Shabbat Table Talk

Parashat Sukkoth

Erev Shabbat, 10 October 2003
Week of 5-11 October 2003
Torah Portion: Lev. 22:26-23:44
Haftarah: Zech. 14:1-21
Readings for Sunday, October 12: Wisdom 7:7-11; Heb. 4:12-13; Mark 10:17-30

Time plays an important part in our lives. I remember the excitement and fear experienced by many as we counted down the months, weeks, days, hours, minutes and seconds to the new millennium. I also remember watching the clock strike twelve in country after country, and then the excitement of the sun rising on each of these places. As a society we observe anniversaries of significant events in our county’s history. As religious people we observe a sacred calendar, which is often linked to moments of God’s intervention in our history. Just as the Christian sacred calendar is intricately linked with elements of the Jewish calendar, such as Pesach and Shavuot, so too are these feasts linked to an older calendar: one marking the seasons and planting and harvest. The festival of Sukkoth is linked with the bringing in of the crop of the land (23:39). Here Rashi comments on the fact that the Jewish lunar calendar needs to be adjusted with the addition of an extra month seven years out of 19 (Adar Sheni—“second Adar”). This ensures that the calendar always remains aligned with the seasons.

Abraham Joshua Heschel points out the importance of this ‘transformation’ of secular time into sacred time in his book on the Sabbath. The action of God throughout the history of the Jewish people was seen as more important than the cyclical nature of agricultural feasts, thus emphasizing their dependence upon God over that of their physical sustenance. Everett Fox also highlights the links between the agricultural calendar and the Jewish sacred calendar more clearly. First we observe the dying of the old year followed by the birth of the new year. The “mortification and purgation expressed in Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur” are juxtaposed against the “invigoration and jubilation of Sukkoth.” In observing these feasts we move from the cycle of the natural world in to the sacredness of time.

Chapter 23 of Leviticus presents to the reader one of several versions of the Jewish sacred calendar contained in the Torah (other versions occur in Ex. 23 and 34, with another to be found in Deut. 16. In addition to this we find further reference to the nature of the various feasts in Num. 28:1-30:1, Ex. 12 & 13 and Lev. 16). Fox points out that previous chapters in Leviticus have focused on various other elements of holiness such as worship, ethics, family life and ritual objects. In this chapter, however, the Lord speaks to Moses, outlining the “appointed-times” that are “proclamations of holiness.” It is these sacred moments in our lives that help us to tap in to the eternal sacredness of God’s time.

Before outlining the various festivals described in this chapter, we are reminded once more of the sanctity of the Sabbath. This is “the day of complete rest, a sacred occasion.” The Sabbath is a link with our creation and our redemption through God’s creative and redemptive work, as seen in the commands to remember and observe the Sabbath found in the two versions of the Decalogue. It reminds us that all creation is sacred and that all humanity deserves freedom. It binds us to the sacredness of time. It serves as a reminder that God is at work in our history. It calls us to observe the Sabbath on a weekly basis and to keep it in mind throughout the week. In a world that seems bent on working, playing, and consuming twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, Sabbath stands clearly as a “proclamation of holiness.” This phrase stands as a refrain, repeated eleven times in this chapter, reminding us of the importance of the sacred [23:2 (twice), 3, 7, 8, 21, 24, 27, 35, 36 & 37]. Rashi also notes that the subject of the Sabbath is placed before the subject of the festivals to indicate that the desecration of the festivals is equal to the desecration of the Sabbath. In addition to this, one who upholds the festivals is considered to have upheld the Sabbath.

The number seven occurs repeatedly within these verses. In the verses leading up to the dual explanation of Sukkoth we find the number seven in the following verses: 23:3, 6, 8 (twice), 15, 16, 18, 24 & 27. The festival of Sukkoth as it appears in this parashah is to fall on the fifteenth day after the seventh new moon (23:34 & 39). It is to last for seven days (23:34 & 39), with the first and eighth days being Sabbaths (23:39). For seven days they are to “bring-near a fire-offering to YHWH (23:36). There is the command to rejoice before the presence of YHWH for seven days (23:40). This is followed by a repetition of the instruction that the festival is to be celebrated for seven days each year in the seventh New-Moon (23:41). There is also the command to stay in huts (sukkah) for seven days (23:42). Fox also notes other occurrences of the number seven being used in relation to time (Ex. 23:10-11, Lev. 25:2-7 & 8-17, Deut. 15:1-3). The number seven represents order and perfection and here, he argues, “time, as well as space and behavior, is to be ordered in a way that again reflects divine perfection.”

In closing, it is also worth considering the command that the observance of the festival requires one to “[stay] in huts [for seven days] in order that your generations know that in huts I had the Children of Israel stay when I brought them out of Egypt (23:42-43).” There has been much conjecture as to the exact nature of the huts (sukkah) referred to in this verse. Are these huts simply the impermanent shelters that the Israelites dwelt in during their time in the wilderness? Are they simply a reinterpretation of the huts constructed by workers so that they could maximize their time at harvest by not having to travel to the fields? Or do they represent the “Clouds of Glory” noted by Rashi, which accompanied the Children of Israel during their time in the wilderness? Here the Sefat Emet provides some illumination. He notes that the Israelites “placed themselves under God’s blessed rule.” After Rosh Ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur Israel are “cleansed of sin and must now choose God as their leader.” We are called then to return to God, “realizing that we have no place of our own, but only dwell in [God’s] shade.” By living in a sukkah we acknowledge that we are in the hands of our God, and that it is God alone who provides permanence in our lives.

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For Reflection [1] How do I mark the sacredness of time in my life? How do I bind myself to the sacredness of time? Is one day the same as the next, or do I remember and observe the Sabbath and the religious festivals of my faith community as a means of acknowledging my dependence upon God?

[2] Do I have the trust to place myself in God’s hands?

Bibliography Fox: The Five Books of Moses. (New York 1995); Green: The Language of Truth (Philadelphia, 1998), These Are The Words (Woodstock, Vermont, 2000); Heschel: The Sabbath (New York, 1951); Plaut: The Torah, A Modern Commentary (New York, 1981); Sapirstein Edition: Rashi/Commentary on the Torah (New York, 1994, 1999).

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This week’s teaching commentary was prepared by Mark David Walsh, B.A. (Ed.), Grad Dip R.E., Australia, Bat Kol Alumnus 2001 & 2002.