Reparation, forgiveness, and redemption in a Sukkoth parable: Movie review of Ushpizin

Abstract

The Israeli film, Ushpizin (2004), has met with local and international critical acclaim. Despite its ultra-Judaic content, it remains popular with a wide audience. The story of an impoverished Hasidic couple who achieve their dreams as a result of Divine intervention (or a random directorial plot twist) captures the emotions of its viewers, irrespective of their religious leanings. The tale revolves around Jewish, Hassidic, and Kabbalistic symbols of Sukkoth (the Feast of Tabernacles), the Biblically inspired fall harvest festival. The unique rituals of the holiday, especially the custom of hosting ushpizin (honored guests), are used to subtly, yet powerfully, convey feelings accompanying personal and historical generativity and development. Kabbalistic and psychoanalytic ideas, remarkably similar despite the longstanding tensions between the two doctrines, coincide to explicate a central theme of forgiveness and reparation. These approaches together yield a more cogent understanding of the film's characters, plot, message, and, ultimately, universal appeal.

Keywords:

• psychoanalysis
• spirituality
• mysticism
• Kabbalah
• Hassidism

Acknowledgements

I thank Paula Hamm, Jacob Hoffman, Judith Kline Hoffman, Phyllis Kline, Zvi Lothane, Mordechai Rackover, Karen Starr, and Paul Stepansky for helpful discussions, and Helen Fox for editorial assistance.

Notes

¹Joseph, the Tzaddik (Righteous One), is also seen as the earthly embodiment of the ninth Sefirah of Kabbalah, Yesod, which is strongly associated with the representation of maleness (Ostow, 1995).

²Interestingly, Belanga, Moshe's family name, is an anagram of balagan, the Hebrew word for a mess or chaos.

³The Shechina is Kabbalistically connected to with the concept of ushpizin. “When a person sits in his Sukkah the Shechina (G-d's Divine Presence) spreads its wings (metaphor) over it from above and then Avraham together with the other five Tzadikim (Yitzchak, Yaakov, Yosef, Moshe and Aharon) and King David dwell together with him” [Ohr Someyach, n.d].