Tisha B’Av is a day that the Jewish Amoraim attributed to the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem as punishment from G-d for the baseless hatred that pervaded Jewish society at the time. Why aren’t we learning from our own history?
The day commemorates the destruction of our first Temple in the year 586 BCE. Sadly, it also marks the day, about 600 years later in the year 70 CE, when Roman legions pushed through the crumbling defences of Jerusalem to desecrate and destroy the rebuilt Second Temple as they crushed a rebellion that shook the heart of the empire and drove our people into exile.
Most Jews commemorate Tisha B’Av by reading the biblical book of Lamentations, which places responsibility for our catastrophe squarely on our own shoulders. Its essential message is that we have a covenant with G-d, who expects us to create a just, caring, and compassionate society, but we didn’t. Consumed by jealousy and baseless hatred for others, we neglected the poor and needy, failed to treat the elderly with dignity and respect, and spurned opportunities to make newcomers feel welcome in our midst.
The destruction of the Temple was one of the watershed moments in Jewish history – the end of one age and the beginning of another. Biblical Judaism effectively ended then because without the Temple, the sacrificial cult and everything that went with it was no longer possible. Rabbinic Judaism – the dominant form of Judaism in the world today – hadn’t yet been born. That would happen in the following months, as Rabbi Yochanan Ben Zakai moved his students to the academy at Yavneh.
With the destruction of the Temple, G-d moved us into a new period of history, one in which our sacrifices would be made of prayer and song rather than of animal gore.
Sinat chinam means groundless hatred. The verb soneh means “to hate”, as in the command lo tisnah at ahicha blevavecha (don’t hate your brother in your heart) – Leviticus 19:17.
The Talmud already knew of the phenomenon of sinat chinam, and taught us about its destructive effect on Jewish life.
Rabbi Abraham Kook, the first chief rabbi of Israel, famously wrote that if the Second Temple was destroyed and the world with us due to baseless hatred, then we shall rebuild the Third Temple ourselves and the world with us with baseless love – ahavat chinam.
I don’t believe in the need for the Temple in Jerusalem and for bringing back sacrifices, but I believe in ahavat chinam (causeless love) that can allow us to achieve anything we would like, we just need to open our eyes and hearts.
Paul McCartney and John Lennon summarised this idea in beautiful lyrics from 1967:
There’s nothing you can do that can’t be done
Nothing you can sing that can’t be sung
Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game
It’s easy
כן יהי רצון (May it be G-d’s will.)
