What the Sukkah Teaches Us About Grief and Possibility

October 2025 | Cheshvan 5786

As I put the finishing touches on my sukkah this year, the temporary walls around me feel more fragile than ever. Tomorrow marks two years. Two years since that October morning when we woke to unimaginable horror. Two years since the lives of more than 1200 Israelis were torn away in an act of devastating violence. Seven hundred and thirty days of grief, anguish, fear, heartbreak, and horror. Seven hundred thirty days of horror for so many people, including the twenty hostages believed to still be held alive in Gaza and 47 hostage families still waiting for their beloved family members to be returned to them.

On the eve of this second yartzheit of that terrible day, as I have on so many days of the last 2 years, I am feeling acutely the pain and devastation of the destruction of tens of thousands of Palestinian lives. Our tradition reminds us that every single human life is itself a sacred universe. Every one. Each beloved human life, each person and their sacred tapestry of relationships, dreams, and possibilities now extinguished. The pain of looking squarely at the scale of the loss and heartbreak can be too much to bear.

The sukkah teaches us about impermanence, both as warning and as hope. Our ancestors understood that the structures we build, the securities we assume, the systems we inhabit are all more temporary than they appear. Like my ancestor Abraham Isaac de Jessurun, who fled Portugal in 1592, himself descended from generations who kept the flame of Jewish identity alive in secret under the Inquisition's brutality, our forebears knew that what marks us as other can exclude us from belonging, but can also become a passage to safety. They navigated the fluidity of exile and rebuilding, of devastating loss and a stubborn insistence on believing something better was possible.

Could Abraham have imagined that the Inquisition would one day be relegated to history? I don't know. But reflecting on how much the world has changed in the years between his life and mine reminds me of the critical truth that sustains my own flame of hope: even the most oppressive and violent systems are built by humans, which means we also have the power to dismantle them.

So sitting here now, I find myself thinking not only about the fragility of what we cherish, but also about the impermanence of what feels insurmountable. The same spiritual wisdom that reminds us not to take our safety for granted also tells us that the brokenness we witness is not fixed, that the cycles of violence and dehumanization that feel so entrenched are also temporary structures.

This is where I find myself reaching beyond the overwhelming sense that everything is irreparably broken, beyond the forces arrayed against us that can feel insurmountable. In the same way that our harvest festival acknowledges both abundance and scarcity — celebrating what has grown while recognizing our dependence on forces beyond our control — we can hold both the devastating losses of these years and the audacious belief that transformation remains possible.

What have we gleaned from these years of heartbreak? I think of those in our communities who have refused to let their own pain close them off from the pain of others, who somehow resist the very human tendency to allow trauma to unmoor us from the anchor of our shared humanity. Like my grandfather, Claude Baxter, who maintained empathy and curiosity even after a childhood of dehumanization and exile from Nazi Germany; they keep a spark of possibility burning when despair threatens to overwhelm.

The temporary dwelling of the sukkah invites us to remember that we are all more vulnerable than we like to admit, and all more resilient than we often realize. In this fragile structure, we practice what it means to create sacred space even when we cannot guarantee protection from the elements. We practice choosing life, possibility, healing, empathy, and curiosity in the face of overwhelming dehumanization.

Today, as we mark this anniversary, we hold the sacred weight of every life lost. Israeli and Palestinian, each one irreplaceable, each leaving behind beloved people in devastation and grief. We stand on the shoulders of our ancestors who have persisted in their belief that a different world is possible.

The sukkah will come down in a few days, as it should. But our work continues on, fueled by small daily invitations to practice transformation in our communities and movements. The work of building the power necessary to create lasting change cannot wait for perfect conditions.

However grief finds us today, my hope is that we remember the teaching of impermanence not as cause for despair, but as an invitation to audacious hope. One day, may the darkness of this time feel like as distant a memory as our ancestors' whispered blessings over tiny flames in shuttered kitchens. May we find the courage to believe that the structures of violence that feel so fixed are no more permanent than these temporary dwellings. And may we each find within ourselves the fuel to keep the spark of possibility alive, committing ourselves to the patient work of constructing something more just and more whole.

In solidarity and hope,

Joanna Ware
Executive Director
Jewish Liberation Fund