with Dawn Kepler
How Do We “Do” Sukkot?
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| Sukkot celebrates harvest |
If you have a question for our experts about Sukkot, or any issues about family life and relationships between people of different faith, please email us at bridges@sfjcf.org.
Anyone who has gone to an October Fest or Apple Harvest, or gathered with friends for fruit-picking before making jam, knows the exhilarating feeling of experiencing autumn’s abundance. Festivals to celebrate the harvest are a part of the vast majority of agricultural communities. In Judaism, the harvest festival is Sukkot.
This ancient biblical holiday, which lasts for eight days, is one of the three pilgrimage festivals. In antiquity, the Jews made pilgrimage to Jerusalem to make an offering at the Temple. Imagine thousands of Jewish families traveling to the same site to hold one heck of a big barbeque... [continued]
The Fall Holy Days… from A to Z
By Suzan Berns
The Jewish month of Tishrei, which falls sometime in the autumn, (depending on the vagaries of the Jewish calendar) is chock full of holidays. It begins with Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, on Tuesday, Sept. 30* and ends with Simchat Torah, the day we complete – then begin again – the reading of the Torah, or the Five Books of Moses, on Wednesday, Oct. 22.
In between we find Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, and for many, the holiest day of the year (Thursday, Oct. 9); Sukkot, a festive harvest holiday that lasts seven days (Tuesday, Oct. 14), and Shemini Atzeret, (Tuesday, Oct. 21) which is dedicated to a successful growing season and is celebrated more widely in Israel.
As with all holidays, the Tishrei festivals have many symbols and traditions associated with them. Following are some of them… from A to Z. If you’d like to know more, there is a wealth of information available on the internet. (For starters, www.urj.org/holidays and www.jewfaq.org present Reform and Orthodox perspectives, respectively.)
Apples & honey – It’s traditional to welcome the new year with apples dipped in honey. The taste treat symbolizes our hope for a sweet year to come. The blessing that accompanies the ritual is: Blessed are you, Lord, our God, ruler of the universe, who creates the fruit of the tree. (Baruch atah Adonai, Elhanu Melekh Ha-olam, borei pri ha-eitz... [continued] |
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