Why Isn’t Sukkot in the Spring?

Editor’s note: For more on the trend of historicizing holidays, see David Frankel, “Integrating the Exodus Story into the Festivals,” TheTorah.com (2014).

Jeffrey Tigay, The JPS Commentary: Deuteronomy (Philadelphia: JPS, 1996), p. 152.

Deut 16:9. Editor’s note: For more on the agricultural theme for Matzot, see Yael Avrahami, “Why Do We Eat Matzah in the Spring?” TheTorah.com (2018). For the connection between spring and Pesach, see Kristine Garroway, “The Origins of the Biblical Pesach,” TheTorah.com (2015).

Exod 23:15 and many other passages. Editor’s note: For more on the connection between Matzot and the exodus, see Zev Farber, “How Eating Matzot Became Part of the Exodus,” TheTorah.com (2018).

Exod 23:16 and many other passages.

See e.g. b. Shabbat 86b. Editor’s note: For more on how this conception developed, see Norman Solomon, “Shavuot: How the Festival of Harvest Grew,” TheTorah.com (2014); Michael Segal, “The Festival of Covenants,” TheTorah.com (2014).

Exodus 23:16 and many other passages.

Editor’s note: For more on the origins of Sukkot, see Zev Farber, “The Origins of Sukkot,” TheTorah.com (2017).

Lev 24:42-43. Editor’s note: For some historical-critical discussion of what this verse might mean, see, David Frankel, “How and Why Sukkot Was Linked to the Exodus,” TheTorah.com (2015); David Ben-Gad HaCohen, “When and Where the Israelites Dwelt in Sukkot,” TheTorah.com (2016).

Studies in Vayikra (Leviticus), translated by Aryeh Newman (Jerusalem: World Zionist Organization, 1980), pp. 232-233.

This debate appears in the Babylonian Talmud (Sukkah 11b) as well, but there the opinions of the two rabbis are reversed. Editor’s note: For more on this text, see Jeffrey Rubenstein, “The Sukkah and Its Symbolism,” TheTorah.com (2014).

Supercommentators on Rashi struggle to explain why, despite his frequently affirmed commitment to peshat, (e.g. commentary to Gen 3:8), Rashi chooses to side with the opinion that sukkot here must refer to miraculous clouds of glory with which God protected the Israelites in the wilderness. Most likely Rashi, like Nehama Leibowitz centuries later, preferred to have the sukkah commemorate something supernatural, rather than something natural and mundane.

Ramban commentary to Lev 23:43. Translation from Charles Chavel, with minor changes.

Ibid.

A shorter version of this explanation is also found in the Tur’s Torah commentary: וצוה לעשות סוכה בתחילת החורף שאם היו עושים אותן בקיץ לא היה ניכר אלא היה נראה שעושין אותן לצל – [the Torah’s] command is to make a sukkah in the beginning of the winter. If we made them in the summer, it would not be noticeable. It would seem that we were making them for shade.

An allusion to Isaiah 49:10.

Today in Cologne, Germany, where it is commonly felt that the Tur was born, October average temperatures range from a high of 15 C to a low of 6 C, with nine days of rain in the month. Jerusalem in the same month experiences an average high temperature of 25 C and a low of 17 C, with 1 day of rain. See https://www.google.com/search?q=average+temperatures+october+cologne+germany and https://www.google.com/search?q=average+temperatures+october+jerusalem+israel.

Most scholars believe that Ramban never saw Rashbam’s Torah commentary. See e.g. Jonathan Jacobs, “Was Ramban Acquainted with Rashbam’s Torah Commentary?” [Heb.] Mada’ei ha-yahadut 46 (2009), 85-108. It is not clear whether the Tur saw Rashbam’s Torah commentary.

In his Talmud commentary he is often wordy, but rarely in his Torah commentary. Perhaps here he highlighted an innovative insight he was proud of.

Editor’s note: For more on this theme in Deuteronomy, see David Frankel, “The Good Land of Israel,” TheTorah.com (2017); Reuven Kimelman, “The Shema’s Second Paragraph: Concern Over Israel’s Affluence,” TheTorah.com (2018).

An allusion to what is written about Sukkot in Deut 16:13.

Rashbam makes a similar point in his explanation of the phrase ארמי אבד אבי in his commentary to Deuteronomy 26:5. See my, “Did an Aramean Try to Destroy My Father?” TheTorah (2013). Professor Warren Zev Harvey of the Hebrew University has argued that there is a remarkable similarity between Maimonides’ explanation of the reason for the mitzvah of sukkah (in Guide of the Perplexed 3:43) and what Rashbam writes here. He points out that this shared explanation is almost unique in the history of Jewish thought before the days of Maimonides, with the exception of one short mention of this idea in the writings of Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BCE -c. 50 CE) in his The Special Laws 2:208: “ It is proper in the time of riches to remember one's poverty.” See Warren Zev Harvey, “האם קרא רמב"ם את רשב"ם” [Did Maimonides Read Rashbam?] in שיר המעלות לדוד: מחקרים במדעי היהדות לכבוד הרב פרופ' דוד גולינקין [Shir Ha-Ma’alot L’David: Essays in Jewish Studies in Honor of Rabbi Prof. David Golinkin], ed. Martin S. Cohen (Machon Schechter, 2025), 151-160. As Harvey argues, it is unlikely that either Rashbam or Maimonides was influenced by Philo’s writings. But, he argues, this and other similarities might support the idea that Maimonides did read and was influenced by Rashbam’s Torah commentary. Harvey also notes there (pp. 154-155) that Rashbam’s explanation was controversial. For example, Naftali Herz Wessely (1725-1805), in his commentary to Leviticus 23:43 in Mendelssohn’s Be’ur, wrote strongly against it: ואיך נקבל זה—“how could we accept this [explanation]?”

The etymology of the word אזרח, translated here (following JPS) as “citizen,” is unclear. But its use in contrast with the גר, or stranger, makes its basic meaning clear: someone who is not a stranger but an indigenous member of Israelite society. According to Ben-Yehudah (Thesaurus Totius Hebraitatis, vol. 1, p. 134) and Kaddari (A Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew, pp. 22-23) it is related to an Arabic root meaning “pure of breed.” According to Brown-Driver-Briggs (A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, p. 280) it is related to the Hebrew root ז-ר-ח which often means to rise and thus it refers to a person who arises out of the land.

See also Num 15:13-16:

^{במדבר טו:יג} כָּל הָאֶזְרָח יַעֲשֶׂה כָּכָה אֶת אֵלֶּה לְהַקְרִיב אִשֵּׁה רֵיחַ נִיחֹחַ לַה’: ^טו:יד וְכִי יָגוּר אִתְּכֶם גֵּר אוֹ אֲשֶׁר בְּתוֹכְכֶם לְדֹרֹתֵיכֶם וְעָשָׂה אִשֵּׁה רֵיחַ נִיחֹחַ לַה’ כַּאֲשֶׁר תַּעֲשׂוּ כֵּן יַעֲשֶׂה: ^טו:טו הַקָּהָל חֻקָּה אַחַת לָכֶם וְלַגֵּר הַגָּר חֻקַּת עוֹלָם לְדֹרֹתֵיכֶם כָּכֶם כַּגֵּר יִהְיֶה לִפְנֵי ה’:^טו:טז תּוֹרָה אַחַת וּמִשְׁפָּט אֶחָד יִהְיֶה לָכֶם וְלַגֵּר הַגָּר אִתְּכֶם:

^{Num 15:13} Every citizen, when presenting an offering by fire of pleasing odor to YHWH, shall do so. ^15:14 And when, throughout the ages, a stranger who has taken up residence with you, or one who lives among you, would present an offering by fire of pleasing odor to YHWH—as you do, so shall it be done by ^15:15 the rest of the congregation. There shall be one law for you and for the resident stranger; it shall be a law for all time throughout the ages. You and the stranger shall be alike before YHWH; ^15:16 the same ritual and the same rule shall apply to you and to the stranger who resides among you.

Exod 20:10.

Lev 16:29.

Exod 12:19. See ibn Ezra’s longer commentary to Exod 13:7 where he says that a stranger who wishes to live among the Israelites does so on condition that he or she observes the restrictions of Shabbat, Pesach and Yom Kippur.

See Sifra Emor 12:17.

This was noted in the website alhatorah.org, citing a manuscript that attributes a similar explanation to a “Rav Yosef,” which is, in all likelihood, R. Yosef Qara.