Dear Friends,
As this Shabbat approaches, I am sitting in a much quieter home than normal. Earlier this week, I drove to Camp Harlam, our regional URJ camp, and dropped off my kids. It is, without question, their happiest day of the year. They count down to it for months. And yet, as the sun set on their first night in their cabins—surrounded by friends in their home away from home—the Jewish world ushered in its saddest day of the year: Tisha B’Av.
Traditionally, Tisha B’Av is observed through fasting, mourning, and the chanting of Eicha, the Book of Lamentations. My first real introduction to the day came during my year in Israel while studying to be a cantor. At sundown, my classmates and I made our way to the plaza at the Western Wall. Thousands of people, dressed in black, gathered together. As darkness fell, they sat on the ground, wept, chanted lamentations, and prayed for the rebuilding of the Temple.
I was stunned. To say this was not part of my classical Reform upbringing would be an understatement.
The next evening, we returned. As the fast ended, those same people who had spent twenty-four hours mourning simply stood up, embraced one another, and went home. Life resumed. Once again, I was struck—not only by the depth of the grief, but by its limits. Judaism had made space for sorrow, but it had also insisted that sorrow not have the final word.
According to Jewish tradition, five national catastrophes occurred on the Ninth of Av: the decree that the generation of the Exodus would wander the wilderness for forty years; the destruction of both the First and Second Temples; the fall of Betar during the Bar Kokhba Revolt; and the plowing over of the Temple Mount. Over the centuries, the date has also become associated with other tragedies, including the expulsion of the Jews from England in 1290, the expulsion from Spain in 1492, and the beginning of the liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto.
I’ll admit I was a little curious how the staff and faculty at Camp Harlam would balance the happiest day of the summer with the saddest day of the Jewish calendar. But then I realized I wasn’t worried at all. I know those kids are in good hands.
Because, in many ways, camp teaches exactly the same lesson that Tisha B’Av does.
Jewish life has never been built on pretending that suffering doesn’t exist. We remember it. We name it. We sit with it. We let it shape us. But then we stand up. We rebuild. We sing again. We create new expressions of Judaism when the old ones no longer fit. We find joy not because pain has disappeared, but because choosing joy is itself an act of faith.
Perhaps that’s why it doesn’t bother me that my children began camp on Tisha B’Av. There may be no more Jewish response to loss than surrounding yourself with community, singing together, learning together, and imagining a better future. If the destruction of the Temple taught us anything, it is that holiness is not confined to one place. We carry it with us wherever we gather.
So this Shabbat, I hope you’ll make room for both. Acknowledge the brokenness in our world and in our own lives. Don’t rush past it. But don’t let it be the only story you tell. Find the people who bring you joy. Celebrate what is good. Laugh a little louder. Sing a little more. Because our tradition asks us to hold both the bitter and the sweet—and reminds us that even after our deepest lamentations, we can still rise, walk home together, and begin again.
Shabbat Shalom,
Cantor Rebecca Moses