Parshat Emor5 min read

The Stolen Lulav That Testified Before the King

A bandit returned a rug to buy a defender and met that defender as his accuser. So a stolen lulav (palm branch) testifies on Sukkot.

Curated by Arthur · Told by Maggid ·
Table of Contents
  1. The Crossroads and the Rug
  2. Take for Yourselves
  3. Fifteen Steps of Water and Song
  4. The Water Libation
  5. Woe to the False Defense
The Stolen Lulav That Testified Before the King Click for full size

The Crossroads and the Rug

A bandit waited at a crossroads and stripped a tax officer of everything he carried, including a fine rug. Months later the bandit sat in a cell. The same officer came to the bars with a deal that smelled like mercy. Return what you took, and I will speak for your acquittal before the king.

The bandit handed back the rug, the only item left. The officer coached him on exactly what to say in court. The next day the king asked whether anyone would defend the prisoner. He named the officer. The king summoned the man and asked what he knew.

The officer testified: this is the very bandit who robbed me on the road, and this rug is my witness against him. The room erupted. Woe to the man whose defender turned into his accuser. The rug that was meant to buy a voice became the voice that closed the case. Soft cloth, hard witness.

Take for Yourselves

That, said Rabbi Levi, is a stolen lulav. The Torah says "and you shall take for yourselves" the four species on Sukkot (the autumn festival of booths). The rabbis hear two demands in the small words. The lulav must be taken by each person, and it must be your own. Not merely borrowed. Never stolen.

You lift the branch on the festival to plead for a year of life, but the branch itself cries out before the Holy One: I am stolen, I am robbed. The angels echo the courtroom crowd. A mitzvah (a commandment) built on theft does not advocate for you. It testifies against you.

The joy of the festival cannot launder the taking. The hand that waves a stolen palm is already on trial inside the waving. "For yourselves" is not a small legalism. It is the difference between a defender and an accuser held in green leaves.

Fifteen Steps of Water and Song

In the Temple, fifteen steps rose between the Court of the Women and the Court of Israel, and on them the Levites stood with harps, lyres, and cymbals during the water-drawing celebrations of Sukkot. The joy was so great the sages said whoever had not seen it had not seen joy in his life. Water drawn from the Shiloah at night, brought up with torches and dance, poured on the altar at dawn.

That joy was public, costly, and clean. It did not require a stolen branch. It required feet on stone, voices in pitch, and water that belonged to the rite. The contrast is sharp on purpose. Festival joy without justice is the bandit's rug in another costume. The steps count upward while a stolen mitzvah counts downward in the ledgers of heaven.

Torches lit faces that had not taken what was not theirs. The music did not need a crossroads robbery to fund its instruments. Legitimate joy has its own economy.

The Water Libation

The water libation on the altar was itself a claim about who owns the year's rain. Israel poured water before God as if to say the skies answer a people who answer law. A stolen lulav (the palm branch) interrupts that conversation. You cannot ask for rain with a hand that took what was not yours and call the request pure.

The midrash's parable refuses to stay in the jail cell. It climbs the fifteen steps and stands under the torches. Every joyful mitzvah can become an accuser if its object was seized. The king in the story is not only a human court. The King of the universe hears the rug and the palm alike. Pour clean water. Wave a clean branch. Or do not pretend the altar will ignore the provenance of your props.

Woe to the False Defense

The bandit thought he had bought a voice. He had bought a witness for the prosecution. So a person who steals a lulav to fulfill Sukkot buys a prosecutor in green leaves. Better an empty hand and honest poverty than a full hand that will speak against you when the books of life are open.

When the festival ends and the branches dry, the story still stands at the crossroads. Return what is not yours before you ask heaven to speak for you. The officer's betrayal of the deal is not the midrash's cruelty. It is the midrash's clarity. What was taken remains able to talk.

On Sukkot the nation asks for rain, life, and a sealed good year. The midrash answers with a courtroom because requests are legal speech as much as liturgy. Bring clean objects to the plea. Bring a name that is yours. Otherwise the four species become four witnesses, and the joy on the fifteen steps will not cover the theft at the crossroads.

RepentanceCommandmentsDivine JusticeSukkot
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From the tradition

Sources

3 sources

The texts behind this telling. Some cards carry a translation of the source; others are our own retelling of it, and each card says which. Every card links out to the original.

Pesikta DeRav Kahana 27:6Pesikta de-Rav Kahana

Translation of the source text.Pesikta de Rav Kahana according to an Oxford manuscript, Dov Mandelbaum ed., N.Y. 1987 · CC-BY

"And you shall take" (Leviticus 23:40). Rabbi Hiyya taught: there must be a taking by each and every one of you. "For yourselves" (ibid.) means from what is your own, and not from what is stolen. Rabbi Levi said: to what may one who takes a stolen lulav be compared? To a bandit who sits at a crossroads and robs those who come and go. Once a legionary passed by, intending to collect the public tax of a certain province, and the bandit rose against him, robbed him, and took everything he had. After some days that bandit was caught and thrown into prison. The legionary heard of it and went to him, saying, "Stand and give me back everything that man robbed and took from you, and I will plead your case for acquittal." The bandit said to him, "Of everything that man robbed and took from you, he has nothing left except this rug, which is yours." The legionary said, "Give it to me, and I will plead for your acquittal before the king." He gave him the rug he had taken from him. The legionary said, "Tomorrow you will go out to judgment before the king. He will call you and say, 'Do you have anyone to plead your acquittal?' and you will say to him, 'There is a certain legionary,' and he will send and summon him, and I will plead your acquittal." The next day he went out to judgment. The king called him: "Do you have anyone to plead your acquittal?" He said, "A certain legionary." The king sent and summoned him and said, "What do you know that you can plead acquittal for this man?" He said, "I know that at the time you sent me to collect the public tax of a certain province, this man rose against me, ambushed me, robbed me, and took everything I had, and this very rug bears witness against him." Then all began to say, "Woe to this man, whose defender became his accuser." So too a person takes a lulav in order to gain merit through it; but if it was stolen, the lulav cries out before the Holy One, blessed be He, and says, "I am stolen, I am robbed," and the ministering angels say, "Woe to this man, whose defender became his accuser."

Full source
Sukkah 51b (via Hebraic Literature, 1901)Hebraic Literature (1901)

Retold in our words. Read the original at the link below.Project Gutenberg eBook #14368, Hebraic Literature · PD-US-pre-1929

There were fifteen steps in the Temple that led down from the Court of Israel to the Court of the Women. The rabbis said they matched the fifteen Shir HaMa’alot, the Songs of Ascent, in the Psalms (Psalms 120-134). On these steps the Levites stood and sang.

The rabbis declared: whoever has not seen the joy of the annual Simchat Beit HaShoeivah, the ceremony of water-drawing on Sukkot, has not seen rejoicing in his life.

At the conclusion of the first day of the Feast of Tabernacles, priests and Levites descended to the Court of the Women, where great preparations were made. Double galleries were erected, the upper for women, the lower for men, so that the sexes could rejoice without mingling. Golden candelabra towered above the court, tall as sycamores, with four bowls at the top. Young priests climbed ladders with pitchers of oil. When the lamps were lit, there was no courtyard in Jerusalem that did not glow with their light.

The Levites sang, and the sages danced with burning torches in their hands, and the flutes played until the dawn.

The rabbis said joy like that needs witnesses. It could not be remembered — only seen.

Full source
Ta'anit 25bTalmud Bavli, Ta'anit

Translation of the source text.William Davidson Edition - Vocalized Aramaic · CC-BY-NC

Rabbi Elazar said: When they pour the water libation on the Festival, one deep says to the other: Let your waters flow forth, for I hear the sound of two companions. As it is said: "Deep calls to deep at the sound of Your channels" (Psalms 42:8).

Rabba said: I myself saw this angel of the rain. It resembles a calf, and its lips are parted, and it stands between the lower deep and the upper deep. To the upper deep it says: Pour down your waters. To the lower deep it says: Let your waters flow forth, as it is said: "The blossoms have appeared in the land" (Song of Songs 2:12).

Full source