The customs surrounding the Biblical Feast of Sukkot
suffer from forced explanations which makes it difficult to understand. The
most problematic issue is the sukkah - the booth or tabernacle, from where the
festival gets its name - Feast of Tabernacles or Feast of the Booths (also Feast
of the Ingathering or simply The Festival). The fanciful explanations altered
the meaning of the entire feast and this is a pity as it is easy to understand,
and in its simplicity makes perfect sense.
In accordance with Leviticus 23:
42, Ye shall dwell in booths seven days;
all that are home-born in Israel shall dwell in booths; that your generations
may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths, when I brought
them out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.
Sukkot takes place during the
autumnal equinox full moon, five days after Yom Kippur. From 15 to 22 Tishrei -
this normally falls towards the end of September and October. This falls after
the harvest and normally before the first rains. At this time of the year,
activity on the farms slowed down and it was the ideal time to take a holiday -
relax a little after a year of hard work. It was therefore the ideal time for
Solomon to inaugurate the Temple (1 Kings 8) and the Second Temple (Ezra 3). For
the same reason Jonathan Maccabee (160 BCE) and Alexander Janneus (103 BCE)
timed their 'crowning' to coincide with the holiday. The holiday did not come
into being because of the crowning or the opening of the Temple - or because it
is the time when the Messiah/Messiach is going to appear or reappear. It was a
natural 'holiday' time.
Sukkot is a 'get-back-to-nature'
and 'meet-the-neighbors' holiday and in this context the sukkah, is the 'cabin
in the woods'. It is natural to be outdoors at this time of the year - in
modern Israel nature reserves are still popular over Sukkot. Starting with the
full moon, the festival starts with an experience of the night. Sleeping in the
sukkah, the moon keeps festival-goers awake till late and they only wake up
when the sun bakes them out of bed. All around are neighbors doing the same so
nobody feels guilty about relaxing a bit - the perfect holiday.
For seven days of the festival,
all family activities like eating, prayers, and getting together (the men are
supposed sleep in the booth as well) take place in a sukkah built outside the
house. The booth is a room with at least three walls constructed according to
strict guidelines. Materials like branches and planks are used with the roof
covered with branches (normally palm) to leave a certain amount of gaps. Originally,
and during the wanderings of the Israelites in the desert, the sukkah was built
from palm leaves, olive and myrtle branches or when nothing else was available,
almost any branch. This was done according to a minimum specification as
to what constitutes a 'house'. With more building materials at hand in later
years, the minimum standard became a maximum, so it would still seem
like a hastily constructed 'booth'. At some stage decorating the sukkah and
hanging colorful and pleasant smelling citrons like the esrog in the sukkah
became a custom. Later still more elaborate decorations were used.
The sukkah was there to maintain
a distinct character for the Israelites while they wandered among the desert
tribes. It stands as a counterpoint to Pesach which is a celebration of the
Israelites leaving Egypt and going into the desert to live in tents. To prevent
assimilation God ordered them to build 'booths'. They did this whenever they
stopped for seven days or more to remind them they were not nomads - one day
they will live in houses in a land they can call their own. In this, it is like
an harvest, an 'ingathering'.
At Pesach, those partaking of the
feast recline while they eat because in a tent sitting upright on a chair or
standing is impossible. The booth was built next to the tent based on an
Egyptian design of a shelter, which was used by rich Egyptians when they went
hunting or for a picnic. It was high enough so everyone could sit on chairs at
a table, get up to pray standing, and never bow down the way one has to do in a
tent. It was the way of people who lived in houses.
Sukkot is therefore a time of a
promise fulfilled. This makes it a hated festival among those who do not stand
with Israel - it is salt in the wounds of the Palestinians and Arab nations who
base their entire system of belief on replacement theology. But Zechariah 14:
16 - 17, makes it clear; there are those who live in tabernacles and those who
live in tents in the desert - without rain. And
it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came
against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord
of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. And it shall be that whichever
of the families of the earth who do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the
King, the Lord of hosts, on them there will be no rain.
From this understanding of Sukkot it is clear how it
fits in with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur to form one festival, as it was
during the First Temple period. Rosh Hashanah is there to determine who stands
with Israel for the year - Yom Kippur mourns the shame of those who did not
stand with Israel - Sukkot celebrates those who stand with Israel.
