Sukkot is a holiday with a strong emphasis on Chinuch, properly educating the next generation of Jews. The Talmud tells a story that Shammai cut a hole above the bassinet of his infant grandson and placed kosher schach on the hole, so that the baby would be able to fulfill the mitzvah of dwelling in a Sukkah. Perhaps it’s due to the message of Sukkot: God’s ongoing protection- that we especially want to include children in the mitzvah of sukkah.
Halacha also pays special attention to the need, and mechanics, of educating children in the mitzvah of the 4 Minim. In Sukkah 46b, Reb Zeira insists that parents not give a child their lulav and etrog on the first day sukkot. For a child can acquire a gift, but cannot legally give a gift. On the first day of Sukkot there is a special obligation for the lulav and Etrog to be Lachem, yours. If parents give their child their set, the child will acquire it but then be unable to gift it back to the parents. There is an entire category of 4 Minim called “chinuch sets”. (Rav Moshe Feinstein is adamant that such sets be at least nominally Kosher, for we should only be educating our children with items that are kosher to be used.) Perhaps this special emphasis on chinuch by the 4 minim is due to the fact that we wave them in all four directions, indicating that Hashem is everywhere- a crucial lesson for our children.
Children learn what is important to their parents based on the praise that they receive. Rabbi Joseph Telushkin notes that today’s children most often receive the highest praise in one of four categories:
Academic/ intellectual achievement, Athletic abilities, Artistic attainment, or Physical appearance.
Everyone loves a compliment. But what about kids that don’t excel in any of the above? Usually the best compliment they will hear about themselves is that “S/he is a really GOOD kid.” This causes children to infer that being good is not a big deal. Rabbi Telushkin suggests that parents ask their children: What do you think I as your parent want you to be? Successful, good, smart or happy? (Many children do not pick Good)
It’s fine to compliment for other traits as well. But Good needs to be at the top of the list.
Germany perpetrated the Holocaust not due to a lack of smart people, but a lack of good people.
Examples of being good are things that everyone can do: 1) speaking out against a bully 2) befriending a new kid at school 3) finding a lost wallet or phone and working hard to locate the owner 4) offering one’s seat to an older person 5) treating siblings decently 6) not cheating on a test.
Save our highest praise for individual, one-to-one acts of goodness and integrity- and children will derive their self-esteem more from their goodness than from anything else.
On Sukkot we celebrate being successful, being smart and being happy. Being Successful: Sukkot celebrates the harvest, when the farmer feels a sense of security and satisfaction due to his full silos and the success of his efforts. Being smart: for an integral aspect of Sukkot is knowledge. The Torah says that we dwell in sukkot for 7 days
“In order that your [ensuing] generations should know that I had the children of Israel live in booths.”
Being happy: for sukkot is called Zman Simchateinu, the time of our rejoicing.
On Sukkot we celebrate being successful, being knowledgeable and being happy. But we can never lose sight of the importance of being GOOD. Goodness must be celebrated above all of the rest.
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