The Torah says all the citizens of Israel should sit in sukkot (Vayikra 23:42), and from this the Gemara concludes (Sukkah 27b) that it is fitting for all of Israel to sit under one sukkah. Rav Kook teaches in the collection of his essays called Ma’amarei HaRaAY”aH that this means that everyone should be able to respect one another’s unique point of view.
He explains that disputes occur when people allow themselves to be led by their “imaginative faculty.” In doing so, he is referring to a concept from the Rambam that one draws conclusions without basing them on evidence or careful analysis. Rav Kook says that when everybody is figuring things out for himself, and not using careful logic, people come to different conclusions and then fight over their respective errors. But through living in this world, people becoming weighted down by the constant barrage of inputs and conflicting information they must make sense of, and they shut down inside their own consciousness until they are no longer able to sense with clarity what is true and what is not. As people conduct themselves in a manner that is not equal to the ethical standards set forth in the Torah, they become more affected by physicality and materialism and they become more susceptible to this phenomenon.
However, in the aftermath of Yom Kippur and the long process of teshuva that preceded it, the citizen of Israel is cleansed of his transgressions and by extension his errors and the false consciousness that gave rise to it. In this light, he is able to stop focusing on his internal dialogue and the many errors that arise from it, and to become sensible to the true nature of the universe. In this way, he begins to grasp the higher truth that can only be understood with a pure mind.
One who fully comprehends higher truth understands that there are many valid approaches to achieving such awareness, and he loves and respects his fellow who shares this vision but who might have a different individual perspective. Those who labor in error and doubt distrust and despise one another. But those who are open to clarity of mind embrace those who think differently than they do. So it is only base and confused people who feud among themselves and form factions and parties to oppose one another. But on Sukkot, after the conclusion of the Ten Days of Repentance, all of Israel is capable of reaching this higher awareness where we can all sit together under the same sukkah. Chazal say this is what we should be doing – this is the appropriate state for Israel on Sukkot.
Of course we also know that the sukkah is sometimes an allegory for the Beit HaMikdash. It is only through embracing and integrating all of the many different attitudes and experiences of every different kind of Jew that we can collectively achieve the highest level of consciousness which necessarily will also lead to true unity. With the power of that sanctified unity, we will merit to sit together between the walls of the rebuilt Beit HaMikdash.
