A seven-day festival beginning four days after Yom Kippur, has both historical and agricultural origins. Historically, it represents the journey of Israel through the desert after the Exodus from Egypt—during which time the people lived in booths of an obviously impermanent nature. Agriculturally, the holiday celebrates the final harvest of fruit and produce of the year.

At the focal point of the Sukkot celebration stands a small, fragile, temporary, hut-like structure called a sukkah. The sukkah links us to our past: to the sukkot our ancestors lived in during their forty years of wandering in the desert and to the sukkot they built in their fields during harvest times when they settled in their land.

The sukkah becomes for us what it was for our ancestors—a statement of faith, a declaration of human dependence on G-d. G-d, not the flimsy sukkah, provided protection from the desert’s dangers. G-d, not the farmer, provided the rain sun, wind and soil in proper proportions for a successful harvest.

“On the first day you shall take the product of the harder (goodly) trees (etrog), branches of palm trees (lulav), boughs of leafy trees (hadas), and willows of the book (aravah), and you shall rejoice before the Lord your G-d seven days.” (Leviticus 23:40)

For the fruit of a “goodly” tree, we use a citron, or etrog, which looks like a large bumpy lemon. It has a delicate, fresh aroma. The other three symbols are branches of different kinds of trees. The branch of a palm tree, or lulav, is tall and slender, almost like a sword. For the “leafy tree” we use myrtle, or hadasim, whose leaves are small, oval and sweet-smelling. The willow, or aravot, has long, thin feathery leaves.

A Jewish holiday marking the conclusion of the annual cycle of public Torah readings, and the beginning of a new cycle. Simchat Torah is Hebrew for "rejoicing with the Torah”. On the morning of Simchat Torah, the last parashah of Deuteronomy and the first parashah of Genesis are read out in the synagogue. Most communities have a special Torah reading on the eve of Simchat Torah. At both the morning and evening services in the synagogue, the ark is opened, and the Torah scrolls are carried around the synagogue in seven circuits, accompanied by singing and dancing.