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Good Shabbos!
Neli
The Simple Things
2 minute read | Straightforward
Sukkos is the harvest festival. Nature and God have given their bounty; a year of stressful and messy work in the field has finally paid off, and the storehouses are full. In an agrarian society, it was probably the time of year where everyone got their best night’s sleep on a full belly.
And yet Sukkos is the festival of Hoshana – literally, “save us!” – הושע נא. Each day of the Sukkos prayers is marked by beautiful and moving liturgy tracing all the times and circumstances God has saved us, culminating in Hoshana Rabba, with the ultimate wish to please save us too. But it’s the time of year we probably ought to feel most safe and secure!
But the Hoshana prayers seem like they would fit better at calendar moments we were at our lowest and needed God’s salvation most. So why not say them on say, Pesach, when the Jewish People were mired in Egyptian slavery, or maybe the infamous day of mourning and loss, Tisha b’Av?
A recurring theme of the Torah is that challenging moments are obvious in the sense that we know how to respond. In a crisis, we know we have to do better, be better, pray harder, and perhaps fast. Don’t tell the poor soul mired in those unfortunate circumstances to have faith and believe – it’s unnecessary because that’s all they have.
Someone whose family is well and whose well-paying job is stable doesn’t feel the same desperation that the other guy does. How could he?
At the exact calendar moment of security, the Torah reminds us not to take our wins for granted, to count our blessings. We step outside our solid and warm homes into the flimsy and makeshift Sukka, which by definition, must be structurally defective for permanent habitation, reminding us how frail we are and how life is so temporary. That’s not a bad thing – that’s just what it means to be human. The Sukka is not built for inclement weather, and that’s just fine. It’s not supposed to. We don’t control the weather outside the Sukka; we only control what happens inside the Sukka. It’s not made of much, but the mitzvah is to make it as beautiful as possible on the inside.
We step away from the trappings of success to live in simplicity with God. We need to remind ourselves at the moment that we feel most blessed because that’s when we are prone to forget. So we beg for help – save us… from ourselves, from our own complacency.
We can forget that the difference between the successful and unfortunate person isn’t necessarily the effort and merit each puts in. We can forget that a whole lot of things we were desperate for a few years ago worked out quite nicely in the end. The Sukka is an excellent metaphor for the uncontrollable vicissitudes of life, a humbling moment amid proud successes.
It’s not about saying thank you for finally getting what you wanted; it’s about recognizing that you were always blessed. That maybe we don’t need the trappings of success to see our blessings; that in the moments we have deemed to be blessed, we need to remember not to take for granted all the other blessed moments as well.
We don’t control our circumstances, but we can find joy in life regardless.
Redeeming the Past
2 minute read | Straightforward
After Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, we have hopefully resolved to do better and be better, feeling invigorated and full of life.
Yet, in all likelihood, we return to the daily grind of everyday living with the same habits and routines we had as before. It’s not like we press the reset button and walk out on our families and communities and jobs, and we shouldn’t want to!
But what sort of change can we realistically expect to see if our lives basically stay the same?
Perhaps we can learn from the mitzvah of Sukkah that immediately follows.
The defining feature of a Sukkah is that the roof is made from unprocessed raw plant matter that creates sufficient shade. The classic example is the byproduct of the threshing floor and winery, what’s left once you’ve extracted the useful resources. What’s left isn’t waste that is disposed of; the husks and stalks can be recycled and repurposed and used for the mitzvah of Sukkah.
And that’s precisely what Teshuvah is.
It’s not realistic to make a clean break from the past, to put mistakes wholly behind you and move on. Instead, you should carry the past forward with you; mistakes can become educational steps that help us climb and reach higher if we only learn and improve, and we can evolve.
There’s an old Chassidic saying that highlights Sukkah as the only mitzvah a person does with muddy shoes; muddy shoes are the natural result of our journey through life. The dirt we pick up along the way is intimately interconnected with who we are and wholly inseparable; people who have made mistakes are welcome in the Sukkah.
This may also explain why the Zohar calls the Sukkah the shade of God – God is with us in our dark moments too – צילא דמהימנותא. It may also explain why of all festivals, Sukkos, in particular, is the time of joy – the debits can turn into credits – זְמַן שִׂמְחָתֵנוּ.
There is a mystical element here as well. The Hebrew word for husks and rind is קְלִפָּה. In Kabbalistic symbolism, souls are shining lights, and sins cloak the soul in layers of קְלִפָּה, sort of like an onion. Instead of discarding the קְלִפָּה, Teshuvah transforms it from a bad thing into a good thing.
It’s not a magic trick – sins and transgressions are treated differently based on Teshuvah’s motivation. The way you adapt your past mistakes materially affects the way you incorporate the lessons learned to be a better person.
The Esrog reflects this concept as well; it the choicest of the four species and a symbol of the ideal human who is great in deeds and wisdom. Yet if you cut one open, the edible fruit is tiny – the inedible rind makes up most of the mass; but that’s still what an ideal person looks like. The best of us builds up plenty of rind over time, and that’s simply part of what makes a beautiful Esrog.
Perhaps that’s why Sukkos comes right on the back of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. We shouldn’t just sink back into the same routines as before, but Teshuvah doesn’t need to look like such a radical departure from the past. Change is incremental – it doesn’t have to be so different from past habits and routines; maybe it’s quite similar, but with small improvements and modifications.
Sukkos teaches the holistic view of how we change.
We all make mistakes.
The only real mistakes are the ones you don’t learn from.
Recreating Egypt and Sinai
2 minute read | Straightforward
One of the more forgotten laws is the mitzvah of Hakhel.
On the first day of Chol HaMoed Sukkos, two weeks after the end of the Shemitta year; every man, woman, and child would assemble to hear a public Torah reading from his personal Sefer Torah:
מִקֵּץ שֶׁבַע שָׁנִים, בְּמֹעֵד שְׁנַת הַשְּׁמִטָּה–בְּחַג הַסֻּכּוֹת בְּבוֹא כָל-יִשְׂרָאֵל, לֵרָאוֹת אֶת-פְּנֵי ה אֱלֹהֶיךָ, בַּמָּקוֹם, אֲשֶׁר יִבְחָר: תִּקְרָא אֶת-הַתּוֹרָה הַזֹּאת, נֶגֶד כָּל-יִשְׂרָאֵל–בְּאָזְנֵיהֶם: הַקְהֵל אֶת-הָעָם, הָאֲנָשִׁים וְהַנָּשִׁים וְהַטַּף, וְגֵרְךָ, אֲשֶׁר בִּשְׁעָרֶיךָ–לְמַעַן יִשְׁמְעוּ וּלְמַעַן יִלְמְדוּ, וְיָרְאוּ אֶת-ה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם, וְשָׁמְרוּ לַעֲשׂוֹת, אֶת-כָּל-דִּבְרֵי הַתּוֹרָה הַזֹּאת – Every seventh year, after the Shemittah year, on the festival of Sukkos… in the place that He shall choose, read the Torah before all of Israel, so they will hear it. Gather the nation – men, women, children, the stranger among you… so that they may learn and fear Hashem your G-d. (31:10-12)
It’s an unusual mitzvah, in that it is fulfilled by everybody – young and old, men and women, Kohen, Levi, and Yisrael. Children aren’t typically expected to observe the Torah like adults – yet the Torah not only includes them but adds additional emphasis that they are a part of this ceremony:
וּבְנֵיהֶם אֲשֶׁר לֹא-יָדְעוּ, יִשְׁמְעוּ וְלָמְדוּ לְיִרְאָה אֶת ה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם – The children who do not yet know will hear and learn to fear Hashem your God… (31:13)
Why is it important that children are a part of this mitzvah?
The Gemara says that while a child does not have the mental capacity to technically fulfill a mitzvah, there is a pedagogical benefit to their inclusion nonetheless.
The reason children must attend is simple and powerful: the Torah is for everyone – even the king, and even the children. Today, we call this principle the rule of law.
R’ Shai Held considers Hakhel an orienting event that re-enacts the redemption and revelation the foundational moments of Egypt and Sinai that Judaism revolves around.
It takes place after the Shemitta year because Shemitta releases slaves and debts, and discharges mortgages and pledges.
It takes place on Sukkos because it is the time of year that everyone leaves the illusion of security and trappings of life behind, living with simplicity and vulnerability together – צילא דמהימנותא.
It is not enough that everyone attends; they must be there “together”.
The Shem Mi’Shmuel notes that to achieve the level where we can accept the Torah once more, it takes a whole year of living in liberty and equality, free from the obsession of increasing our private property.
The Sfas Emes teaches that the effort parents have to make to bring their kids teaches the children how important it is to understand this. While it may be difficult to explain to a young child that something is important, they will understand when you show them.
The Hakhel ceremony reaffirms that beneath the details and minutiae of our lives, we cannot help but acknowledge our shared common identity and fundamental dependence on God. Accordingly, it is entirely fitting that the experience of the children is front and center.
The Torah belongs to everyone. The buildup to the moment at Sinai where the Jewish People could accept the Torah in sacred unity with one voice is reenacted every calendar cycle at Hakhel, and the Torah calls for a similar process to break the barriers down.
To build a community, you need a longer table; not a higher fence.
Transcending Time
3 minute read | Advanced
From Rosh Hashana through Sukkos, honey features prominently at the festive meals. Honey is sweet and symbolizes the sweet new year we yearn for.
But if you think about it, using honey is odd. Honey is sweet, but it comes from bees, which have a painful sting and are not kosher creatures.
Honey is a complex sugar; why don’t we use simple cane sugar, a naturally growing plant that metabolizes into the energy that fuels all living things?
The universe operates on fundamental laws of physics that express empirical facts and describe the physical properties of how the natural universe works. One such law is the law of entropy, which describes how natural states tend to undergo increasing decay and disorder over time. Eventually, all things break down.
The Midrash suggests that the notion of Teshuva predates the universe, that Teshuva is not subject to the space and time of our universe or its constraints, including entropy.
Creation is an environment where humans can make choices. The nature of a test is that it is challenging; you can pass or fail. As much as God can want us to pass a test, the objective fact remains that tests can and will be failed. But God is not gratuitously cruel and does not set us up to fail; the fact we can fail necessarily requires the existence of Teshuva, so failure is not the end. People can learn from their mistakes, leave them behind, and move on.
R’ Nechemia Sheinfeld explains that the supernatural aspect of Teshuva is that it unwinds the effect of time and entropy; we can repair our mistakes, removing the decay, leaving only the lesson we have learned. Teshuva is not an after-the-fact solution; it’s baked into the fabric of the creation process, so redemption is structurally possible from the outset.
Existence without Teshuva would be static and stagnant – there would be no recovery from failure or setbacks, no growth, and, therefore, no life. Teshuva must predate existence because that’s the only way life can change and become.
With Teshuva, sins, and transgressions can be recategorized based on motivation. When Teshuva is motivated by fear, sins are downgraded to accidents and oversights; when motivated by love, sins can become merits. It’s intuitive; how a person adapts past mistakes materially affects how you incorporate the lessons learned to be a better person.
It’s a bit like learning to ride a bicycle. The first time you lose your balance, you fall and hurt yourself. Maybe next time, you wear a helmet and pads and slowly learn how to keep your balance. If you focus on how bad falling hurts, you’ll never learn to ride the bike. But once you learn to keep your balance, you forget about falling, and maybe you don’t need the pads anymore. You now know how to ride a bicycle.
R’ Shlomo Farhi teaches that this is why the Hebrew word for “year” – שנה – is cognate to the words שני and שנוי – “secondary” and “change” respectively. Today’s achievements are built on the foundations of yesterday; a repetition would be no different from what came first, and a fresh start can’t carry the lessons along the way. This may help explain why we temporarily behave more diligently in the intervening days between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur – a reliable foundation is the precursor of a strong building.
R’ Meir Shapiro teaches that this is why honey, not sugar, is the centerpiece of the holiday imagery. Honey is kosher despite being a product of non-kosher origins, and maybe you get stung. It’s complex, not simple. But doesn’t that sound a lot like Teshuvah? You made mistakes that weren’t so kosher; maybe they stung a little and weren’t so simple, but you can learn and grow from them all the same – you’ve made something kosher from something that’s not.
As R’ Nachman of Breslov taught straightforwardly: if you believe you can break, then believe you can fix.