Eric's neighbor isn't going to bed on the night of Hoshana Rabba. Eric thought the sealing was Yom Kippur. He fasted for it, he stood for Ne'ilah, he heard the gates close. So what is still open two weeks later?

Rav Yaakov Shepherd answers from the Arizal: Hoshana Rabba is the second seal, and its night is a continuation of Ne'ilah itself. What was decided has not yet been handed over, and while it sits in the heavenly court it can still be changed. That is the note the Zohar calls the pitka, and why in Jerusalem people wish each other pitka tava, a good note.

From there, the walking. Why one circle each morning of Sukkot and seven on Hoshana Rabba, and what the circle actually does: a surrounding light, drawn down to guard the Shechinah before the union of Shemini Atzeret. You are not circling to get something. You are circling to be a wall.

And the wall does not end on Friday: the hakafot of Simchat Torah, the dancing with the Torah, keep strengthening that same protection.

Then the turn. The siddur has Eric asking two names, Ani vaHo, to save him, and Eric thinks that is exactly the pendant kabbalah the Rav warns against. The Rav takes it apart: where the two names sit inside the seventy-two, why the names cannot save anyone, and what you are really addressing when you say hoshia na. Then a short practice for the night itself: the wall, one deed, and two words said to the light inside the letters and not to the letters.

Recorded in Jerusalem, at the Yeshiva of the Mekubalim, Nefesh HaChaim, at King David's Tomb.

From Erev Yom Kippur until Hoshana Rabba, names are carried in prayer at King David's Tomb, and the same money reaches families as food before the festival. Hoshana Rabba, Friday 2 October, is the last day to join:

https://www.jgive.com/new/en/ils/donation-targets/176166

Hoshana Rabba, Simchat Torah, Sukkot, hakafot, Arizal, Zohar, 72 names, Kabbalah, Jewish prayer, Ne'ilah, Shemini Atzeret, Nefesh HaChaim