Efrat, Israel-- The festival of Sukkot is potentially one of the most enjoyable, engaging and liberating of all of the Jewish holidays. What can be more attractive than building and decorating a temporary "house" - giving the entire family the fun project of constructing together a "home away from home" which hosts such impressive and other-worldly personalities as the Patriarchs, Joseph, Moses, Aaron and King David?

And then to enjoy a sleep-away in such an environment is a transporting happening! The pity is that Sukkot falls only four days after the great Yom Kippur fast, which is itself the culmination of a ten-day heavily and heavenly burdened synagogue experience. We hardly have an adequate opportunity to "get into" the Sukkot spirit - and activity - in a proper manner. Why does the Jewish calendar have to be so crowded?!

Apparently, the connection between Sukkot and the prior High Holy-Day period is not at all fortuitous, but is very much an intricate part of the Divine design. And since we are commanded to properly inform the future generations as to the significance of the sukkah (see Leviticus 23:43), it is important to examine in depth the connection between the festivals.

The Talmud reports a fascinating difference of opinion as to precisely what it is that the sukkah is commemorating: Rabbi Akiva maintains that we are replicating the actual booths in which our ancestors dwelt during their desert wanderings, while Rabbi Eliezer believes that we are re-creating the miraculous "clouds of glory" which descended from the Almighty as an ethereal protective shield when they left Egypt [B.T. Sukkah 11b].

In addition to the obvious miraculous vs. realistic interpretation of the sukkah symbol which is apparently the major issue in this difference of opinion, I would like to suggest an additional distinction - and a synthesis of both opinions.

Since our tradition records that the final judgment and absolution of God during this period of repentance is rendered on the seventh day of Sukkot (Hoshana Rabba), it is clear that the sukkah is an intrinsic part of a process which began with Rosh Hashanah. We may be waving the Four Species during the day and sleeping in the sukkah at night, but what is really going on here is repentance.

Hence, even when R. Eliezer and R. Akiva disagree as to the identity of the "booths" themselves, perhaps they are also distinguishing between two different aspects of the repentance process.

Indeed, the Holy Zohar speaks of two forms of repentance: a lower repentance (teshuvah tata'ah) which is for a specific transgression or group of transgressions, and a higher repentance (teshuvah ila'ah) which is an uplifting of the entire personality, a total ennobling of one's direction in life. I would suggest that R. Akiva's sukkah, reminiscent of the flimsy desert structures, is linked to the lower form of repentance, and R. Eliezer's "clouds of glory" sukkah is linked to the higher form of repentance. And ultimately we need both forms!

If we turn to Maimonides' codification concerning repentance, we find a fascinating support for our hypothesis. Initially, Maimonides describes the penitent as having to experience a humbling process: "The path of repentance is for the penitent to cry out constantly before God with tears and beseeching. He gives charity according to his ability, distancing himself from what he did, and he changes his name as if to say that he is not the same person who committed these transgressions, transforming his deeds into righteous deeds. HE EXILES HIMSELF FROM HIS PLACE, because exile serves as a forgiveness for sin in that it causes a person to become more subdued, humble and subservient." [Laws of Repentance, Ch. 2, Hal. 4]

Here we see an implicit connection between the last step in the repentance process and the sukkah. Since no one understands the humbling experience better than a person who has fallen so low that he must leave his accustomed abode, that he no longer has a permanent roof over his head, the sukkah becomes in actuality the final step in Maimonides' vision of repentance. And the entire desert experience, with the Israelite wanderings from place to place, has served as the historical paradigm of Jewish exile, according to most biblical interpretations, with the sukkah standing out as the ultimate personalized symbol of this exile.

Exile is punishment as well as forgiveness, with the joy of the festival emanating from our relief in Divine absolution as well as in the fact that "we have endured for close to 2000 years, and the fragile sukkah has still not yet fallen in". [Yiddish folksong, "A Sukkeleh"]

Yet several chapters ahead Maimonides codifies a different kind of repentance, a state of perfection which places the penitent close to the Divine Presence: "Repentance is on the highest level because it brings a person close to the Divine Presence. Yesterday he was hated by God and alienated and abominable. But today he is beloved, delightful, close, a beloved friend." [Laws of Repentance Ch. 7, Hal. 6] A friend of God! What a startling idea.

But Maimonides codifies that it is possible, and represents the highest achievement of repentance. What do friends do? One way to express delight and closeness with a beloved friend is to invite him into your home. And in a sense, this is what happens on Sukkot. During Yom Kippur we were all in the presence of God - "lifnei Hashem" - like angels in heaven. But on Sukkot, which arrives only four days after Yom Kippur, our presence before God is extended by His making our home and His home the very same home. All through the months of Elul and Tishrei we add the 27th psalm to the prayer service , which includes the following verse: One thing have I desired of the Lord ...that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life... to see the sweetness of the Lord and to visit in His sanctuary." [Psalms 27:1]

Finally on Sukkot our desires are answered. In effect, God is the bridegroom, and we, the Jewish people, are the bride called upon to enter the bridegroom's home. The seven days we sit inside the sukkah correspond to the seven days that a marriage is celebrated . Since no 'Sheva Brachot' is complete without new faces at each of the seven festive meals, into our sukkah we also invite new faces for the duration of the seven days: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Joseph and David, and the custom is called "ushpizin.'

Perhaps we must first seek forgiveness for our individual transgressions and lovingly accept the exile of the sukkah of R. Akiva before we can enter the marriage chamber of the glorious sukkah of R. Eliezer. How fortunate are we that the one naturally turns into the other as we reach upwards in our relationship to the Divine.