Four Species, Many Meanings

Midrash and the Rabbinic Imagination--A Working Description

• A feature in the text draws the careful reader’s attention--Reading the Torah as if it is a love letter.
• An idea of religious and human concern animates the rabbinic imagination and is in search of a canonical home.
• Midrash is the space where the text and the idea meet in the middle, expanding the canon in the process.

Rabbi Ethan Tucker, “Filling Gaps and Fulfilling Visions: Midrash and the Rabbinic Imagination” https://youtu.be/9xcJ8GQj3Ng

At face value, these verses point towards our awareness of God’s power in bringing rain and fertility in the coming year. But on an experiential level, this midrash suggests a more audacious posture, where we do nothing less than hold God in our hands. The possibility of God’s presence being in this world depends on our willingness and ability to do the delicate work of grasping for the divine.

Rabbi Aviva Richman, Holding and Being Held: A Theology of Sukkot and Shemini Atzeret https://www.hadar.org/torah-resource/holding-and-being-held

It's not clear that what is being named here are particularly positive aspects of our ancestors. Certainly the verse here about Sarah being old comes at a difficult moment for her in the Torah when she laughs, and then it seems like she's rebuked for laughing. We are trying to step into our lineage and accepting it what it is. Not making a rosy picture but naming these different experiences of our ancestors. About Avraham and Sarah and the idea of old age being beautiful. There's a discussion of whether a dry or old lulav, or etrog can count for the mitzvot and and while it seems like technically, they shouldn't count, especially the etrog that we think of as young, fresh and beautiful, here is being associated with the beauty, glory and dignity of old age. There is actually a minority opinion within the tradition that may be a dried lulav or etrog could be kosher. This should make us probe our notions of what we consider to be beautiful. It could mean that the wrinkles of old age are actually being named as something that is beautiful and worthy of honor and dignity. So, as we shake our 4 minim, especially this Pri Eitz Hadar, and we try to bring together this agricultural image of the fresh new harvest but this midrash pushes back on that a bit and makes us linger with the idea that old age might be particularly beautiful or glorified. Minimally, we should pause and think about what we consider to be beautiful, and let ourselves notice beauty dignity, where we might overlook it.

Rabbi Aviva Richman, Simchah in the Sukkah, part 2, October 7, 2020. https://www.facebook.com/HadarInstitute/videos/377742050072053 (my notes SMZ)

Based on Netivot Shalom, vol. 2, pgs. 203-206

A different medrash provides a variation on the unity theme. Each of the four species, it notes, has a different complement of qualities. When taken together, one compensates for what the next lacks. We can view this as a guide to life’s challenges. Maharal teaches[Chidushei Aggados, Bava Kamma 30A] that wholeness and perfection comes in three varieties. True perfection comes only if we are perfect in our relationship to Hashem, to others, and to ourselves. Like the Four Minim, life provides situations that have taam v’rei’ach – taste and aroma, while others have one or the other. Some situations have neither.

This holds true for each of the areas of perfection. At times, Hashem makes His presence and closeness felt, and we sense the richness in serving Him. At other times, He withholds part of the experience, as if we could detect the taam but not the rei’ach, or the opposite. There are also times when we feel nothing, making it much harder on us. Our job, however, is to serve Him as the absolute King, regardless of how He presents Himself to us. Like the eved Ivri – the indentured servant of Exodus 21 – we are to work day and night, i.e. whether He illuminates our lives, or leaves us in the dark.

Our relationships with others are governed by the same diversity. Some people appeal to us in all aspects, while others offer at least some likeable characteristics. Still others do not excite us in any way at all. Nonetheless, we are instructed by the Torah to practice ahavas Yisrael to all Jews, regardless of how they strike us.

Similarly, we face mood changes that threaten the way we relate to ourselves. At the extreme, some people are subject to so many stresses and psychic changes, that peace and tranquility are distant and elusive goals. They become fundamentally dissatisfied with themselves. Here too, accepting the malchus of Hashem in its fullness demands that we not slip into moroseness and lethargy, but rise above our natural feelings. We must remain satisfied with our selves, confident that everything Hashem sends our way serves His purpose. He made us who we are, where we are, and what we must deal with. This allows us to bear all burdens with joy and love.

The message of the Four Minim – the lesson that this mitzvah was designed to impart to our neshamos – is that all four types and situations require the same response from us. Some may be more difficult or more attractive for us than others, but we are required nonetheless to remain steadfast and consistent in our pursuit of perfection in all our relationships, whether to Hashem, to others, or to ourselves. From the diversity of qualities in the four species, we arrive at a point of uniformity.

Text Copyright © 2009 by Rabbi Yitzchok Adlerstein and Torah.org https://torah.org/torah-portion/nesivosshalom-takingthelulav

The vibrant and dynamic four species that quickly dry out and wither represent our bodies, in our strength and frailty, as we hope for life in the coming year. The mitzvah is to hold these distinct species together, a sign of the energy and intention it requires to hold the disparate parts of ourselves together. It is as if we will simply fall apart if we are not being held together.
Our hands holding what is essentially an effigy of ourselves remind us of the the importance of those hands, human and divine, that constantly hold us together. We could interpret this holding in a physical way, but also in terms of our sense of dignity, identity and self. Actualizing a reality of human dignity takes a lot of maintenance and investment, nothing less than a constant act of being held.

Rabbi Aviva Richman, Holding and Being Held: A Theology of Sukkot and Shemini Atzeret https://www.hadar.org/torah-resource/holding-and-being-held

"It was by no means predetermined that the etrog was to become the peri ‘eṣ hadar of Leviticus 23:40... Yet, despite the many possible interpretations, the etrog won out, and has come to be cherished in antiquity and today as the most beautiful and important Jewish fruit. Perhaps, in the twenty-first century in which we live, with its globalism, mass migrations, and melting-pot ethos, the fruit should be conceived of as “beautiful” (hadar) for the successful journey it has made. In many ways, there is nothing more beautiful than a migrant who has been able to leave behind the pressures of his or her youth to find a new homeland in which he or she is loved, honored, and esteemed."

David Z. Moster, Etrog: How A Chinese Fruit Became a Jewish Symbol

Bringing these species together, then, reminds of the long, arduous, and blessed route to Israel— wandering, liminality, possession, and finally rootedness. Rabbi Matthew Berkowitz, "An Environmental Journey" https://www.jtsa.edu/torah/an-environmental-journey/

In truth, the four species uniquely and specifically represent water, in a manner that bears uncontestable evidence to our ancestors' intimate familiarity with the native flora and ecology of Israel.

The willow (Salix species), as already mentioned, is one of the plant world's finest symbols of water. Described by the Torah as "willows of the brook," the Talmud even questions whether willows that have not grown along water are permissible for use in the ritual....The willows, in general, are water-loving plants that can grow in habitats too wet for other species to survive. In the ritual of the four species they present themselves as advocates for an abundance of rain.
The lulav is the as yet unopened date palm frond, or leaf. The palm (Phoenix dactylifera) is a sign not merely of the desert but specifically of the oasis in the desert, the island of water in a sea of sand. Where the date is found, water cannot be far away....
The natural habitat of the myrtle (Myrtus communis) is the hilly and mountainous areas of Israel in general but, more specifically, "the riverine thickets" according to Michael Zohary and the "slopes of stream banks" on "Israel's mountains and hils" as described by Nogah Hareuveni. The Bible takes for granted the myrtle's hydrophilic characteristic and utilizes the myrtle as a metaphor for an abundance of water [as in Isaiah 41]....
The citron (Citrus medica), too, is a symbol of water. Although not a native, it was the first tree of the citrus family (which includes lemons, oranges and grapefruits) introduced into Israel.... The citrus family as a whole demands heavy irrigation and the citron, being the first of the citrus in Israel, undoubtedly quickly earned the reputation of being a lover of water.
[The citron] represented the hopes for rain mainly on the cultivated plains.
The four species, then, symbolize water in the diverse ecological habitats of Israel: the desert wilderness, the mountains and hills, the cultivated plains, and the river valleys. They are part of a stimulating and thought-provoking ritual of thanking God for the previous year's rain and, at the same time, serves to direct and concentrate man's prayers for the rains to come.

Arthur Schaffer, "The Agricultural and Ecological Symbolism of the Four Species of Sukkot" Tradition, 20(2), Summer 1982 https://www.agri.gov.il/download/files/my%20four%20species_1.pdf