Harry's video blog - Can We All Get Along?: Tisha B'Av

as Jews we know that time is both a line and a circle it's aligned because we move from one day to the next to the next week or month or year or decade or Century Etc but it's also a circle because each year we return to certain days and certain special days have certain attributes or signatures or energies rashash sha for example is uniquely appropriate to recognize God as the creator of the universe on yum Kipper our prayers for forgiveness so more readily accepted and on Passover we have special protection but our sages tell us that someday when the Messiah comes in the Messianic era all of those holidays will disappear we won't need them any longer we won't need rashash because it'll be obvious that God created the universe and he runs it we won't need jum ker because none of us will be sinning any longer and we won't need that special protection of Passover because we'll have it every day but the rabbis tell us to holidays will remain on the calendar one of them is porum that makes sense if you have a holiday that's that enjoyable why get rid of it but the other one is surprising if not shocking it's Tish above Tish above will remain as a holiday but one second Tish is not a holiday it's not a celebration it's a disaster it's a tragedy it's a root canal but the rabbis mean to say is that it will become a holiday why because For the First Time After thousands of years will finally have answers to those unanswerable questions of how could or why did God allow this or that tragedy to happen and when we do get those answers we'll see how everything makes sense how everything is interconnected we'll see God's hand written across the broad path and scope of history and will smile we'll be comforted we'll have peace of mind we'll celebrate but that still doesn't seem to make sense because tish's unique signature or energy seems to be one of Destruction or desperation so how could that turn into one of Celebration the answer is that it has always been one of Celebration not of Destruction why because the original Tisha of the first ninth day of of in the desert the spies returned from their tour of Israel and they were supposed to bring back a good report the report that two of them cave and yosua Joshua did bring back a report saying yeah the inhabitants of the land of Canan are strong and they're big but the bigger they are the harder they'll fall we will win because God's on our side but the 10 other spies destroyed that they bastardized that message they said they're too big we'll never be able to beat them and the people of Israel believed them and they cried and God said you cried today for no reason in the future on this day I'll give you something to cry about that day should have been one of Celebration that people should have been saying yes we're going into the holy land and instead they cried so since then God has taken that celebratory energy and he's masked it he's covered it up throughout the generations even through today many years later on two different occasions the temples were both destroyed on Tish abov and so many other tragedies occurred on that day we're told that the temple was destroyed because of sinam Senseless hatred among Jews they just could not get along well if we're going to rebuild that Temple if we're going to build a third one we've got to rectify that problem we've got to get along and I must say that in my lifetime I do not recall a period of such extended solidarity amongst Jews as the one we are in the midst of right now since the time when those three innocent teenagers were kidnapped through the search through the grizzly discovery of their bodies through the commencement of hamas's outrageous attacks on the civilian population of Israel through Israel's just and measured and appropriate response to defend itself Jews of all types with only a handful of knuckleheaded exceptions have banded together tall Jews and small Jews and male and female and religious and non-religious and everybody in between praying together studying together donating together donating time and donating money making solidarity trips sending supplies showing support writing up EDS doing everything that we can to support the cause stand in together with one voice educating those people with broken moral compasses to teach them the difference between good and evil to teach them difference between terrorists not militants terrorists and Innocents to teach them difference to the people that values human life versus one that doesn't if we can continue to do that if we can continue to stand together as one who knows we Jews May yet build that Third Temple sooner than we expected