Sukkot is one of the three harvest festivals of Judaism. Though the sight of a sukkah, someone shaking the green lulav or the yellow etrog may be familiar, its origin in Jewish history is less widely known.
In Israel, like Melbourne, the local weather is defined by the winds blowing in from either a hot desert or a cold body of water. While our weather is famously erratic, Israel’s is remarkably stable, usually only having three periods of rain. Sukkot occurs when the second rains of the year wash away the strong Khamsin winds. Fertile desert dust and nourishing ocean water in a dance for dominance.
These seasonal rains once coincided with another important event. While today we work year round fairly intensively, farmers in past centuries and millennia did not. Instead, there were specific and short periods of intensive labour in service of food production, and otherwise, little work was needed. The land ensured that free time was had.
In the Torah, Sukkot is called Chag Haasif. Though this is sometimes translated as "harvest festival", it actually refers to the processing of harvested grain. For once the harvest was collected, and stored, the community would gather in a sukkah. There, in the cooling breeze of autumn, they enjoyed respite from their labour, and took in the land which they collectively tended to.
If anyone has worked on a kibbutz, they may have enjoyed a meal in a rough shack during their work day. Often made of corrugated iron or other scrap material, this is just a modern form of the sukkah.
The rituals that developed around Sukkot signified the Jewish people's belonging to their land. Each species within the lulav is native to the Land of Israel. But these rituals had other meanings too. When a king was crowned he would be welcomed by the blasting of a shofar and the waving of a lulav. Because of this, before the Magen David, the date frond was was the primary symbol of our people and the land which they inhabited. After the destruction of the second temple, this royal lulav greeting evolved. Today we wave the lulav in six directions in declaration of God's universal sovereignty. Thus, in the absence of a kingdom, God as portable monarch would keep the Jewish people.
The utilitarian sukkah and the symbolic lulav are both quintessential elements in our Sukkot experiences each year. Each serve to bring a distant memory of our connection to that land and its harvests with us throughout the diaspora. For this reason Sukkot, more than any other festival, reminds us that Judaism was once a culture deeply tied to land, and that Jewish community was fostered through it.
In the last century many saw the kibbutz movement as an expression of this ancient relationship. An attempt to create a community on the Land of Israel, free from market and antisemitic exploitation. Today we might express this differently, especially while in the diaspora. Whether through climate initiatives or ecological care for our own communities, there is no shortage of attention needed for the lands which Jews now inhabit.
As the Jewish world, and indeed the whole world, continues to grapple with our place in this planet's delicate ecosystem, we should feel empowered as inheritors of such a legacy. Whether we recite a prayer or simply enjoy communal meals sheltered by date fronds, Sukkot is a reminder for us all to meet as a community, and consider our relationship to the land which we inhabit, and the landscapes which sustain us.
Meretz Australia's Sukkot Picnic 5783/2022, photo by Maddy Blay
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