TISHA B’AV AND THE JEWISH CALENDAR
In last week’s sermon, I mentioned the ingenious correspondence between the liturgical calendar and the cycle of Torah readings that overlays it. This week, I’d like to focus directly on the Jewish ritual calendar itself. I used to think that the holidays were thrown together hodgepodge, that their positions and sequence during different seasons was an accident of history and tradition. If Hanukkah fell in the dead of winter, it was because the festival celebrated a military victory that happened to take place on the 25th of the month of Kislev. If Tisha B’Av came around at the height of summer, it was because it commemorated a specific historical tragedy, the destruction of the Temple, which happened to take place on the 9th of Av. In fact, however, the entire Jewish year is exquisitely designed and balanced. Not only do the holidays and festivals correlate with the seasons, they also correlate with each other. Let me describe how Tisha B’Av fits into the largest possible frame.
Tisha B’Av is a day of fasting and mourning. Its rituals mirror those of Shiva: shaving, bathing, wearing leather or jewelry, sexual relations, work, and even the study of Torah are all forbidden; mirrors are covered; adherents sit on the floor or low stools. Actually, Tisha B’Av marks the culmination of an escalating period of mourning that begins three weeks earlier, on the 16th of Tammuz. Throughout the three weeks, one may not get married and, according to Ashkenazi custom, one may not shave or cut one's hair. Beginning with the first day of Av, Ashkenazim refrain from eating meat, drinking wine, attending parties, going to the movies, etc.
Tisha B’Av is the nadir, the lowest point of sadness in a period of sadness. Like the lowest point of the tide, which ebbs to its fullest extent and begins to flow back, Tisha B’Av is also the turn-around point. A new period of uplift and renewal begins during the afternoon. Worshippers put on tallit and tefillin, sit in chairs, and begin to sing once again. The chanter repeats the climactic line of the Book of Lamentations using a new, upbeat trope in the major key: hashiveinu Adonai eileicha venashuvah, chadesh yameinu kekedem, “return us to You, O God, and we shall return; renew our days as of old.” Hashiveinu anticipates Teshuvah, the fundamental theme of the High Holidays, which is repentance. Hashiveinu becomes the refrain throughout the so-called “seven weeks of consolation,” which connects Tisha B’Av to Rosh Hashanah. Thus, Tisha B’Av is the gateway to the High Holiday season.
How, exactly, does Tisha B’Av relate to Rosh Hashanah? The theological premise underlying Tisha B’Av is the idea that our unethical behavior as a people brought about our own demise. The Rabbis of the Talmudic era viewed all of Jewish history through the lens of our relationship with God. Historians may assert that Assyria, Babylonia, Greece and Rome conquered the Land of Israel (along with many other politically insignificant territories) due to their overwhelming might as the world superpowers of their day. For the Rabbis, these empires were merely agents of God’s will. I daresay most of us have trouble with the Rabbinic interpretation of history. However, think for a moment of its implication. According to the Rabbinic view, since we are responsible for the tragedies that befall us, it means that we also have the capability to overcome them. If the Talmudic sages, who witnessed the destruction of the Temple, had considered the Jewish nation as the unfortunate victim of history with no recourse, we would have expired as a people then and there. Instead, their insistence that we, not the Romans, were responsible for what happened to us rendered us the agents of our own future and ensured our survival. The Rabbinic insight that ethical behavior translates into real-world consequences—for better or for worse—provides the basic link between Tisha B’Av and the Rosh Hashanah. Mourning leads to introspection; introspection leads to atonement; atonement leads to moral improvement.
In This is Real, and You are Completely Unprepared, Rabbi Alan Lew traces the significance of Tisha B’Av beyond Rosh Hashanah, all the way to the end of Sukkot. I highly recommend this beautiful book for your High Holiday preparations. The entire period from Tisha B’Av through Sukkot is set aside for intense spiritual reflection and transformation, akin to Lent for Christians or Ramadan for Muslims. (By the way, the month of Ramadan is taking place right now.) Two contrasting structures bracket the extended time frame. The Holy Temple, built of stone, but destroyed, marks its beginning; the Sukkah, built from flimsy material and open to the elements, marks its end. Rabbi Lew derives great symbolic meaning from the juxtaposition of these two frameworks. Paradoxically, there is no permanence in that which is meant to last, the great Temple of Jerusalem, but there is true permanence in that which is meant not to last, the dwelling booths of the wilderness. The most enduring human constructs are precisely those creations that are the least material.
Finally, we can extend the meaning of Tisha B’Av within the largest possible time frame, the annual seasons of the natural world. In the fullness of summer, when the earth basks in luxurious warmth, we might be tempted to forget that anything can come along to disturb our ease and tranquility. Like the glass that the groom shatters underfoot at the climax of the wedding ceremony, Tisha B’Av comes along to remind us that we are not invincible. Conversely, in the dead of winter, when all of nature lies dormant beneath the snows, we might give up hope that we will ever arise again from gloom and despair. In the darkest moment, Hanukkah arrives to remind us that light will shine again. Tisha B’Av, calling to mind the destruction of the Temple, and Hanukkah, marking its rededication, are opposite poles on the same spectrum. Thus, the Jewish holidays, and Tisha B’Av in particular, reinforce the paradoxical yin yang of human existence.
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