Tisha B’Av this year is not what it used to be. If last year the people of Israel mourned the destruction of the Temple and prayed that the Third Temple would not be destroyed out of gratuitous hatred, this year the people sitting in Zion mourn another destruction, and pray for a very concrete deliverance.
New laments were written for the occasion, when many are looking for words for the deep rift that plagues Israel. In a year that ranges from endless mourning to an attempt to continue living, the day that is unique in the Jewish calendar for commemorating the Holocaust takes on a new meaning. In the World Organization of Orthodox Synagogues, in the Reform Movement and in the OU (Orthodox Union) Lamentations were compiled and collected relating to the situation, which were put together to give words to the great destruction.
Rabbi, bereaved father and treasurer of mourning: “We thought it was right that the prayers and mourning should refer to the present”
Rabbi Shmuel Slotaki is the director of the World Organization of Orthodox Synagogues, but on October 7, he reluctantly added another title: bereaved father of two sons. Noam and Yashi Slotaki left their apartments in Be’er Sheva on the morning of Simchat Torah and rushed to the battles in Alumim, where they fell after a long battle.
Tonight, Rabbi Slotaki will be at the square of the abductees for an evening prayer and a joint lamentation, including a prayer for the return of the abductees home. The laments that were composed during the past year by people from a wide range of the Israeli public were collected by the World Organization of Synagogues, and Slotaki makes sure to spread them everywhere, in the hope that they can also find a place in the hearts of those who do not usually pray.
Rabbi Shmuel Slotaki (Photo: Yoni Reif)
“We called on the public in the synagogues and also at home to use these laments. Let everyone choose a lament that they connect with, which in their opinion reflects our reality,” says Rabbi Slotaki, “Most of the laments speak of the situation of pain and bereavement, the great terrorist attack that was accompanied by heroism and resurrection. We thought it was right that the prayers and lamentations should not be like a sealed book, that speak of the past and do not refer to the present. The pain should be present, as well as the expectation, the hope, the heroism.”
Do you have any hope that it will also connect other audiences, more people who less celebrate Tisha B’Av?
“Yes. These are laments that can be said in a synagogue, but also at home as a form of prayer or participation in the sorrow of the people and the public. Therefore, it is intended both for the public in the synagogue and for individuals or other publics.”
In terms of the coming years, do you have any hope that this will also be part of the ritual?
“I have no doubt. I still don’t know which of the laments will occupy the more significant place, but it will happen. Like for example in the period after the Holocaust, there too laments were compiled and some of them entered the book of laments and are recited in the majority of synagogues as part of the mourning order.”
It can also be said that with the progress of Zionism, a new attitude was created towards the events we went through over the years.
“Definitely. More than that: there is a great deal of debate among the arbitrators regarding the extent to which it is possible and proper to change prayers or sections that were composed in the past. For example, one of the blessings in the standing prayer of Tisha B’Av speaks of the destruction of Jerusalem and the low state of the city of Jerusalem. Is it correct to use these phrases in a time of redemption And the growth of the city? To change the understanding, or also to change the wording, something new in light of the special times we are in.”
“These lamentations, on the one hand, present the pain, the great break, the severe blow that we suffered on the seventh of October at the Simchat Torah. And at the same time, in a significant part of the lamentations, the revival and heroism are emphasized, which are what unites us and can preserve us as a public and as a people. It is not only despair, fear, and pain , but also the hope for a better future.”
Lamentation over the events of the Iron Swords/Rabbi Yosef Zvi Rimon
In the lament authored by Rabbi Yosef Zvi Rimon, rabbi of Gush Etzion and president of the Mizrahi Global, there is a reference to the terrible reversal and the massacre of Simchat Torah, the eighth assembly in which “we turned from our sickness into a gloomy toga”. The lament mentions the settlements of Otaf, Ofakim and Sderot, the invasion of Israel by Hamas terrorists and the atrocities committed in the settlements.
How about the place of the seven circles,
run away from the threat of kidnappings,
Enemy is a kindling of burnt offerings,
Murderer, gamer, without letting go.
The 14-bar lament also includes a reference to the nature of the surrounding settlements, a request from God to take revenge on Hamas, and the immense wonder that in the 76th year of the state, Jews are once again in hiding, persecuted and tortured in captivity. Alongside this, the heroism of the warriors is mentioned, with an allusion to female warriors, and even a verse that refers to the attack by Iran on April 13 and the threat from it these days:
Persian tyrants will start plots,
The attackers sent prayers to Noshai,
The ships sat with their eyes full of wishes,
See your prince – Horrible praises.
The lament ends with words of hope for revival, redemption and the release of the abducted, while differentiating it from the destruction that occurred during the First and Second Temples and giving thanks for the state that still exists and stands, alongside a call for unity in the nation and communalism in the land.
Bring back the captives, call out to the captives,
Nte Ekurim in the love of eternity,
The injured are proud of the oppressed,
Conduct your testimony with grace and mercy.
A contemporary lament / Liora Weinraub-Zielke
The Lamentation describes the events of Simchat Torah 2014 through the letters A-B, the order of which has changed. “All the bad and terrible words in the Bible came out and were slaughtered by the good words. This lack of light caused confusion for all the letters,” reads the explanatory notes to the Lamentation, which contains about a hundred verses and fragments of verses , and a mention of all the Jewish settlements that were attacked by Hamas.
A father died, babies were taken home without their mothers
Tishri was also gathered and died with them
His hand to the stake was broken and a nation divided
And Isaac will be bitter and their anger will rise
The light of the candle trembled, yes it went out
Death is silent, peace is not silent
Kfar Gaza is like a lot of love
At Ari Sithmum, the Philistines were defeated
Each of the stanzas opens with one of the letters A-B, but the order is destroyed, except for the last two stanzas. In these houses order returns and seeks to instill hope, but reminds that there is another way to revival.
Kinet Barry/Yegal Harush
In the lament written and composed by the bard and musician Yigal Harosh, and published about a month after the massacre, he asks “Icha” at the beginning of each stanza, about another terrible thing that happened that day, and ends each stanza with “My eyes spring forth water from the depths of my brokenness.”
How are mothers / and girls and teenagers
In the captivity of kingdoms / like wild beasts
And break down barriers / straight lines
and pasku mholot / and music poets
My eyes spring from water / from the depths of my heart
“From the outside you will sharpen a sword and enter verification rooms, in Bari and Ra’im, Kfar Gaza and Sderot Halli, naked and naked motels”/The Orthodox Union
In the Orthodox Union, the OU, Rabbi Moshe Ha’Uer created An adaptation of the lament ‘Who will give heads of water’ From the 11th century, when hundreds of thousands of Jews were brutally murdered throughout Europe and its surroundings, and as a result of the events, the Kaddish prayer was also composed, which is central to every prayer to this day.
Rabbi Moshe Ha’Oar, CEO of the Orthodox Union (Photo: The Orthodox Union)
“This lamentation allows all those interested, in Israel and in the Diaspora, to express the painful event experienced by the entire nation of Israel during Tisha B’Av,” says Rabbi Ha’Oer, CEO of the Orthodox Union. According to him, the goal is that this lamentation will be read in synagogues for many years to come, to remember the The cruelty of our enemies and the mental strength of the people of Israel.
“How did she sit alone in Mammad”: laments and sermons of the reform movement
The survivors of the massacre in the Otaf settlements connected lamentations and sermonscollected and distributed by the reform movement. The emphasis of the lamentation is on the difficult female experience, from observers who cried out and no one is listening, to women who went through atrocities in their homes to captives who are still dying in captivity.
Nurit Hirschfeld Skopinski, survivor of the massacre at Kibbutz Nahal Oz, wrote the lament ‘Icha sat alone’ and a midrash from the destruction midrash.
How did she sit alone?
in Mammad
family, and one more,
And another, and another.
Liora Ilon, survivor of the massacre at Kibbutz Kfar Gaza, Compiled a midrash The power of a community to minimize sorrow in the world, and ‘mourning for a beloved country’. She laments cities and kibbutzim that were destroyed, women and men that were slaughtered and a leadership that does not save her sons and daughters from the hand of trouble and the enemy. However, the lament ends with words of hope.
And prayer carried together to the borders of peace,
for good neighbors, for leaders with humility
Shenkhabed Ish Ohiu, Isha Ahotha,
When the earth grows again, grain and vine.
Alongside Hirschfeld-Skopinski and Alon’s midrash, Gili Zivan composed the midrash ‘All the blood of my brothers and sisters cry out to me from the ground’. Asharat Shoam authored the midrash on the subject of ‘captive redemption’. Rivka Lovitz authored the lament ‘Nem and Yishen Shumer Yisrael’. Yael Worgan authored the Midrash for Nation of Nation.
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2024-08-13 14:30:44
