Manufacturers help families mark festival

Prefab Sukkahs help preserve a centuries-old Sukkot tradition.
WASHINGTON POST
Jews wandering in the desert after their escape from Egypt fashioned primitive shelters using branches, grasses and scraps of fabric.
Their ordeal begat Sukkot, the weeklong festival that started Friday at sundown and is, thousands of years later, still celebrated inside temporary habitats.
But modern life begat modern problems for the faithful: too little time or not enough skill to erect such structures.
This, in turn, begat entrepreneurs who devised kits so worshippers could assemble their seasonal refuges, called sukkahs, quickly and easily.
Mail-order sukkahs are among those put up to mark the holiday that comes four days after Yom Kippur, the solemn Day of Atonement that ended at sundown Monday. Within the sukkah walls, observant Jews pray, take their meals and sleep. Beneath its roof, left partially open to the elements, they are at once protected from the sun, exposed to rain and able to gaze up at the star-filled heavens.
"On Sukkot, we think about happiness," said Rabbi Stephen Baars, of the Aish Hatorah Study Center in Bethesda, Md. "So one of the keys of happiness is that you can only take into the sukkah what is important to you. You can't take your BMW, your computer. What can you take in? Friends, family. It focuses you for a whole week."
Symbolism
The structure is meant to symbolize both the sheltering embrace of the Almighty and the flimsy, temporary dwellings God instructed the Jews to build for protection from weather and wildlife as they wandered the desert after escaping from Egypt some 3,500 years ago, Baars said. The sukkah's very impermanence is meant to teach that real security comes from faith in God.
The holiday, also called the Feast of the Tabernacles, roughly coincides with the end of the harvest season, and sukkahs are usually bedecked with fruit and vegetables. All or parts of the structures are saved from year to year, as is the decorative plastic produce, used in place of real fruit and vegetables so as not to attract bees, deer or other of God's uninvited creatures.
There are no statistics on how many of the estimated 5 million to 6 million Jews in this country construct their own sukkahs. These days synagogues often provide large versions for their congregations. But many families prefer to celebrate at home.
How one family celebrates
"We hang things in there like fun artwork by the kids, fake fruit, purple lights and bee traps. You definitely need bee traps," said Diane Mandell Horwitz, whose husband, Alex, a teacher, and children Ari, Alex and Ellie Mandell, work on it together in the days immediately following Yom Kippur.
Four years ago, Horwitz surfed the Internet and spent about $75 for bright yellow canvas "walls" that the family pulls out of storage each year. Each of the three walls is printed with Hebrew prayers and attaches to the deck of the family's Fairfax, Va., home; the existing overhead latticework serves as the sukkah roof and is covered with fresh greenery.
"You have to schlep everything outside, and it's kind of a pain in the neck. But then you are out there and dinner takes two hours instead of 10 minutes. It makes you take time out of your life. We have many meals there, the kids do their homework there. We actually try to sleep in it. And yes, it has gotten cold and wet," said Horwitz, noting that an outdoor outlet powers the sukkah's lights.
Growing reflective, she added, "The really cool thing is the spiritual part. You are supposed to be able to see the stars, and there you are with your family and you have everything around you that is important. It's very beautiful."
Prefabricated kits
Sukkah kits are growing in popularity, say those who market them.
The Sukkah Center in Brooklyn has been assembling kits for more than 30 years. "People are becoming more observant, and even those who aren't want to be a part of it for the big holidays," said manager Mendel Sufrin -- (800) 227-7852; www.sukkah.com.
His sukkahs range from a two-person travel model that folds up to fit in a car trunk ($225) to 12-by-28-footers that accommodate more than 30 people ($1,750). The kits -- with canvas or modular fiberglass walls -- meet all requirements of Jewish law; the roof mats -- which must be organic, not manufactured -- are certified kosher, he said.
Sufrin said, "Now you can get a pop-up sukkah that is like a collapsible, mobile laundry basket. You kind of throw it in the air and it self-erects."
In 1990, psychologist and woodworker Steve Henry Herman founded the Sukkah Project in Durham, N.C., to make what he calls "klutz-proof" kits at the request of his rabbi.
"We started taking orders. For a number of years, they were wood and real basic. We'd send the plans and the metal connectors and tell people what they needed at the lumberyard," said Herman.
"Then they wanted bigger ones, smaller ones. Now we have 20 different models. Most are still wood frames, but we added a line made of metal pipe and we send the fittings."
"For about $100, anyone can have a nice, big sukkah," said Herman, (919) 489-7325; www.sukkot.com.