Haftorah Shabbat Chol HaMoed

So. We’re in the middle of Sukkot, now. Sukkot is one of my favorite holidays, and probably deserves its own note. We made a Sukkah this year, only the second time we’ve done it and the first time since we bought a house. It’s a terrific Sukkah: the swingset, some PVC pipes from a cheap gazebo thing, lots and lots of corn stalks for a roof, four massive sunflower stalks, one wall of colored paper chains and one of hanging pictures. It was fun to put up, and it looks great.

For me, an important part of building a Sukkah—do y’all know about Sukkot and Sukkahs? Essentially, the holiday commemorates the wandering of the people Israel in the desert; we set up these makeshift structures that are often translated as booths for no good reason. The holiday is eight days; some people sleep in their Sukkah, some take all their meals in them, some have one meal in the Sukkah, some just build it and let the kids play in it. Up here in Southern New England, it’s too dark and cold to have dinner in the Sukkah, and what with one thing and another we haven’t managed lunch in the Sukkah yet, either. We have a couple of days left, don’t we? Anyway, it’s a great Sukkah even if we don’t eat in it.

For me, an essential part of building a Sukkah is cobbling it together out of what we have to hand. Or, rather, combining some good planning and preparation with improvising. I know that it would be easier to buy a kit, and some of the kits are terrific, but I wouldn’t enjoy it much. I suspect that the swingset will be part of the structure every year for a while, and I suspect that I’ll make the roof with corn stalks, but I may come up with something clever for the walls sometime, or figure out a way to make it bigger, or build it off the garage or something. For me, the improvisation is part of what makes the connection for me between what I am doing and wandering in the wilderness. Not that the Israelites in the wilderness did a lot of improvising, but that there’s the sense of temporariness that is part of the point of Sukkot. Together with the harvest festival, of course, and the connection with the change of seasons and nature and whatnot.

So, of course, the special Haftorah reading for the Shabbat in Sukkot is Ezekiel 38:18-39:16, the war with Gog.

And it shall come to pass at the same time when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord GOD, [that] my fury shall come up in my face. For in my jealousy [and] in the fire of my wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel; So that the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that creep upon the earth, and all the men that [are] upon the face of the earth, shall shake at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground. And I will call for a sword against him throughout all my mountains, saith the Lord GOD: every man’s sword shall be against his brother. And I will plead against him with pestilence and with blood; and I will rain upon him, and upon his bands, and upon the many people that [are] with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire, and brimstone. Thus will I magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be known in the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I [am] the LORD.

Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog, and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I [am] against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal: And I will turn thee back, and leave but the sixth part of thee, and will cause thee to come up from the north parts, and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel: And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand. Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands, and the people that [is] with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and [to] the beasts of the field to be devoured. Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken [it], saith the Lord GOD. And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I [am] the LORD. So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not [let them] pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I [am] the LORD, the Holy One in Israel. Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this [is] the day whereof I have spoken.

And they that dwell in the cities of Israel shall go forth, and shall set on fire and burn the weapons, both the shields and the bucklers, the bows and the arrows, and the handstaves, and the spears, and they shall burn them with fire seven years: So that they shall take no wood out of the field, neither cut down [any] out of the forests; for they shall burn the weapons with fire: and they shall spoil those that spoiled them, and rob those that robbed them, saith the Lord GOD.

And it shall come to pass in that day, [that] I will give unto Gog a place there of graves in Israel, the valley of the passengers on the east of the sea: and it shall stop the [noses] of the passengers: and there shall they bury Gog and all his multitude: and they shall call [it] The valley of Hamongog. And seven months shall the house of Israel be burying of them, that they may cleanse the land. Yea, all the people of the land shall bury [them]; and it shall be to them a renown the day that I shall be glorified, saith the Lord GOD. And they shall sever out men of continual employment, passing through the land to bury with the passengers those that remain upon the face of the earth, to cleanse it: after the end of seven months shall they search. And the passengers [that] pass through the land, when [any] seeth a man’s bone, then shall he set up a sign by it, till the buriers have buried it in the valley of Hamongog. And also the name of the city [shall be] Hamonah. Thus shall they cleanse the land.

I do not understand the thinking here at all. Do you?

Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.