SHMINI ATZERET
Deut. 14:22-16:17
Num. 28:35-30:1
On Shmini Atzeret, we read about tithing, the remission of debts and sacrifices for this holiday. Shmini Atzeret is perhaps the least well-understood major Jewish holiday, and I would guess that only a minority of Jews know why it is celebrated. (Actually, traditional commentators are similarly at a loss to explain why we celebrate this holiday.)
One meaning of “Atzeret” is “assembly,” from the Hebrew root meaning to gather. We have certainly gathered as a Jewish community during the past month for the High Holy Days and Sukkot, but we have yet another opportunity to draw together. Some of us do so by visiting the sukkot of friends and neighbors, others by attending services in shul. Nevertheless, we are together even while we as a people face unprecedented struggles.
Bill McKibben, a professor at Middlebury College, wrote in the New York Times on Monday that "an irrational response [to the challenges we face] would be to try to ignore [them]. Many folks are doing so. However, this kind of avoidance will just get us in deeper trouble by ceding control to those who profit from it, so I hope we won’t choose quietism or escape."
To me, the meaning of “assembly” is found in community. We have communities in our congregations, in Israel, and in the Jewish People around the world, regardless of the divisions we have among ourselves. Some are currently reluctant to publicly declare their membership in our community out of fear of antisemitism or “othering.” I take this holiday’s core message to be a reassuring statement of the unity of the Jewish People, and I rejoice in 3,000 years of assembly. Am Yisrael Chai b'yachad.
