Judaism. We spend 10 days between #RoshHashanah and #YomKippurbegging God and loved ones for forgiveness. We spend some 26 hours fasting and imploring God to give us more life, more days on this earth, another chance. We come out of Yom Kippur feeling victorious. But, the very next moment we put up this flimsy, vulnerable, temporary structure called the #Sukkah. Why? To remind us that life is temporary, that things can change within seconds, that “without tradition our lives would be as shaky as a fiddler on the roof” and that we must remain humble beneath the night skies filled with stars that outnumber the particles of sand on this earth. Just when we think we’ve arrive, we’re reminded that the process is more important than the results, that the journey matters more than the destination, and that the yearning to seek God is more vital than any single good deed. Judaism is too real. That’s why we don’t have large cathedrals or monuments. Because we celebrate the intangible. Come walk with me.
Sukkos. The sukkah represents the body. We enter into our own body, in a manner of speaking, to fulfill the mitzvah. But what is this sukkah? Fragile. Easily blown down. Here for a limited time. The book mandated to read during sukkos? Kohelet. Breath of breath – everything is breath. All fragile and easily breakable and quickly passing away. Yet, it is also mandated alone among the holydays, as the z’man simchatenu. The time of our joy. It is a command of the tradition that jews, even though we acknowledge the transience of all things, yet we are commanded to rejoice and sing and drink and eat and be with our close ones. May it be a z’man simchatenu for all of us. For all of you.
