Sukkot

Sukkot · Booths / Huts / Tabernacles

The harvest festival of booths, recalling the wilderness journey and our dependence on God.

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Name, translation, date and length — the facts to have by heart.

Hebrew name: Sukkot
English translation: Booths / Huts / Tabernacles
Date / timing: Begins 15 Tishrei (September–October), five days after Yom Kippur
Length: 7 days (one day less in Israel), plus Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah
Historical reason: Wandering in the desert for forty years after the Exodus and before Israel, living in temporary huts (sukkot).
Agricultural reason: The final harvest festival of the year, in September–October: the harvest of the fruits and the of the summer. Each of the represents a different kind of growth in the Land of Israel, each with its own demand for water and its own texture.

Why this exists, what happened, and the values it carries.

Sukkot means booths or huts — a tabernacle: the temporary shelter the Israelites lived in.
It carries two meanings at once: a harvest festival and a remembrance of the wilderness journey after Egypt.

After the Exodus and before entering Israel, the Israelites wandered in the desert for forty years, living in sukkot — temporary huts.
The recalls those temporary dwellings of the wilderness years.

Rituals, symbols, prayers and foods — and the reason behind each.

Building a and covering it with s'chach.
Eating meals — and by some, sleeping — in the ; the meal itself indicates celebration, and the food is for everyone.
Taking and waving the : (lemon-like citron), (palm branch), (myrtle), (willow).
Shaking the in every direction — east, south, west, north, up and down.
Reciting .
, the intermediate days.
, the seventh day.

The is deliberately fragile — its roof of s'chach lets you see the sky — to teach dependence on God rather than on walls; everything is fragile.
The roof is the most important part: it must be temporary, made of material cut from the ground. The walls can be made of anything, but there must be at least three and never four, and no door — the stays wide open.
Eating in the moves ordinary life outdoors and makes the lesson physical, and the shared meal makes it a celebration.
Waving the in every direction expresses that God is everywhere and gathers the harvest's bounty into the blessing.

Sukkah: Temporary dwelling; fragility and dependence on God. Minimum three walls, never four, no door, and a temporary roof.
S'chach: The natural roof covering cut from the ground; temporary, and the sky must be visible through it.
Etrog: Citron, like a lemon — one of the .
Lulav: Palm branch — one of the .
Hadas: Myrtle — one of the .
Aravah: Willow — one of the .

The Hebrew vocabulary for this topic.

Sukkah: The booth or hut built for the festival.
S'chach: Natural material used to roof the .
Four Species: (citrus), (palm branch), (myrtle) and (willow), waved together.
Chol HaMoed: The intermediate days of the festival.
Hoshanah Rabbah: The seventh day of Sukkot.

Answer these out loud before you sit down with the rabbis.

1What the /booth actually is, and why it must be temporary and open to the sky.
2Why there are at least three walls, never four, and no door.
3Name the and explain what we do with them and which direction we shake them.
4The double meaning of Sukkot: agricultural (final harvest) and historical (forty years in the desert).