Tisha B'av 5779


Husband here. I have just had the most meaningful Tisha B'av I have had in a long time, possibly ever. Thanks to Tamar, I was able to spend the day on my own in Yerushalayim, hearing a gadol hador (Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb) deliver important messages about identity, narrative and the shechina. I also saw an old friend who tapped me on the shoulder at just the right time. I was having a bit of a moment (there is very little opportunity to have "moments" as things are always moving so fast around here) during the kinnah of Btzeti Mimitztrayim. There is always a lot to process in this kinnah, but with being in Yerushalayim while singing it, and trying to contemplate the myriad contradictions presented by this kinnah it was just too much.

It is hard to also reconcile the fact that you look around and see that we are 99% there: Jews in their own land, building their own cities, living a religious life, but that it basically all means nothing (at least one day of the year) when we don't have the Beis Hamikdash. The shabbos literature here focused on the steps we need to take to actually start building but it is still just a lot of words and not a lot of action. I'm not one of those who walk on the temple mount, or think we should go to arms to build our temple, but I think there can be a lot more verbal and group organization around this goal.

Following that I traveled to the kotel to daven mincha gedola. It wasn't quite a "balagan" yet, but it was deifnitely tight in the tunnel part of the kotel where the sun wasn't bearing down on you. The minyan I joined was ashkenaz, and they read haftarah from a klaf, something that is almost never seen in the states. There was definitely some achdus going on as a bachur saw I wasn't able to hear the chazzan and he let me stand nearer to the bimah. We didn't have a kohein in our minyan but I heard birkat kohanim from a different minyan while I was getting my tefillin on. I really wanted to go to the kotel today since when we went there right after we landed, it wasn't davening time (it was late Friday morning) so I hadn't done an actual tefillah at the kotel since I arrived. Mincha concluded and I took a few moment at the kotel praying for my family and also for a refuah shelyama for one of our family friends who could use our tefillos. I then respectfully walked away from the kotel and began my journey home.

The bus from the kotel to Binyanei Huama (the Jerusalem convention center) where all the inter-city buses leave from took a very wind-y route through Yerushalayim. I wanted to get home, but in retrospect riding through this holy city was a good way to spend the day.

Yes this all sounds like a lot to do on a (in the grand scheme of things, not-so) hot day when not eating or drinking and I agree, it is. But I wanted to do it once, while I knew it could all be done. When I knew I could hear Rabbi Weinreb, Hashem should bless him with many years of health. When I knew I could see the kotel one last time before the Beis Hamikdash was built and would be able to tell my children what times were like without out it. May the Beis Hamikdash be rebuilt speedily in our days.

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