Jews will mourn through the final nine days of The Three Weeks of grief that began with the Fast of Tammuz and ends with Tisha b’Av, Which is the day commemorating the destruction of the Jewish temples.

 

Tisha b’Av simply means:  The 9th day of the Jewish month of Av; which is the fifth month of the Jewish calendar (our August).  However, Tisha b’Av is much more than just a date on a calendar.  This peculiar day has held great significance for the Jews across the globe.

 

Tisha b’Av is marked with sadness and fasting from food and drink.  Observant Jews avoid bathing or washing clothes or enjoying entertainment like music or movies; for it is on this day that Jews are reminded of their tragic history.  Yet, this day is also expressly linked with Israel’s glorious destiny.  The Jews also look forward to the ultimate rebuilding of the Temple, to a time when Tisha b’Av will become a day of joy and gladness as it was foretold in Zechariah 8:19:  “Thus saith the LORD of hosts; The fast of the fourth month, and the fast of the fifth, and the fast of the seventh, and the fast of the tenth, shall be to the house of Judah joy and gladness, and cheerful feasts; therefore love the truth and peace.”

 

In Jerusalem, all public transportation will be silenced; all restaurants will remain closed on the evening of the 9th of Av as the sun sets.  As the Hebrew day of great tragedies, Tisha b’Av, will begin at sundown in remembrance of the destruction of both the First and Second Temples on the 9th of Av, hundreds of years apart (see below).  Tens of thousands of Jews will gather at the Western Wall to pray and petition the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Israel).  Jewish hearts around the world will long in unison for the future Temple, the one to be established when the Messiah comes (still looking for an earthly King).

 

 

JEWISH TRADITION

 

 

Jewish tradition regards Tisha b’Av as the day the Children of Israel were prohibited from entering the Promised Land.  You will recall, God commanded Moses to send 12 spies into the land of Canaan, one from each of the tribes of Israel.  They returned with tales of a land flowing with milk and honey.  However, Israel feared the inhabitants of the land.  Of the 12 spies, only 2, Joshua and Caleb, had faith that God would deliver the land into their hands.  Yet the nation of Israel was consumed by fear and doubt.  Thus, God decreed that a generation would pass away, wandering in the wilderness, before Israel would be allowed to enter His Land.

From that time forward, the 9th of Av has marked some of the most harrowing days in the history of the Nation of Israel:

 

On the 9th of Av, in the year B.C. 586, Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the First Temple, built by Solomon, and the Babylonian captivity began.

 

On the 9th of Av, in 70 A.D., the Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans; destroying that which was standing during Christ’s ministry, precisely as Jesus predicted in Luke, Chapter 19.

 

Also, on the 9th of Av, in the year 135 A.D., the famous “Bar Kokhba” revolt was squelched when Bethar, in which the last Jewish stronghold fell to the Romans, and until 1948 no Jew could call the land promised to them by God to be their residential homeland.

 

One year later, in 136 A.D., on the 9th of Av, the Roman Emperor Hadrian established the heathen temple to Jupiter on the site of the Jewish Temple.  Hadrian rebuilt Jerusalem as a pagan city, and renamed the land as “Palestina,” in an attempt to distance its Jewish heritage.  This attempt to disavow the land from its Jewish roots was later echoed by the British in their labeling of the land as, “Palestine,” in around 1922 A.D.

 

On March 31, 1492 A.D., the Spanish monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella issued a royal decree that all Jews must leave Spain.  The deadline was set for August 3rd of that year.  If any Jews were found in Spain after this period they were to be killed.  The date on which the Jews were to be killed, on the Jewish calendar, not corresponding to the Gregorian calendar at that time, was the 9th of Av.

 

If this information hasn’t gathered your attention as being interesting enough, the 9th of Av is also the day of:

 

The declaration of the Crusades by Pope Urban II in 1095 A.D. (it might be remembered that the main reason for the Crusades was to exile Arabs from the land of Palestine); The burning of the “Talmud,” in 1242 A.D.; The signing of the edict by King Edward The First, in 1290 A.D., expelling all Jews from the Isles of England; The start of the First World War in 1914 A.D. (it might be noted here that since World War One did not result in an establishment of planting the Jews in their homeland, Another World War, World War Two, was enacted); The mass deportation of Jews from the “Warsaw Ghetto,” to the “Treblinka” extermination camp in Poland in 1942 A.D.; The bombing of the “AMIA Jewish Community Center” by Arab terrorists in 1994 A.D. in Buenos Aires, Argentina, which killed 86 and wounded more than 120.

 

Thus the 9th of Av, Tisha b’Av, has become a symbol of all the persecutions and misfortunes of the Jewish people, and for the loss of their national independence and their sufferings in exile.  It is a day of intensive mourning for the destruction of the Temple, and for the city of Jerusalem.

 

In the year 2005, the 9th of Av marked another milestone in Israel’s history.  That year Tisha b’Av marked the beginning of the Israeli withdrawal from the “Gaza Strip.”  All 21 Gaza settlements were evacuated along with four of 120 settlements in the “West Bank.”  The withdrawal marked the end of Israel’s 38-year presence in the “Gaza Strip.”  Approximately 9,000 Jewish settlers were made to leave their homes.  Some were forcibly removed.  The withdrawal took place amid a backdrop of widespread protests, and was accompanied by whispers of civil war.

 

The withdrawal was seen as necessary for Israel’s security.  However, in the eyes of the Palestinians, the Gaza withdrawal represented victory in their armed struggle against the Israeli occupation.  Israel’s retreat was seen as the direct result of the sacrifice of suicide bombers and the almost constant barrage of mortars and rockets on the settlements.  The bottom line:  it was a victory for terrorism.  Six months later, after being credited for bringing about the Israeli retreat, the terrorist organization Hamas claimed victory in the Palestinian parliamentary elections.

 

However, other than in reference to the First and Second Temples, you can find any historical event on that day or any day you want to fit your narrative.  Thus, stick with the Temples; and the rest is history; or is it?

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