Shabbat Greetings

There is something wonderfully strange about the holiday we celebrate on this Shabbat. Sukkot lasts seven days. We know that from the Torah. And then, just when we think the festival is finished, the Torah says: “On the eighth day you shall observe a sacred occasion.” (Leviticus 23:36) The Torah calls this day Shemini Atzeret, literally, “the eighth-day assembly.” Numbers says similarly: “On the eighth day you shall hold a solemn gathering; you shall not work at your occupations.” (Numbers 29:35)

But why an eighth day? Sukkot is complete. The seven days are over. The sukkah has served its purpose. We have waved the lulav and etrog. We have celebrated the harvest, welcomed guests, and rejoiced. And yet Torah says to us – stay – one more day.

The rabbis imagined God saying to Israel at the end of Sukkot: “Your departure is difficult for Me. Stay one more day.” (Babylonian Talmud, Sukkah 55b) What a beautiful image. After all the intensity of the Hebrew month of Tishrei: Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot, we might be ready to move on. We have prayed enough. We have reflected enough. We have celebrated enough. But Judaism gives us one more day.

Not because we have failed to finish, but because some experiences are too important to leave behind immediately. And that is where Simchat Torah enters tonight. Historically, Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah developed as distinct observances. Shemini Atzeret is the biblical festival that follows Sukkot. Simchat Torah developed later as the  celebration of completing the annual cycle of Torah reading and beginning it again. In many traditional (Conservative and Orthodox) Diaspora communities, those became two separate days: Shemini Atzeret first, and Simchat Torah afterward.

Reform Judaism, like Jewish communities in Israel, observes one day of the festival rather than adding a second day. Consequently, we celebrate Simchat Torah (tonight) and Shemini Atzeret (tomorrow morning) together. I think there is something spiritually powerful about that because Simchat Torah asks us to do something that is almost impossible to do in ordinary life: to finish and immediately begin again.

We reach the final words of Deuteronomy. Moses blesses the people. He climbs Mount Nebo. He sees the Promised Land, but he does not enter it. Then, almost without taking a breath, we turn the scroll back to the beginning: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Deuteronomy ends. Genesis begins. The Torah has no real “end.” Or perhaps more precisely: every ending contains the possibility of a beginning.

That is why Simchat Torah is not simply a celebration of having completed a book. We celebrate the fact that Torah remains unfinished in us. We read the same words year after year, but we are never the same people reading them. Last year, we may have heard the story of creation one way. This year, we hear it differently. Last year, Moses’ final blessing may have spoken to us as parents, children, teachers, or students. This year, perhaps it speaks to us as people who have experienced loss, change, joy, uncertainty, or new beginnings. The Torah has not changed. We have.

So tonight when we begin again, we do not really return to the same place. We return as different people. That is why the Reform celebration of Simchat Torah fits so beautifully with Shemini Atzeret. Together they teach us something important about Jewish life.

Chag Sameach.

SHABBAT SHALOM