Every year when my daughters where in elementary school, on the intermediate ( Chol Hamoed)days between Sukkot and Shemini Atzeret the school would take the children Sukkah hopping through Miami so they would go and experience the joy of being in a sukkah. One of the Sukkahs they would visit was the one we had built in our back yard. They would pray and sing ( even the birds would sing with them), have a pizza party and their teacher, Mr. M, would tell a story. One story he told so many years ago has stayed with me ever since.
“In a town in Russia there used to be two carpenters and every year they would build a huge communal Sukkah for the whole town. One year the town prospered and everyone wanted to build their own Sukkah. The two carpenters where very busy building hundreds of Sukkahs for every Jewish family in town. Eruv Sukkot they had finished building all the Sukkahs but they didn’t have time to build their own so they decided to build one Sukkah together where they could share for the holiday with their families. The first night of Sukkot there was a huge storm in town and all the Sukkahs collapsed to the ground, the only Sukkah that didn’t get destroyed was the one the two carpenters built together to share, all the towns people ended up sharing the Sukkah with the carpenters.
The moral of the story is that Sukkot is a holiday of unity, H”S doesn’t want us sitting alone in our Sukkahs. We are meant to share our Sukkah with others and feel the bond between us. So if you are one of those blessed ones that is building a Sukkah this year don’t forget to share it and invite those who don’t have one, for H”S there is no greater joy than to see his children together in harmony and love.
Shabbat Shalom ❤️
