I think of the sukkah as a physical representation of the divine presence that is always surrounding us, a way of making that invisible energy tangible so that we can more fully experience it.
I invite you to imagine entering a sukkah. Notice first its strange mix of stability and instability, how it feels both solid and not solid at the same time. It does have walls, but maybe not all four, and they might not be the most sturdy, moving about in the wind. And even if the walls feel solid, the roof certainly does not. Notice the roof. It is the opposite of what a roof should be – it is full of holes, purposely leaky to let the stars in.
A Dream
To let the stars in. What I invite you to sense into as you enter the sukkah is how this strange mix of concrete and not concrete makes it all feel a little like a fairy tale house, a fantasy, a dream, like it does not quite partake of this world, but of some other alternative plane you can sense but not really name. The sukkah lets the stars in, lets the heavens in, lets you sit in this concrete world, eating and drinking and sleeping – going about your daily business of living – and still be in touch with another more amorphous one. It blurs the lines for you for a moment, like you are half in this world and half in the next one, dwelling here in this physical frame but with an awareness of the vast beyond.
It’s like that threshold moment between sleep and awake when you can still touch the threads of your dreams, of your unconscious, of something that you have always known, half remembering something ancient, a kind of trance or prophetic state, in both worlds at once. You are fully here in your body and at the same time you are in touch with the stars, with this other divine reality, seeing and knowing the truth of that other reality as clearly as you can see and feel the physical walls of the sukkah.
A Cloud
According to one view in the Talmud, the sukkot the Israelites dwelled in in the desert were actually ananei hakavod, the clouds of divine glory that accompanied them on their journey (Sukkah 11b). Clouds. The sukkah as we build it, with its mix of the concrete and the ephemeral, is rather like a cloud. A cloud has substance of a sort, but is also amorphous, ethereal, porous. That is the experience of the sukkah, like living inside of a cloud, a cloud of divinity. In our society it is usually not a positive thing to say that someone has their head in the clouds, but maybe that is what we are being invited into here, to have our head in the clouds, to let ourselves be a little less tied to our brick houses and concrete concerns and live a little more inside a cloud, aware of the stars, feeling God’s presence with us, around us. Can you touch that for a moment, the sense of a divine cloud around you, wrapping you up in its softness?
There is a shift that can happen for us in this cloud. It is a bit hazy there so we can’t quite see like we usually do, which can be pretty scary at first, but over time, what the fog does is to blur all of the looping worries that preoccupy our minds – their content becoming less sharp and clear, like an unfocused photograph or a fuzzy radio sound – and we begin to see other things more clearly: the divine reality just beneath the surface, the love that undergirds it all, what it is that matters most to us and how we should spend our time. In the cloud of the sukkah, this space between worlds, with the stars visible, in the fog of it, we actually learn to see.
Surrounded by Clouds
This cloud we inhabit in the sukkah, there is also a deep sense of comfort in how it surrounds us and holds us. It’s actually not just one cloud. There is a tradition that there were seven clouds of glory in the desert accompanying the Israelites, one on each side of them – to the north, south, east and west – one above them, one beneath them and one up ahead guiding them (Mekhilta deRabbi Ishmael Beshallah 1:21). Surrounded by clouds, like the angels that are all around us at bedtime, to the right, left, ahead, behind, and the divine presence hovering over us (see the bedtime prayer). The sukkah physically represents this experience of God as we sit in its midst, surrounded on all sides. We wave the lulav, too, in all directions, as if demarcating this aura that embraces us – north, south, east, west, up, down. God’s aura is all around us.
Maybe you can turn now to notice these clouds around you, these angels, this divine aura, this presence, this warm glowing light – normally invisible, but now made visible through the sukkah – turning now to notice it and greet it. Ah, it’s right here.
Mobile
Like the sukkot and the clouds in the desert, this aura is mobile, travelling with us wherever we go. Maybe imagining yourself walking along a street and seeing a divine cloud floating along with you as you walk. As you continue to walk, you pass through a gate of distress or illness or great challenge. See how the cloud stays with you, accompanying you through those gates. Gam ki elekh be’gei tzalmavet, lo ira ra ki atah imadi. Lo though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil for you are with me (Psalm 23:4). For You are with me.
Accompaniment, Not Protection
Now, to be sure, this divine presence does not guarantee we will not have to walk through the valley of the shadow of death, to pass through those gates of suffering. We do suffer, as do those we care about. I believe this is part of the lesson of the sukkah. The truth is that the sukkah is a flimsy means of protection. We are exposed in it to all of the elements. And this exposure is important because it points out what we all fundamentally know but try not to see: how very vulnerable it is to be human. Yes, we could go inside and build up a shelter of concrete, but even then, we know we would never be fully protected. So much can happen to us.
And so the question becomes – especially after Yom Kippur, when we are confronted with our lack of control even over whether we live or die – and so the question becomes: how are we to live such a tragic, uncertain, impossibly vulnerable existence? What can keep us afloat and grounded? The sukkah’s answer is not – don’t worry, you won’t ever get hurt. That wouldn’t be honest, like a parent denying a painful truth. The sukkah’s answer is – I’ll be with you when you do get hurt.
It’s not that God protects us from harm, though that may also be true at times. But no, I think we have a much deeper need than protection, a more essential need – to be accompanied. Trauma, it turns out, is not what happens to us that is difficult, but the experience of going through it alone. It is the aloneness that hurts us more than anything else. The sukkah symbolizes that God stays with us through all weather. It’s not so much protection as accompaniment.
Perhaps you or someone you love are currently going through a difficult time. And maybe you look to God to fix things. That is not wrong. We can pray for that. It’s just not guaranteed that all will turn out ok. It might not be ok. But the one thing we are guaranteed, that is always always accessible to us, is this sukkah feeling, the sense of an aura around us, a cloud of divine presence accompanying us, holding our hand through it all, attentive and attuned and caring. No one can ever take that away from you. It’s a tiny portable sukkah you keep in your pocket, this knowledge that God is with you.
Glory
In their accompaniment, these sukkah clouds don’t just comfort us with God’s company; they also teach us who we are as creatures worthy of that company. Note that they are called ananei hakavod, clouds of glory. Glory. They are like a halo around us marking as glorious. It is not just God’s glory that they mark, but our own.
So maybe imagining yourself walking along that street again, aware of that halo of glory around you. God walks with you and that makes you walk tall, your head held high, remembering your dignity, your worth, your honor, your glory. You are a creature of God. Inhabiting that glory, believing in it, living into it, walking with pride and confidence. And maybe with clarity, too, clarity about where to go next, letting the God in you guide you (as in the desert), moving forward with self assurance, knowing who you are and what you are about, your powerful aura clearing obstacles before you. Other forces may swarm around you like bees to distract you and overwhelm you – sabuni kedvorim as we say in Hallel, “they have surrounded me like bees” – but you stay grounded and centered in your awareness of God, and from the power of that emanating aura, the bees dissipate, Because inside yourself, what you know is that you are you are actually wrapped in clouds of glory, surrounded not by bees but by divine presence – a kind of protective force field – and so nothing else can touch you. You walk on into the new year in strength.
Other People Are Glorious, Too!
And maybe as you walk, you turn to your left and to your right and notice your companions on the road, how they, too, have an aura, how they too, are trailing clouds of glory, each one with a halo, each one a beloved manifestation of divine light. Their halos, their auras, they are not normally visible, but you see them now, like the sukkah, something invisible becoming visible for a moment, seeing God’s presence everywhere we look. We are surrounded by it.
Sukkah In Your Pocket
Maybe you can take this tiny portable sukkah with you in your pocket as a parting gift, so that whenever you need it, you can pull it out, blow it up and enter the sukkah again, feeling and remembering that God is with you. Hashem imakhem, my glorious friends. God is with you. Always.
Photo by shu lei at Pexels
