How Can We Say Thank You While Something Is Still Missing?

During Hallel on Sukkot we do something that appears contradictory. We wave the four species at “Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good” and wave them again at “Please, Lord, save us” (Mishnah Sukkah 3:9). With the same lulav, within minutes, the person both thanks and begs for salvation.

We often imagine a sequence: first the problem will be solved, then I will be grateful. First the salvation will arrive, then I will rejoice. The sages present a more complex soul. A person can be deeply grateful while also carrying real pain.

Gratitude is not denial of what is missing. If a family is struggling, there is no need to claim everything is perfect. If someone is waiting for healing, marriage, livelihood or peace at home, that person may pray with full force. Yet the missing piece does not have to erase everything that already exists.

Psalm 118, which includes “Give thanks to the Lord,” also knows distress: “From the narrow place I called to God.” The same psalm speaks of enemies surrounding the speaker and still repeats gratitude. Biblical faith is not a life without trouble; it is the ability to see God’s kindness within a life that is still unfinished.

Rabbi Yochanan explains the waving: move it outward and back for the One to whom the four directions belong, raise and lower it for the One to whom heaven and earth belong (Sukkah 37b). When I say “thank You” and wave in every direction, I acknowledge that the good in my hands is not self-generated. When I say “save us” and wave toward those same directions, I remind myself that the place where I am still waiting is not outside God’s presence either.

Some people feel guilty for struggling because they have so much to be grateful for. Others feel that expressing gratitude means surrendering the right to hurt. Sukkot allows both voices to coexist. I can say: I am grateful for my children, and I am in deep pain over what one child is going through. I am grateful for my job, and I still ask for change. I am grateful for life, and I still pray for healing.

Gratitude is not a contract that forbids us to ask for more. It can actually make the asking less bitter, because it reminds us that lack is not our entire story.

Perhaps that is why both movements are made with the same lulav. The Jew does not hold gratitude in one hand and pain in the other. He holds the whole of life in one hand, what has already been received and what is still missing, and directs both toward the One to whom the four directions, heaven and earth belong.

For what You have given me: thank You. For what is still missing: please save me. And the way in which salvation will come, I leave to You.