IN YOUR HOME Created by Miriam Feinberg Early Childhood Consultant Sukkot and Simchat Torah • äøåú úçîùå úåëåñ OCTOBER, 2011 — TISHREI, 5772 Shalom Parents, Jews have celebrated Sukkot by building booths Sukkot and Simhat Torah are fun holidays! throughout the ages. Today’s sukkah is a replica of The nine-day holiday period begins with Sukkot the original booths. The act of building it, decorating on the fifteenth of the Hebrew month of Tishrei it, welcoming guests in it, eating in it and sometimes (five days after Yom Kippur) and culminates with sleeping in it, enhances Sukkot celebrations. Today’s Simchat Torah. Reform Jews generally observe an sukkah, like biblical ones, is built with at least eight-day holiday, celebrating Simchat Torah on three walls and a roof that is sparsely covered with the eighth day, as is done in Israel. branches so that stars are visible at night. Sukkot, a time of sharing and thanksgiving, Simchat Torah comes on the ninth day of this celebrates the start of autumn and reaping of summer joyous festival when the year’s reading of the Torah crops, commemorating a time when the Israelites is completed and then begun again with the reading of became a united people. Genesis. On Simchat Torah evening and The lulav and etrog, symbolic of during the next day, Torah scrolls are vegetation that grows in Israel, are taken from the Torah Ark and carried important Sukkot rituals. They are around the synagogue as celebrants sing held together, shaken and waved and dance in a joyful procession. Torah in specific ways, while reciting a scrolls are carried around the synagogue particular blessing, as commanded seven times instead of the usual once. in the Torah. The lulav is made Each time around is called a hakkafah up of three special plants (palm, (hakkafot in plural). Children of all ages myrtle, and willow) which are bound are encouraged to join the procession, together, and held with the etrog, while waving special flags. The flags or citron. They may be purchased at remind us of those carried through the a Jewish bookstore or synagogue. desert to the Promised Land by the twelve tribes of Israel after the Exodus Building, decorating and living in booths is from Egypt as described in the Torah. essential to Sukkot. Israelite farmers built booths in ancient times. They lived together in villages, Holiday dates this year are: going out to work in their fields every morning and Erev Sukkot (the first evening of Sukkot): returning home in the evening. But when crops were Wednesday, October 12. ripe there was not time to go back and forth. Farmers The first two days of the holiday (when many worked their fields from early morning until nighttime, people attend synagogue services and refrain from harvesting as needed and resting nearby in little huts working): Thursday and Friday October 13 and 14. they had built (called “sukkot” and translated as Simchat Torah: The evening of Thursday October “booths”). Joyful feasting followed the harvest. 20 and Friday October 21. Page Two CELEBRATE IN YOUR HOME October, 2011 Tishrei, 5772 Sukkot and Simchat Torah • äøåú úçîùå úåëåñ HAVING FUN AT HOME HOW CAN YOU BUILD A SUKKAH? bend a tree over the top of your sukkah). It should It’s so much fun to build one’s own sukkah. A pre- be covered, giving more shade than sun during the fabricated one may be bought at a Jewish book store day, while not preventing rain from coming through or one can be built from scratch. It is usually erected and open enough for stars to be visible through the as soon after Yom Kippur as possible. It does not roof at night. need to be elegant and may be decorated any way you like. Check for ideas in The Jewish Catalogue With your child: Gather materials to create (p. 129, Jewish Publication the roof. Society,1973). When building a sukkah, DECORATING: Since the sukkah is considered your consider ideas below: If “home” for the eight days (but not used on Simchat your family chooses not to Torah), it is customary to decorate it nicely. You can build a sukkah, you can hang fruits, flowers and strung beads and decorate do many of the suggested the walls with posters, pictures and your children’s activities in your home. unique works. Try these ideas: SELECT A SITE: Find one Pine Cone Decorations that has nothing hanging Materials: pine cones, water paints (in a variety above it; (a roof or a tree of colors), paint brushes, glue, glitter, yarn (cut in branch). 2 foot lengths). With your child: Walk Procedure: Gather pine cones with your child. around your yard Paint some. Place glue and glitter on others. searching for the best When the pine cones have dried, hang location. them from the sukkah roof with yarn, or place THE WALLS: It must have at least two complete walls them in a and a small part of a third one. You don’t need to bowl as a table build all three walls; you can use the side of a build- centerpiece. ing, and build only two others. Use any material, being creative and having fun, as long as the walls are Leaf Picture sturdy enough to withstand a normal wind. Decorations Materials: leaves, glue, paper, safety pins or tape. THE ROOF: S’chach (roof material on the sukkah) can be made from branches of any tree, as long as it Procedure: Gather fallen leaves with your was live when it was cut. It must be made from mate- child. Glue them onto papers. When the glue rial that grows from the ground (branches or leaves has dried, attach the papers to the walls of the or wooden slats or shrubbery; but not metal or food) sukkah, using safety pins (if the walls are fabric) and presently detached from the ground (Don’t just or tape (if the walls are a hard surface). SUKKOT AND SIMCHAT TORAH WORDS Erev: Literally meaning “evening,” it refers to the Ushpizin: Meaning “guests” and pronounced first evening of a holiday. “ooshpeezen,” it is customary to invite our Etrog: A citron held with the lulav on Sukkot. ancestors to spiritually join us in our sukkah. Lulav: Made by combining branches from palm, Schach: Branches that form the sukkah roof. myrtle and willow trees, it is held together with the Hakkafot: A joyous procession when the Torah etrog on the first seven days of Sukkot (but not on scrolls are carried around the synagogue seven Simchat Torah), while reciting a special blessing. times on Simchat Torah. Page Three CELEBRATE IN YOUR HOME October, 2011 Sukkot and Simchat Torah • äøåú úçîùå úåëåñ Tishrei, 5772 What CAN YOU DO IN YOUR SUKKAH? During Sukkot we eat, drink, and study in the sukkah, and often invite guests to join us there. Some people even sleep there if possible. WELCOME GUESTS (Ushpizin): With your child: Sing touch and smell the lulav According to Kabbalistic tradition, songs he knows from and etrog. If you decide not seven spiritual guests (biblical school. to purchase them, visit a Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, synagogue on Sukkot when Aaron, Joseph and David) visit the READ: See recommended books others might be using them sukkah, each on one of the days on page four (They are not used on Simchat that we eat there. Some people Torah) and offer opportunities like to include other spiritual With your child: Select for you and your child to hold guests; like biblical Sarah, Re- favorite books to read and shake them. becca Leah, Rachel, Deborah, together in the sukkah. Ruth and SIMCHAT TORAH Esther… EAT: Sukkot or others menus, reflect- CARRY AND WAVE A SIMCHAT of your ing the harvest TORAH FLAG: Simchat Torah is choosing. festival, gener- particularly happy and is usually Decide ally include very child-centered. Children are with your dishes with fresh encouraged to join in the proces- family fruits and veg- sion, usually waving special flags. which ush- etables. Stuffed pizin to in- vegetables are Making A Flag vite. Make typical; some Materials: A large square posters say because, like piece of white construction with those cornucopia, they paper, scissors, a blue crayon names represent a boun- or marker, a paper towel roll, and hang tiful harvest. tape or glue. them in your sukkah. The spiritual guest With your child: Decide Procedure: Fold a large for each day is invited before on fruits and vegetables rectangular piece of the meal as we say “Enter, ex- to include in meals and construction paper in half and alted holy guest (the name of the purchase them together. then in half again, creating guest)…” four boxes. Cut out the lower right box. Decorate the top Making Ushpizin pictures What Else CAN YOU right box with a blue star in Materials: A large roll of paper, the middle and a blue strip scissors, crayons or markers, tape. DO TO Celebrate? above and below the star. Roll the left half of the paper Procedure: Would your child’s SUKKOT around a long cardboard roll. guests like to be ushpizin? Tape or glue the rolled paper Suggest that a guest lie down BLESS THE LULAV AND to the cardboard roll. You’ve on a large piece of paper on the ETROG: made an Israeli flag. floor. Another person should An important Sukkot first trace and then color in observance is the blessing her outline using crayons of the lulav and etrog. Hold or markers. Cut out the them together and wave completed outline, write the them in all directions to guest’s name on it and hang it acknowledge God’s sovereignty on your sukkah wall.