By the Grace of G-d
Dear Friend,
Sukkot is every bit as joyous as I was hoping.
Perhaps this year I am attuned to it more than ever because it comes against the backdrop of an unusually challenging era.
The glowing feeling of being securely ensconced in G-d’s embrace is uplifting, serene, liberating, and transformational.
Even as the world around us continues to be disrupted and uncertain, Hashem remains an eternal constant, upon Whom we can and do rely.
Sitting in the Sukkah is a poignant and audio-visual sensory reminder of Hashem’s protection and care. We need but to ‘recharge’ our ‘faith-batteries’ and we are good-to-go, to dance our way back into the world fully ‘charged’.
Why do I mention disruption and certainty? What happened now?
Two things, affecting people and objects very close to me, shook me up over Sukkot.
My hometown of Melbourne, Australia. A dependable, usually not overly unpredictable place. A bit boring at times, in a good way.
Something totally unpredictable happened in Melbourne. On the second day of Sukkot, Wednesday Sep 22, they had an earthquake of almost 6 on the Richter scale. It was short, but long enough to be scary. Our daughter Mushka who lives in Melbourne, told me that she huddled with her children under the doorposts. One of my friends told me that he was so rattled that he said the ‘Shema Yisrael’ as is the custom when one thinks that their time has come, and they are passing away from this world.
Thank G-d there were no injuries to anyone!!! A real miracle!!!
It happened on the second day of Sukkot.
(One rabbi in Melbourne shared that he was shaking his lulav at that exact time… and the walls of his home started shaking with him… that must have felt very other-worldly…)
Sukkot reminds us that we are all vulnerable. So does an earthquake. How much more so when an earthquake comes on Sukkot. But Sukkot also provides the response to our feelings of helplessness.
By sitting in the small ‘Sukkah’s’ we construct, we remind ourselves of G-d protecting our ancestors in the ‘clouds of glory’ as they left Egypt. And He continues, for more than three thousand years now, to be the only ultimate provider and protector of us and of all that we hold dear. Even the usually unflappably dependable stability of ‘mother earth’ is only because G-d wishes it to be so.
The gift of Sukkot is the invitation to tap-in to the source of all stability. Once you ‘plug’ into a solid connection with G-d, you are able to live a serene, or at least a less stressful, life.
Actionable item: We have a Sukkah in JCafe, in Beth Elisheva, and mobile Sukkah’s. Feel free to reach out by email or phone to schedule to make a blessing in the Sukkah and wave the Lulav and Etrog in all directions as well. By doing so you will be taking concrete steps to invite Hashem’s protective aura from all directions and in every aspect of your life.
Here in Bangkok at Beth Elisheva something happened that was very close to home, and even more so, close to heart and soul.
Due to a crack in the building, the rain started leaking in from the roof on top of the Aron Kodesh – Holy Ark.
Initially, when we first discovered it, rain was dripping inside the Ark on the Torah, and it seemed like G-d forbid a tragedy had befallen us and the Torah’s were ruined.
Upon further inspection, once we took out the Torah’s and inspected them, it turned out that we had experience a miracle of sorts.
First of all, the fact that the leak started on Monday evening this week is a miracle. Because this Monday evening was the first night of Sukkot. Only because of Sukkot, were we downstairs at the Synagogue on a Monday night. Because the next day was the first day of Sukkot we opened the Aron Kodesh to prepare the Torah’s for the reading next day.
Because we discovered the leakage so soon after it started, the Torah’s were slightly damaged but not ruined.
Actually, all the Torah’s besides for one, seem to be fine. One scroll did get quite soaked at certain parts. But, after opening the scroll and leaving it overnight it seems like the parchment has some wrinkles at some areas, but the Torah letters are all intact. Which means that it remains a kosher Torah to be used for many years to come. This too is a miracle, as the damage could easily have been worse. (In order to be absolutely sure, we will send it for a full check-up by an expert scribe in Israel).
The initial shock that registered on the faces of everyone who saw the possibly ruined Torah, spoke volumes about how deeply and inextricably Jews are bound up with the Torah. It was as if someone they loved dearly had gone through an accident where the worst was feared. The relief on everyone’s faces upon learning that the situation was far better than imagined, was like getting a positive prognosis from a doctor that the injuries were not life threatening G-d forbid.
Indeed, the Torah teaches that ‘Israel, Torah and the ‘Holy one blessed be He’ are all one’. This threesome, the Jews, G-d and His Torah are inseparably intertwined with each other. It is thus of no surprise that everyone was so deeply touched by the possible loss of this Torah.
When one thinks about what could have happened, and how we were saved from that possible outcome, one realized that we experienced a miracle and for that we are joyously thankful to G-d.
Being thankful is great. Acting on that gratitude and showing just how much the Torah’s being saved means to us is even more impactful.
Perhaps there is an actionable message here.
The actual Torah that was affected, was the ‘community Torah’. This was a Torah scroll that was written especially for our Jewish community in Thailand. It was commissioned and paid for by the contribution of many tens of members of our community. It was initiated at the time after our long standing Sefer Torah had become invalidated.
Maybe it is time for a new unity Torah?
Truth be told, by amazing Divine Providence, this idea was already germinating in my head without me even knowing it.
Just two nights earlier, I had been listening to a talk that the Rebbe gave forty years ago (1981) the night before Sukkot. The Rebbe had initiated a campaign to unite as many Jews together as possible by having them ‘purchase letters’ in the Torah and ‘writing them into a Torah scroll’. When a Jew pays for a letter to be written into the Torah in his or her merit, it becomes so to speak ‘their letter’. Each letter of the Torah is irreplaceable. Thus, by having your own letter in the Torah, you become united with the other hundreds and thousands of Jews who have also partaken of this Torah.
Every Torah has 304,805 letters.
That is a lot of opportunity for unity.
The purpose of this campaign, explained the Rebbe, was not to increase the numbers of Torah in the world, which is in itself a holy mission but not the purpose of this particular campaign. It was a campaign to generate unity.
We had done this before in Thailand. And it was this unity Torah that had now been damaged.
I looked back at my records to see when exactly the former Thailand unity Torah had been written.
Twenty years ago exactly. At the end of Sukkot.
A lot has changed in twenty years. Many have been born. Some have passed. Our community has grown. Not just in Bangkok but in many other provinces and cities.
Join the dots.
Do you think it may be time to write a unity Torah again?
Let it sink in…
Let us think about it over Shabbat…
And then, if you like I think that it may be a Heaven-sent opportunity, let’s work on the details.
Shabbat Shalom,
Chag Sukkot Sameach,
Rabbi Yosef Kantor