Sukkot is “ the time of our rejoicing” because we do not celebrate alone. G-d also joins the celebration and rejoices with us.
Joy unites, it is contagious and it must be shared.
There is a story told of a town in Poland were they used to build one big comunal Sukkah for the whole town. One year everyone had a prosperous year and everyone decided to build their own Sukkah. So everyone hired the two carpenters of the town to build their sukkahs. The day before Sukkot the carpenters realized they didn’t have time to build their Sukkah, so they decided to build one Sukkah for both families.
The first night of Sukkot, there was a terrible storm and it destroyed all the sukkahs except the sukkah the two carpenters had built together. At the end the whole town had to share the carpenters sukkah.
Sukkot is about unity. Even if we build our own personal sukkah in our backyard we are meant to share it with others.
We bind together the “four kinds” which symbolize different personalities: the etrog represents the Jew that learns and does Mitzvahs, the lulav (the palm) represents the Jew that does Mitzvahs and doesn’t learn, the hadassim represents the Jew that learns but doesn’t do Mitzvahs, and the aravim represents the Jew that doesn’t learn and doesn’t do Mitzvahs. Nevertheless they are all put together and shaken. Because when we are shaken it really doesn’t matter who is more learned or who is better, what matters is that the world sees the Jew as a Jew. Acknowledging that our diversity is our strength. Our uniqueness is what makes us special because each one has something to contribute to the greater good.
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