(40) On the first day you shall take the product of hadar*hadar Others “goodly”; exact meaning of Heb. hadar uncertain. Traditionally the product is understood as “citron.” trees, branches of palm trees, boughs of leafy*leafy Meaning of Heb. ‘aboth uncertain. trees, and willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before your God יהוה seven days.

Rabbi Mani opened, "'All of my bones shall say, "Lord, who is like you"' (Psalms 35:10). This verse was only stated for the sake of the lulav (the four species). The spine of the palm branch is similar to the spine of man. And the myrtle is similar to the eye. And the willow is similar to the mouth. And the etrog (citron), is similar to the heart. David said, 'In all of the limbs, there are no greater ones than these, as they are compared to the entire body.' This is [what is meant] by 'All of my bones shall say.'"

"Come and see: When one sits in this dwelling, the shade of faith, Shekhinah spreads Her wings over him from above, Abraham and five other righteous heroes come to dwell with him!"
Rabbi Abba said "Abraham, five righteous heroes, and King David dwell with him! As it is written: 'Seven Days dwell in sukkot.' 'Seven days' it says, not 'For seven days.' Similarly it is written: 'Six Days YHVH made heaven (Exodus 31:17). Day after day, one should rejoice with a radiant face along with these guests who abide with him."

Sit, sit, [you] lofty guests; sit, sit [you] holy guests; sit, sit [you] guests of faith...

On the first night when one enters the sukkah before sitting to eat, and on every night before the meal, one should say: I am inviting the lofty guests, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Joseph and David.

On the first day, one says:
If you please, Abraham, my lofty guest, may all of the exalted guests - Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Joseph and David - sit with me and you.

And so forth for all the days.

MISHNA:One who did not see the Celebration of the Place of the Drawing of the Water never saw celebration in his days. This was the sequence of events: At the conclusion of the first Festival day the priests and the Levites descended from the Israelites’ courtyard to the Women’s Courtyard, where they would introduce a significant repair, as the Gemara will explain. There were golden candelabra atop poles there in the courtyard. And there were four basins made of gold at the top of each candelabrum. And there were four ladders for each and every pole and there were four children from the priesthood trainees, and in their hands were pitchers with a capacity of 120 log of oil that they would pour into each and every basin. From the worn trousers of the priests and their belts they would loosen and tear strips to use as wicks, and with them they would light the candelabra. And the light from the candelabra was so bright that there was not a courtyard in Jerusalem that was not illuminated from the light of the Place of the Drawing of the Water.

§ It is taught in a baraita: They said about Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel that when he would rejoice at the Celebration of the Place of the Drawing of the Water, he would take eight flaming torches and toss one and catch another, juggling them,and, though all were in the air at the same time, they would not touch each other. And when he would prostrate himself, he would insert his two thumbs into the ground, and bow, and kiss the floor of the courtyard and straighten, and there was not any other creature that could do that due to the extreme difficulty involved. And this was the form of bowing called kidda performed by the High Priest.

Rabbi Tanchum bar Chiya said, "The descent of rain is as great as the giving of the Torah. The giving of the Torah brought joy to Israel, and the descent of rain brings joy to all the nations and to all the world, to beasts, to birds, and to wild animals, as it says (Psalms 65:10), 'You visit the earth and water it; You greatly enrich it.' Rabbi says, 'You satisfy its desire,' as it says (Genesis 3:16), 'And to your husband will be your desire.'"...

Rabbi Elazar said: When the water libation was poured during the festival of Sukkot, these waters of the deep say to the other waters of the deep: Let your water flow, as I hear the voices of two of our friends, the wine libation and the water libation, which are both poured on the altar. As it is stated: “Deep calls to deep at the sound of your channels, all Your waves and Your billows are gone over me” (Psalms 42:8), i.e., the upper waters of the deep call to the lower waters of the deep when they hear the sound of the libations. Rabba said: I have seen this angel in charge of water, Ridya, in the form of a calf whose lips were parted, standing between the lower waters of the deep and the upper waters of the deep. To the upper waters of the deep, he said: Distill your water and let it rain. To the lower waters of the deep, he said: Let your water flow from below, as it is stated: “The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove [tur] is heard in our land” (Song of Songs 2:12). The appearance of flowers in this verse alludes to the libations, as both the blooming of flowers and pouring of these libations are annual events. The time of the singing is referring to the singing of the Festival. Finally, the term tur in Aramaic can also mean an ox; in this context, it is interpreted as a reference to the angel Ridya.

The earth was unformed and desolate, and (there was) darkness over the surface of the abyss. The breath of Elohim hovered above the surface of the water.

He opens the good treasuries in heaven and sends rain upon the earth, namely, the fructifying rain The rain from heaven is full of vitalizing power; see infra, pp. 63 and 167. The actual expression in our context is “the masculine waters.” Eth. Enoch liv. 8 offers a parallel: “And all the waters shall be joined with the waters, that which is above the heavens is the masculine, and the water which is beneath the earth is feminine.” See Charles’ interesting note (8) on p. 107 of his edition, where he quotes T.J. Berakhoth, 9:2, “the upper water is male and the lower water is female.”

The dew that the Holy One, Blessed be He, will use to revive the dead is found in heaven, as it is written: “A bountiful rain You will pour down, God; when Your inheritance was weary, You confirmed it” (Psalms 68:10).

The Sages taught: A person should not drink water from rivers or from ponds at night. And if he drank, his blood is upon his own head due to the danger. The Gemara explains: What is this danger? The danger of blindness. The Gemara asks: And if he is thirsty, what is his remedy? If there is another person with him, he should say to him: So-and-so, son of so-and-so, I thirst for water. And if there is no one else with him, he should say to himself: So-and-so, my mother said to me to beware of shavrirei, the demon of blindness. He should continue to say the following incantation, in the first part of which the demon’s name gradually disappears: Shavrirei berirei rirei yiri ri; I thirst for water in white earthenware cups. This is an incantation against those demons.

Solomon said to them: Where is Ashmedai? They said to him: He is on such-and-such a mountain. He has dug a pit for himself there, and filled it with water, and covered it with a rock, and sealed it with his seal. And every day he ascends to Heaven and studies in the heavenly study hall and he descends to the earth and studies in the earthly study hall. And he comes and checks his seal to ensure that nobody has entered his pit, and then he uncovers it and drinks from the water in the pit.And then he covers it and seals it again and goes.

And Abaye said: At first I would say that this practice that people pour out a little water from the mouth of a pitcher before drinking from it is followed because of twigs it might contain. But the Master said to me that it is followed because there are foul waters in the pitcher.

The Gemara relates: There was a certain son of a demon that was in Rav Pappa’s house as a servant. It went to bring water from the river, and it delayed in returning. When it came, the members of Rav Pappa’s household said to it: Why did you delay? It said to them: I waited until the foul waters passed. In the meantime,

the demon saw the members of Rav Pappa’s household pouring water from the mouth of the pitcher before drinking from it. The demon said to them: If I had known that you regularly do this, I would not have delayed. I would have brought the water straight from the river, knowing you would pour out the foul waters.