Sukkot in Early Judaism
The festival of Sukkot, meaning “booths” or “tabernacles” (Deuteronomy 16:13, 16; Leviticus 23:33), occurs at the end of the autumn harvest and is also called the Festival of Ingathering (Exodus 23:16; 34:22). Sukkot lasts for seven days, followed, according to Leviticus 23:26, by an eighth day called ‘atseret. (The meaning of ‘atseret is uncertain, but it may refer to a sacred gathering.) Two distinctive features of the holiday are the practice of dwelling in booths for seven days and the taking of four species of plants, originally perhaps for the construction of the booths but later practiced as a separate ritual (Leviticus 23:40–43). Leviticus 23:43 explains the booths as a remembrance that God made the Israelites dwell in booths on their journey from Egypt to Canaan.
Philo characteristically provides both a rational explanation of Sukkot that is practical and ethical and a symbolic explanation focusing on the number seven. Josephus paraphrases and expands on the biblical prescriptions around the observance of Sukkot (Leviticus 23:34–43), conflated with the requirement of pilgrimage to Jerusalem on the festivals (Deuteronomy 16:15–16). He also relates an episode during the First Jewish Revolt in which the Romans arrive at the city of Lydda (Lod) on Sukkot to find it empty, the Jews having left on pilgrimage to Jerusalem. When the Romans near Jerusalem, the Jews abandon their observance of the festival to take up arms against them.
Rabbinic literature narrates the ritual water libation in the Temple, an act of sympathetic magic whose purpose was to stimulate rainfall. The rabbis also prescribe how a sukkah is to be constructed, how people are to “dwell” in it by eating their meals there, and how the four species of Leviticus 23:40 are to be handled. A unique source, discovered in situ in the Judean desert, is a letter from Simeon bar Kosiba, leader of the second Judean revolt against Rome in 132–135 CE, requesting that the four species of plants be sent to his camp. See also “Bar Kokhba Letters.”