CAJE's Holiday Links
Table of Contents
This page contains links to web sites and pages with resources useful to Jewish educators. The information is divided into the following categories:
HolidaysNote: We're in the process of revising how these links appear to you on the page, so that they will be easier to access. Soon each holiday will appear in a section on its own. We've checked these links carefully for authentic Jewish content from the broad spectrum of modern Jewish thought and practice. One thing became distressingly clear: when you search for terms related to Jewish holidays on standard search engines, among the top-ranked results you are offered are many links to sites using holiday-oriented games and "educational materials" as lures for conversion of Jews. The real purpose only emerges if you look at the leading (or misleading) questions, the answers to quizzes, games, and puzzles, and the content of the plays and skits offered on such sites. Converting us is clearly important enough that a lot of time and effort has gone into such sites. The lesson? There's a host of material available online, but the Jewish educator must review material thoroughly before using it in the classroom or on a school website. ShabbatThe most important and influential Jewish holiday is also the most frequent: Shabbat (in Ashkenazi Hebrew and Yiddish, "Shabbos"). Shabbat reflects two central features of Jewish religious practice: commandments to walk in God’s ways (in Latin, imitatio dei), and to learn and act upon what is learned from experience. In Bereshit (Genesis), God creates for six days and then refrains from creating for one, the seventh day, blessing that day and making it holy. In Sh’mot (Exodus), the commandment for Shabbat reads: “Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord Your God: You shall not do any work—you, your son or daughter, your male or female slave, or your cattle, or the stranger who is within your settlements. For in six days the Lord made Heaven and earth and sea, and all that is in them, and He rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it.” A classic formulation of the commandment to emulate God is found in D’varim (Deuteronomy) 10:12-20, where God’s behavior is described and we are commanded to do as God does. In D’varim, the Shabbat commandment emphasizes our own national experience. “Observe the Sabbath day, and keep it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, your son or daughter, your male or female slave, your ox or your ass, or any of your cattle, or the stranger in your settlements, so that your male and female slave may rest as you do. Remember that you were a slave in the Land of Egypt and the Lord your God freed you from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore, the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the sabbath day.” Torah law comes back to this experience again and again as a reason for all manner of commandments. Rabbinic texts address the apparent oddity of Torah presenting two different versions of the Shabbat commandment. The hymn “Lekha Dodi” cites the tradition: “Shamor ve-zachor bedibur ehad” — “’Shamor’ (observe) and ‘Zakhor’ (Remember) were pronounced together as a single utterance!” In educational or heuristic terms, Shabbat serves as a weekly touchstone, a reminder for much of Jewish behavior. Heschel famously dubbed Shabbat “a Temple in time,” a temporal structure standing immutable in Jewish life in contrast to its spatial counterpart. The importance of this temple in time grew even greater with the physical destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem and the Second Exile. Though scattered around the world, the Jewish People could gather together weekly in time, if not in space. The potent role of Shabbat in Jewish survival moved Ahad Haam to state, “More than Israel has kept the Sabbath, the Sabbath has kept Israel.” Shabbat has other aspects: It is a day of liberation from labor, a day of self-liberation and self-restraint. Far from being ruled by those legendary Jewish Luddites, the Notsa-Postas, Shabbat is an all-natural day of heightened awareness of the world. Jewish educators should be aware of the growing trend of embedding Jewish-theme terms such as “Shabbat” or “family Shabbat,” on websites whose actual goal is to proselytize to Jews. There also is no lack of forthrightly church-oriented sites declaring that they present Shabbat in its true meaning, and offering advice or even how-to pages. The links below include only those sites consonant with CAJE’s mission.
Back to TopRosh ChodeshJust as the year (shanah) begins Rosh Hashanah, so each month (hodesh) of the Jewish year, based on a lunar calendar, begins with a day designated as "Rosh Hodesh." The root of the word "hodesh" is het-dalet-shin, meaning "new," because each month begins with the new moon. When the Temple still stood, the calendar was not calculated and set in advance as it is today, but, rather, it was proclaimed on the basis of active observation of the moon. The sighting of the new moon was anticipated eagerly. As soon as the central authorities could ratify the testimony of two eyewitnesses, a system of hilltop signal fires would relay the news to the entire country within a short time. Simultaneously, the Temple rites and sacrifices for Rosh Hodesh would begin. The problem of maintaining a synchronous calendar grew increasingly difficult with (a) the destruction of the Temple; (b) the disruption of communication during our three rebellions against Rome; and (c) the movement of Jews to communities across the length and breadth of the Roman world and beyond, along the Silk Road. A calculated, set calendar was an obvious solution, but there was reluctance to see exile and the absence of the Temple as permanent states of affairs. The Romans, knowing full well that their control over Judea and Jerusalem gave them a big stick with which to control the Jews, used this to their own advantage. As late as the 360s, a Roman emperor was holding out highly politicized promises of rebuilding the Jewish holy places, encouraging enmity between the Jews and the growing Christian sect. In the end, the promises came to nothing, and the rabbis of the Talmudic period created a set calendar — with the understanding that this was a stopgap measure necessary for maintaining national unity in exile, something that no one had ever done. It worked; we still use the calendar they created. Although the dates of observances were long established, the mechanism for unified time had been the proclamation of new months from the Temple. Calculating and fixing a calendar of months was a defining step that enabled Jewish communities everywhere to remain united in time even when the Diaspora was dividing them in space. In the liturgy, as they did for most holidays, the rabbis instituted Rosh Hodesh prayers and blessings parallel to the observances of the Temple, in some cases even describing the Temple services and sacrifices. This would ease the way back to what they regarded as the normal state of affairs when Jewish independence was restored and the Temple was rebuilt. A venerable tradition of special women's observance (mentioned in the Talmud) has made Rosh Hodesh in modern times the occasion for a host of Jewish women's religious, educational, and spiritual activities. Thus, over the centuries, Rosh Hodesh has continued to evolve, as the links below illustrate.
Back to TopPesach/PassoverPesah is the first holiday of the year, according to the Biblical reckoning, since the year began in the spring in ancient times. For this reason, we recite the sheheheyanu blessing, the prayer noting the time we perform a particular mitzvah or action during the year, over a series of things as part of the Pesah observance. Pesah is the first of the Three Pilgrimage Festivals (Shalosh Regalim), together with Shavuot (seven weeks after Pesah) and Sukkot (in the fall). All three have multiple significances. In their roles as agricultural/harvest holidays, all three are linked to the growing seasons and planting/harvesting cycles of the Land of Israel. Together, the three holidays also form a coherent, annual curriculum for reenacting our journey from slavery in Egypt to wandering in the wilderness to receiving the Torah at Mt. Sinai and entering into a covenantal partnership with God. Recognizing that in this cycle the Torah established powerful educational tools, the rabbis carried the pedagogic aspect forward in their redefinition of the holidays to make the calendar portable, so that it could withstand the vicissitudes of exile. This is particularly true of Pesah, which is widely seen as an essential part of Jewish family tradition. Pesah is best known, however, as commemorating the departure of our ancestors from four centuries of slavery in Egypt. On the first night of the holiday, we recreate the last evening meal our ancestors ate as slaves, to which is added a script telling (literally, "haggadah) how we came to be slaves in Egypt, and how now, through our brit with God, we are leaving slavery and undertaking the responsibilities and rights of a free people among the nations of the world. (In the Diaspora, this ceremonial meal is observed on the first two nights.) The Rabbinic script for this retelling of the story is remarkable for a number of details. Gloating is forbidden. We are reminded to pour out drops of wine, symbolizing happiness, to commemorate the suffering of the Egyptians, who though our enemies in this story, are still people with their own relationship with God. And most remarkable of all, the central figure of the retelling is not the human leader, Moses, but, rather, God. Pesah has many themes that over the years have been adopted by various Christian denominations. A complete discussion of this phenomenon is outside the scope of this brief introduction, but suffice it to say that there are as many Christian websites concerned with interpreting Pesah as there are Jewish ones. Cyber-missionary websites deliberately project every appearance of being legitimately Jewish - until you read closely and discover the slant of their interpretations. They may use Hebrew language texts, offer haggadot and even give recipes. They see our holidays as theirs to interpret and celebrate as they see fit; our significance to them is as potential converts (sooner or later), as a deeper analysis of some of their websites reveals. CAJE’s weblinks, of course, include only sites consonant with CAJE’s mission of promoting excellence in Jewish education.
Back to TopThe MimounaThe Mimouna, celebrated the evening after Pesah, is a festival of Moroccan Jewry that has gained added significance for the Moroccan community in Israel today. Some folk etymologies derive the name from "Maimon," the family name of Maimonides, but most relate it to a North African word for "good fortune." In any event, it is an occasion for joyous family celebration, singing, feasting, and hospitality. Celebration of the Mimouna in Israel today has also become a kind of Moroccan-Israeli ethnic pride event.
The SeharaneThe Seharane is a spring festival observed immediately after Pesah by Kurdish-Jewish communities. As has happened with holidays brought to Israel by other immigrant communities, the Seharane has gained additional significance as a sort of Kurdish-Israeli pride festival.
Yom Ha'AtzmautLinks for Yom Ha'Atzmaut have been chosen to provide:
One of CAJE's signal strengths is its unique mélange of people and views ranging across the Jewish spectrum; though these websites express a variety of ideas that may differ with one another, they are all consistent with CAJE's mission. (A caution; ha-mevin yavin: Jewish educators assigning students to do research using the Web should be aware of the growing number of websites [not included here] portraying the emergence of the State of Israel on the world scene in terms inconsistent with CAJE's mission.)
The Omer and Lag B'OmerThe Omer is a seven-week period from the second night of Pesah to the night before Shavuot. In Temple times, on the second day of Pesah, individual farmers brought offerings of a measure of grain called an "omer." From that point on, each day of the Omer is marked with heightened anticipation, as days are counted off while looking toward Shavuot. As with the Shloshet Haregalim (Pesah, Shavuot, and Sukkot), the Omer plays a role in the symbolic, ritual reenactment of our journey from slavery in Egypt, to the theophany at Mt. Sinai, to the wandering in the desert, and finally to our arrival in the Land of Israel and the initiation there of the terms of the covenant. Over history, the Omer took on different characteristics, fine-tuned by the leaders of different periods. In Temple times, the Omer is remembered as a joyous period; when our tenure in the Land of Israel became less secure, the rabbis used the Omer differently, as a period of solemn reflection and rededication to the covenant. The modern character of the Omer as a period of mourning was set in the century following the destruction of the Second Temple (70 C.E.). Though Rome was then at the zenith of its military power, we continued to rebel. The Romans saw our revolt under Bar Kokhba in the 130s C.E. as threatening their grip on the whole eastern Mediterranean, and the rebellion ended in slaughter of leading rebel scholars such as Rabbi Akiba, exile and slavery for mass numbers of Jews, and the wiping of "Judaea" off the Roman map. Traditions diverge as to whether it was an illness or the Romans who caused the death of a large number of Rabbi Akiba’s students, but tradition agrees that the deaths ceased on the 33rd day of the Omer. From the Bar Kokhba rebellion on, the Omer, which was also the time of year the Romans launched military campaigns, has been observed as a period of mourning with a single letup in the somber mood. Lag ("literally 33rd") B’Omer is a day for reenacting some of the events associated with the rebellion: going out to the woods to study Torah with scholars (the study of Torah was prohibited and certain scholars were put on an “outlaw” list by the Romans); archery and other warlike sports; and bonfires. In Israel today, there are visits to caves or hiding places traditionally associated with scholars such as Shimon bar Yochai. It is important that educators understand Lag B’Omer as part of a grand, annual cycle of reenactments based in the Torah and greatly expanded by the rabbis to train the young to understand their adult roles as covenantal partners with God.
Yom Yerushalayim
Yom Yerushalayim (Jerusalem Day; literally "Day of Jerusalem") (28th of Iyyar) commemorates the reunification of Jerusalem at the time of the Six Day War in 1967, after 19 years of division, during which Jews were barred from visiting the Old City. The name of the holiday is a deliberately ironic reversal of the imagery of Psalm 137. Note verses 5-7:
The Day of Jerusalem in this familiar Psalm is the day of Jerusalem's destruction and dismemberment. The Day of Jerusalem we celebrate today marks the reversal of that long, sad era in Jerusalem's history, and the restoration of a unified Jerusalem to its historic role. Though the Biblical motifs of restoration, reconciliation, and reversal of fortunes may be ancient, in the modern selection of the name "Yom Yerushalayim," we see them converge with the notion of "shlilat hagolah," the "negation of the Exile," a tenet of modern Zionism. Today, Yom Yerushalayim goes further: it honors the status of Jerusalem as the eternal capital of the Jewish People. As always, we offer links which are consistent with CAJE's mission. We hope that the following links will be useful for CAJE members whose schools teach Yom Yerushalayim.
ShavuotShavuot, second of the Three Pilgrimage Festivals (Shalosh Regalim), is a major holiday with multiple layers and associations of meaning. It is celebrated seven weeks after Pesah, marking the end of the Omer. In its agricultural role, Shavuot is called Hag HaBikkurim, the "Holiday of the First Fruits," yet its customs go back to the period before we entered the Land of Israel, when we wandered in the wilderness. The Torah depicts how even after the dramatic events at the Red Sea and Mt. Sinai, we were still subject to a slave mentality; it would be fascinating to see what a consulting diagnostician today would make of the Torah’s description of our attention span. The Torah has a colorful strategy for dealing with our inability to visualize the future; periodically, during our wandering, we are presented with glowing descriptions of the wonders of the Land that awaits us. The most famous describes the "Land flowing with milk and honey" (Exodus 3:8 and elsewhere); another in D’varim 8:7-8 describes how the Land of Israel features Seven Species (Shiv’at HaMinim): wheat, barley, vines, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates. Tradition says that the first of each of these crops harvested each year was brought as the first new offering of the agricultural year — on Shavuot. As a holiday celebrating a stage in the relationship between the People of Israel and the God of Israel, Shavuot is called Z’man Matan Toratenu ("The Time of the Giving of Our Tora"”) or Hag Matan Torah ("Festival of the Giving of the Torah") and marks the theophany, the encounter with God at Mt. Sinai during which the giving of the Torah was the central event. For this reason, it is traditional to spend the entire night of Shavuot in Torah study, a custom known as Tikkun Leil Shavuot. (In the Diaspora, where the holiday is observed for two days, the Tikkun takes place on the first night in most traditions. However, the customs of the Yemenite Jews preserves another ancient minhag, in which the two days are observed almost as a continuum, with Tikkun Leil Shavuot on the second night of the holiday, parallel to the Yemenite minhag for Hoshana Rabba. On Shavuot, we also read The Book of Ruth, which depicts the ups and downs of agricultural life in early Israel, the Torah-mandated sharing of produce with the poor, and how these two factors led to the marriage of Ruth and Boaz, great-grandparents of King David. In turn, because tradition says that King David died on Shavuot, the holiday is also his yahrzeit. The subject of the God of Israel entering into a covenant with the People of Israel (involving the Land of Israel) remains a controversial one in the eyes of some people. Shavuot is above all a holiday celebrating a central event of that covenant, the giving of the Torah. For this reason, Shavuot has assumed significance to some non-Jews, in whose world-view our covenant must be only a way station, not a permanent relationship between God and the People of Israel. Many non-Jewish websites dwell on these non-Jewish views of Shavuot. However, we have here, as elsewhere, listed only websites whose goals are consonant with CAJE's mission of pursuing excellence in Jewish education.
Shiva Asar B'Tammuz and the Three WeeksThe conquest of Jerusalem in 586 BCE began with the breaching of the outer defenses on the 17th of Tammuz and culminated three weeks later with the seizure and destruction of the First Temple on the 9th of Av. In the years that followed, it became traditional to commemorate this traumatic sequence of events and to link this observance with later calamities. The links below provide information both on the historical background and on the specific customs and practices associated with this three-week annual observance.
The Nine Days (preceding Tisha B'Av)The time between the 17th of Tammuz and the 9th of Av is designed in stages that gradually heighten the collective consciousness of impending national crisis, or rather, re-enactment-of-calamity-by-retelling of the Destruction of the Temple(s). Of these stages, the most demandingly tense is the last, the nine days from Rosh Chodesh Av to Tisha B'Av. These links describe the customs of the Nine Days and the rationale behind them.
Tisha B'AvThe 9th of Av is a day fraught with calamitous national memories for the Jewish People. If this day were only associated in our collective memory with the destruction of the First and Second Temples, it would be enough for us - but whether by design or perforce, Tisha B'Av is an observance that when needed expands its function to commemorate new calamities, and keyn ayen-horeh, we never seem to lack for woes. Its position on the Jewish educational calendar gave Tisha B'Av a special significance in the Diaspora in the 20th century. An emotional outpouring of memories since the 1970s has so seared the Shoah into our consciousness that it is hard to remember a time when people would not speak of these things. Yet in the first decades after World War II, Diaspora communities were reeling in shock from two new realities: the opening of a doorway home from Exile, and the murder of a third of our family on the threshold of that redemption. So great was the pain that parents regularly objected to any mention of the Holocaust in Jewish schools, but in Jewish summer camps, Tisha B'Av observances began to focus not only on ancient events but also on more recent ones. For two generations of Jewish students, Tisha B'Av programming was their first Holocaust education. Today, Yom HaShoah has become widely accepted, and Tisha B'Av has resumed its earlier themes. As noted above, this temporary expansion of Tisha B'Av to allow for a religious response to new events is part of the tradition of this solemn holiday. Perhaps the reason is that Tisha B'Av marks the date at which the Jewish People began the long history of our Exile, and many other misfortunes which befell us could be attributed to that central reality: Exile. After the State of Israel came into being, there were serious debates as to whether Tisha B'Av should even continue to be observed. Once again, the observance of Tisha B'Av is changing in character. These links offer information on many of the topics touched upon in this introduction.
Tu B'AvA Mishna, perhaps pointing to a single Biblical reference (in Judges 21, not a promising start), tells us that the 15th of Av was in early times a celebration when the daughters of Israel, dressed in white, would dance in the vineyards. Modern Israeli culture has revived—or perhaps embraced and transformed—this mysterious festival. So have North American Jewish summer camps, eager for a summer holiday not associated with mourning and disaster.
Elul, the Season of S'likhotThe month of Elul has changed roles over the course of centuries of Jewish life. In early Biblical times, when the year began in Nisan, Elul anticipated the series of midyear holidays in the seventh month, Tishrei. Later, we returned from the First Exile having adopted the Babylonian calendar as a new standard, with the year beginning not in spring but in fall. Elul assumed a different significance, anticipating the yamim noraim, the "days of awe," or "high holidays." As these links illustrate, the prayers and customs of Elul, such as the penitential S'likhot prayers, prepare the way for the New Year to come.
Rosh HashanahAs its name indicates, Rosh Hashanah marks the beginning of the Jewish year. This holiday and its liturgy began to take shape during and just after the First Exile, when our sense of the calendar was reoriented to begin in the fall rather than in the spring, as it had earlier. It was at this point that a number of agricultural holidays underwent transformation - in Exile, they became important ways of remaining linked to the Land of Israel. Rosh Hashana assumed a new significance as an assertion of both of national identity and of our ongoing relationship with our God. We were literally a captive audience to the Babylonians' annual fall holiday; they marched their gods around their cities, culminating in banquets and ceremonial reading of their creation story. A vital part of Jewish education, the ongoing cycle of public Torah reading began at this point, and it is not by chance that we read our creation story at this point in the year. When the Babylonians returned their main god, Marduk, to his temple, they "enthroned" him in an elaborate ritual; it is also not by chance that on Rosh Hashana, our malkhuyyot liturgy proclaims our God king. As these links show, Rosh Hashana has accumulated new meaning over the many centuries of Jewish history.
Aseret Yemei Teshuvah - Ten Days of RepentanceRosh HaShana and Yom Kippur stand at either end of this ten-day period of introspection, self-evaluation, and reconciliation. The traditional liturgy tells us that on Rosh Hashana the annual, divine accounting of individuals' merits is written, but that it is sealed only on Yom Kippur, so that these ten days offer a chance to reflect and to repent. What's done cannot be undone, but one can learn from mistakes and do better. The Hebrew word for "sin," "het," simply means "missing the target;" it has no connotation of intrinsic evil from which one needs to be saved. The presumption is that people want to do the right thing. The word "teshuvah," in "aseret yemei teshuvah," is probably best rendered not as "repentance" or "penitence," but as "getting back on track." By tradition, these ten days are used for reconciliation of any sins or grievances among people, so that these are resolved as far as possible by the time Yom Kippur comes. As the links below show, the Ten Days offer no magical solution. Individuals still bear ongoing responsibility for decisions and actions; indeed, the real significance of the Ten Days is in how we exercise our free will.
Tzom GedaliahWithin days of the destruction of the First Temple, the Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar appointed Gedaliah ben Ahikam as governor of Judah. Gedaliah was the son and grandson of officials closely associated with King Josiah and the prophet Jeremiah. Tradition sees Gedaliah as a positive, hopeful figure, but shadowy figures bent on ongoing war with Babylon immediately assassinated him. A few of his circle survived but saw no hope of avoiding reprisals and repression; they set out for Egypt with Jeremiah and disappeared from history. This episode—the assassination of a national leader by unrealistic zealots—has been observed as a fast day ever since.
Yom KippurThe Yiddish writer S. Anksi, in The Dybbuk, describes Yom Kippur as a supreme, perilous alignment of the holiest in time and space: only once a year, on this holiest of days, would the holiest person (the kohen gadol) enter the holiest place, the Holy of Holies in the Holy Temple, and there pronounce aloud the holiest word in the holy tongue, the Divine Name (which in later times, Jews have traditionally not spoken, using a variety of euphemisms such as "Hashem," literally, "the Name"). We still describe these rituals in the liturgy of Yom Kippur, but the holiday has been transformed into a day of personal atonement for sins against God. As the Ten Days of Repentance (for reconciliation of sins or grievances among people) come to an end, Yom Kippur focuses for 24 hours on the relationship between individuals and God. The traditional liturgy alternates between passages evoking intense, personal introspection and self-judgment and passages narrating in dramatic detail the way in which Yom Kippur was observed when the Temple stood. The influence of history may be seen in passage after passage in the mahzor (prayerbook): Kol Nidrei, at the beginning of Yom Kippur, stands as mute testimony to the vicissitudes of centuries of powerless exile and religious coercion; it asks that vows—such as forcible conversion—made without intention be considered null and void. (Kol Nidrei is recited in Aramaic everywhere except in the tradition of Italian Jews, whose mahzor uses a Hebrew version.) Even as The Ten Martyrs describes the brutal deaths of rabbinic leaders at the hands of the Romans following the defeat of the Bar Kokhba rebellion, at another level, it evokes feelings of national identity, heroism, and resistance. These are prayers intended to induce not only self-evaluation but also wrestling with self over issues of identity and core values. The haftorah for Yom Kippur is the Book of Jonah—the story of someone who finds that there is no hiding from responsibility.
SukkotSukkot is a holiday with many names and many significances: Our year originally began in Nissan, and the date of Sukkot is noted in Vayikra as "the fifteenth day of the seventh month." Sukkot is the third of the Three Pilgrimage Festivals (shalosh r'galim) on which sacrifices were brought to the Temple. Sukkot is also a fall harvest holiday linked to enjoyment of the blessings of the Land of Israel and the fruits of independence. (Sukkot inspired the American holiday of Thanksgiving.) Each year, in our holidays, we re-enact a series of events from our history. On Sukkot, we re-enact the manner in which our ancestors lived while trekking through the desert after leaving Egypt. Thus it is a holiday that from the very beginning is intended to have educational content, where display and ceremony are intended to provoke intergenerational discussion of our people's experience of history. In its role in the annual cycle of educational reenactments (we might even say simulation games), the holiday is called "Sukkot," "booths," referring to our portable desert shelters. In its role as a harvest holiday, it is called "Hag He-Asif," "The Feast of Gathering-In." Yet another name describes the contrast between this holiday and the solemn high holidays that precede it: "Z'man Simhatenu," "The Time of Our Rejoicing." Rabbinic texts recall joyous evening ceremonies (which they call "simhat bet hahoshoeva") in the Temple during hol ha-moed Sukkot. Special liturgy and ceremonies mark the seventh and final day of Sukkot, which is known as "Hoshana Rabba." In establishing Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) as the megillah to be read on Sukkot, the rabbanim reach out to challenge future generations with enduring, cosmic questions of wisdom literature: Is it good to be alive? How does one cope with the brevity of life? Seeing that there are so many cycles in nature, do we really need to put so much effort into this time around? Might there not be others? But to understand what the rabbis were doing, one must see the larger context, the sequence of Biblical texts the rabbanim have us read during the weeks preceding and the weeks following Kohelet, the juncture at which we conclude D'varim and begin Bereshit again. We may choose to read the Torah anew, but the story it tells is linear, and so is time. Against that backdrop, the rabbis are certain that we will understand Kohelet's magnificent outburst. We see the cycles of nature, Kohelet says, and everything seems to get a fresh start, except for us; we grow old while the world seems to stay young-doesn't that make our lives meaningless? But Kohelet's conclusion is the opposite: No, it means that each moment is precious and full of boundless potential to create and to enjoy. This is the message toward which the rabbanim have been guiding us, in their subtle way. In establishing sequences of texts, the rabbanim never thought small; in interpreting them, the meforshim may see the trees but never lose sight of the forest for the trees; in teacing a holiday like Sukkot, with so many and such varied levels of meaning, it is all the more important to teach our students always to search for the big picture.
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