“And ye shall keep it a feast unto HaShem seven days in the year; it is a statute for ever in your generations; ye shall keep it in the seventh month. Ye shall dwell in sukkot seven days; all that are home-born in Israel shall dwell in sukkot; that your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in sukkot, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am HaShem your G-d.”
Our sages disagree as to the meaning of the verse, “that your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in sukkot.” According to Rabbi Eliezer, the word sukkot refers to the Clouds of Glory with which God protected the Jews. Rabbi Akiva teaches that it refers to the actual booths that they lived in during their time in the wilderness.
The understood principle in all such disagreements is “these and these are the words of living Torah.”
