Looking back at Sukkot and ourselves
Looking back at Sukkot and ourselves

My grandmother (mother of my father) Mina bat David, A”H, for whom I am named, passed away a few days ago on the second day of Yom Tov of Sukkot. I would like to say this Dvar Torah in her memory. I believe it is not by coincidence that she died on this holiday.

When we look at the Jewish holidays, they tend to celebrate great or momentous occasions.  Pesach celebrates the great miracles God performed against the Egyptians and the freeing of the Jewish people from bondage.  Shavuot celebrates the giving of the Torah.  Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur celebrate God judging the world and forgiving our sins.  Even Purim and Hanukkah celebrate miracles (although on Purim it is a hidden miracle) of the Jewish victories over Haman and Antiochus and the rededication of the Beit Hamikdash.  Sukkot, on the other hand, seems to celebrate something very mundane – that God housed the Jews in Sukkot when they left Egypt. 

What is significant about the fact that we lived in Sukkot in the desert?  It seems even the Gemara finds this troubling in that Rabbi Eliezar says it is referring to Ananei Hakavod – i.e. a miraculous Sukka of clouds. (Sukkah, 11b).   

Not only does the purpose of Sukkot seem mundane, but the celebration of Sukkot seems unusual.  It is not enough to remember that we lived in Sukkot, but we actually have to build one and live in it.  Would it not have been sufficient to add a few lines in Kiddush mentioning that God housed us in Sukkot?

Sukkot celebrates a different aspect of Torah - not the Torah we read in books or learn in school, but rather the Torah we experience at home with our families.
On a simple level, I think the answer is that we should not just thank God for the great miracles, but also for the miracles that God performs for us every day.   Sukkot symbolizes everyday miracles in that it represents God’s care and protection in the desert.  Similarly, God cares and provides for us every day.  Unfortunately, we often take our comfortable lifestyles for granted, so God reminds us that we rely on Him for our well-being by requiring us to move back into Sukkot for a number of days. 

However, on a deeper leveI, the key to understanding this holiday is by looking at the time when the Jews lived in Sukkot – i.e. right after they left Egypt.  At that time, the Jews were a newborn people, starting a new history.  The Sukkah represents the time when God formed the Jewish people into a new nation.  Significantly, it was not the Jews who grew up as slaves in Egypt who inherited the land of Israel, but rather their children who grew up and lived in Sukkot that went into Israel and inherited that land.  Their primary life experience and memory occurred in the Sukkah.

Similarly, today Sukkot represents the formation of our Jewish identities.  Sukkot is different than the holiday of Shavuot where we celebrate the giving of the Torah from an intellectual perspective.  In contrast, Sukkot celebrates a different aspect of Torah - not the Torah we read in books or learn in school, but rather the Torah we experience at home with our families.  It is this Torah of experience, particularly when we are young, that forms the basis of our Jewish identity as adults.  As adults, we may not remember everything we learned in school, but we will remember our father making Kiddush, our mother lighting Shabbos candles, and sitting in the Sukkah with our families.  

The holiday of Sukkot is not primarily celebrating that we lived in huts, it is celebrating the life of Torah that was lived and experienced in those huts. When we sit in the Sukkah, we re-experience memories from our formative years and create new memories for the next generation. That is why it is not enough simply to mention in Kiddush that we lived in Sukkot or read about it in the Torah in shul; we actually have to build a Sukkah and live in one.   One cannot learn an experience from reading about it, he must actually live it himself.  

And this is why it is so significant that my grandmother died on Sukkot.  Her life was dedicated to making her house like one of those Sukkot in the desert, a place where Torah was lived and experienced and where she formed the Jewish identity of her children.