In addition to the regular ushpizin (mystical guests) that we proudly welcome each night into our sukkah, our family has a beautiful custom. We go around the table and I ask each person at the table to answer the following question.
If you could invite anyone as your personal ushpizin, someone who is not alive anymore, from the recent past or from long ago, who would it be and why?
Some mention members of their family, grandparents or great-grandparents. Others share personalities from Tanach and yet others mention heroes of modern Israel.
The answers are fascinating and offer a great insight into what people are reading, thinking about, feeling or who they are missing.
This year, I want to ask it a little bit differently. Who would you invite to be your ushpizin that thinks differently from you, that believes differently, observes differently, dresses differently? Do you have friendships, not acquaintances, but real friendships with people different from you?
“Seven days you shall bring offerings by fire to G-d. On the eighth day you shall observe a sacred occasion and bring an offering by fire to G-d.”
Many make a mistake of seeing Shemini Atzeres as the “last days” of Sukkos, but the truth is they are an independent holiday, Atzeres, not Sukkos. Indeed, our rabbis label them an independent holiday.
The rest of Sukkos, sacrifices are brought in the merit of the nations of the world, but on Shemini Atzeres, the sacrifices are exclusively on behalf of the Jewish people, G-d’s children.
Rashi quotes the midrash that compares it to a king who hosts all of his children for a party for several days and when the last day comes, he pleads, please stay with me one more day. Classically this is understood to mean, it is difficult for me to separate from you.
However, Rabbi Avraham Mordechai Alter has a phenomenal interpretation: What bothers G-d is not our parting from Him; He will come with us. What bothers Him is the idea that for the last month-and-a-half we have been united, spent quality time together, worked together, celebrated together, focused on our sense of community with a shared destiny, together.
Now, the holidays will be behind us and we will go back to the usual divides, focusing on our differences instead of our commonalities, resuming the usual blame, finger pointing, name calling and hyper criticism.
We will go back to own interests, instead of focusing on community, go back to judging others based on what is on or not on their heads instead of what is in their hearts, go back to worrying about whether the community is going too far to the right or swinging to the left.
G-d dreads that business as usual.
The High Holidays and Sukkos were so refreshing, so different, so unified, so happy. Says G-d: Your divisiveness is so difficult for me. Please spend one more day unified and together, transcending these differences and that stupidity.
How will we spend this one last day? We will grab hands and dance in a circle, a circle that has no beginning and no end, no hierarchy or tier system, no head of the table or dais, or lead position, just everyone dancing equally in a circle, united, together.
There is not one circle for shtreimels, one for black hats and one for knitted kippot. There isn’t a circle for the old and one for the young, or a circle for the Republicans and a circle for the Democrats.
One circle, one people, one community, one history and one destiny. That is the enduring image of this holiday, that is the message we take with us into the dead of winter and beyond.
Don’t stop dancing even when Simchas Torah ends. Don’t stop holding the hands of the person on your left and your right literally, and metaphorically.
Don’t let go of the hands of your family, friends and members of the community. Don’t let go of the hands of those who are here, and don’t let go of those who are gone.
Like the ushpizin, we have felt the presence of our ancestors, our parents and grandparents over these holidays. Our homes have been filled with the aroma and taste of their recipes, we have heard the tunes they sang and we have been observing their customs. They have lived with us these last few weeks and we must not let them go.
Seeing separation and division is hard for G-d and it should be hard for you.