Who Is In the Center of the Circle?
Hakafot are a central part of Sukkot and the one custom we observe on both Sukkot and Simchat Torah.[1] What is the significance of this practice?
Sukkot — Torah in The Middle
Our hakafot commemorate those done in the Beit Mikdash around the Mizbei’ech (upon which they sacrificed korbanot).[2] In their place, we encircle the Sefer Torah on the bimah in shul.[3] Encircling the Sefer Torah on the bimah reflects the centrality of Torah and Torah learning to Jewish life.[4]
Simchat Torah
On Simchat Torah, the Torah moves to the periphery of the circle and becomes part of the actual hakafot and dancing. This begs the question: With the Torah no longer at the circle’s center, what is?
There are two answers to this question.
Celebrating Our Relationship With Hashem
The first answer is that Hashem is (symbolically) in the middle of the circle. The gemara[5] tells us that in the future, Hashem will arrange a circle of tzaddikim in Gan Eden who dance around Him, point to Him in the middle, and proclaim: “Hinei Elokeinu zeh, kivinu lo v’yoshi’einu — This is our G-d, we yearned for him and he saved us.”[6]
Our Simchat Torah hakafot may be a similar celebration of Hashem’s presence at the center of our lives.[7] This explains why we use the same “Hinei Elokeinu” pasuk to introduce the hakafot.[8]
We celebrate Sukkot through the fulfillment of many mitzvot. Once we transition to Shemini Atzeret, we no longer have these mitzvot to fulfill. Instead of the sukkah, the four minim, and the Simchat Beit Hashoei’vah, we focus our celebration on the inherent simchah of our relationship with Hashem, whose presence in the center of the circle symbolizes His centrality in our lives.
The Yehi Ratzon we say before the hakafot also presents the hakafot as strengthening our relationship with Hashem. The prayer asks Hashem to allow the hakafot (which symbolize the circuits that toppled the walls of Yericho[9]) to remove the iron wall[10] between Him and us and help us connect with Him and His Torah.
According to this first approach, the Torah our hakafot focus upon during Sukkot moves to the periphery on Simchat Torah because we now focus directly on our relationship with Hashem. After circling the Torah during Sukkot, on Simchat Torah, we take it in hand and, together with it, celebrate the relationship with Hashem it facilitates.
The Children — Our Future
A second answer to the question is that the circle focuses on our children. The Rashba[11] mentions a custom to adorn the children with the silver crowns generally used for the Sifrei Torah and to put the children where we usually place the Sifrei Torah.
Linking our Torah and Torah simchah to our children celebrates having children we can teach Torah to and reminds us to pass the Torah on to future generations.
By dancing with and around our children, we pray that they too will live by and pass the Torah on to their children — a hope we express in our daily Birkat HaTorah:
ונהיה אנחנו וצאצאינו וצאצאי אבותינו וצאצאי עמך בית ישראל
כולנו יודעי שמך ולומדי תורתך לשמה
(May we, our descendants, the descendants of our ancestors, and the descendants of your people, the house of Yisrael, all know Your name and learn Your Torah for its sake).
The Torah reading for Simchat Torah includes the pasuk “Torah tzivah lanu Moshe, morasha kehilat Yaakov.”[12] This pasuk, the first we teach our children as soon as they come of age,[13] defines the Torah as our eternal communal inheritance that we perpetuate from generation to generation.[14]
The Man from Vilna
The Jewish people have had highs and lows, including moments when our future seemed bleak. Our focus on our children and raising them according to Torah values ensured our continued survival and success.
We recently experienced such a moment during and after the Holocaust. A beautiful story immortalized by a popular song powerfully expresses this idea:
...I remember liberation, joy, and fear both intertwined:
Where to go and what to do, and how to leave the pain behind.
My heart said, "Go to Vilna." Dare I pray yet once again
For the chance to find a loved one or perhaps a childhood friend?
It took many months to get there, from the late spring to the fall,
and like I, many others, close to four hundred in all,
and slowly, there was healing, broken souls now mixed with light.
When someone proudly cried out, "Simchas Torah is tonight!"
We ran as one toward the shul, our spirits in a trace,
and we tore apart the barricade — in defiance, we would dance,
but the scene before our eyes shook us to the core
scraps of siddur, bullet holes, bloodstains on the floor
Turning to the eastern wall, we looked on in despair
There would be no scrolls to dance with — the holy ark was bare
Then we heard two children crying, a boy and girl whom no one knew
and we realized that no children were among us but those two
We danced round and round in circles
as if the world had done no wrong
from evening until morning
filling up the shul with song.
Though we had no Sifrei Torah
to clutch and hold up high,
in their place, we held those children
Am Yisrael Chai
.....the Jewish People WILL live on.....
(The Man From Vilna, Journeys)
Let’s use Simchat Torah to ensure that we appreciate the great gift of our children, our responsibility to help them appreciate the beauty of our Torah and the great zechut of passing it on to their own children in the future.
[1] See Rema (Orach Chayim 569:1), who links the hakafot of Simchat Torah to those of Sukkot and may imply a thematic relationship (והכל משום שמחה).
[2] Mishnah Sukkah 4:5. See Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chayim 560:1) who connects our hakafot to the hakafot of the Mikdash.
[3] See Shulchan Aruch (ibid.) who mentions the custom to include a Sefer Torah.
[4] It is noteworthy that, as opposed to the chazan’s amud, which is placed in the front of the shul, the bimah is in the shul’s center. This reflects the supreme importance of Torah and Torah learning (even more than that of tefillah).
[5] Talmud Bavli, Masechet Taanit 31a.
[6] Sefer Yeshayahu 25:8.
[7] We find a paradigm for dancing with the Torah being considered as dancing before Hashem in David HaMelech, who, when dancing in front of the Aron Hakodesh, is described as dancing before Hashem (Shmuel II 6:16). See Mishneh Berurah (669:11) who quotes this as the basis for the Simchat Torah hakafot.
[8] See Shir Hashirim 1:31, which connects the celebration of Hashem’s salvation (described at the end of the pasuk) to a celebration of our relationship with Hashem Himself.
[9] See Yerushalmi Sukkah 19a.
[10] Based on Yechezkel 4:3 and the Talmud Bavli, Berachot 32b.
[11] Responsa (Meyuchasot l’Ramban) 260.
[12] Sefer Devarim 33:4.
[13] Talmud Bavli, Sukkah 42a.
[14] See Ramban on the pasuk, who explains that the pasuk promises that the Torah will never be forgotten by the children of the Jewish people.
