How Many Holidays Are During Sukkos?

I was privileged to present this material - in a much expanded way - for Torah In Motion on 4/30/2026

The class is available online https://torahinmotion.org/classes/parshat-emor-how-many-holidays-are-there-in-tishrei-the-strange-phenomenon-of-the-holiday

or on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XW_ZetzHvrw

If you choose to watch - I highly recommend speeding up the video to 1.5 or 1.75 speed 😇

Parshat Emor

by Rabbi Avi Billet 

The holiday we mostly call Sukkos is mentioned in the Torah five times. 

Shmos 23:16 – “And the holiday of the ingathering at the צאת (end/beginning) of the year, when you gather your doing from the field.” 

Shmos 34:22 – “And the holiday of ingathering at the תקופת (time) of the year.” 

[Many commentaries note that the words צאת and תקופת refer to a time of the year when the agricultural season comes to its conclusion, which is as the fields are closing up in advance of the winter, after the ingathering/harvest.]

In both of those cases, the Torah does not give a date, does not tell us how many days, and only mentions the concept of “ingathering” as it calls the festival “Chag HaAsif” – essentially the Jewish version of Thanksgiving.

In Bamidbar 29:12 we are given the date – 15th of the 7th month – we are told the holiday is a “Mikra Kodesh” (holy convocation), and we are told it is a 7 day celebration/holiday. We are given detailed specifics about the Korbanot (offerings) that are to be brought on those 7 days, and we are introduced in verse 35 to an 8th day called “Atzeres” which has its own set of Korbanos. 

Devarim 16:13 we are told that this holiday is called Chag HaSukkos, a 7 day day festival which takes place when you gather from your threshing floor and vat. We are given a special mitzvah to rejoice (16:14,15) as the 7-day celebration is moved specifically to the place where God will choose, which we later find out refers to Jerusalem. 

The Bamidbar passage is most interesting, because (as noted) it gives Korban-instruction for all the holidays. Rabbi Menachem Leibtag produced the following chart, which can be found on his website https://tanach.org/bamidbar/pin/pins2.htm in one of his classes on this holiday. 

For the moment we’ll note that the number of bulls (Par) brought for Rosh Chodesh and the first two festivals is 2, while the number of bulls brought on Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur and Shmini Atzeret is 1. The rams (Ayil) and sheep (Keves) are the same for ALL of the holidays, except the days of Sukkot, where they are respectively doubled – 2 rams, and 14 sheep. Most glaringly, the number of Par on Sukkot is much larger, though it decreases by one each day.  [This is a larger discussion beyond the scope of this essay.]

 Hold the thought, as we now look at the verses in Emor which discuss this holiday, in Vayikra Chapter 23. The chapter begins with an introduction in verses 2-3 telling us “these are the holidays,” while noting that there are 6 days of work, and a 7th day which is Shabbat Shabaton. [While this seems to refer to Shabbos, Vilna Gaon notes that it refers to the six days in which the Melakha for cooking is allowed on a holiday, while Yom Kippur is a day of total rest.] Then all the holidays are mentioned, seeming to come to a close with verses 37-38 which say “These are the holidays” and once again there is a reference to the rest days of Shabbos. Before the closure of that segment, in verses 34-36, we are told about the holiday of Sukkos “On the fifteenth day of this seventh month, is the Festival of Succoth, a seven day period to the Lord. 35 The first day is holy… 36 … the eighth day, it shall be a holy occasion for you.. It is Atzeret, You shall not perform any labor…” 

 The change from the Shemos passages is the name of the holiday, the number of days, and the concept of refraining from labor as well as the additional last day. We have already noted these elements above from the passages in Bamidbar 29 and Devarim 16 – in the latter source, a mitzvah of being joyous on the holiday was included.

 While verses 37-38 seem to bring this segment to its conclusion, the next word, the first word in verse 39, is אך, HOWEVER, followed by a whole new presentation of this holiday. “39 But on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you gather in the produce of the land, you shall celebrate the festival of the Lord (חג ה') for a seven day period; the first day shall be a rest day, and the eighth day shall be a rest day.” There is a reference to ingathering, a new name is given to the holiday (Chag Hashem), and the holiday is now described as a שבתון (rest day) rather than Mikra Kodesh (see 35-36, and Bamidbar 29). Then we are introduced to the mitzvah of the 4 Species which is to be taken on the 1st day (verse 40), which includes an instruction to rejoice (ושמחתם) for a seven day period. Verse 41 calls it a חג לה' - a festival to the Lord, for seven days in the year, while verse 42 introduces a Mitzvah familiar to all of us “For a seven day period you shall live in Sukkahs. Every resident among the Israelites shall live in Sukkahs.” Note, this is the only time the Sukkah is mentioned in all of the Torah in the context of this holiday – other than the name of the holiday used in Devarim 16 and earlier in this chapter. And finally, verse 43 explains why we are to dwell in Sukkahs, “in order that your [ensuing] generations should know that I had the children of Israel live in booths when I took them out of the land of Egypt. I am the Lord, your God.” 

 Let us explore 3 approaches to understanding what is going on with all these holiday-names and different instructions.

Rabbi Leibtag’s approach

Sukkos is a combination of the shared aspects of Rosh Chodesh, Pesach, and Shavuos – all of which have a historical connection to the Exodus, and the shared aspects of Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur and Shemini Atzeres – all of which carry elements of judgment associated with them. As a result the number of rams and sheep is a combination of both aspects, and therefore seems doubled, but is really the adding of 1+1 and 7+7. He argues that there should be 3 bulls each day (2+1), and that there is a larger significance to the additional bulls per day (10,9,8,7,6,5,4), which is beyond the scope of this essay. 

Rabbi Mordechai Breuer’s Approach

Sukkos has an agricultural aspect + a historical aspect. The Mitzvah of Simcha on the holiday only exists on account of the agricultural side of the Mitzvah, which is why Pesach, which is completely historical in nature – recalling the Exodus and all thoughts associated with Matzah – never has a Mitzvah of Simcha associated with it, while Shavuos, the holiday of the Harvest (חג הקציר) and first fruits (ביכורים) does have a mitzvah of Simcha. Quoting Abravanel on this chapter, he notes that the mitzvah of gathering the 4 Minim, only on the first day (ולקחתם לכם ביום הראשון) is a fulfillment of Chag HaAsif – the holiday of the ingathering, an agricultural observance of an agricultural celebration, which is associated most directly with joy. The Mitzvah of Sukkah, on the other hand, is historical in nature, as the verse notes that it is on account of dwelling in סכת (Sukkahs) when God took the Israelites out of Egypt.

 The historical nature of the holiday follows the historical element of Chag HaMatzos in two ways – one following events, and one a play words attached to a specific event. The Israelites left Egypt with dough on their backs, and then dwelled in booths during the course of their journeys. The play on words is that their first stop was in a place called Sukkos. Perhaps that is where they baked their dough and ate the matzah that came from the dough they took out of Egypt. 

 Noting the time gap of 6 months between the celebrations of these two 15th-of-the-month holidays (Chag HaMatzos = 15th of Nissan, Sukkos = 15th of Tishrei), Rav Breuer suggests that Chag HaMatzos is a celebration of the Exodus, while Sukkos is a celebration of the experience in the wilderness. The place Sukkos brought a certain conclusion to the Exodus component, while the journey from Sukkos to Eisam, which is “at the edge of the wilderness” – a journey defined by וה הולך לפניהם יומם... – and God accompanied them with clouds by day and fire by night – is the model of their survival in the Midbar, the wilderness. 

 Rashbam on 23:43 redefines the essence of the Sukkah: You make the Sukkah at the time of the ingathering, when your homes are filled with grain, wine, oil. You remember how you survived in the wilderness through God’s grace. And you are reminded that as God took care of you then, He continues to take care of you as you settle in the Land of Israel. You didn’t have homes in the wilderness. Now, when you are in the Land, and you have homes, you go to your Sukkah in celebration of the abundance you have. In other words, it IS an agricultural holiday, but it has a serious nod to the historical events which modeled your survival in the Land. [He suggests looking at the latter part of Devarim 7, which serves as a reminder of the Exodus and how God took care of the Israelites, and the first 16 verses of Devarim 8, which serves as a reminder that survival in the land is contingent on doing God’s will, and not letting any success in the land get to your head.] 

 In simple terms, Rav Breuer looks at the Sukkah – a feature of anyone watching over crops over the course of the growing season (in Israel, the summertime) and suggests that what the holiday of Sukkos is meant to do is take the universal/secular Sukkah and turn it into a Sukkah of Kedusha (holiness) – which is why the holiday is referred to as חג ה' – a holiday of Hashem, in Vayikra 23:39. 

 R Yoel Bin Nun’s Approach

Looking at all the evidence we’ve shared, he suggests there are actually 2 different holidays happening simultaneously. Chag HaAsif, like Shavuos, is a one-day agricultural holiday celebrating the ingathering. Chag HaSukkos is a 7-day historical celebration, mimicking, in a sense, the 7 days of Chag HaMatzos. [He believes that because of this there should be 6 Parim each day, thus the added numbers are 7,6,5,4,3,2,1 – this analysis is beyond the scope of this essay. Recall Rabbi Leibtag looked at this differently.] 

4 Minim are a mitzvah of Chag HaAsif. The Sukkah is a mitzvah of Chag HaSukkos. The holidays, as celebrated together at the same time, take on a new name of Chag Hashem.

 Nechemia chapter 8 tells a tale of the Israelites observing Rosh Hashana, and then reading a Torah for the first time in a long time, and discovering the holiday of Sukkos, which they proceed to observe through making Sukkahs in the Yerushalayim area out of “olive leaves, olive branches, hadasim, Lulavs, aravos.” 8:17 – “the returnees from the captivity made booths and dwelt in the booths, for they had not done so from the days of Yehoshua son of Nun until that day.” 

While this seems to suggest the holiday had NEVER BEEN OBSERVED, Rav BinNun suggests that what had been observed was Chag HaAsif in Yerushalayim, because the 1-day Mitzvah of the 4 Minim (per how the Torah presents it) could actually be extended in Yerushalayim because the 4 Minim were gathered all 7 days in the Mikdash, whereas Sukkos was observed (through the building of huts) in the rest of the country, but not Yerushalayim, which presumably was not an agricultural town, so there was no need for the huts Rav Breuer spoke about – secular huts which were turned holy in honor of the holiday. [This Nechemiah passage is obviously a much larger discussion…] 

 In conclusion, Sukkos, Chag HaAsif, Chag Hashem are not merely synonyms for one holiday. They are different names of different holidays/festivals/celebrations which all take place at the same time of year, and even on the same days. This explains why their presentation in the Torah comes in different ways, even with the 4 Minim only being mentioned once, and the Mitzvah to dwell in the Sukkah only being mentioned once. The Mitzvah of joy (Simcha) is associated with the holiday for different reasons – mostly agricultural – though the holiday itself has a very strong historical component born out by God’s role taking care of the people in the wilderness, and specifically in their first stop out of Egypt, in a place called Sukkos. 

 If we would appreciate this holiday, and all holidays, for their deeper significance, our relationship with the Almighty and our gratitude to Him would increase manifold. May we merit to see His protective hand on holidays and throughout the year.