Walls both physical and spiritual
YOSSI ARON
FOUR fast days relate to the destruction of Jerusalem and its temples. Best known is Tisha b’Av, marking the date of the actual destruction of both, it serves as the culmination of the three weeks of mourning that begin on Tammuz 17 when the walls of the city were breached.
The Fast of Gedaliah, the day after Rosh Hashanah, recalls the assassination of Gedaliah who governed Judea after its capture by Nebuchadnezzar; that assassination led to the final exile of all Jews from Judea to Babylon.
December 27 is the fast of Asara b’Tevet —- Tevet 10 —- perhaps the least known of all four. It marks the day on which the walls of Jerusalem were besieged by Nebuchadnezzar’s army, some two-and-half years before the city was finally captured.
Inasmuch as it marks the beginning of the events leading to the destruction, the rabbis saw it as so important that it should even be observed on Shabbat. And although this cannot happen in our fixed calendar, Asara b’Tevet may fall on Friday, in which case it does continue into Shabbat, ending not when candles are lit, but when it is really dark.
Nevertheless, even though in the Northern Hemisphere this mid-winter fast is short and comparatively easy, it seems to be the largely forgotten relative of the others. After all, everyone knows of the three weeks bound by Tammuz 17 and Av 9, while the Fast of Gedaliah is in many minds associated with the high holy days. So in order to strengthen a day whose observance seemed weak, the Israeli rabbinate declared it Yom Hakadish Haklali -— the general day of saying kaddish.
Halachah prescribes that those who do not know the correct date of a yahrzeit should pick a day for carrying out annual observances. Accordingly, for relatives of many murdered during the Holocaust, this became the recommended date. Thus, ancient and modern tragedy were brought together by an observance symbolising the tragedy of exile across the ages.
That aside, however, the origins of the fast day turn our minds to walls — specifically the ancient walls of the city of Jerusalem. However, the walls in question were not those with which so many of us are familiar.
The latter were built by Suleiman after the Ottoman capture of Jerusalem in 1517; they enclosed the city as it had developed during the crusader era. A portion of the wall besieged on the original Asara b’Tevet has been excavated and is visible in the midst of the Jewish quarter of today’s Old City. The city of Jerusalem of old did not include the current Christian and Muslim quarters, but extended from the Temple Mount down the hill outside the contemporary walls to the area of the City of David and the Siloam pool.
With that in mind, we can also more easily understand the expression aliyah l’regel —- going up on foot to the Temple -— because then the Temple Mount was the highest point of the city.
While on the topic of walls, it is worth noting the extent to which walls feature in Jewish history. A primary form of defence in ancient times, we read in the Tanach of the walls of Jericho, Jerusalem (in various periods) and even of Shushan and other cities of Persia during the Purim story.
Then there were the ghetto walls in European cities, regrettably culminating in those of the Holocaust era. Israel too has a much-criticised wall constructed in self-defence; in an ideal world it would not be necessary, but it reminds us that even in our land today, we are not yet safe and secure from those seeking our destruction.
So much for physical walls. Those aside, there are also mental walls — mindsets of our own or others that can protect or imprison.
Jewish sages throughout history have always sought to learn spiritual lessons from physical events. Perhaps as we commemorate the besieging and subsequently breaching of physical walls that have impinged so much on our history, we might also turn our attention to the latter walls of the mind and seek to breach them through a return to traditional values.
And in that context, we will eagerly await the culmination of Jewish destiny as per the last verse of the focal piyyut (poem) of the selichot of Asara b’Tevet: “From sadness and sighing redeem O God my soul, for Your people provide respite my King and Holy One, change to relief the fast of the fifth month [Av]; to happiness and rejoicing the fast of the fourth month [Tammuz] and the tenth month [Tevet].”
Yossi Aron is The AJN’s religious affairs editor.
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