Succos - 0001 Sukkos & Shemini Atzeres | 2 Levels of Closeness With Hashem

The Inner Meaning Behind The Four Species and the Sukkah

In the festival of Sukkos, the main mitzvos are to shake the four species and to sit in the sukkah. (Aside for the times of the Beis HaMikdash, when we had the mitzvah of nisuch hamayim[1] in the Beis Hamikdash on Sukkos).

The mitzvah of the four species involves the concept of movement: we shake them and move them around. On a deep level, this act symbolizes how we want to “move” away from evil - and instead “move” ourselves closer to Hashem. By contrast, the mitzvah of sitting in the sukkah involves no movement at all; we sit in it, and don’t move at all. This symbolizes a different aspect of our Avodas Hashem: the point of “non-movement.”

In other words, there are two steps that we ascend on in our Avodas Hashem. The first step is to move towards the palace of the King, and then we sit in His company – in His tzeil (shade), which alludes to the tzeila d’meheimenusa (“in the shade of emunah\faith”), the term that describes the sukkah.[2]

Sukkos of Today and Sukkos of the Future

In the future, where we will sit in the “sukkah made of the leviathan skin”, the “skin” (עור, spelled with the letter ע) of the sukkah will instead become “light” ((אור. The sukkah of nowadays, which acts a skin-covering over us, serves as a tzeil (shade) to shade us from the sun’s rays, but on a deeper level, it also conceals us from the spiritual light of Hashem’s radiance which will be fully revealed in the future. In the sukkah of the future, where the original spiritual light will be once again revealed, the concealment will be removed; we will graduate from עור to the higher level, אור.

The sukkah of the future will be an entirely spiritual light. It will be the perfect sukkah, in which “all passerby” (“kol ha’ezrach”) will be enveloped within it; a hint to this is that the word “ezrach”, “passerby”, is rooted in the word “zerichah”, “light.” This alludes to the sukkah of the future, which will be totally a spiritual light. The depth behind is because the sukkah is not just about dwelling “in the shade” of the sukkah, but to dwell in Hashem’s light.

Dovid Hamelech says, “Hashem is my light, and my salvation.” Chazal expound on this verse that the words “my light” are referring to Rosh Hashanah, while the words “my salvation” are referring to Yom Kippur. And Sukkos, which is the continuation of this, is the actual revelation of “my light”, which was Rosh Hashanah; it is entirely Hashem’s light.

It is only nowadays that the sukkah is like a “shade” (or shadow), because since there is currently evil in the world, the evil places a “shadow” on the “light” of Rosh Hashanah and dims it from its full effect. But in the future, when all evil will be removed from the word, the festival of Sukkos will no longer be a concept of “shade”; it will rather be a concept of complete spiritual light.

Shemini Atzeres – A Day of Complete D’veykus With Hashem, Above All Spiritual Light

Higher than the level of Sukkos is the level of Shemini Atzeres, which is the day of unity (yichud) between Hashem and the Jewish people. Its spiritual light is above the spiritual light that is revealed through Rosh Hashanah and Sukkos.[3]  Chazal say of this day that Hashem says, “Remain with me one more day”.

This is the great desire (cheishek) that Hashem has for the Jewish people, and it is above all spiritual light. It was around before Hashem created light on the first day, thus is it is above light. This great desire of Hashem for us returns on Shemini Ateres.