Rabbi's Derasha

There seems to be a schizophrenia about the Mitzva of Sukka.  The Mitzva is supposed to give us knowledge about how we dwelled when Hashem took us out of Egypt.  But we have two very different opinions about what that means.  There are those who say that it refers to Sukkot Mamash, actual booths like what we build in our yards.  Or it refers to the An’nanei HaKavod, the clouds of glory which surrounded the people in their journeys in the desert.  

We can say of course that both opinions have validity, they both have a logic behind them.  The clouds were a miraculous part of the journey in the desert.  What’s more, they are consistent with the theme of Teshuva in regard to the Sukka.  It is a Mitzva that fits into the framework of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.  The clouds we are commemorating were not the orginal clouds of the Exodus.  Those clouds disappear after the episode of the Golden Calf.  They return only after forgiveness comes on Yom Kippur and the Jews begin to build the Mishkan.  This is why the Chag is at this time of year, and why it strikes a note of Teshuva.  We are going out to the Sukka as part of our consciousness of the judgement at this time of year.  

We can understand why we would celebrate something miraculous.  But why would you mark the Sukkot as mere booths?  We don’t mark every detail of going through the desert.  The reminder comes in the simplicity of that experience.  Precisely at this time of year, when we have brought the crop in from the fields, we leave the house and live in flimsy structures.  That is a reminder of the way we lived in the desert, in utter simplicity and with a deep consciousness of being taken care of by Hashem. 

They are two different apporaches, however.  Yet the Torah encourages us to maintain both simultaneously.  Both views have sections in the Torah devoted to them, and both are implied in the fuller spelling of the word Sukkot at the end of the section on the Chag we read this morning.  

I think there’s a way to understand this.  Let’s compare Pesach and Sukkot.  For Pesach, we pursue so many stringencies.  I’m not speaking about anything extra.  Even beyond Kitniot for Ashkenazim.  Everyone searches for Chometz, burns it, nullifies it.  Nothing is left anywhere.  It’s a very strict holiday.  

But on Sukkot it’s the opposite.  The building of a Sukka is full of leniencies.  Sometimes people call to ask about their Sukka and they say to me, “that’s it?  That’s all I need?”  The walls can bend to meet the Schach.  Ten inches is the same same as no inches.  It’s three walls but it’s really just two and a little bit.  

What is the difference.  I heard put the difference this way: On Pesach, Hashem comes to visit us.  He visited homes in Mitzrayim.  He is visiting us.  So we have to do all we can to prepare the house properly.  If He does not want Chometz, there will not be a crumb.  

But on Sukkot, we are visiting Him.  It’s His Sukka, and so he tries to make it possible to fit anyone who wants to come.  

I had a Chavrusa once. He came from the illustrious Twersky family, a well-known name in the Jewish world.  Almost all of those well-known Twerskys originally stem from the original rebbe from Chernobyl in the 18th century.  That rebbe sent his sons away and they all developed Chasidic courts in towns all over Europe.  But one son stayed in Chernobyl and that son’s direct descendents ended up in Boro Park in Brooklyn.  My Chavrusa was the grandson of the Chernobyl Rebbe of Boro Park.  

I heard the following story about that rebbe from his son, my Chavrusa’s father.  It took place on Sukkot, when the rebbe hosted hordes of people in the Sukka.  The president of the Shul was sitting next to the rebbe but so was a street person.  The president asked the rebbe, “Doesn’t it bother you to sit with people like that?”  And the rebbe answered: “After 120 years, I will want to sit at the table with Avraham Avinu.  But next to Avraham, I will look like that person at my table.  I want to be able to say, ‘Just like I sat with anyone at my table, I hope Avraham Avinu will sit with me.’”

I love that as a story about the rebbe.  But I especially love it as a story in a Sukka.  That’s what it means when the Torah says “Kol Ezrach B’Yisrael,” that we wish we could put all of the Jewish people in the Sukka. 

This is why there are these two disparate approaches to why we are in the Sukka.  We don’t have to reconcile them.  Hashem can figure that out because He is the host.  When we walk into the Sukka, we are on Admat Kodesh, on His holy ground -- in a simple place and encircled by clouds of glory simultaneously.