44 | SEPTEMBER 28 • 2023 
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arshat Emor outlines 
the festivals that 
give rhythm and 
structure to the Jewish 
year. Examining them 
carefully, however, we see 
that Sukkot is 
unusual and 
unique.
One detail 
that had a 
significant 
influence 
on Jewish 
liturgy appears 
later on in the Book of 
Deuteronomy: “Be joyful at 
your Feast … For seven days 
celebrate the Feast to the 
Lord your God at the place 
the Lord will choose. For the 
Lord your God will bless you 
in all your harvest and in all 
the work of your hands, and 
your joy will be complete” 
(Deut. 16: 14-15).
Speaking of the three 

pilgrimage festivals 
— Pesach, Shavuot 
and Sukkot — Deuteronomy 
speaks of “joy.” But it does 
not do so equally. In the 
context of Pesach, it makes 
no reference to joy; in that 
of Shavuot, it speaks of it 
once; in Sukkot, as we see 
from the above quotation, 
it speaks of it twice. Is this 
significant? If so, how? (It 
was this double reference 
that gave Sukkot its 
alternative name in 
Jewish tradition, zeman 
simchateinu — the season of 
our joy.)
The second strange 
feature appears in Emor. 
Uniquely, Sukkot is 
associated with 
two mitzvot, not one. The 
first: “Beginning with the 
fifteenth day of the seventh 
month, after you have 
gathered the crops of the 

land, celebrate the festival 
to the Lord for seven days 
… On the first day you are 
to take choice fruit from the 
trees, and palm fronds, leafy 
branches and willows of the 
brook, and rejoice before 
the Lord your God for seven 
days” (Lev. 23: 39-40). This 
is a reference to the arba 
minim, the “four kinds” — 
palm branch, citron, myrtle 
and willow leaves — taken 
and waved on Sukkot.
The second command 
is quite different: “Live in 
booths for seven days. All 
native-born Israelites are 
to live in booths, so your 
descendants will know that 
I made the Israelites live 
in booths when I brought 
them out of Egypt. I am the 
Lord your God” (Lev. 23: 
42-43). This is the command 
to leave our house and live 
in the temporary dwelling 

that gives Sukkot its name: 
the festival of Tabernacles, 
booths, huts — an annual 
reminder of portable homes 
in which the Israelites lived 
during their journey through 
the wilderness.

DUAL SYMBOLISM
No other festival has this 
dual symbolism. Not only 
are the “four kinds” and 
the tabernacle different in 
character, they are even 
seemingly opposed to one 
another. The “four kinds” 
and the rituals associated 
with them are about rain. 
They were, says Maimonides 
(Guide for the Perplexed, 
III: 43), the most readily 
available products of the 
Land of Israel, reminders 
of the fertility of the land. 
By contrast, the command 
to live for seven days in 
booths, with only leaves 

Rabbi Lord 
Jonathan 
Sacks

SPIRIT
A WORD OF TORAH

The Uniqueness of Sukkot

BY GILABRAND/WIKIPEDIA

