Four species kit
Four species kitIllustration

A new gadget invented by the Israeli Kanfot Hadar company is likely to make your next Sukkot a more enjoyable one.

The company has come up with an innovative and practical solution to help one carry all the things he needs with him on Sukkot. These are the four species (which are taken to the synagogue daily), the tallit [prayer shawl], and the siddur/machzor [holiday prayer book], quite a balancing act. The etrog [citron] top and bottom must remain intact, the lulav [palm branch] tip must not split, etc.

“The new Jewish gadget is a product that grew out of a deep and tangible need in the Jewish world,” explained Ehud Natan Mor of Kanfot Hadar. “Anyone who, during Sukkot, has ever held the four species and has taken them to synagogue along with the tallit and the siddur, has felt how difficult, cumbersome, and how uncomfortable it is. Things fall, break, and are disqualified from a halakhic point of view.”

It was out of this need that Kanfot Hadar came up with the four species kit, explained Natan Mor.

“The kit brings a practical solution to this complication and on the other hand maintains what we are required to do: to keep the glory and splendor of Sukkot,” he said.

The kit is made up of two main parts: The kit itself has a base to which a box for the etrog is connected with a strong magnet, and also has a stand for the lulav, hadas and arava. The stand is put into the base and is closed from the top by a protector. A sponge which is located at the base of the lulav protector can be wet with water to maintain the freshness of the four species, a goal which every Jewish man expends efforts to achieve on the holiday.

In addition, there is also a carrier, into which the four species kit is inserted. The carrier also has two pockets, one for the tallit and one for the siddur. The kit, resembling nothing so much as a viola or gutar case,  can be carried on the back or by hand, depending on what each person is comfortable with.

Natan Mor added that Kanfot Hadar has shown the kit to most of Israel’s renowned rabbis.

“We’ve shown it to most of Israel’s great rabbis, and we’re still in the process of showing it to the rest,” he said. “The rabbis saw the product and they were happy with it. It’s not a halakhic issue, but it is important that we visited them, because there is no one like Israel’s great rabbis to show us the way to do things.”