Blessed art Thou….. Who has kept us alive, sustained us and brought us to this Time.
Time flows, moving constantly forward but in many forms, colors and tempos. Once upon a time is a child’s time. A wondrous time in some imaginary past when all was possible. Adult time is in the Here and Now, regulated clock time – predictable, restricted and routine. There is seasonal time based on the sun, and Jewish time based on the moon. There are good times, which always seem to end quickly and difficult times, which often seem to drag on forever. There are past, present and future times. With so much time available, isn’t it amazing that people say, “I have no time!” Is there such a thing as “no time”? Time is always there – even if all we’re doing is wasting it. It’s free and equally available to one and all – all day, every day, all the time. What we do with it is our business. But since it passes so quickly and there’s no way to save or preserve it (even though people often try to “save time”) we might as well exploit it to the full and remember: Mitzva gedola lihiyot b’simcha tamid… it is a great mitzvah to live with simcha – tamid … at all times.
“There is a time for all things,” said Shlomo HaMelech in Kohelet, and if he said it, it must be true. We read Kohelet on Sukkot, a chag replete with time-related themes. Chazal called it Zeman Simchateinu – the Time of Our Joy – but that’s only one of its motifs. Here are a few more time-linked musings in honor of the Time of Our Joy.
A Time For Gathering In Sukkot is an eternal time of joy, and if we are worthy, of plenty. It’s Chag Ha’Asif, the time the harvest is gathered in the fields of Eretz Yisrael. It’s a time we remember that city life is not the source of life; that Eretz Yisrael has been blessed with seven life-sustaining crops, fruit and produce grown in holy soil and suffused with kedusha, the combined product of man’s efforts and G-d’s blessing. And the Arba’ah Minim, the four species, are yet another reminder of the gathering in of the harvest, as well as the unity of Am Yisrael.
A Time To Dwell There are two commandments la’shevet –to sit, i.e., to dwell – in the Torah. One is to dwell in Eretz Yisrael. The second is to dwell in the sukkah. When you dwell in Eretz Yisrael you are obviously involved in all the business of living. But when you dwell in the sukkah, all you need do is to be there! By simply entering the flimsy walls covered with s’chach, even if you aren’t doing anything else, you are fulfilling the mitzvah. This must be the easiest mitzvah in the entire Torah! And if we leave our cell phones and other technological wonders in the house, we might even hear the birds singing G-d’s praises alongside our own. Sounds great, doesn’t it?
A Time For Rain Sukkot is all about water and life-giving rain. It’s time for Tefillat HaGeshem and the Simchat Bet HaShoeva in the Beit HaMikdash. Westerly winds blow, the clear blue Israeli sky fills with white cumulous clouds and the smell of rain is in the air. Tefillat HaGeshem – the Prayer for Rain – won’t be said until the end of the holiday, but a few stray drops often make an appearance earlier on. Of course, a few stray drops may be greeted with joy, but we all hope that the first real rains will wait patiently until after all our sukkot are taken down and packed away! A soggy, rain-drenched sukkah is a sorry sukkah indeed.