Shalom Chaverim!
Long ago, the Biblical poet Kohelet stared life in the eyes and declared at the start of his book:
הֲבֵל הֲבָלִים הַכֹּל הָבֶל
Haveil havalim, ha-col havel…
Futility of futilities, all is futile
Kohelet was an existentialist before existentialism. Encouraging, isn’t he?!
You could also translate it more spiritually and “Eastern” as “Emptiness of emptiness, everything is Empty”; or more “Western” and psychological as “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”
The tradition is for us Jews to read the book Kohelet [or “Ecclesiastes” as the translation calls it] on the Shabbat of the intermediate days of the week-long Sukkot festival. Interestingly, this year Sukkot begins on a Shabbat: There is no intermediate day that is a Shabbat this year, because by next Shabbat we will already be in the Shemini Atzeret holiday that concludes the festival.
As for reading Kohelet as you sit in the sukka on Shabbat…there is a nor’easter brewing and it is not looking likely that we will have the opportunity this year! Note: If enough rain is falling that it would ruin your bowl of soup, or if it was leaking to such a degree inside your house that you would have to go elsewhere, then the requirement of sitting in the sukka is foregone until the downpour abates.
Given such obstacles apparent ahead of us, is attempting to read Kohelet this year during Sukkot itself a futile endeavor? Should we should just skip it?
The forecast for this Sukkot holiday weekend seems appropriate for these words of Kohelet [Kohelet 11:3-5]:
אִם־יִמָּלְאוּ הֶעָבִים גֶּשֶׁם עַל־הָאָרֶץ יָרִיקוּ…
If the clouds are filled, they will pour down rain on the earth…
He extrapolates from this observation and concludes:
וְאִם־יִפּוֹל עֵץ בַּדָּרוֹם וְאִ֣ם בַּצָּפוֹן מְקוֹם שֶׁיִּפּוֹל הָעֵץ שָׁם יְהֽוּא׃ שֹׁמֵר רוּחַ לֹ֣א יִזְרָע וְרֹאֶה בֶעָבִים לֹא יִקְצֽוֹר׃ כַּאֲשֶׁר אֵֽינְךָ יוֹדֵעַ מַה־דֶּ֣רֶךְ הָרוּחַ כַּעֲצָמִים בְּבֶ֣טֶן הַמְּלֵאָה כָּכָה לֹא תֵדַע אֶת־מַעֲשֵׂה הָאֱלֹהִים אֲשֶׁר יַעֲשֶׂה אֶת־הַכֹּֽל׃
…and if a tree falls to the south or to the north, the tree will stay where it falls. Whoever watches the wind will never sow; and whoever observes the clouds will never reap. Just as you do not know how the life-breath passes into the limbs within the womb of the pregnant woman, so you cannot foresee the actions of God, who causes all things to happen.
I think most of us often feel like Kohelet, that everything is set, axiomatic, and inevitable, and yet at the same time beyond understanding, always changing, and open to God [or to blind chance!].
Kohelet continues to face and draw conclusions from the puzzling predictability of life which, for all that, we can’t seem to grasp completely or to utilize in all its fullness [Kohelet 1:7-9]:
“All streams flow into the sea, Yet the sea is never full; To the place [from] which they flow, the streams flow back again. All such things are wearisome: No one can ever state them; The eye never has enough of seeing, Nor the ear enough of hearing. Only that shall happen which has already happened, only that shall occur which has already occurred: There is nothing new under the sun!”
…and yet, despite the existential angst of life-in-general and all the dread of what could go wrong (or about an approaching storm!) which is mixed with the upbeat promise and opportunity of this New Year already begun …despite all that, we read Kohelet’s words during Sukkot.
Sukkot is, in fact, the most existential holiday on the Jewish calendar. It may very well be the most existential holiday on any calendar! This is the holiday to simply “be” – to fully be…where you are already and ‘in the moment’ of being there.
Perhaps, therefore, we should sit in the rain after all! We could experience the hydrological cycle that Kohelet (and our weather forecaster!) describes. We would perhaps feel the rain’s connection to the canyons carved by the floods and the sands spread by the waves. We could sense the rainfall source of our refreshment at drinking from a stream or even gulping at the kitchen faucet. We would see and hear the drama of this weekend’s storm and the smell of just-after-rain. We could be washed over by the rain which is, ultimately, the water which is two-thirds of our bodies going through life to enable every laugh, cry, kiss, sigh, and rejoicing at seeing that same old sun rise again for another day and set over that full/never-full sea once again.
The goal of Sukkot when we read this book by Kohelet is simply to sit in the Sukkah. To enjoy food and the company of friends and family; To admire the beauty of nature all around with full awareness of the impermanence of it all; To appreciate; To be at home wherever you are in the world and with your life even when – especially when – recognizing that it is all transitory…
…And with all that, to follow the Torah’s claim that Sukkot is to be “nothing but happy”; “nothing but joyous” [Devarim 16:15].
Chag Sameach and SHABBAT SHALOM!
Rabbi Michael