"But you that cleave unto HaShem your G-d are alive every one of you
this day."
(Deuteronomy 4:4)
Av 9, 5767/July 23, 2007
The Torah reading of Shlach (Numbers 13:1-15:41) relates the episode
of the twelve spies, hand picked by Moshe rabbeinu - Moses our master,
who returned from a forty day sojourn in the land of Israel laden with
wonderful fruits attesting to the beauty and bounty of the land, only
to shatter the people's will by stating that all evidence pointed to
the land being unconquerable. The people, for despairing of G-d's
promise, were handed a Divine punishment: they would all die in the
desert. Only their children would merit the triumphant entering and
conquest of the land of Israel. The day of this decree: the ninth of
Av.
Further, Midrash tells us that G-d rebuked the Israelites,
saying "since you have cried over nothing, this day, the ninth of Av
will prove in time to be a day of real anguish for the Jewish nation."
And so it is that both the first Holy Temple and the second were
destroyed by our enemies on the ninth day of Av - Tish'a b'Av.
Subsequent Jewish history has been plagued by disasters of existential
proportion on the ninth of Av.
According to Midrash, every year following the debacle of the spies,
on the ninth of Av, all the Israelite men would dig their own graves
and lie down in them. The following morning only those who had escaped
the decree for one more year climbed up out of their graves. For
thirty nine years this grim ceremony repeated itself each year on the
ninth of Av. In the fortieth year of the wanderings of the Jews
through the desert, the Israelite men, on the ninth of Av, once again
dug their own graves and lay down within them. The following morning
each and every man who had entered his own grave emerged alive. Their
punishment was over. All those still alive on the tenth of Av would be
counted among those who would enter the promised land. Still not
convinced, and concerned that they may have simply misread the
calendar, the men proceeded to reenter their graves each night for an
entire week. On the night of the fifteen, Tu b'Av, when the moon was
full, and all doubt that the Divine retribution had run its course was
dispelled, the people celebrated.
What a difference a week makes. From resignation and despair, to
celebration and a renewed sense of determination; determination to
fulfill the historical task you have been assigned.
The ninth of Av, and the three weeks of mourning leading up to it, are
the culmination of the frustration and disappointment of yet another
year gone by and still we have not begun the rebuilding of the Holy
Temple, the historical task assigned us. Tonight, the ninth, we fast.
In a way, we have dug our own graves and are going to lay down in them
tonight. After all, should our fate be any different than the
generation of the desert who despaired of G-d's promise? And we who
arise tomorrow night from our fast, and from our self-dug graves of
despair, we should spend the next seven days looking deeply at
ourselves, and at each other, and by full moon draw the solemn and
unshakable conclusion that we, just like the generation that entered
into the land to conquer and settle it, we are the generation of the
third Temple. No self doubt will stop us. No nation will deny us. We
the living will build for G-d a sanctuary, that He may dwell among us.
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