Simchas Beis HaSho’eivah: Joy in the process
Have you ever had a nagging feeling that you just want to move on to the next stage? In grade school you cannot wait to get to high school. In high school you are already dreaming of Israel. Once you are in Israel, you want to start college. In college, you cannot wait to finish and move on. Then it is marriage, then children, then waiting for the children to grow up, and so on.
Life begins to feel like a race from one milestone to the next, always climbing but never arriving. The finish line keeps moving forward. And the question is: can we learn to find joy not only in the destination, but in the process itself?
This question is at the very heart of Sukkot. In the Beis HaMikdash there was a unique Avodah known as Nisuch Ha’Mayim, the water libation. Each day water was drawn, placed into a golden vessel, and poured on the Mizbeach. Yet astonishingly, the drawing of the water, not the pouring, became the catalyst for one of the greatest celebrations in all of Jewish life. Simchas Beis HaSho’eivah was marked by music, dancing, and even the greatest sages juggling fire before the people.
The Mishnah makes a striking claim: Mi Shelo Ra’ah Simchas Beis Hasho’eivah, Lo Ra’ah Simchah Mi-Yamav. One who never witnessed this celebration has never experienced true joy in their life. Think about that. Never experienced joy. What could possibly make this celebration so unique, so surpassing all others?
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An even deeper question sharpens the mystery. The Mishnah refers to the entire celebration by the name Chalil, the flute. But the flute was only one instrument among many. Harps, lyres, and cymbals all played their part. Why did the flute alone give its name to the Simchah?
The Rambam and the Bartenura explain that the flute was a piercing instrument, able to rise above the softer sounds like the harp. It was, in a sense, the leading voice of the orchestra. But why should the flute, of all instruments, symbolize the essence of the joy?
The answer lies in the very walls of the sukkah itself. Rashi tells us that the Schach must be made from Psoles Goren V’yekev, the byproducts of the threshing floor and the winepress: straw, branches, and chaff.
Why would the Torah command us to cover the Sukkah not with the polished fruits of our harvest, but with the seemingly worthless leftovers? To teach us a profound truth: what looks like Psoles is not waste at all. The in-between stages, the discarded fragments, the “means” that appear to serve only the “end” are in truth the very building blocks of holiness.
This is the secret of the Simchas Beis HaSho’eivah. The water was not yet poured. The Avodah was not yet complete. And yet it was specifically in the preparation, in the process, that the joy reached its highest pitch. Chazal are teaching us: if you only feel Simchah at the finish line, if you wait until the goal is reached to rejoice, then you have never truly experienced joy at all.
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Life is not made up only of weddings and diplomas, new homes and milestones. Life is drawing water. Life is the pink slips and the setbacks, the countless steps, the small preparations, the ordinary days that feel like they are just on the way to something greater. The Schach above our heads reminds us that the Psoles is not garbage. It is the very material from which Simchah and kedushah are woven.
Rav Hutner explained that this is why the flute became the symbol of the celebration. Breathing out seems wasted. Inhaling gives life, but exhaling appears to serve no purpose except to prepare for the next breath. Yet the flute takes the exhale, the seemingly empty breath, and turns it into music. The Chalil transforms what looks useless into song.
So too with our lives. The moments we dismiss as meaningless, the efforts that feel small, the endless days that look like Psoles, all of these can become music when sanctified in the service of Hashem.
There is a powerful story from early Jewish immigrants in America. A Jew would find work, but every Friday, when he explained that he could not come in on Shabbos, he was fired. By Sukkot, his home was filled with pink slips. Instead of despair, he took those slips and hung them as decorations in his Sukkah as noy Sukkah. He understood that the challenges of keeping Shabbos, the “waste” of being fired again and again, were not wasted at all. They were his Schach, the very crown of his Sukkah, transformed into holiness and joy.
This is the essence of Simchas Beis HaSho’eivah: to recognize that every breath, every effort, every step of the process is not wasted but sanctified. To hear the music in the Chalil, to see the holiness in the Schach, to find joy in the very act of drawing water.
As the Navi promises: U’she’avtem Mayim B’sason Mi’ma’aynei Ha’Yeshua. You shall draw water with joy from the wells of salvation. May we merit not to live our lives waiting for the next stage, but to rejoice in each stage, to embrace every process as holy, and to discover Simchah not only at the end, but in every step along the way. When we wait to live, we are in truth only living to wait. On Sukkot we rejoice in living fully, right here and right now.
Rabbi Benny Berlin is spiritual leader of BACH Jewish Center in Long Beach.
Write: Columnist@TheJewishStar.com
