This week the Jewish community worldwide observes Tisha B’Av, the ninth day of the month of Av. As many of you know, this comemorates the destruction of the Temple, the ancient sacrificial cult and , as history has evolved, the variety of sadness and persecution that have befallen us, from pogroms, to Holocaust, and now, October 7. Traditionally, we read the Biblical Book of Lamentations, and for some of us, observe a fast.
Many congregations will observe this day in a variety of ways, but the truth is that the day is lost on much of contemporary Jews, and it is a yearly struggle to bring that sense of meaning and history to a community that may be more involved with summer vacations.
And, to be honest, how many of us will mourn for the destruction of the sacrificial cult and ancient Temple and pray for its return? But Tisha B’Av is also a stark reminder that we are a people of history and that history flows through our veins.
Some of that reminder will no doubt be spoken of this week as we have been reminded that, as a result of October 7, we lost a lot of innocence in the belief that we in this country were immune to antisemitism. One of the stark realities last fall was the fact the so many “friends” of ours in the battle for social justice, with whom we had marched and struggled, were silent is light of the attack on October 7th. In truth, the community mourned the loss of some of those relationships, and it may be safe to say that the mourning period continues.
But there is another aspect of this sense of loss that I wanted to trot out for consideration and it speaks to the issues that surround our own aging.
In so many conversations with individuals and in some classes of late, the issue of our own losses have come up. Usually they have been losses due to health or losses of relationships. These are realities associated with the fact that many of us as we get older, have to adjust and even accept new realities of life.
These present us with moments of great choice.
How do we respond o these new realities?
How do we choose to live our life, do we accept and move on, or surrender and retreat from life?
Do we mourn for a life that was and fail to move on, or do we mourn and then remember that life is a sacred gift and that life is to be lived.
What shall we mourn for this week?
Shalom,
Rabbi Richard F Address
Rabbi Richard F. Address, D.Min, is the Founder and Director of www.jewishsacredaging.com. Rabbi Address served for over three decades on staff of the Union for Reform Judaism; first as a Regional Director and then, beginning in 1997, as Founder and Director of the URJ’s Department of Jewish Family Concerns and served as a specialist and consultant for the North American Reform Movement in the areas of family related programming. Rabbi Address was ordained from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 1972 and began his rabbinic career in Los Angeles congregations. He also served as a part time rabbi for Beth Hillel in Carmel, NJ while regional director and, after his URJ tenure, served as senior rabbi of Congregation M’kor Shalom in Cherry Hill, NJ from 2011-2014.
Be the first to comment