, also known as the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles, is an annual autumn festival celebrated by Jews. It is one of three times of the year where a man is expected to appear in Jesusalem with produce for an offering. Passover and Shavuot are the other two times.
This eight day festival begins the day of the full month in the lunar month of Tishri.
Because the holiday ends the harvest season, one of the traditional activities was to set up booths decorated with fruit. It commemorates the makeshift dwellings made when the Israelites were wandering in the wilderness (Leviticus 23:42-43). While it is not practical to build and reside in these crude structures today, many synagogues build a Sukkot (meaning booth) for its members so short rituals can be conduced.
Like other Jewish holidays, there are many rituals, recitations, and ceremonies accompanying the holiday. In Israel, many of these traditions remain but in other parts of the world, strict adherence to customary Sukkot practices have diminished because of urbanization. Nevertheless the holiday still serves as a reminder of great hardship and a simpler life of times past.
