Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah: Why the Number Eight Is Beyond Nature | Rabbi Yosef Benyaminov

Simchat Torah is such an incredible holiday. It's really part of Shemini Atzeret. What is Shemini Atzeret and what is Simchat Torah? And why is it celebrated together? You see, Shemini means number eight, that Atzeret of the number eight. What is number eight? Number eight has very deep spiritual significance to all Jewish people. We know that Hanukkah is celebrated on throughout the eight days. We know the boy gets circumcised on the eighth day. So, what is this number eight? What does it resemble? Maral writes an incredible thing. He writes that seven is a number that belongs to this world. There's seven days of the week. There's seven colors in in a rainbow, Roy G Biv. There's seven musical notes. Cuz this world is is bound by number seven. But, eight is one above this world, which means it belongs to the realm of spiritual, it's beyond and above this world. So, eight always represents a miracle. Like, the boy gets a bris milah because that connects him to Olam Haba. Once he gets the first mitzvah, he has Olam Haba. Eight, we all know Hanukkah is because the the the little jar that lasts for eight days, that was a miracle in itself. What about Shemini Atzeret? Why is that the eighth day? Because our sages tell us Hashem says, "I want to stay with you to be with you one more day." Right? It's a day that we spend with Hashem. It's not related to Sukkot at all. Shemini Atzeret is a separate holiday. Hashem says to to to the Jewish people, "You came now to the Bet Hamikdash." Remember, we all had to go for Pesach, Shavuot, Sukkot, Shlosh Regalim to visit Hashem, so to say, in Yerushalayim. And Hashem said, "You know what? Stay one more day. Sukkot is the last holiday until long time from now, going to be Pesach, another six months, right? And it's going to be a long, dark, cold winter. Stay one more day." And that's the holiday where we spend with Hashem like connected to him on this on a very deep level. But that's what number eight is. As I say, just saw that Shavuot was number eight. Meaning, we have to count 50 days from Pesach, which is 7 * 7. The seventh week, the eighth day, the 50 days is the eighth day of that last week of seven. So, the sages took that concept of Shavuot and they brought it to over here to Shemini Atzeret to say we celebrate uh the completion of Torah on this day because that's the beginning of Shavuot and Shemini Atzeret is the completion. And that's what makes this holiday, Shemini Atzeret, so beautiful is because we're celebrating the oneness. This is a miracle that Jewish people lasted so many centuries together with Hashem and this Torah.