(Leviticus 23:42)
Tishrei 19, 5776/October 2, 2015
Tishrei 19, 5776/October 2, 2015
For seven weeks the entire nation of Israel has been involved in a great spiritual exercise. It began in the month of Elul, a month of introspection and reflection on our failings as well as our aspirations. These four weeks are accompanied by selichot - special supplications and liturgical songs announcing our culpability and beseeching G-d's mercy.Elul is followed immediately by Rosh HaShana, the day in which we coronate G-d as King of all creation, the anniversary of the day G-d created Adam, our great great grandfather. On the tenth of Tishrei is Yom Kippur, a day of fasting and intense prayer, in which we transform ourselves into angelic beings, worthy, we hope, of standing before G-d and meriting His forgiveness. Four days later we shed our angel's wings and white robes and submerge ourselves into a world of intensified physicality: this is the world of Sukkot, surprisingly, perhaps, the climax of our seven week spiritual journey.
Shouldn't Yom Kippur be the final act in our odyssey? Can we get any higher than being angel-like in our purity and unity of intention? Torah says yes. One step higher than being like the heavenly beings is being ourselves - human beings. G-d created us and placed us in this physical world for a purpose, and that is to raise up our physical world by endowing it with spiritual worth. And we do this by intending our every physical act into one which elevates creation and brings our physical world, our human being world, closer to G-d's presence. Our sukkah, our temporary dwelling which we build and live in for the seven day Sukkot festival, becomes a self-made and self-contained microcosm in which every physical activity we perform within it is a commandment fulfilled and a raising up of our physical life of otherwise mundane activities. Eating, sleeping, sitting, studying, are all beautiful acts of piety and faithfulness when performed in our sukkah. In addition, the daily waving of the arba minim - the four Torah mandated species - myrtle, willows, palm fronds and citroens - is yet another act of sublime physicality in which we sanctify the physical by imbuing it with sacred purpose.
When we do leave our sukkot after our week-long "lifetime" within the sukkah, we are primed and ready to face a new year, spiritually recharged and ready to inject our year with divinely inspired purpose by directing our thoughts and actions, as physical and mundane as they may be, toward our King and father, Who we coronate on Rosh HaShana, and Who sees into and protects our temporal sukkah-like existence as a loving father.
The spiritual recharge is not just a metaphor. Here in the land of Israel the spiritual mountain climb that the entire nation has participated in for seven weeks now, creates a tangible energy and excitement that is exhilarating. Walking down the streets of Jerusalem during the seven days of Sukkot is unlike anything experienced elsewhere on earth. Our sages tell us that in the time of the Holy Temple, the daily Simchat Beit HaShoeva, the Water Libation Ceremony and Celebration, (which the Temple Institute reenacted just yesterday), created such a plethora and surfeit of spiritual energy, that ordinary people would leave the Holy Temple courtyards with words of prophecy on their lips. We may not be there yet, as the challenge of building the Holy Temple still lies before us, but based on the incredible spiritual energy being generated in Jerusalem today, the day of the Holy Temple, the Water Libation Ceremony, and spontaneous prophecy seems very close, indeed. Chag Sukkot Sameach - Happy Sukkot!
-The Temple Institute
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