Mourning 
Wed Aug 06, 2008 at 20:43:24 PM EDT
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( - promoted by Rabbi Jill Jacobs)
Every year, as Tisha B'Av approaches, I think to myself, what's to cry about? The Jewish blog-world is filled with posts on what to cry about, how to make Tisha B'Av relevant to today, how to connect to the day, or to the litany of Jewish tragedies, or to a personal tragedy, as yet unmourned, or perhaps, unnoticed. Don't take me for heartless, but it can be difficult to muster up real emotions for the dead of 2,000 years ago, or 600 years ago, or sometimes, even the dead of 60 years ago. I'm not alone in this, I know.
The Rambam writes in the Mishneh Torah (Laws of Fasting 5:3) that five events happened on the ninth day of Av: the sin of the Spies (about which we read in this week's parsha), the destruction of the First Temple and the Second Temple, the capture of Betar and the killing of the proto-messianic Bar Kochba and all his people, and finally, the plowing of the Temple Mount by Turnus Rufus. In short, for the Rambam, Tisha B'Av is the betrayal of hope. It is the time when the three promises that God makes the Jewish people are all reversed: that He will give them the land of their forefathers, that He will dwell among them, and that He will bring a messiah to redeem them.
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