourselves from our grounded lives, and live in temporary shelters, flimsy and impermanent.

Rootless

The Sages taught: All seven days of Sukkot, a person renders his sukkah his permanent residence and his house his temporary residence. (Sukkah 28b)²²

For seven days only, we pretend our lives are rootless and temporary. Then we move back into our “permanent” homes—if we are fortunate enough to have them.

Refugees from natural disasters, or from disastrous governments, often live in temporary housing in camps, waiting for months or years for their own homes. When I leave my comfortable apartment and walk down the street, I see homeless people living in pup tents with makeshift awnings, which they set up in parking strips or under bridges—until they are ordered to move on.

A sukkah roof that looks green on the first day of Sukkot is often withered and brown by the seventh day. Can rootless human beings sustain life any better than rootless plants?

And can those of us blessed with rooted lives remember that nothing lasts forever, and our lives are temporary, too?

Jonah 4:5.
Isaiah 1:8, Job 27:18.
2 Samuel 22:11, Psalm 18:12, Job 36:29.
Scholars do not agree on when these three books were written, but a common theory is that Numbers and much of Deuteronomy date to around 600 BCE, while Leviticus was written later, from roughly 550 to 350 BCE.
The other two pilgrimage festivals are Pesach (Passover) and Shavuot.
Leviticus 23:35.
Instead of “the citrus tree”, the Hebrew says a tree of hadar (הָדָר) = splendor, beauty. The Talmud determined that meant a tree bearing a citrus fruit called an etrog (Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 31a, 36a). Instead of “the myrtle tree”, the Hebrew says a tree of avot (עָבֺת) = thick foliage. The Talmud determined that this meant the myrtle tree (Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 12a, 32b).
Nehemiah 8:13-15.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 27b.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 22b.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 29a.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 9b.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 4b, 7b.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 23a.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 28b.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 4a, 22b.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 11a.
Boards less than four handbreadths wide are acceptable in the roof, as long as the gaps between them are as wide as the boards—and partially filled in with vegetation (Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 15a). Sukkah 15a also permits metal skewers.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 11a.
Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 12a.
William Davidson translation in www.sefaria.org.
Ibid.

Ecclesiastes & Sukkot: Nothing New

Do you celebrate this year’s harvest, and pray for the right weather to do it again next year—or does the endless cycle of seasons make you tired? Do you rejoice over the good things in life, even though they do not last—or do you despair because nothing lasts?

Both of these approaches, the practical and the existential, are part of the week of Sukkot, called zeman simchateynu, the “time of our rejoicing”. This year, Sukkot will end at sunset on Sunday, October 16.

Sukkot was originally a celebration of the harvest of autumn fruits (grapes, figs, pomegranates, and olives), then became one of the three annual pilgrimage-festivals at the temple in Jerusalem. After the fall of the second temple in 70 C.E., the festival moved into people’s yards or streets, where they built fragile temporary shelters called sukkot (סוּכּוֹת) = huts, booths, temporary shelters (singular: sukkah). Traditionally, Jews spend part of each day of Sukkot inside their sukkot, conducting rituals to pray for enough rain for the coming year, and eating festive meals (unless it is already raining).¹

Life is temporary

The biblical reading for Sukkot is the book of Ecclesiastes/Kohelet. This book views all life as fragile and temporary, like a sukkah. But instead of celebrating that we are alive to see another season, Ecclesiastes questions whether our brief lives have any meaning.

In the well-known King James translation, Ecclesiastes begins: “Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.”

The word “vanity” in this 17^th-century translation refers to doing something in vain, i.e. with no resulting change. In the original Hebrew, the word is haveil.

The words of Kohelet², a son of David, king in Jerusalem:

Haveil havalim, said Kohelet.

Haveil havalim! Everything is havel. (Kohelet 1:1-2)

haveil (הֲבֵל), havel (הָבֶל), or hevel (הֶבֶל) = (noun) puff of air, vapor; (adjective) impermanent, fleeting, futile, absurd.

havalim (הֲבָלִים) =plural of haveil. (In biblical Hebrew a singular noun followed by the same noun in the plural can be translated as “~ of ~s” (as in “holy of holies”, “king of kings”). This construction means “most ~”, “highest ~”, or “utterly ~”. Thus haveil havalim = utterly transitory, utterly futile, utterly absurd.)

Kohelet considers both gaining wisdom and gaining wealth. Both of these efforts yield temporary satisfaction. But he dismisses them as hevel because they cannot last.

Wisdom

Kohelet values wisdom as a tool in the search for the purpose of life. Yet he considers wisdom hevel because disappears over time.

And I said to myself: “The fate of the fool is also mine; then why have I been wise?” That was when I spoke in my heart and concluded that this too was havel. Because the wise man along with the fool is not remembered forever; as the days continue to pass, all of them are forgotten. Alas, the wise man dies along with the fool! (Ecclesiastes 2:15-16)

The wise man dies and his wisdom is forgotten. Presumably, after enough millennia have passed, the wisdom book of Ecclesiastes will also be lost!

Wealth

Since many people value wealth, Kohelet builds a large estate with gardens, slaves, treasures, and singers.

And I did not neglect anything that my eyes asked for, I did not restrain my heart in any enjoyment. Rather, my heart rejoiced in all the fruits of my labor—and that was the only thing I got out of all my labor. (Ecclesiastes 2:10)

The pleasure of creating and maintaining a luxurious estate is not enough to give life meaning. Kohelet adds that passing on your wealth to your heirs is useless, since sooner or later the inheritance will be controlled by a fool who does not care about what you achieved.³ Furthermore, no matter how much luxury you accumulate, you can’t take it with you.

As one goes out from his mother’s womb naked, he will return … He cannot carry the fruits of his labor in his hand. (Ecclesiastes 5:14)

Innovation

Wisdom and wealth are not the only things that people believe are worthwhile. Some people today say life is about doing good and giving to others; but Kohelet barely touches on that subject. Others find meaning in scientific discovery, invention, artistic creation, promoting new social structures, or increasing knowledge; but Kohelet is not impressed.

What profit is there for the human

In all his labor

That he labors under the sun? (Ecclesiastes 1:3)

He describes how the cycles of nature never change, then claims that human endeavors are also repetitious.

What will happen

Has happened before

And what is done

Has been done before.

And there is nothing new under the sun. (Ecclesiastes 1:9)

There may be something of which it is said: “Look, this one is new!” But it occurred long ago, it happened before our time. There is no memory of the first ones, and also, like them, the later ones will not be remembered … (Ecclesiastes 1:10-11)

Thus Kohelet presents two reasons why human inventions are hevel. Even a human invention, discovery, or work of art only repeats what someone else created earlier; there is nothing new under the sun. And eventually people forget the so-called innovation—until someone else rediscovers it.

I have observed all the deeds done under the sun, and hey!—everything is hevel and herding the wind! (Ecclesiastes 1:14)

So much for devoting one’s life to discovering, inventing, or creating. So much for trying to improve the world through new science or new ways of government.

In a few billion years our whole solar system will die. But in the meantime, our earth has radically changed during the last two millennia. Thanks to human innovations, billions of people live longer and healthier lives, enjoy luxuries Kohelet could not have dreamed of, and acquire knowledge he would have envied.

Humans innovations have also resulted in so much pollution that the climate around the world is permanently disrupted, with grave results for all living things.

We can still celebrate our harvests and pray for the right amount of rain. We can still enjoy eating and drinking and spending our short lives with someone we love, as Kohelet suggests.⁴ But perhaps we can also recognize that there are new things under the sun—and our lives can be meaningful, not hevel, if we dedicate them to making changes for the good.

A sukkah is modeled after the temporary hut the ancient Israelites erected in their fields during harvest season to provide a shaded place for laborers to take a drink or a meal break, as in the book of Ruth. The roof of a ritual sukkah is made out of vegetation such as reeds or branches, and must have gaps wide enough for rain to come in—and for the people inside to see stars at night.
The word kohelet (קֹהֶלֶת) = assembler (from the root verb kahal (קהל) = assembly). Jewish tradition attributes the book to King Solomon, who succeeds King David in the first chapter of 1 Kings, but there is no corroborating evidence.
Ecclesiastes 2:18-21.
Ecclesiastes 3:22, 5:17, 9:9.

Sukkot & Ecclesiastes: Rejoicing Without Justice

Life on earth is the only life that humans get, according the Hebrew Bible (except the second-century B.C.E. book of Daniel¹). The souls of all dead humans, good and bad, go to Sheol, an underground place of oblivion. There is no reward or punishment for human deeds after death.

The reward for virtue in most of the Hebrew Bible is a long and healthy life with male descendants and a good reputation. The punishment for wicked deeds is an early death, the early death of one’s children, or being forgotten.

Psalm 37

Do not get inflamed over evildoers;

Do not envy those who do wrong.

For quickly they will dry up like grass;

Like green plants they will wither. (Psalm 37:1-2)

In a little while the wicked one will be no more;

When you look at his place, he will not be there.

But the humble will take possession of the earth

And delight in abundant well-being. (Psalm 37:10-11)

For the wicked will be shattered,

But God supports the virtuous. (Psalm 37:17)

In the Psalms, God is omnipotent and just. If bad things happen to good people, they are temporary setbacks, and only those who have done something wrong suffer sickness and beg God for mercy.

Yom Kippur and Sukkot

At Yom Kippur services, Jews pray to a God who tempers justice with mercy. Besides begging God to forgive us for our misdeeds, we chant God’s self-description to Moses in the “thirteen attributes”, including “a compassionate and gracious god, slow to anger and abounding in kindness and dependability.”²

Four days after the sun sets on Yom Kippur we begin the week of Sukkot, when the Torah commands us to “rejoice before God, your God, seven days”.³ Rejoicing seems appropriate after the work of atonement is done, the last crops have been harvested, and the grapes have been pressed for new wine. Life is good.

But the Torah reading for Sukkot also says:

In sukkot you must dwell for seven days. All the citizens of Israel must dwell in sukkot, so that your (future) generations will know that I made the Israelites dwell in sukkot when I brought them out from the land of Egypt. (Leviticus 23:42-43)

sukkot (סֻכֺּת) = temporary shelters; huts made of branches and mats to provide shade for harvesters in fields and vineyards, for travelers, or for cattle. (The roofs of ritual sukkot must provide more shade than sun, but still let in any rain.)

So we rejoice even though our shelters are temporary, our harvest is temporary, and our lives are temporary.

Ecclesiastes

During Sukkot we read the book of Ecclesiastes/Kohelet, which begins:

Haveil of havalim, said Kohelet.

Haveil of havalim! Everything is havel. (Ecclesiastes/Kohelet 1:2)

haveil (הֲבֵל), havel (הָבֶל), or hevel (הֶבֶל) = puff of air, vapor; ephemeral, futile, fleeting. (“Vanity” in the King James Bible. Plural: havalim (הֲבָלִים).)

All human achievements and human lives are as temporary as puff of air. Meanwhile the seasons go around forever, like the cycles of the sun, the winds, and the water.

And there is nothing new under the sun. (Ecclesiastes 1:9)

Furthermore Kohelet observes that wisdom and foolishness, virtue and wickedness, make no difference in the fate of human beings. Kohelet does not question God’s omnipotence, and refers to God as judging humans according to their virtue, but concludes that humans cannot change the quality or length of their lives through good deeds or religious observances. God has predetermined everything.

And I said to myself: The virtuous and the wicked God will judge … God sifts them out only to show them they are beasts. Because the fate of the sons of humankind and the fate of beasts are one fate, since this one dies and that one dies. The spirit of the human has no advantage over the beast, since everything is hevel. They all go to one place, they all come from the dust and they all return to the dust. (Ecclesiasters 3:17-20)

Humans die like beasts. But does God grant virtuous humans any of the biblical rewards during their lifetimes—

—by giving them longer lives?

I have seen everything in my days of hevel. There is a virtuous one perishing in his virtue, and there is a wicked one living long in his evil. (Ecclesiastes 7:15)

—by giving them descendants to inherit what they built?

And I hated everything I earned from my toil that I was toiling under the sun, that I would leave it to the human who will come after me. And who knows whether he will be wise or foolish? But he will control everything I earned from my toil that I toiled, and that I gained by wisdom under the sun. This, too, is havel. (Ecclesiastes 2:18-19)

—or by giving them renown in the memories of those who follow?

There is no remembrance of the wise or of the fool. For it is already certain that in the days to come everything will be forgotten. (Ecclesiastes 2:16)

After examining what actually happens on earth, “under the sun”, Kohelet concludes that dispensing justice is simply not something that God does.

Then is there any point in avoiding evil?

Kohelet considers any pleasure in life an unpredictable gift from God.⁴ But he recommends against either drowning in despair or drowning in sensuality. The wisest course of action is to enjoy simple physical pleasures, friendship, and love.

Go, eat your bread with joy and drink your wine with a good heart, because long ago God was favorable … At all times let your clothes be clean and let your head be oiled. (Ecclesiastes 9:7-8)

Friendship is also valuable.

Better are a pair than one alone, for they get good recompense for their toil. For if they fall, one can raise his friend, but if one falls alone there is no second one to raise him. Also if a pair lie down together they are warm, but for one alone there is no warmth. And if one is attacked, the pair can stand against [the attacker]. (Ecclesiastes 4:9-12)

Succumbing to a woman who is a sexual predator leads to bitterness, not enjoyment.⁵ But if one happens to have a good spouse, that is another reason to rejoice.

Enjoy life with a woman whom you love all the hevel days of your life that have been given to you under the sun. (Ecclesiastes 9:9)

According to Kohelet, the only good that humans can do is to appreciate the good things in their ephemeral lives. But later Jewish tradition adds that in situations even when God is not righting wrongs, humans should do what they can to improve the world. Kohelet notes the violent oppression that humans commit, but does not advocate taking any action to reduce it.⁶ Nevertheless, Kohelet says:

All that you find your hand has the power to do, do it, because there is no doing or learning or wisdom in Sheol where you are going. (Ecclesiastes 9:10)

I believe that the best life, however fleeting, is one in which we not only enjoy the physical pleasure, friendship, and love that come our way, but also do everything within our own power to improve life for other humans, and for all living things under the sun.

Daniel 12:1-3 describes the resurrection of at least some of the dead, perhaps in messianic times. (See my post Vayeilekh: The End of Days.) Another work written in the second century B.C.E., the non-canonical Book of Enoch, describes the separation of virtuous souls from wicked souls in preparation for the resurrection of the virtuous and the torture of sinners. Only after the first century C.E. did the writers of the Christian New Testament and the rabbis of the Talmud imagine an afterlife in which good souls are rewarded in a heaven and bad souls suffer in a hell.
Exodus 34:6.
Leviticus 23:40. The Torah reading for the first day of Sukkot is Leviticus/Vayikra 22:26-23:44.
Ecclesiastes 3:12-14.
Ecclesiastes 7:26.
Ecclesiastes 4:1-3.

Repost: Sukkot

We came home today after a quick trip to Meissen, Germany. Home is the apartment in Prague we moved into three weeks ago. We know where everything is here, and we have our new routines down. We know, finally, how to operate the washing machine. We know the neighborhood, including our two favorite restaurants, and we know where to put our recycling. We’ve been watching workers remove the cobblestones on sections of sidewalk, dig trenches, lay cable, fill in the trenches, and replace the cobblestones in decorative patterns.

We know our way around the nearest public square, where we get on the subway to go sightseeing, shop at our usual grocery store, print files at our copy shop, and get cash at our bank machine. We can make change in Czech koruny. (They don’t use the euro here in Czechia.)

We are comfortable in our home in Prague. And next week, we leave to spend a month in Italy.

Traveling the slow way, with no house waiting for us back in the United States, is good practice in accepting impermanence.

So is the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. For a week, Jews are supposed to live at least part of each day in a sukkah, a temporary structure with a roof of branches or reeds that has enough gaps to feel raindrops and see stars.

For this re-post, I polished up my 2013 post on the Torah reading for the week of Sukkot: Sukkot: Temporary and Permeable.

We too are temporary and permeable. My husband and I are traveling abroad now because we know the improvement in our health is temporary; someday we will decline again, and someday we will die.

Since life is temporary, why not make the most of it? Since every home and every habit is temporary, why not embrace change? And since every soul is permeable, why not open ourselves to joy and edification as well as sorrow?

In Jewish liturgy, Sukkot is known as “The Season of Our Rejoicing”.

Kohelet: Is Life Meaningless?

During the Jewish week of Sukkot, which began on Wednesday evening, the traditional reading is the book of Ecclesiastes/Kohelet. Sukkot is called zeman simchateynu, the “time of our rejoicing”. In the Torah Sukkot celebrates the harvest of autumn fruits (grapes, figs, pomegranates, and olives), and the people live in fragile temporary shelters called sukkot. Today Jews still erect and decorate sukkot and hold rituals and meals inside them.

Although these huts only last for a week, we rejoice inside them. The author of the book of Kohelet (“Assembler” or “Assemblyman”¹), on the other hand, seems to be depressed.

The famous opening of the book in the King James Bible translation includes “Vanity of vanities; all is vanity.”

The word “vanity” here means doing something in vain, i.e. with no resulting change. Futility is is indeed one possible translation of the Hebrew word haveil.

Haveil havalim, said the Assembler.

Haveil havalim! Everything is havel. (Kohelet 1:2)

haveil (הֲבֵל), havel (הָבֶל), hevel (הֶבֶל) = (noun) puff of air, vapor; (adjective) evanescent, futile, absurd. (Also the name of Adam and Eve’s second son, called “Abel” in English. See my post Bereishit: Fairness and Free Will.)

havalim (הֲבָלִים) = plural of haveil. In biblical Hebrew, a plural noun immediately following the same noun in the singular noun is an intensive. Thus haveil havalim means utterly evanescent, utterly futile, or utterly absurd, though it can also be translated as “futility of futilities”.

The poetic introduction of the book of Kohelet describes how the cycles of nature never change; the sun keeps rising and setting, the wind keeps going around, water flows down to the sea and then returns to its sources.

What will happen has happened before

and what is done has been done before.

And there is nothing new under the sun. (Kohelet 1:9)

After the introductory poem, the writer uses an exclamation that becomes a refrain throughout the book:

Everything is hevel and herding ruach! (Kohelet 1:14)

ruach (רוּהַ) = wind; spirit; mood.

In a world of futility and absurdity, trying to achieve anything is like trying to herd the wind.

The rest of the book reports the writer’s fruitless attempts to find meaning in life despite the fact that everything in this world, “under the sun”, is hevel. Chapter 2 points out that no matter how much you achieve, no matter how much luxury or wisdom you acquire, you still die, and whoever inherits from you also dies.

Chapter 3 starts with the famous poem beginning:

For everything there is a season

and a time for every business under heaven:

A time to be born

and a time to die… (Kohelet 3:1-2)

Humans also follow natural cycles, making no progress and doing nothing truly new. God has determined everything, according to Kohelet, and humans die just as beasts do.

Everything goes to one place; everything comes from the dust and returns to the dust. Who knows if the ruach of a human rises to [what is] above, and the ruach of the beast goes down [what is] below, to the earth? (Kohelet 3:20-21)

Judging by the rest of the book, the writer does not believe the spirit (ruach) of any human rises to another life after death. Death is simply an ending, and it usually comes before the person has had enough of life.

Yet life, according to Kohelet, is depressing. The author points out the inevitability of oppression, evil, envy, and folly.² Wealth may disappear, and power is no good because every boss is at the mercy of a superior, and even the king is at the mercy of the crops of the land.³God might grant someone every desire, along with wealth, possessions, honor, 100 children, and a long life, but that person will still die before being sated with good things; we can never live long enough.⁴ God makes good and bad things happen; humans have little effect.⁵

Here is hevel that is done on the earth: that there are righteous ones who God treats as if their deeds were like those of the wicked, and there are wicked ones who God treats as if their deeds were like those of the righteous. I say that this, too, is havel. (Kohelet 8:14)

Life is absurd, rather than meaningful, in the face of the “problem of evil” (also called the theodicy).

Kohelet also points out that wisdom is easily brought down by one foolish act⁶, and that we have decay to look forward to as well as death⁷. Yet our fragility is part of the celebration during Sukkot; every sukkah is designed to let the rain in, and every morning we stand inside and conduct a ritual to encourage the rainy season to begin.

The most the author of Kohelet can recommend is to enjoy life despite its meaninglessness:

Go eat your bread with joy and drink your wine with a good heart since God has already approved your deeds. At all times let your clothes be clean, and oil not lacking on your head. Choose life with a woman whom you love, all the days of your life of hevel that God granted you under the sun, all the days of your hevel, because that is your share in life and your exertion that you exert under the sun. Everything that your hand finds to do, do with all your power, because there is no doing nor reckoning nor knowledge nor wisdom in Sheol [underground], where you are going. (Kohelet 9:7-9)

I cannot argue with Kohelet’s advice about cultivating physical pleasure, loving companionship, and zest in your work. Nor would I deny that everything decays and dies. But unlike the author of Kohelet I believe that new things do happen, and humankind is making progress in some areas, however slow and faltering. And I believe that even though life is too short and reality is absurd, life has meaning. What gives life meaning to me is the conviction that even though so much is out of our hands, we humans can, with conscious attention, change our own minds.

So what if all my thoughts and experiences vanish when my body dies? So what if the whole earth and all human achievement is lost forever when the sun explodes? What happens right now, this moment, is still meaningful if we make it so.

The book of Kohelet ends (excluding the postscript) in the same place it begins:

And the dust returns to the earth, where it was,

and the ruach returns to God, who gave it.

Haveil havalim, said the Assembler.

Haveil havalim! Everything is havel. (Kohelet 12:7-8)

Yes, everything is like a puff of air, evanescent and absurd—but some things still matter. And yes, as long as we live, we humans are herding ruach. But we are not always futilely trying to herd the wind. Ruach can also mean mood or spirit. Sometimes we learn how to herd our own moods, so we can rise above them. Sometimes we can even herd our own spirits, nudging our own souls to make our lives meaningful.

Then it is easy to rejoice inside the fragile, evanescent, absurd sukkot of our lives.

—

The word kohelet ( קֹהֶלֶת) comes from the root verb kahal (קהל) = assemble. But the -et ending is a mystery; it might indicate either a female or a vocation, and it might mean a member of an assembly rather than the one who calls the assembly. See Robert Alter, The Wisdom Books, W.W. Norton & Co., New York, 2010, p. 337.
Kohelet chapter 4.
Kohelet chapter 5.
Kohelet chapter 6.
Kohelet chapter 7.
Kohelet chapter 10.
Kohelet chapter 12.

Haftarat Simchat Torah—Joshua: Strong and Resolute

The standard cycle of Torah readings ends with Moses’ death in the last Torah portion in Deuteronomy/Devarim, Vezot Habrakhah. On the holy day of Simchat Torah, most Jewish congregations read this last portion in a Torah scroll, then roll the scroll all the way back and read the beginning of Genesis/Bereishit. The accompanying haftarah (reading from the Prophets) is Joshua 1:1-18.

Have you ever tried to turn over a new leaf, and found that without a systematic process you soon slide back to your old ways?

One process for changing your life can be found in the Jewish holy days from Rosh Hashanah to Simchat Torah. I realized this year that these days are a recipe for a 23-day period of transformation.

Blowing the Shofar, from Minhagim, 1707 — Blowing the Shofar,
from Minhagim, 1707

1) On the two days of Rosh Hashanah (“Head of the Year”), we declare the beginning of a new year. And we wake up when we hear the blast of the shofar, a loud wind instrument made out of a ram’s horn.

2) On Yom Kippur (“Day of Atonement”), having apologized to the people we have wronged and forgiven those who wronged us, we go on to confess our errors to God and forgive ourselves.

3) During the seven days of Sukkot (“Huts”), we eat, sleep, and study (as much as the weather permits) in temporary shelters whose roofs of branches let in some rain and starlight. The new lives we are creating for ourselves are like these sukkot: fragile, not secure—but open to nature, to other people, and to the presence of the divine.

Hoshana Rabbah, by Bernard Picart c. 1733 — Hoshana Rabbah,
by Bernard Picart c. 1733

4) On the seventh day, Hoshana Rabbah (“Great Supplication”), we circle the sanctuary seven times while beating willow branches on the floor to symbolically disperse the last traces of the previous year’s misdeeds.

5) On Shemini Atzeret (“Eighth Gathering”), we pray for rain so that the new seeds we have planted will grow during the winter.

6) On Simchat Torah (“Rejoicing in Torah”), we read the end of the Torah scroll (the last portion in Deuteronomy/Devarim, called Vezot Habrakhah, “And this is the blessing”). Then we roll it back to the beginning and read about the creation of the world in Genesis/Bereishit. In this way we acknowledge the blessings of the old year, close the book on our past mistakes, and launch into creating our new life.

The haftarah for Simchat Torah is the beginning of the book of Joshua, right after Moses has died. Everything must change now. Joshua, who has spent 40 years as Moses’ attendant, must quickly become the de facto king of the Israelites. The Israelites, who have spent 40 years wandering in the wilderness, complaining about the food, learning the rules of their new religion from Moses, and listening to the old folks’ stories about being slaves in Egypt, must now become first a conquering army, then a people who farm, trade, and live in towns—in the unfamiliar land of Canaan.

Moses Appoints Joshua, by Henry Northrop, 1894 — Moses Appoints Joshua,
by Henry Northrop, 1894

Both Joshua and the Israelites are unprepared for their new lives.

Moses anticipates this toward the end of Deuteronomy. He legitimizes Joshua as his successor by laying hands on him, and God confirms it with a pillar of cloud. Then Moses tells the Israelites:

Chizku and imetzu! Do not be afraid and do not feel dread in front of them [the Canaanites], because God, your God, is going with you Itself. It will not let go of you and It will not forsake you. (Deuteronomy/Devarim 31:6)

chizku (חִזְקוּ) = (plural) Hold strong! Hold on! Be fortified! Be stalwart! Be strong!

imetzu (אִמְצוּ) = (plural) Be resolute! Be firm! Be strong!

Then Moses called Joshua and said to him, in the sight of all Israel: Chazak and ematz, because you yourself shall bring this people to the land that God swore to their fathers to give to them, and you yourself shall apportion it among them. (Deuteronomy 31:7)

chazak (חֲזָק) = (singular of chizku) Hold strong! (etc.)

ematz (אֱמָץ) = (singular of imetzu) Be resolute! (etc.)

After Moses dies, Joshua may have felt like running run away, but he accepts his new life. The book of Joshua begins with God speaking to Joshua.

It happened after the death of Moses, the servant of God; God spoke to Joshua, son of Nun, Moses’ attendant, saying: My servant Moses is dead. So now get up and cross this Jordan, you and all this people, into the land that I am giving to them, to the children of Israel. (Joshua 1:1-2)

Joshua says nothing, but I imagine him feeling fearful and doomed. He served as a general once, 40 years ago, when Amalek attacked the Israelites; but the untrained ex-slaves won the battle only when Moses raised his hands toward heaven. Joshua has never led a war of conquest or administered a country. When he was one of the scouts Moses sent to report on the land of Canaan, he could not even persuade anyone that the land was worth entering. How can he persuade the Israelites to cross the Jordan and enter it now? And how can he turn himself into a conqueror, judge, and administrator?

God tells him:

No one shall be able to stand against you, all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, I will be with you. I will not let go of you and I will not forsake you. (Joshua 1:5)

I expect it would help to know that God was on your side. When I embark on a new phase of my life, it helps to know that I am doing the right thing. But that knowledge by itself is not enough to make me step forward.

God continues:

Chazak and ematz, because you shall apportion among this people the land that I swore to their fathers to give to them. Only chazak and ematz very much to guard and do according to all the teaching that My servant Moses commanded to you. Do not deviate from it to the right or to the left, so that you shall act with insight everywhere you go. … Did I not command you: chazak and ematz? You shall not be afraid and you shall not be dismayed, because God, your God, will be with you wherever you go. (Joshua 1:6-7, 9)

Joshua proceeds to become the leader he never was before. He makes decisions based on the teachings of Moses, he conquers large parts of Canaan (with the help of two divine miracles), and he divides up the land among the tribes of Israel.

Chazak and ematz, he probably reminds himself; hold strong and be resolute! The Bible uses this particular pairing of words only at four times of major change: when Joshua replaces Moses as the leader of the Israelites (in Deuteronomy and Joshua), when Joshua encourages his officers to continue the conquest of Canaan (in Joshua), when Solomon replaces David as the king of Israel (in the first book of Chronicles), and when King Hezekiah encourages his people to defend Jerusalem against the Assyrians (in the second book of Chronicles).

In all four transitions, the people who were told to be resolute felt nervous and insecure. And all four times they succeeded in their new roles.

It takes a lot to turn over a new leaf, to embark on a new direction in your life. From the Jewish holy days at this time of year we learn to wake up, face what we did wrong, make amends, and let go; to live for a while in the insecure space of transition as we stay open to guidance and pray for growth; to acknowledge the blessings in our old lives before we begin creating our new lives; and, in this week’s haftarah, to proceed with an attitude that will keep us going on our new path. We must trust that we are doing God’s will or the right thing, and we must be determined to keep going regardless of anything frightening or discouraging along the way.

Chazak and ematz; hold strong and be resolute. Keep going.

Re-eih: Recipe for Joy

Sometimes joy comes unexpectedly. But sometimes we plan to rejoice on a particular occasion, acting with joy and thus inducing a feeling of joy. This week’s Torah portion, Re-eih (“See!”), says that three times a year, everyone should rejoice.

Universal joy is required during the three annual pilgrimage festivals, Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot. Although the Torah gives instructions for these three festivals in the earlier books of the Torah, this portion in the book of Deuteronomy/Devarim is the first one that mandates a pilgrimage to the central sanctuary even for Pesach.

Three times in the year all your males shall appear in the presence of God, your god, in the place that [God] will choose: on the festival of the matzot and on the festival of the shavuot and on the festival of the sukkot … (Deuteronomy/Devarim 16:16)

matzot (מַצּוֹת) = unleavened bread. (This spring festival is part of Pesach or Passover.)

shavuot (שָׁבֻעוֹת) = weeks. (This summer festival occurs after counting seven weeks of the barley harvest, and includes bringing the first fruits and loaves of leavened bread to the priests at the sanctuary.)

sukkot (סֻכּוֹת) = huts, temporary shelters. (In Exodus this autumn festival is called the festival of the asif, “ingathering”, and pilgrims donate products from their threshing-floors and wine-presses. Leviticus adds the rituals of dwelling in temporary huts for seven days.)

…and they shall not appear in front of God empty-handed; each man [shall give] according to the giving-capacity of his hand, according to the blessing that God, your god, has given to you. (Deuteronomy/Devarim 16:16-17)

Only Israelite men are required to make the three pilgrimages to the central sanctuary (which was in Shiloh for about 370 years, and Jerusalem for about 1,000 years). But this week’s portion also encourages women, children, and slaves to go, while recognizing that the journey may not be possible for pregnant or nursing women. Each head of a household must bring the second tithe (a donation for the priests and the temple administration), and a sacrificial animal for God. But the donations must be in proportion to the family’s wealth, so nobody’s joy is dampened by having to give more than they can afford.

In the Torah’s previous instructions regarding the three festivals, rejoicing is mentioned only once, when Leviticus 23:40 says to take branches from four species of trees and rejoice for the seven days of Sukkot.

But in this week’s Torah portion, rejoicing is called for three times, once in the instructions for Shavuot and twice in the instructions for Sukkot.

(Although this Torah portion does not specifically mention rejoicing during Pesach, later passages in Ezra and Chronicles 2 mention rejoicing in Jerusalem during this festival.)

The requirement for rejoicing in the portion Re-eih includes the Levite, stranger, orphan, and widow, who were not mentioned in any of the earlier instructions on the three festivals. During Shavuot, the Torah portion says:

Rejoice in the presence of God, your god—you and your son and your daughter and your man-servant and your woman-servant, and the Levite who is within your gates, and the foreigner and the orphan and the widow … (Deuteronomy 16:11)

And during Sukkot:

Rejoice in your festival, you and your son and your daughter and your man-servant and your woman-servant, and the Levite and the foreigner and the orphan and the widow who are within your gates. Seven days you shall celebrate a festival for God, your god, in the place that [God] will choose, because God, your god, will have blessed you in all that comes to you and in all the doings of your hands, and there will be for you only joy. (16:14-15)

Feeling joy might be easy for the landowner who brings his offerings to the sanctuary, since he gives in proportion to his means, and he is celebrating that God blessed his agricultural endeavors with success.

But when the Torah addresses this landowner, it informs him that his family and his servants or slaves must also feel joy during the festivals. Furthermore, the Torah gives examples of four classes of people who are unlikely to own land or other independent means in a society built around inheritance through the male line: the Levites, whose pasture land is restricted and depend on donations; foreigners, who can lease but not inherit estates; orphans who have no fathers to provide for them; and widows, who are dependent on the mercy of relatives unless they have wealthy sons. The Torah says that all of the disadvantaged people who live in the landowner’s town or village must also rejoice during the three festivals. Their joy becomes the landowner’s responsibility.

What can he do for them? According to the commentary of 19^th-century rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, he must arrange for those who cannot travel to rejoice at home. Everyone who can travel must come with him to the central sanctuary, to experience the joy of celebrating in the national community, whose people are dedicated to one god, and to one another.

Hirsch added that these festivals are also times that God appointed to meet the people at God’s sanctuary. The awareness of God’s presence, he wrote, brings the purest joy.

In the 11^th century, Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki) wrote that the phrase I translate above as “there will be for you only joy” means that if you bring everyone to God’s chosen place for a festival, God promises you will be happy.

I have observed this effect in my own life. Occasionally happiness lifts me when I am alone; more often it comes when I am with my beloved. But when I am singing with my congregation at services, my heart almost always rises. The only times this communal singing does not bring me joy are when someone in the group looks angry or miserable.

The unhappy people are like the poor foreigners in the Torah, alienated from the community where they live. Sometimes these “foreigners” cannot come to the place where God is; they are unable to travel spiritually. Then those of us who have greater means, like the landowners in the Torah, must make arrangements to help them rejoice in the spiritual state where they are.

Other times, the unhappy “foreigners” are able to travel, if we carry them with us. The Torah tells us not to neglect them, but to bring them to God’s place to celebrate with us.

Then “there will be only joy”. Complete joy happens only when everybody contributes, and nobody gets left out.

Sukkot: Temporary and Permeable

Everything in life is temporary, including life itself.

The annual festival of Sukkot was once a pilgrimage to the temple to celebrate the harvest. Since the second temple in Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 C.E., Sukkot has centered around this instruction in the Torah:

In the sukkot you shall live seven days; all the citizens of Israel shall live in the sukkot, so that your generations will know that I made the children of Israel live in the sukkot when I brought them out from the land of Egypt. (Leviticus/Vayikra 23:42-43)

sukkot (סֻּכֹּֽת) = huts, temporary shelters constructed in fields during harvest (often translated as “booths”). Singular: sukkah (סֻּכַּה).

The Sukkah

This week many Jews are eating meals and spending time in their sukkot. A ritual sukkah must be a temporary structure. While it can be attached to a wall of one’s house, it must also have temporary walls and a temporary roof. The roof must also be permeable, made of plant materials such as branches or reeds—materials that leave gaps big enough to let in both rain and starlight. One cannot seal oneself off from the world in a sukkah; the outside world is always coming in.

The Mishkan

The sukkah reminds me of another temporary dwelling-place in the Torah:

And let them make for me a holy place, and I will dwell in their midst. Like everything that I am showing you, the pattern of the mishkan and the pattern of its furnishings, thus you shall make it. (Exodus/Shemot 25:8-9)

mishkan (מִּשְׁכָּן) = dwelling-place, home. (From the root verb shakan = stay, dwell, inhabit.)

Every time the Israelites camp in the Torah, the priests and Levites assemble all the pieces of the mishkan to rebuild the sanctuary. Then when the Israelites move on, the Levites disassemble all the pieces and carry them on the journey through the wilderness. The mishkan, the holy place where the presence of God dwells, is both temporary and portable.

Divine cloud rising from mishkan (artist unknown)

It is also permeable, but in the opposite direction from a sukkah. Rain and light from outside a sukkah penetrate its roof and come inside. The mishkan has cloud by day and fire by night inside it, from the divine presence in its inner chamber. The cloud and fire inside penetrate the roof and appear outside, above the mishkan where people outside the sanctuary can see the divine manifestation.

Inside and Out

When we assemble a sukkah, it’s not only a dwelling-place for us, but also a mishkan for God. In kabbalah, the aspect of God that dwells here in this world is the Shechinah, a feminine form of the noun for “dweller, inhabitant” (from the same root as mishkan). As we sit in the sukkah, we invite God in, along with the rain and starlight. And God dwells “in our midst”, inside us. It is a mitzvah, a good deed, to invite other people to join you in your sukkah. I can imagine this fellowship in a fragile structure radiating goodwill out to the world.

Like the mishkan, a sukkah is temporary. Sitting in a temporary shelter can remind us that we are temporary visitors in our world. Humans get attached to things; we crave permanence. Yet in the Torah, the Israelites escape the slavery of Egypt and live in the wilderness for 40 years in tents, moving on whenever God’s pillar of cloud and fire lifts from the mishkan.

A sukkah is a reminder that we have the power to become free from attachments to material things, even from attachments to our homes and our familiar lives. We can find shelter wherever we go. Sometimes it’s hard to step out from under our solid roofs, but we can do it.

Sukkot is also called “The Season of our Rejoicing”. May we all rejoice, knowing that everything in our lives is temporary and permeable—and knowing that accepting this fact of life brings us inner freedom.