Last month, I wrote that during the Jewish Holidays I would not charge my community with the mission to find answers, instead I would exhort them to spend the next year asking good questions. Rosh HaShannah and Yom Kippur have now passed and this week, as if to underline my request, we are about to embark upon the Jewish Festival of Sukkot. To quote that famous not-quite-Jewish leader, Winston Churchill, the ritual observance of Sukkot is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
In addition to prayer services, the primary observance of Sukkot is to build a sukkah, a temporary structure with at least three walls and a roof of branches or other organic materials that cannot be solid. If you can’t see the stars through the roof when you go into your sukkah at night, the structure is not kosher, or ritually appropriate for the holiday. Similarly, if the structure cannot be taken down after the conclusion of the holiday, it is, again, not kosher. During the course of the holiday, observant Jews will eat their meals in the Sukkah, decorate them with lights and produce and tapestries and host large festive gatherings inside. Some will even sleep in them.
Which, of course, raises the question: Why? In the culture in which we live, we’re used to holidays being observed in houses of worship. We are also comfortable with ritual observances and customs that take place in the home. I can’t think of any other religious obligations that must take place in lean-tos in our yards.
The first place to look, of course, is the Bible. In the Book of Leviticus, Moses tells the Israelites to move into booths, or in Hebrew, sukkot, for seven days each year as a way to remember that we had lived in temporary structures during the years that we wandered in the wilderness. (Levitcus 23:33-44) So, in one sense, this practice is just a very literal reading of the Torah. But even though the Jewish people have been called The People of the Book, in our tradition, biblical citations are usually just the beginning of the conversation.
The next question is usually: What is the reason behind this particular commandment? One of the best explanations of this puzzling ritual that I have read is from the teachings of a British rabbi named Jonathan Wittenberg. Rabbi Wittenberg points to the paradox that the temporary nature of the structure is supposed to remind us of the permanence of our relationship with God and the principles of our tradition.
The sukkah, he explains is a reminder of our vulnerability. It is a way to impress upon us the ephemeral nature of those structures that we count upon for stability and protection. We spent Rosh HaShannah and Yom Kippur within the fixed and sturdy walls of the synagogue. During every other week of the year, we live under the impermeable roofs of our homes. We spend Sukkot outside, hearing the wind rustle through the trees, feeling the heat and the cold of the outdoors. And it is that moment that we can reach out to God.
It turns out that there is something sacred in being aware of our vulnerability. This reminder of our insecurity helps us to remember to reach out for help and to search for meaning. This shocking departure from our usual complacency nurtures the humility in which we realize that, just as we need support, we need to hear the cries of others who are need of assistance, and not just during one particular holiday. And this commandment to leave our homes for one ritual week and to dwell in the sukkah instead brings us face to face with our obligation to respond to those who are in need of housing and shelter every day of the year.
In our prayerbook, the Festival of Sukkot is called zman simchateinu, the time of our rejoicing. And for this week, we celebrate the way that exploring our own vulnerability helps bring strength to our own faith and to our obligations to provide support to others.
About Rabbi Eric M. Rosin
Rabbi Eric Rosin began his professional career as an attorney in Los Angeles serving the entertainment industry, but discovered he needed to be doing something he was passionate about. He left the practice of law and began studying for ordination at the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies in Los Angeles. After ordination, Rabbi Rosin served for two years as the assistant rabbi of Temple Beth-El in Richmond, Va., then assumed the pulpit at Kesher Israel Congregation in West Chester, Pa. in 2004.
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