Dear Friends:
How did we survive Tisha B’Av?
Can you imagine that day?
The First Temple: never had there been a more perfect society in this world. An entire people dedicated to the service of G-d. Dignitaries from the four corners of the world came to witness the glory of the Kingdom of David and the shining Temple on the Hills of Yerushalayim. Priests in their holy attire, prophets speaking the word of G-d, the Sanhedrin dispensing law directly from the will of the Ruler of the Universe, an entire people whose perfectly ordered existence reflected the will of the Creator! Holy children, shining in their innocence, astounding in the depth of their understanding. Great rabbis filled with the knowledge of Torah, their every movement and expression a reflection of the Divine Will. Peace! Tranquility! Abundance! And not simply in this world: so it would lead to the Next World as well!
It was all destroyed!
“On this night, weep and wail, my children. For on this night my Holy Temple was destroyed and my palaces were burnt down! The entire House of Israel shall lament over my agony and bewail the conflagration.” (Kinnos 3, Tisha B’Av)
The Second Temple: Can you imagine the hopelessness? Where could you find hope? An entire people, the Chosen Nation, dispersed to the Four Corners of the World! How could we ever survive as a nation? How could we ever even begin to maintain our holy way of life? How could we hold on to the Torah? How would we survive the utter blackness which confronted us on that day of catastrophe?
My friends, it is just incredible that there remains a Jewish People today! With our myriad of problems and conflicts, our tzouris, our powerful evil inclination pulling us toward acceptance of the ways of the nations among whom we dwell --- still we survive! Still we cling to our Torah! Still we cling to our ancient way of life!
If you look in the Torah you will see that there have been many occasions on which it seemed that the world was ending. In fact, the world actually did end on many occasions. But G-d has decreed “t’chias ha maisim … resurrection of the dead.” Consider the following:
- The Expulsion from the Garden of Eden
- The Great Flood
- The Destruction of the Tower of Babel
- The Destruction of the First Temple
- The Destruction of the Second Temple
- The incredibly brutal persecutions of our seemingly endless Exile, culminating in the unspeakably horrible events of the Holocaust.
- And finally, the events of today, in which the entire world is gathering around the Holy Land, on the sea as well as the land, converging upon us from four sides. All our former “friends” are turning against us as a new Tisha B’Av threatens to overwhelm us, G-d forbid. What are we to do?
THE AMAZING FACT IS THAT WE HAVE SURVIVED ALL THESE CATASTROPHES!
We are still here!
We still grasp onto our Torah with all our strength!
Even the assimilated Jew knows he is a Jew!
Every event which occurs to us has been predicted, and this in itself is proof that there is a Ruler to the universe. In a way, it is shockingly simple! Don’t we say twice a day, “Beware lest your heart be seduced and you turn astray and serve gods of others and bow to them. Then the wrath of G-d will blaze against you … and you will swiftly be banished from the goodly land which G-d gives you.” (Shema, Deuteronomy 11:16-17)
This is terrible … and incredibly comforting!
For if the Torah predicted it all, that means that G-d is in His Place. The ancient Truths are in place. Nothing has changed! That means that, if we caused it by allowing our hearts to “be seduced,” by “turning astray” and “serving gods of others,” then we can fix it by DEDICATING OUR HEARTS TO TORAH, TURNING BACK AND SERVING G-D!
WE CAN FIX IT!
When ancient Egypt collapsed, all the Egyptians collapsed with it. The greatest culture in the ancient world was swallowed up in the Ten Plagues and the Red Sea. There was nothing left! Imagine that you were an Egyptian in that utter catastrophe. Even if you survived physically, how could you avoid total hopelessness and despair? Your entire world had just been wiped off the face of the earth!
And now imagine that you were a Jew in ancient Egypt. The same time and the same place! You have before you Our Teacher Moses and Aaron the High Priest! Moses, the greatest man who ever lived! Aaron, whose rock-like integrity brought peace from Heaven down to earth. These two shining figures are going to lead you out of burning Egypt to Mount Sinai, where you are going to meet G-d Himself, Who will give you forever His Holy Torah! You are filled with “light, gladness, joy and honor” (Megilas Esther 8:16).
The Egyptian is filled with despair; the Jew is suffused with light and joy!
My friends, what is different today? The nations crumble and decay, and we – lehavdil – stand on the brink of the Day of Moshiach! Yes, the nations can share our glory if they wish. All they have to do is bless us and help us. We all have free will. As it is written, “I will bless those who bless you.” (Genesis 12:3)
May we soon see the day when G-d wipes away all our tears and the Holy Temple once more stands in shining glory on the Temple Mount, never more to depart!
© Copyright 2010 by Roy S. Neuberger
