Six Days After the Saddest Day of the Year

When I speak to our synagogue on Shabbat, or send Shabbat messages to the community, I don’t often dwell on the haftarahs, the sections from the Prophets that we append to each of our weekly and holiday Torah readings.  But the haftarah we recited last Shabbat morning, and those we will recite over the next six weeks, teach us something important.  They remind us that this period in the calendar, from the observance of Tisha B’Av to Rosh Hashanah can and should be understood as the pre-High Holiday period.  Normally, we think of Elul, the Hebrew month that precedes Rosh Hashanah, as being the official beginning the High Holiday season.  But the entire season needs to be understood in this context as well.  The three weeks that preceded Tisha B’Av are known as “The Three Weeks of Rebuke.”  Liturgically, we prepared for Tisha B’Av, the saddest day of the Jewish year, with three special haftarahs read on each of the three Shabbats that precede Tisha B’Av that warned of doom and destruction.  Yet after that sad day, our mood changes.  The three weeks of rebuke yield to seven weeks of comfort, as now, the weekly Haftarahs until Rosh Hashanah speak of consolation, renewal and the eternal bond between God and Israel.  They remind us: no matter how far we have strayed, or think we have strayed, we can always return.  We can always rebuild.  We can always fix what is broken, or at least make a good faith effort.  That is the essential message of the entire High Holiday season.

An interesting event that occurs right after Tisha B’Av gives an example of the hopefulness of this period in the calendar.  Only six days after Tisha B’Av, we observe a minor festival—almost a folk festival—known as Tu B’Av, the fifteenth day of the month of Av. This year, it fell this past Wednesday.  Often understood as some kind of Jewish Sadie Hawkins day, the single young women of Jerusalem would, according to Jewish lore, dress in identical white clothing and dance in the vineyards, suggesting to the young men that the time had come for choosing a bride. 

Why would this charming yet seemingly minor event be scheduled during this season of the year?  I have always suspected that this was deliberate.  In ancient times this was the season of the year when marriages were arranged, and Erusin (engagements) were established. During this season of hope and renewal, the entire Jewish community made a bold statement.   Sadness gives way to new possibilities for joy.  Despite whatever we might have faced in the past, we look forward to our future with hope and optimism and faith.  And no single institution is more representative of those values than marriage. Indeed, the very marriages that would be arranged on the 15th of Av were likewise, according to tradition, announced before the community on Yom Kippur afternoon.

Tu B’Av reminds us that we must also face the future with optimism and faith, as did our ancestors facing far more arduous conditions and challenges.  So in this spirit, I want to challenge all the members of our community to use this extended pre-High Holiday time to think, to reflect and to ask:  what is missing from our lives?  What are those changes, adjustments, and corrections that I need to make to live the type of life that I ultimately wish to lead?  How can I be inspired by the example of hope and renewal that is so central to this season of the year to help me achieve my goals?  And how might a deeper engagement with Jewish life, with its calendar, its community, its prayer, study, and sacred obligations, help us become the people we wish to be?? 

This is the time to ask these questions.  This synagogue exists to help you find answers, as well as provide a community of seekers to accompany you on your unique journey.  Shabbat Shalom.