The Meaning of Tisha b'Av

Tisha b'Av, the ninth of the month of Av, which begins at sundown tonight, is a holiday mourning the destruction of the 1st and 2nd Temples; hoping for their restoration and the Jewish people's return to worship in that space. The Temples were built on Mt. Zion, which is what is today called the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Functionally, Tisha b'Av is a 2,600 year old Zionist holiday, a least by the most basic definition of seeking a return to Zion.

Yes, there are other events that are now included in the Jewish people's mourning on Tisha b'Av including the expulsion of the Jews from Spain and the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto, but at its heart, Tisha b'Av is about a return to a restored Mt. Zion.

Those who believe that Zionism is fully a modern invention are wrong. Those who believe that Zionism is solely a response to events in Europe in the 20th Century are wrong. What changed at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th Centuries was that Jews, facing genocidal mobs in no few nations and severe bigotry even in the most welcoming of them, asked why Jews as a people should not assert our right to nationhood, like other peoples and nations, and to seek to return as a people to our ancestral land, from which we were violently expelled, and to which we had hoped to return for the entirety of our nearly 2,000 year exile as a people, to live in security and prosperity.

The answer, as we wept by the "waters of our Babylon" in numerous countries, was "Im tirzu, ein zo agada," "If you will it, it is no dream." And the Jewish people returned in larger and larger numbers, as refugees from persecution, were not welcomed, but were attacked and even massacred by inhabitants of the land whose ancestors had conquered the territory from its previous conquerers centuries earlier. But the people whose origin is in the land of Israel, the people of the Kingdom of Judah, who had been in exile, survived and re-founded a nation.

Tisha b'Av reminds us of more than just the times when we were exiled or faced tremendous loss as a people, it reminds us as well that whatever glories we might have or whatever temporary solace we may find, that we must ever be vigilant of threats. That it perhaps reminds us as well of difficulties faced by other peoples is inherent to the nature of the day, when we remember humankind's ability to act with inhumanity against Jews through generation after generation.

It is on Tisha b'Av, perhaps most of all, that Jews traditionally expressly hope for the coming of the Messianic Age, a time when such tragedies would end and peace would prevail. Today, many of us believe that bringing about that age requires our efforts rather than a divine act. May we act to bring about an age when the mourning of all peoples turns into laughter and joy.

Then the words of the prophet Isaiah will ring true and the day will come when people can turn their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, when nation will no longer lift up sword against nation, and their children won't ever have to learn of war.