Our ancestors did not want SukkotLit. Booths or huts Sukkot is the autumn harvest Festival of Booths, is celebrated starting the 15th of the Jewish month of Tishrei. Jews build booths (sukkot), symbolic of the temporary shelters used by the ancient Israelites when they wandered in the desert. Traditionally, Jews eat and sleep in the sukkah for the duration of the holiday (seven days in Israel and eight outside of Israel). The lulav (palm frond), willow, myrtle, and etrog fruit are also waved together. to end, so they added an extra day to this festival—one more day to linger over the joys the holiday offered. Our celebrations look quite different now, but we too appreciate this day—and the special prayers for rain associated with it.
A presence that bursts forth from the emptiness
A prayer for rain during the Amidah on Shemini Atzeret in memory of those fallen during the Yom Kippur War
A complete ritual featuring a prayer for rain, packing boxes of food for a food pantry, and an optional text study.
On Shemini Atzeret, Jews offer a special prayer for rain (it is the beginning of the rainy season in Israel). The traditional version of this prayer refers obliquely to each of the forefathers and their relationship to water; this version highlights the foremothers.
Women’s prayer for rain
In this immersion, we will reflect and expand on our personal experiences of identity, using writing exercises and in-depth discussions to think about, challenge, discover, explore, and experiment with different ways to identify ourselves, to consider how those ways connect us to and separate us from others, and how they represent and misrepresent aspects of who we are.
Four sessions, starting June 15th
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