I sometimes wonder who had the idea of cramming so many holidays together in the Jewish calendar. We are hardly finished with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur before we start getting ready for Sukkot. (It is a custom by some to start erecting the sukkah immediately at the conclusion of Yom Kippur.)
But it also seems to me that we can look forward to this next holiday
another way. W
e read in the daily prayer book
and
praise God for watching over us with the phrase “hapores sukkat shalom aleinu” (whose shelter of peace is spread over us). This is a remarkably beautiful concept – God is sheltering us as we sit in a flimsy sukkah (shelter). We don’t ask God for a strong, hurricane-proof shelter, but just a flimsy shelter through which the ra
i
n can (and often does) fall.
As Rabbi Neal Katz has noted (Reform Voices of Torah, 10/16/16) we use the metaphor of a sukkah in this daily prayer precisely because we know how fragile peace can be. If we want a more permanent and enduring kind of peace, it is up to us to make it happen. In doing this, we become God’s partner in a most noble effort.
This Sukkot, when peace and security does not exist for millions, through natural disaster or war, or through racial bias and hatred,
through mindless gun violence
or even from a lack of civility, perhaps as we sit in our fragile Sukkah and give thanks to God for seeing us through to this joyous occasion, we can remember that it is part of the Jewish Mission statement to help bring peace to all.
Shabbat Shalom and Chag Sameach.
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