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Many connections can be made between vegetarianism and the Jewish festivals of Sukkot, Shemini Atzeret (the Eighth Day of Solemn Assembly) and Simchat Torah.

Sukkot, which begins at sundown Monday, commemorates the 40 years when the ancient Israelites lived in the wilderness in frail huts and were sustained by manna. According to Isaac Arama, the author of Akedat Yitzchak, the manna was God's attempt to reestablish for the Israelites the vegetarian diets that prevailed before the flood in the time of Noah.

Sukkot, the Jewish harvest festival, is a reminder that people can be sustained on vegetarian diets. Animal-centered diets presently involve more than 70 percent of the grain produced in the United States being fed to animals raised for slaughter.

Meanwhile, about 20 million people die because of malnutrition every year.

On Shemini Atzeret — Tuesday, Oct. 9 — Jews pray for rain, and plead to God that it should be for a blessing, not a curse. This is a reminder of the preciousness of rain water to nourish the crops so that there will be a successful harvest.

Also, according to the Talmud (Rosh Hashanah 1.2), the world is judged on Sukkot with regard to how much rainfall it will receive.

In the days when the Temple stood in Jerusalem, there was a water drawing ceremony (Simchat Bet Shueva), designed to remind God to pour forth water when it was needed.

Modern intensive livestock agriculture requires huge amounts of water, much of it to irrigate feed crops. According to Newsweek, the amount of water needed to raise one steer could float a naval destroyer. A person on an animal-based diet requires up to 14 times as much water as a person on a strict vegetarian diet.

On Simchat Torah — Wednesday, Oct. 10 –Jews complete the annual cycle of Torah readings and begin again, starting with the first chapter of Genesis. It contains God's first dietary law:

"Behold I have given you every herb yielding seed which is upon the face of the earth, and every tree, in which there is the fruit of a tree-yielding seed — to you it shall be for food" (Genesis 1:29).