by Dwight A. Pryor
The season of the Fall holy days is something that I have been studying for many years, and I never ceased to be amazed at the richness of the meaning and beauty of this season. What has been impressed on me this year—in studying this and giving attention to this season—is that it is a kind of spiritual symphony that God has composed. The high holy days leading into Sukkot is a magnificent symphony that has various theological refrains that run throughout this period of days. But it culminates in a grand crescendo of celebration called Sukkot –the season of joy, the season of rejoicing.
I want to set the stage by reviewing as it were the score of this God ordained symphony, so that you can more fully appreciate its finale in Sukkot (Tabernacles). All of the festivals in this Fall season take place in the Hebrew month of Tishrei, beginning with Rosh Hashanah on Tishrei 1. But the whole 29 day period prior to that (the month of Elul) is the time of preparing the heart, of preparing the ears to hear what God has to say during the month of Tishrei.
The sequence of events is as follows: The month of Tishrei starts with the celebration of Rosh Hashanah on the 1st and 2nd day of the month. That is the Jewish New Year that inaugurates 10 days of awe (yamim noraim), also called ten days of repentance, which culminates on Tishrei 10, Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement). On Tishrei 15 begins the festival of Succoth. It is a 7 days festival which runs through to the 21st of Tishrei. The 7th day of this festival is a very special one. It is called the Great Hossanah (Hoshannah Rabbah – Tishrei 21). On the 8th day (Tishrei 22) comes the concluding day of assembly (Shmini Atzeret), which in Israel also is the day of Simchat-Torah, which is the day of rejoicing and celebrating in the Word of God. Tishrei 1 to 22 is a magnificent symphony that has various movements, various refrains, emotions and paces. But it builds up to a crescendo of rejoicing and celebration in the Creator God, the Lord of Israel.
Rosh Hashanah is the celebration of the birthday of the world, it is the anniversary of the world’s creation by God—in Lev 23 it is spoken of as the Feast of Trumpets. Trumpets is the word for shofar (in this text), the ram’s horn – it is one of the chief symbols1 of Rosh Hashanah. Unlike our gentile way of celebrating New Year, the Jewish New Year is a time of soberness, of reflection, of introspection. It is the recognition that you are entering a period in which the book of life is being opened and the opportunity is there for your name to be entered as you stand before the righteous Judge, the King of the universe. It is a time of remembrance2 that God is Creator, but more seriously, it is the day of judgement.3The image that runs throughout these high holy days is one of a trial — of the Judge sitting on a bench and you come and present yourself to him. That is why they are called 10 days of Awe, or repentance. It is a season or a time for turning around from selfishness (self-centredness), turning from sin, mistakes, wilfulness and error; and getting back on track with God. It is a time for seeking out forgiveness from others you may have offended, it is a time for extending forgiveness to those who have repented and asked for it. Properly handled, it culminates in the holiest day of the biblical calendar, normally called Yom Kippur (or accurately called Yom Hakippurim)4, the Day of Atonement. It is the day on which Israel collectively will confess–and does confess–her sins before the Almighty God. This beautiful series of confessions5 include 44 statements of confessions; two confessions for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet.
It is a time of actively seeking to correct wrongs that may have been done. The sages teach, as did Jesus, that it is inappropriate and ineffective to offer a sacrifice unto God for forgiveness of your sins if you haven’t first sought to reconcile the one you have offended. Lay down your gift before you go to the altar, and go unto your brother/sister and make it right, otherwise the sacrifice is of no avail. Sacrifices were effective only when accompanied by repentance, and repentance must bear fruit, as John the Baptist taught. The fruits of repentance is making restitution when you have wronged somebody—just as Zachaeus had wronged his fellow Israelites, and in his act of repentance he corrected that wrong; he repaid them 4 times, and showed great generosity. That is what this season is all about. The repentance that begins with Rosh Hashanah culminates in a real kind of dying on Yom Kippur. In that dying comes renewal and rebirth when God forgives. The gates of forgiveness are always open. God is eager to forgive and honours your repentance—and in that forgiveness (that covering, that atonement) you are brought back into oneness with him, i.e. into fellowship. And in that there is a renewal, a rebirth of your life.
So you have this wonderful scenario of repentance, renewal and rebirth, and then four days later comes the season for rejoicing. True rejoicing comes only after there has been true repentance and renewal. Such rejoicing you have never seen (the rabbis said) until you have seen Jerusalem on the Feast of Tabernacles. Only when you are assured and confident that the God who is just is also the God who loves; the God who holds you accountable is also the God who eagerly forgives and atones – only then can you be filled with a joy that passes understanding, only then can you act foolishly. Some of you were taken aback by the rejoicing, the exuberance of praise this evening, but it reminds me of how Jerusalem was in Jesus’ day. Sages were noted to do outrageous things on the Feast of Tabernacles. One of the most famous Rabbis was noted for doing gymnastic feats in the temple, standing on his head rejoicing before the Lord, because he knew the joy of the Lord.
Yom Kippur ends with a service called Ne’elah (The Closing), just as the Temple gates were closed at sundown so the day of Atonement is closed. It ends in a very powerful way with 3 profound and eternally true declarations by the congregation. The first declaration is the Sh'ma, declaring that the Lord Yahweh – he and he alone is God. Three times the congregation repeats the statement that follows after the Sh'ma in synagogue liturgy: ‘blessed be the Name, his glorious kingdom is forever and forever’. And then the culminating statement: ‘If Baal be God, worship him – but if Yahweh be God, worship him’. This is a statement made by Elijah on Mount Carmel when God showed himself powerfully and traumatically; and Elijah proclaims, ‘the Lord Adonai, he is God’. Not Baal, not other deities – but the Lord, he is God. The congregation repeats this statement 7 times; then the culminating moment of the Yom Kippur liturgy is the sounding of the ram’s horn. No sooner has Yom Kippur ended then your mind turns to rejoicing, you go home and prepare the succah – you prepare for festivities. Now we have been atoned for — we have repented, the community has been healed because forgiveness has been sought and given one to another; now we can rejoice. And next year, even in Jerusalem we shall rejoice. Lord come, and come soon.
Ex 23 and Lev 23 talks about Sukkot, the season of our rejoicing. Remember, you have repentance (Rosh Hashanah), renewal (Yom Kippur), rejoicing (Sukkot). So great is the rejoicing that it takes 7 days to contain it, it is so great that 7 days are not enough –- we have got to carry it one more day, because the Lord loves the rejoicing of his people. It is so significant that in the Bible (including the NT) it is simply called The Feast—it is the Feast above all the feasts. In John 7 & 8 we read about Jesus being in Jerusalem at the feast of Succoth. He took two of the most obvious symbols of that great celebration and applied them to himself. We read that Jesus did not go up to Jerusalem until the middle of the Feast.
On that 7th day of the Feast (Hoshanah Rabbah) a dramatic and beautiful ceremony occurs – the celebration of the Water-drawing. The Feast of Tabernacles occurs in the Fall, just before the rainy season begins in Israel. It is a time of great harvest–the final harvest–for the agricultural community. On the 7th day of the Feast a beautiful procession goes down to the Pool of Siloam; with a golden pitcher the high priest takes water and returns to Jerusalem, to the temple. There the high priest he goes before the altar and the people, and petitions God for a great outpouring of rain - which everyone understood had also messianic overtones - it is an outpouring of the Spirit that is being petitioned for; it is petitioning God’s Messiah to come. As the high priest stands before the altar with a pitcher of water and a pitcher of wine, he simultaneously pours them on the altar and petitions God. It is at that very dramatic moment that a rabbi from Nazareth, from the Galilee, who has come up to Jerusalem for the Feast, stands and says in a loud voice: ‘If anyone thirsts let him come to me and I will give him living waters that he would thirst no longer.’ John tells those of us who are gentiles that what he is referring to is the Spirit, which is about to be poured out. Jesus boldly declares that he is the Messiah that all men have longed for.
The other key symbol of the temple liturgy is the burning of torches. Four great menorahs were constructed – 70-100 ft. tall. The whole city of Jerusalem would be illuminated, but on the 8th day of the Feast all the menorot had been extinguished. Jesus says (Jn 8:12) on the temple mount to those who will hear: ‘now that the lamps have been extinguished, I am the light of the world. You need not walk in darkness, for the light has broken upon the darkness.’ So he applies both of these traumatic images to himself, and it is a memorable festival for that reason alone. But there is other beautiful imagery and symbolism to this Feast of Sukkot, in addition to the water and the light of the temple.
There are two other primary symbols associated with this festival. In Lev 23:39 the Israelites are commanded with regards to this festival to carry the 4 items that correspond to God’s commandment – the palm branch, citron, 3 bowls of myrtle, and 2 willow branches. As the people circulated around the altar these 4 species were waved before the Lord as a thanksgiving offer – 3 times in all four directions (east, south, west, north), and then up and down. It symbolises that God is the God of everywhere—he is omnipresent; he covers the whole earth, and we worship him as the one true God. Not a local deity that we make some kind of appeasement to with our crops, but an Universal Deity that we thank for giving us our harvest. There is this agricultural dimension to this festival, because it was the final great harvest of the season in Israel. These four species symbolise both the beauty and the bounty of the harvest.
The 2nd primary image of the Feast of Tabernacles is the sukkah (Sukkot – plural). It simply means booth6; it is a temporary dwelling place with several key features. Every observant Jewish family constructs a succah in their own home, on the balcony or outside in the yard because it is supposed to be constructed outdoors.7 During the harvest season one would leave one’s home and community, go out to the fields and there dwell in the sukkah8 for a season while you harvested your crops. The sukkah is to be something that is of temporary nature (flimsy, fragile); the covering on the roof is very important, it must be partially open to the night sky. It must be covered with living things, natural items like branches and leaves; nothing mechanically created or artificial. The primary significance of this symbol is that it re-enacts in the mind of Israel their sojourning in the desert in which they lived in these temporary succot for 40 years.
There is a fascinating correlation between Passover and Tabernacles Passover occurs on the 15th of Nissan and Tabernacles on the 15th of Tishrei, precisely 6 months later. So twice a year you enter into this remembrance of God’s events of redemption, revelation, protection and guidance. But more than that, I believe there is further symbolism. Passover symbolises the very event of liberation, but Tabernacles tells us about the way of liberation. Passover is a holiday of faith while Tabernacles is a holiday of faithfulness, and both are needed – and the festival reminds us of this. I want to share 3 principles that we can derive from an examination of this festival of Sukkot—I suggest to you that these are 3 principles of what it might mean to live/sojourn in a sukkah-consciousness. This is the way we need to travel to our liberation in the Lord. These are principles that need to challenge, correct and encourage us in our journey with God.
When you are going to live and operate in A Sukkot Consciousness, you must:
1. Confront the insecurity of your freedom. I suspect it is far easier for God to take a person out of slavery than to take slavery out of a person; it is far easier for God to deliver the Israelites out of Egypt than it was for him to keep them in the desert faithful unto him. You can take a person out of slavery by a decisive act of liberation and redemption, but to take slavery out of a person requires a process — it takes time, commitment, faithfulness. That is what Tabernacles is all about, it is the way toward liberation toward our destination in God.
It reminds us that salvation is a process, it is not a one-time dramatic event. There is no quick cure for the slave mentality that we all have, for the old man (the unregenerate self) in each of us. But Sukkot tells us that the way to freedom is the way of freedom. It is a process of maturing, it takes time and encounters difficulties. I suspect that you can remember when you were born again, when you were immersed in the Spirit. What a blessed event! God dramatically reached into your life and saved you from yourself and from sin—there is very little to do from your part except yield. But after that event you may have found that things became awfully difficult, awfully fast. Just like the Israelites we run into Amelekites in our spiritual journey, we find ourselves in a desert. We are hungry and thirsty. We find that people are not dependable.
Israel’s journey of Sukkot took 40 years—that represents 14,000 days. Maturation is a process that requires faithfulness and time. There are many obstacles. The way to freedom is the way of faithfulness. All it took for redemption is faith, but what it takes to operate in a succot-consciousness, is faithfulness. I find that too many Christians are quite willing to experience Passover, they are quite willing to be baptised and go through the Red Sea, but very few are ready to go make the journey in a sukkah. We all want Passover, but how many of us have faithfulness for the journey to God’s appointed place, God’s destination in your life? You need a Sukkot-experience. You say, ‘it is too difficult’. Well, it is only when the Israelites dwelled in their sukkot that they dwelled in the very presence of God – a pillar of fire and a cloud protecting them, warming them at night, hovering over them in the day.
It is only in the sukkah that you arrive at God’s destination for your life—and that I find is the first principle. We must confront that insecurity we have about the freedom we are given. We are always looking back, we are always considering alternatives. We have been set free in Christ, but we do not want to continue in our freedom in Christ. Paul confronted this constantly with the early church - ‘it is for freedom that you have been set free, why do you keep enslaving yourselves to certain forms of security?’
2. We must journey with God in a way that we are willing to let go of what is seemingly substantial in our life, and grab hold of and depend upon what C.S. Lewis calls the ‘unseen real’. If you are going to grow up in God, if you are going to get to his place of destination for yourself, you have got to be willing to let go of those things which seem substantial and secure in your life, and grab hold of those intangible things of dependence upon God. A sukkah tells us that we must leave (at least for a season) those very comfortable, convenient and secure places that we have erected for ourselves – our homes with thick walls, fully insulated from any hardship, from any elements in the world. We have got to make ourselves vulnerable and open. We have got to actually trust in God to be our source of provision and protection and presence. We have got to be willing to live in a very fragile kind of existence, in an openness. Instinctively we desire just the opposite, instinctively we build walls of security around ourselves. We build psychological walls. Sukkot challenges that. Instinctively we want to accumulate treasures, create our pension plans, grab power, prestige and position. We want to attach ourselves to other people, to other leaders, or to created things.
But Sukkot tells us this is all emptiness under the sun, it is all vanity, it is meaningless in the natural, it is foolishness. In fact it borders on idolatry, because you are placing your security on something other than God— and we all do it. It is an illusion; your security is totally illusory. Sukkot tells you that you need to examine your security—true security comes only from God. Your life is so fragile - don’t ever take it for granted. Outside of God’s protective wings you are so vulnerable! Where is my security? Is it in my insurance? Thank God I have insurance. Is it in my income? Thank God I have an income. But my security has to be in God – and if I don’t know that I am operating in an illusion. Sukkot says: confront your illusions, recognise that true security is only in the overshadowing sheltering arms of a loving God. If you are like me, we give a lot of lip-service to trust, but Sukkot says: do you really trust God? Are you really willing to open yourself up to be vulnerable, fragile, dependant—or are you going to operate in your psychological structures, your mental, traditional, doctrinal structures?
Please don’t misunderstand me — Sukkot doesn’t demand that you renounce worldly wisdom, it doesn’t say you should not plan, you shouldn’t build a home. No, it doesn’t call for renunciation, but it does however call for the recognition of the limits of those things, and it calls for a serious reflection of what and whom you are worshipping. Where does your security truly reside? I believe many of us fail to receive the best from God because we refuse to take on a succah-consciousness, we refuse to become open and vulnerable. Some of us are much too comfortable in our traditional structures – religiously speaking. We find great security in our doctrines, we find great security in past experiences with God and in the strengths of our personalities. I am here to tell you that this is vanity, it is empty. You are blocking the very pillar of fire and glorious cloud of God coming upon you, because you are not willing to be able to depend more on him than on those experiences, religious traditions, worldly strengths.
Several of us here have a very dear friend who right now is receiving treatment in a hospital for serious depression that he faces. He is a brilliant young man who has enormous strengths of will and character, who studied the Scriptures and can expound upon them quite impressively. But he has been dying, literally, on the vine. Some of the finest Christian counsellors in America are working with him and they have found that he is extremely difficult to work with – he is such a strong character that he refuses to let go and yield. He feels like he can handle this problem if he can just be left alone and deal with it himself. He doesn’t want to be made vulnerable to other people, he doesn’t want to be exposed for what he is, he doesn’t want to dwell in a sukkah. He wants to dwell in the security of his depression, of his mental acuity, of his strength of will. And literally he is spiralling downward all the time thinking he is going to get a handle on it. I share this not in any way to embarrass him because we all love him, but I share because it strikes me as such a vivid image of where so many of us are when it comes to our spiritual walk with God. God is pleading with us, ‘please make yourself vulnerable; let me come in a cloud and overshadow you, let me be the fire of the Holy Spirit and warm you’. But we are just wrapped up in our personalities, in our past, and in our religious experiences and theological persuasions, to where we can’t open ourselves us, we can’t for a moment leave those rigid fixed structures and dwell in something flimsy and passing like a sukkah.
It grieves me to think how many of us have the Michal experience rather than the David experience. Michal saw David dancing before the ark and ridiculed him. When that happened she was in the thick walls of her residence looking out at those who were dancing before the ark; she criticised that, and as a result she lived a barren life to her death. So many of us are so barren in the Lord because we have not come into a succah-consciousness. We are holding onto our structures, we don’t want to leave, we are holding onto our chairs, we don’t want the music too loud, we don’t want this, we don’t want that - we’ll go home and be with the Lord. But the lord you tend to get with in that mentality is Ba’al, not Adonai.
3. A sukkah-consciousness gives us the power to discern between the vanity and the value of materialism. On Shabbat that occurs during Sukkot, the scroll of Ecclesiastes will be read to the congregation. How interesting that at the very time of material prosperity and celebration of God’s abundant provision, the text that is read is: ‘vanity, vanity, it is all vanity under the sun - it is empty’. Jesus says, ‘what is the profit if you gain the world and you loose your soul?’ And yet Koheleth teaches us another lesson – namely, that this world is a place to be enjoyed–it is a place to drink, to be merry, to have fellowship–but it is only God who can give you the gift to truly enjoy this material world. Not under the sun, in the natural way, but under the Son (the Son of God), the supernatural way, can you truly enjoy this world.
This strikes me as a powerful corrective to much what is faulty in historic Christianity, i.e. there is a tendency toward other-worldliness, towards an asceticism. Sukkot says this is a time for rejoicing, this is a time for tasting the wine as it has never tasted before. You fasted, you died on Yom Kippur, you denied yourself food, drink, sexual relations – now is the time to enjoy life as never before, recognising that it is so fragile, but because it is so fragile it is even more valuable to you. It is God’s gift that enables you to enjoy life. You I suspect would say, like most Christians, that fasting is a far more spiritual activity than feasting. Sukkot says it is not so.
The greatest festival is not Yom Kippur – as important as it is – it is not Passover or Shavuot. The Feast is the feast of rejoicing. Don’t forget there must come repentance, renewal and rebirth before there can be true rejoicing—but because there has been repentance, renewal and rebirth, there should be rejoicing on a level never known before. That is the message, the principle of Sukkot. It is a time in which we are willing to forgo comfort and convenience, and take our meals and dwell for 7 days in a flimsy structure, so that we can be reminded that apart from God we have no prosperity. And yet at the same time we are also being reminded that because of God we do prosper. It is a time to appreciate your material prosperity, to be thankful for your job, income, house and home, and for the good things God has given you. Use them as an opportunity to further your personal growth. Don’t fall victim (says Sukkot) to a subtle idolatry towards your material prosperity. It is good to have a materialistic dimension to our faith, properly understood—asceticism is not the way of biblical faith. The Bible is a religion of life, and this is a time to celebrate life and to give thanks.
One indication that you have a right relationship with your material prosperity, according to the sages is your generosity towards those in need. Do you have a good eye – says Jesus? Then you are on the right track with material possessions. Do you have an evil eye – are you miserly, stingy, covetous? Then you are serving Mammon. But if you are generous and giving, if you open up yourself, then you understand that material possessions are a gift from God and you have a duty to share. We cannot really love life if we do not live it well—and we will not really live it well until we love life as God intends us to.
In Zech 14:9-11 the great prophet of God declares something about this festival that transcends where we are now and looks to the future, to the coming of the great King. Sukkot has great eschatological implications – when the Lord himself will come and reign in a transformed world. When Jerusalem will be secure; true security is in the Lord. The Lord will be King over all the earth; on that day he will be one and his name will be one (it will be the only name) – vs.9. But notice vs.16,17 – all the nations. In that great messianic age when the Lord comes to rule and reign from Jerusalem we will go up to Jerusalem; and we, together with the Jewish people, will celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles.
There will no longer be a need for Passover (it is finished) or Shavu’ot (it is fulfilled), but there will be a continuing need for Sukkot. In fact rejoicing we will never see the likes of which until the Lord reigns in Jerusalem, and we go up to the Holy City and lift up our voices, bringing gifts in our hands, wave before the Lord the palm branches, the fragrant fruit. Such a rejoicing there will be on that great day of the Lord. But for now we have been given a foretaste of that. Passover has been finished for us, Pentecost has been fulfilled, but now we are on the journey to the place of God’s destination. So it is appropriate that we end tonight as we began, on a note of rejoicing and worshipping before the Lord. We don’t have to look forward to that great eschatological event where God will be one and his name will be one, and every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that he is Lord—we can celebrate it right now; because the King is here, his Spirit indwells you, his name is over you, his love compels you.
Worship the Lord!
Rejoice in the Lord, I say - and again I say, rejoice in the Lord !!
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1 The blowing of the ram’s horn – in fact the festival is called Yom Teru’ah (the festival of the blowing of the horn)
2 Yom Hazikkaron – day of remembrance
3 Yom Hadin
4 The Day of Covering
5 Called Alchet
6 A dwelling place; the KJV translates it as tabernacle
7 This is an outdoor festival, a harvest festival
8 Everyone lived in a central community, they didn’t have a house on a farm – they would travel out to the agricultural regions
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Want to study this subject in-depth? We recommend Principles from the Fall Festivals.
Take me back to the library. Or if you prefer, back to the topic Biblical Feasts.