This Sukkot (and all year), teach your children the mitzvah called hachnasat orchim, hospitality, which teaches us to honor our guests.
According to the teachings of the Talmud, we are required to:
*Greet guests at the door and escort them inside.
* Make an offer to remain cheerful during the visit.
* Ask our guests questions about their interests and activities.
* Escort them to the door when they leave.
On Sukkot we perform a short ceremony to welcome the ushpizin (Aramaic for “guests”). The full text for the invitation includes prayers that our fulfillment of the mitzvah of
Sukkah will be worthy of Divine favor, it is printed in a full daily/festival Siddur (prayer book).
Then, on the first day we say, “I invite to my meal the exalted guests, Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Aaron, and David. May it please you, Abraham, my exalted
guest, that all the other exalted guests’ dwell with me and with you – Isaac, Jacob,
Joseph, Moses, Aaron, and David.”
On each day, a different one of the seven is singled out, in order. Recently, it has
become popular in some circles to invite matriarchs and other important women of
Israel – Sarah, Rachel, Rebecca, Leah, Miriam, Abigail, and Esther – either paired with the
men or on their own.
- Abraham and Sarah represent hospitality, love and kindness
- Isaac and Rebecca represent restraint and personal strength
- Jacob and Rachel represent beauty and truth
- Moses represents eternity and dominance through Torah, Leah represents binah – understanding
- Aaron and Miriam represent empathy and receptivity to divine splendor
- Joseph and Devorah represent holiness and the spiritual foundation
- David and Esther represent the establishment of the kingdom of Heaven on Earth
“When we act in ways that manifest one of these spiritual attributes, the divine light
shines down into the world and brings it closer to its completion” (Derech Hashem 4:2:2,5).
Moadim Lesimcha, Morah Miriam.
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