It is the time for Zman Simchateinu, the season of our rejoicing. Why do we rejoice at Sukkot? Because we build and decorate a beautiful new, albeit temporary, home as our Sukkah, we invite friends, and we eat together within cozy close-knit walls under an autumn sky. We pass the lulav and etrog for shaking and laughter.
But this year, our Sukkot are likely to be empty, if we are able to build them at all. We will not be sharing our food with neighbors and friends; and many of us are not able to go out and buy the lulav and etrog. How do you find joy in a sukkah that exists in our memories, or can only be found on a screen?
When our children were very little, and our backyard in London was unsuitable for a sukkah, we decorated the back room, closest to the backyard, with fairy lights, apples, pictures of the land of Israel, plants, and anything we could think of to create a Sukkah like experience. We had great fun decorating. And it never blew down and got wet! We ate every meal in that room throughout Sukkot. It was a bit odd, but it was fun, warm and full of Sukkot spirit.
If we have re-learned anything from Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, it is that we are resilient and creative. We have the ability to celebrate our traditions with innovation, heartfelt sincerity, and great joy.
This year, fill your home with as much joy, light and fun as you can. If you can’t build or visit a sukkah, try to create a Sukkah atmosphere with fresh flowers, plants, and even twinkling lights in one room of your home. Put lemon oil or lemon candles around the room, to represent the etrog. Print pictures of Israel and put them on the walls of whichever room you are designating as your 2020 Sukkah. If we can’t go out into the Sukkah, bring the Sukkah into our homes and hearts.
These are challenging times. But challenging times require creative responses. Challenging times also need simcha, joy, as an antidote. I am grateful for Sukkot this year. It gives us a chance to celebrate our achievements as a community over Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, and a badly needed respite from this election season.
At CMT, we have many ways we will celebrate simcha/joy over Sukkot. Tonight and tomorrow, we will begin Sukkot with beautiful services, where we will study briefly the ushpizin/ushpizot, the ancestors we invite into the Sukkah each year. Sunday, we have a choice of small in person congregational Sukkot picnics at Newton Town Hall. You bring the food, we’ll bring the lulav and etrog. This coming week, you can sign up to come study with me and others in small groups in our campus Sukkah. You can also join me and other teachers at a local virtual Sukkot Slam, where I will be teaching on joy, on October 7, at 8.30 pm. Next Friday night, on Hoshanah Rabbah, we will have a virtual Dine Under the Stars. After the service, you can sign up to sit at a virtual table with friends or meet new people, as we eat Shabbat dinner together via zoom breakout rooms.
Included in this email are a few other ways to celebrate Sukkot, both in our community and in other parts of the world.
This year, this Shabbat, bring joy home.
