RABBI TILCHIN'S SHABBAT MESSAGEThe three-week journey toward
Tisha b’Av began last Sunday. It can be a challenge to prepare psychologically for immersive grief that may feel artificial, but the importance of focused time for grief and acknowledgment of tragedy is much healthier than living in a constant state of woe.
For the past two thousand years,
customs associated with Tisha b’Av have invited Jews to enter the timeless story of repeated Jewish loss by changing our diet, dress and curtailing joy in our daily activity. For myriad reasons having nothing to do with
Tisha b’Av, it is good to eat less (or no) meat, reduce our consumerist tendencies and stay out of the sun. This, Professor Bobbie Kwall might say, is an excellent example of
Remix Judaism guided by social conscience.
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Amidst the joy we may be feeling as we return to the togetherness we used to know, the undeniable realities we are confronting compel us to approach
Tisha b’Av with heavy hearts. Our multifaith temple, Mother Earth, is on fire. We will never be able to rebuild it or bring back the forever extinct species of animals, insects, marine life and birds that have disappeared just in the last 50 years due to more than a century of wanton killing for furs, skins and tusks, rabid pollution and deforestation that can never be undone.
The sacred temple of American democracy that so many of us take for granted is teetering on the shallow sands of intentionally weakened governing and legislative bodies. In every way, frightening as things are right now, they are poised to decline even further for the foreseeable future. Not too many decades ago, progressive Jewish movements debated the relevance of
Tisha b’Av observance in our time. What a brief luxury that was! Today and going forward, it is, in this rabbi’s opinion, one of our most important observances, not only to honor the myriad losses we have sustained until now, but for all those that lie ahead, affecting Jews as world citizens. When the world is suffering, antisemitism gets a big boost.
Our rabbinic sages created a system of worship and ritual that mandates celebrating life even under the direst circumstances. After the death of a loved one, we rise from shiva and begin to resume our daily tasks at a pace we can reconcile. Depending on the nature of the loss, this can take years, but it begins with the first step outside our homes on the seventh day.
It is harder to grieve for a loss in process than one with a finite conclusion. This year on
Tisha b’Av, we can mourn for all that is already decimated in our world. The challenge for those of us who are plagued with long-range vision is how to use our days between this
Tisha b’Av and next when we are aggrieved again for the same destruction that will likely be even more prominent.
There are lessons can we learn from Jewish history that might be helpful. When the Israelite remnant was scattered after the destruction of the Second Temple, a new Judaism was crafted over the centuries. In the ensuing millennia, many vibrant Jewish societies were built and destroyed, but the enterprise of Judaism lived on. The losses we recall are too great for the human mind to fathom, but in every generation, the living rise from their grief and do what they must to keep on going in hopes of better days ahead. We cannot turn a blind eye to the truths of our past, and Tisha b’Av makes sure that we don’t. At the same time, we must never give up working toward creating a more hospitable world.
Let us be proactive toward extinguishing the active fires in our midst, protecting the human freedoms we have taken for granted for too long and making bold changes personally and communally that can retard the course of environmental degradation. And may we find strength and courage journeying together, post-Pandemic, hand in hand.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Marcia Tilchin
