Page 44 - HaMizrachi # 23 Sukkot Simchat Torah 2020 USA

HOLIDAY READING

Rabbi Benzion Scheinfeld

Celebrating Now and Then:

The Contrasting Messages of Sukkot and Pesach

hy is it that Pesach – rather in a hut in the Sinai Desert having just We do not have to imagine our past to
than Sukkot – is known left Egypt is just fine. Why then, if the feel the internal messages of Sukkot.
Was the holiday when Jews Torah goes to such lengths to recreate We are asked to simply be sensitive
relive and recreate their past? On the Sukkot experience of the midbar, to our present reality. For sitting in a
Sukkot, we are commanded to take does it leave out the clincher? Namely, sukkah circa 2020 is just the same as
our furniture out of our house and our obligation to imagine we are part sitting in a sukkah circa 3300 BCE.
eat and sleep for seven days in a hut of Klal Yisrael journeying through the Both cases involve sitting in a flimsy
covered only by s’chach, braving the desert, as we are obligated to envisage temporary shelter (יא ַ ר ֲ ע ת ַ רי ִ ּ ד) open to
elements, just as our ancestors did in on Pesach? the elements, aware of our tenuous
the desert. The beraita in Masechet physical existence in הֶּז ַ ה ם ָ לֹוע, in this
Sukkah elaborates and says we must Pesach and Sukkot evoke very differ- world, which is ultimately an יא ַ ר ֲ ע ם ַ לֹוע,
do all of our activities in the sukkah. ent internal narratives and empha- a transient world dependent upon
The obligation to reenact on Sukkot size very different types of spiritual G-d. There is no need for imagination
is more encompassing in both time growth. Pesach is a holiday that or connecting to a borrowed experi-
(seven days vs. one for most Pesach emphasizes a one-time event that ence from our collective past.
mitzvot) and scope (all of life’s activi- cannot and will not ever be duplicated.
ties vs. just eating). If observed cor- The ahava between Klal Yisrael and All that is necessary for Sukkot is
rectly, Sukkot seems to be a far more G-d expressed on the night of Yetziat openhearted existential awareness
intense recreation of our past history Mitzrayim was so intense and power- of the present. It is through that
than Pesach. So why all the fanfare for ful that it echoes through time. Once openness we are to connect to G-d
Pesach? a year, the Torah demands we try our by embracing our present and the
best to “remember” that special night ever-present connection to Hashem
Perhaps the answer can be found by built into the fabric of life. Sukkot
solving another apparent mystery that using physical activities to arouse our represents the timelessness of our
separates the two chagim. Concern- imagination and connect with this connection to G-d while Pesach is all
ing Pesach, the Mishna states: “On moment. We are obligated to do our about a moment in time.
this night one is obligated to imagine best to escape our present reality and
themselves as if they were personally go back to a time many years ago. By LeZecher Nishmat Mrs. Esther Scheinfeld z”l,
leaving Egypt.” On Seder Night, one going back and touching that distant a woman whose personality and love of Torah
and Eretz Yisrael touched and inspired so
must also bring one’s imagination in moment – albeit in our imagination many lives. Niftara Rosh Chodesh Elul 5780,
addition to all the required physical – we are fulfilling the Avodat HaYom August 21, 2020.
items (Pesach, Matzah and Maror). (the duty of the day) of feeling the
Just eating matzah and maror, even echoes of that incomparable event.
LeShem Mitzvah, would not fulfill On Sukkot, however, we are not asked
one’s obligation. Rather, one must use to leave our present reality at all. The
one’s imaginative faculties to actually
envision oneself as if I personally was powerful recreations of Sukkot are
not meant to jar our imagination and
leaving Egypt.
transfer us to a distant past. Sukkot
In contrast, despite the intense does not demand ה ָ רי ִ כְז, remembrance,
demands of “living 24/7 in the but ה ָ עי ִ דְי, knowledge. In fact, the rec-
sukkah,” we are not asked to use our reations of Sukkot are not reenact- Rabbi Benzion Scheinfeld is Director of
imagination. Eating and sleeping in ments at all. They are so real they are Camp Kanfei Nesharim and a high school
the sukkah without imagining you are actually reality. educator.

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