By Rabbi Lana Zilberman Soloway 

 

Yesterday (Tuesday) was Tisha B’Av, the 9th day of the Hebrew month of Av, the saddest day on the Jewish calendar. It marks the culmination of the Three Weeks, a period of time during which we mark the two separate times the Holy Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed. First, the Temple built by King Solomon that was destroyed by the Babyloninans in 586 BCE, and then the Temple built by King Herod, which was destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE. Both events concluded with complete destruction of the city of Jerusalem and exile of our people out of the land of Israel, first to Babylon (Iraq of today) and, following the second Temple’s destruction, to Rome, beginning a period of suffering from which our nation has never fully recovered.

Jewish tradition teaches that the destruction of both Temples happened on Tisha B’Av. In addition to this, we recall additional tragedies that happened to our people during the same day, in different periods of Jewish history, including (but not limited to):

• The Biblical story about the return of the scouts from the Promised Land with frightening reports, followed by the Israelites fearing entering the land, resulting in God’s decision that they would wander the desert for 40 years. 

• The Bar Kochba revolt against the Romans in the second century, which ended in defeat as the Jews in the city of Betar were butchered on the 9th of Av.

• The expulsion of England’s Jews in 1290
• The Spanish Inquisition of Jews in 1492

Tisha B’Av is one of the six fast days in the Jewish calendar. For many Jewish people around the world this day is dedicated to fasting, mourning, and praying.

Tisha B’Av is the day we are invited to be intentionally sad and to mourn all the terrible things that have happened to us as a people.

The fact that this day occurs in the middle of the summer, during the longest school break, makes it challenging to tune into sadness, when many just want to go to the beach and have fun. It is also difficult to feel sadness over something that happened thousands of years ago. This year, however, many Jews are finding it not as hard. The sadness many of us feel is very accessible. 

On Tisha B’Av, traditionally we read from the book of Lamentations (Eicha in Hebrew), which recounts everything there is to cry about For These Things I Weep (Lamentations 1:16). This year, on Tisha B’Av, 312 days since the October 7th massacre and hostage taking, there is a much longer and more personal list of things and people to cry about.

Survivors of the horrific destruction of October 7th wrote their own lamentations, in the spirit of the Eicha. Soon they will be published in a book. I received permission to share two of these lamentations with you:

 

O How She Sat Alone: A Lamentation*

By Nurit Hirschfeld-Skupinsky, survivor of the slaughter in Kibbutz Nahal Oz

O How She Sat Alone
Nir Oz, full of blood
Sderot, was like a widow
A city stunned, and who is faithful to her?

O How They Sat Alone
In the shelter room
One family, and another,
And another, and another one.

O How They Sat Alone
The many-eyed women at the observation posts
And there was no listening,
And deliverance – none. 

O How They Sat Alone
Young women and young men
Hiding in pits and shrubs.
Their dancing halted,
And who will rescue them?

O How They Sat Alone
Captive women and captive men
And sitting there, still:
120 men, women, elders, and children.
Crying, they are crying at night
Tears on their cheeks
And there is no one who comforts.

 

*NOTES: This Lamentation will appear in Dirshuni: Women’s Midrash Vol. 2.  

O how she sat alone…full of …was like a widow – A paraphrase of Lamentations 1:1 O how she sat alone, the city full of people was like a widow. Nir Oz – A kibbutz in the Gaza envelope on the North West Negev, attacked on October 7, 2023. Sderot – a city in the Negev North East of Gaza, attacked on October 7, 2023. A city stunned And who is faithful to her? – A paraphrase of Isaiah 1:21 How did she become a whore, the faithful city. Full with justice, righteousness used to rest in her, but now murderers. Crying, they are crying at night, Tears on their cheeks And there is no one who comforts – A paraphrase of Lamentations 1:2 Crying she will cry at night, her tears on her cheek. No one comforts her of all those who love her….

 

Lamentation for a Beloved Land*
By Leora Eilon, survivor of the slaughter in Kibbutz Kfar Azza

O How your dwellings have been turned into ruins,
Your people become exiles in their own land?
O Betrayed land, your sons betrayed you,
They put their desires before all else,
They sealed your fate with their very tongues,
They abandoned you in their hearts, lost in their ways.

O How your Kibbutzim were destroyed, cities made desolate,
Your people dead, your fields wasting away.
Furrows ravaged, become fields of horror,
All eyes devastated, dried out of tears.

Your sons, daughters butchered undefended,
Fair maidens hauled into captivity.
And the plotters standing before them
Whispering, rustling, and the land was silent

Woe unto you, you cowards,
Sitting carelessly in your cushioned chairs,
Entrusted with the lives of beloved captives
While mothers and fathers are wrapped in their grief.

We will yet return and rebuild you, the soil of our homeland
We will yet return and sing in your fields a joyous song
Your sons will yet return to love and forgive
Your daughters will yet return to complete the thankful song
For neighbors and fellows who had become our enemies,
When our eyes will see peace between us. 

And we will cast a prayer together for borders of tranquility,
For becoming good neighbors, for leaders with humility
That we will respect each other, brothers and sisters
When you will sprout again, O land, grain and wheat.

*NOTE: This Lamentation will appear in ‘Dirshuni: Women’s Midrash’, Vol. 2.