Nachamu: comfort

The Rav of Berdichev as all the Sages of the Jewish tradition have detailed at length how God's loving-kindness covers all troubles and destructive forces with patience. "Hope leads to redemption" and this strong belief is amazingly showing again and again throughout Jewish history.

Both Judaism and Christianity persist and breathe of some inescapable though diversified "absence" in terms of "tzimtzum\צימצום", i.e. God’s eclipse, cache, sort of concealment. This Shabbat is called "Va'etchanan\אתחנן - and I shall pray (implore, petition) You" and the parshat hashavua / weekly portion is read in Devarim/Deuteronomy 3:23-7:11.

The reading portion begins with a specific word used by Moses. He has a special demand to God. He is recollecting all the actions that led from serfdom to the gates of entering the Land of Canaan/Israel. Then Moses speaks out his mind. This is an important moment because he is known for his humbleness and never asked nor begged for any personal favor. With regard to the attitude of the Israelites as the struggle he conducted against Pharaoh, Moses proved to have acted with a rare, singular spirit of equanimity and fortitude.

He feels that his own life must come to the end because God will not allow him to enter the land. He prays, with much intensity, in order to bend or change his own destiny. And he feels scared. He had faced death all along the journey, but had brought Jacob’s descent out of the land of “death and idolatry”. He knows that humans are born to die. Nonetheless, God truly is the Lord of the living. In Hebrew, His Name clearly indicates that humankind is called to cross the barriers of dust and reduction to nil: “Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh\אהיה אשר אהיה – I am to be/become the Whole (Total) One Who I will perpetually become (again and again for ever)”.

The move implies to depart and accept to be a "defunct" servant and leader, i.e. leave his service (Latin "defunctus" = officium, function, task, duty) and give up his body and soul to the Life-giving Lord. As if the certitude that there is a world-to-come and a resurrection from the dead could be compared to some place of concealment, still invisible.

“Etchanan\אתחנן” belongs to the words used for depicting the posture of the faithful in the Temple during the offerings. The body bows down to the earth while the head is placed on the right hand. “Chanan\חנן= to show loving-kindness”. Moses dedicated his life to the true emunah\אמונה/faith and worship, thus prescribing the Mitzvot to donning the tefillin/phylacteries and instructing how to build up the Mishkan/Tabernacle. “Tachanun\תחנון – supplication” later became the fervent petition pronounced every morning at Shaharit\שחרית / Morning-dawn prayer and also Minchah-arbit\מנחה-ערבית/ Dusk,Evening prayer, except on holidays and newness events (New Moon).

It is more extensive on Mondays and Thursdays after the 18 Benedictions Amidah. This habit to recite personal petitions seems to track back to the Temple Service and maybe earlier in the Tent of the Meeting. It is a “nefillat apayim\נפילה אפיים – falling on the face (nostrils) without prostration to avoid any confusion with pagan rites. It was substituted by reclining on the left and the right side (Megillah 23a; Avoda Zara 4,1).

Tachanun became a sort of confession of sins and a plea for repentance and salvation (Daniel 9:3; Ezra 9:6; Nehemiah 1:4, cf. the reconstruction of the Temple). “Chanan\חנן = to cover, caress, grace, favor” as in “You graciously endow man with knowledge (Amidah\עמידה: “chonen dat\חונן הדעת”, Shabbat 104a). It also means “to come to rest” (Berachot 30b) as in the Birkat Kohanim / priestly blessing “vayichuneka\ויחונך = and cover you with His grace” (Num. 6:22). The blessing was peacefully used by Saint Francis of Assisi who used to make the sign of the “Tau-tav\תו, last Hebrew letter on the forehead of his brethren.

God told Moses to say a much peculiar detail to the Israelites: “You shall not prolong your days in the Land, but shall utterly be destroyed (“hishamed tishamedun\השמד תשמדון”). And the Lord shall scatter you among the nations and you shall be left few in number among the heathen, whither the Lord shall lead you” (Deut. 4:26-27). Interestingly, tachanun introduces in the Jewish prayer the recitation of the Shema Israel/Hear Israel (Davarim 6:4) which is one of the major element of the weekly Torah portion.

As regards the Ten Commandments that progressively were removed from the Jewish prayer in order to make a distinction with the Christian services, the Mishney Torah/Deuteronomy introduces special elements to allow the Israelites to enhance their prayer after the sin of the golden calf. The original Hebrew version of the repetition of the Ten Divrot/Paroles shows that 17 letters have been added to the text usually cited from Exodus 20. The tradition considers that it shows how “goodly” God is, i.e. “t/ט(9)-o\ו(6)-v\ב(2) = ”. This also insinuates that, in the Mishney Torah\משני תורה or “repetition of the Torah”, God is willing to repair or give full capacities to the Israelites to repair their errors and track back to the first days of the creation, when He stated that the work of creation was “tov meod\טוב מאד – very good “ (Gen. 1:31). Newness and constant renewal is the basic motto that keeps humans alert with regard to the blessing “mechadesh maasey vereshit\מחדש מעשי בראשית – (The Lord Who) permanently renews and makes new the acts of creation”.

Still how come that Moses presents to God such a petition? His brother Aaron died before and was also told that he could not enter the Land. Well, Aaron did not show any spirit of patience and immediately forgot about God when he saw that the Israelites were in need to marinate with an old-fashioned pagan golden calf worshiping flava. He was too much “outdoors” in this wilderness.

Moses is unique in acting with authentic humbleness. His example is unique for the Jews as also for the Christians. In the name of God, Moses told the Israelites that few of them would reside in the Land and not for a long period of time. You bet! He even warns them about their future in the country, i.e. that they will be destroyed and scattered. What a great sign of hope and consolation! This should relly be taken into acount today in Israel. God's gifts are no way answering to requirements.

Let’s simply draw a parallel with Jesus of Nazareth. Paul of Tarsus wrote about him: “He humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross (i.e. abomination)” (Philippians 2:8). This does correspond with the weekly portion that deals with “obedience”; i.e. with the ability to hearing and acting together in full respect with God’s Mitzvot. Nonetheless, there is an real connection between the repetition of the Ten Divrot/Paroles and the sincere desire expressed by the Israelites to sanctify everything that is linked to the Land.

Resting on Shabbat is matched with the exodus: “Remember that you were a servant in the land of Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Shabbat day” (Devarim 5:15). And thus comes the mitzvah to “honor your father and mother… that your days may be prolonged and that it may go well with you, in the land in which the Lord your God gives you” (Deut. 5:16). It is thus evident that the following commandment deals with slaying: “lo tirtzeach\לא תרצח – you shall not kill, remove life from any human being” (Devarim 5:16).

This is the point on the Shabbat following Tisha BeAv: hundreds and hundreds of years after Moses approached God with his personal petition to enter the Land of Canaan, God, repeats = extends with tenderness the code of the Ten Divrot/Paroles He obliges the Israelites to be aware that He - the Holy One - will never forget any tiny sign or letter (Hbr. tag\תג-תגין) while humans may lose their memory and hide their misdeeds into some cache (Cf. Jesus preaching about the prohibition to erase any iota or small sign from the Torah in the Gospel of Saint Matthew).

The Beyt HaMikdash\בית המקדש/Temple was the LIVING House of God and the Romans razed it defiling the sanctity of the place and scattering the Jews. This was simply foretold to Moses as a possible consequence of the Israelites’ lack of respect of the Mitzvot. It is still pending at the present. We do have the Western Wall but the tachanun/supplication insists on the possible rise of the Living Beyt. “May it be Your Will, Lord… to have mercy on us, forgive all our sins, atone all our iniquities… that the Beyt HaMikdash be rebuilt speedily and in our days, that we may offer before You the burnt-offering… as You have prescribed in Your Torah through Moses Your servant” (Shaharit/Morning prayer tahanun). The same demand is said in the Graces after meals/birkat hamazon\ברכת המזון .

Can we only imagine God playing some role game and “Boo-yaa!”, Jews are damned for ever because others thought they survived and continue to outlive for the sake of some spiritual archaeology? Everything is prophetically on the move with God, gyrating and twirling ahead. We might one day– maybe not in our generation but this is not so important – really see the rebuilding of the Temple. This view has nothing to do with any Hollywood-like script and the salvation of some believers. I am not interested in politics either.

It is clear in this sidra / portion that the presence of the Jews in the Land maybe endure or cease in accordance with the Mitzvot. The Mitzvot never disappeared and constitue a huge part of all the heritage of Christdendom. Some may not be able - for spiritual reasons - to get to that point. It has nothing to do with flamboyant scenarii mixing power and might.

We may feel unconcerned by the question that is parallel to Moses’ petition: The Holy Sepulcher is the Empty Tomb, the Anastasis (place of Resurrection). Christianity proclaims that Jesus is risen from the dead, but nobody can prove it. It can only be inspirited by the Spirit and faith. Others cannot believe that to the full. It belongs to the intimate conviction of our souls. Jesus was condemned by the Jewish High Priest Kaipha and rejected by his first apostle Kaipha /Simon-Peter. (Matthew 26:74; Luke 22:61; John 18:27). He was then crucified by the pagan nations symbolized by the Romans.

Judaism continues its path without the House of Jerusalem while Christianity faces the time of the Empty Tomb. There is definitely no contradiction but a terrible historical estrangement that locks up our creeds. The Christian faith is based on the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth who declared: "Destroy this Temple, in thre days I shall rebuild it". Christians can hardly understand that the Mikdash\מקדש was and remains a LIVING- QAYAM\קים "body". It was made of living stones. It is not visible in the present, just as Jesus is not visible in this world. The Sacraments of the Eucharist should be analyzed in the Jewish "shulchan\שולחו " and "eulogical" presence of the TaNaKh. The point is that both Christian and Jews expect the "coming of the Lord". This might be related to God's Shechinah in the rebuilding of the Temple and the SEcond coming in glory of the Resurrected.

Still we can comfort/nachamu\נחמו as Prophet Isaiah wrote in his vision (40,1). It is a miracle that God continues to have confidence in any human being, incl. all believers. This is a permanent scoop: are we able to understand that He trusts in us and not that we trust in Him firstly. Are humans really like on swoll scrubs or, yes, hope is graven in our beings and we shall never wreck again, God forbid.

av Alexander Winogradsky Frenkel
August 12, 2008 - 11 deAv 5768 - יא דאב תשס"ח

Western Wall at night

The major cupola of the Katholikon in the Greek Orthodox Church of the Anastasis (Holy Sepulcher)

To wed or not to wed

This note copes with the Tu Be'Av - 15th of Av festivity (cf. related note).

What marriage means today and why should people bind their lives in wedlocks? How can we, both with regard to Jewish and Christian rites, match today in Israel with the first stated mitzvah/commandment: "p'ru ur'vu umil'u et haaretz\פרו ורבו ומלאו את הארץ - be fertile, and increase and fill the earth and master it"? (Gen. 1:28). After God fashioned the rib (or "side - tzela\צלע'") into a facing-up help and soul-mate for Adam (ezer kenegdo\עזר כנגדו), it is said: "Hence a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife (be'ishto) so that they be "bassar echad\בשר אחד = one, one flesh, one good prophetic announcement" (Bereishit. 2:24). It should be noted that Jesus refers and insists and confirms the importance of this commandment. It is also a human right and requirement. He added: "So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, no human being must separate." (Matthew 19:5; Mark 10:7, that continues about divorce).

The "Ten Paroles/Divrot\דברות" consider the matter as a prohibition: "lo tin'af\לא תנאף - You shall not commit adultery" (Shemot 20:13), though the midrash explains that "God strongly sneezes out of furious anger (Heb. "af")" (Midrash Shemot Rabba 20,3).The real purpose maybe stressed by Paul of Tarsus quoted Genesis 2:24, concluding: "This is a great mystery" (Ephesians 5:32). The apostle meant a mystery of connection between God and His Kahal\קהל (Community). His views about Jesus are thus important in this context because it shows that Christianity fully took up the Jewish tradition for which "marriage, wedding, match, betrothal" are the key and utmost vital mark of holiness between humans and, indeed, called "kiddushin\קדושין - sanctification".

There is no civil marriage in the State of Israel. We face a paradox: the whole Jewish tradition emphasizes the importance of getting married; it is essentiel to establish a family, have children and see the children of their children… in a legal way that also relies upon a strict and very developed understanding of the status and role of women. Marriage is a must, a blessing. Divorce (get\גט= divorce bill) would deeply affect every partner. The Talmud states that it causes God to weep upon His heavenly altar (Gittin 62b) because the only thing He is doing since He created the world is to marry people.

The problem is that there is no majority to accept to be married by the Orthodox Rabbinate. Nu-nu... Or they may not be able to go through the procedures. An Israeli citizen or a pious Jewish person may totally belong to the children of Israel and still not be recognized as a Jew by the Rabbinate. Then, the Orthodox Rabbinate is the only body to be legally entitled to perform weddings and deliver the required ketubah\כתובה (certificate of marriage). Generations of North American people would not be able to show their ancestors' ketubot as the people from the former Soviet Union. In the former USSR, "being a Jew" was a "nationality" that often showed to be in full contradiction with the real origin of the person. Anyone could simply be declared a Jew because of their paternal or maternal lineage.

The Law of Return accepts civil marriage certificates. But very few were married under the chupah\חפה - canopy and as "Jews, officially recognized by the Rabbinate". Local sabras, born in the country, or people who were raised here, often prefer to travel abroad or contact some authorized foreign delegations (embassies). In some cases, this raises very serious cultural problems with psychological identity interrogations: whatever statistics, it is evident that a lot of non-Jews, people of any faith arrived and settled in Israel in the past 60 years. During the war in some parts of Central Europe and Balkans, a lot of newcomers arrived showing documents of some parents or relatives who had lived some time in Israel in the 50ies, then left back to their home countries. In case, they had both Jewish and Christian documents.

Biographies can be absolutely amazing and it often appears that people are all together Jewish, Christian and Muslim, i.e. legally, according to the right of the concerned denominations. This chidush/new unique aspect of the Israeli society shows how terrific, wild and off-the-wall we are in a civilization that develops its energetic socializing capacities. There is another hint: people can get married abroad in any legal country - and then renew many times the same manifold marriage-divorce process in the officially recognized Christian Churches or at some Islamic Courts. Yes, many people are legally compelled not to marry or to cope with problematic lawless give-and-takes.

This is the legal identity dash. There is also the individual clue. In the "new-old"State of Israel, wandering Jews often turned to risky and gambling sort of adultery journeys or settlements. They grow because of the general hedonistic or self-centered tendency to selfishness and loneliness. Stability requires a lot of efforts in matching with the special one. This is a long-term experience. Now, the real touch is love. This does not concern some odd desires, but to make these efforts for the sake of love. And not necessarily because two got damned crazy about each other, share common views or interests as also their families.

The Jewish marriage is short: a) Kiddushin\קידושין (Sanctifications) are immediately followed by the Nissu'in\נשואין (marriage under canopy). Talmud Kiddushin 1:1 states that the woman can be married (acquired/qanah\קנה) by receiving some value - or a contract (the Ketubah is a part of the marriage today) or by having sexual intercourse with the man. Thus, during the Kiddushin, the woman does not say anything, doing more in accepting her husband. The Kiddush and cup of wine reminds: "Your wife shall be a fruitful vine within your house, your sons like olive saplings around your table" (Psalm 128:3).

The bridegroom puts a ring on his bride's index and says: "at mekudeshet\מקודשת/ you are consecrated to me by this ring according to the Law of Moses and Aaron". "Mekudeshet\מקודשת/being consecrated" points out, in return, that the woman blesses and brings "some sanctifying abilities" to her husband. Curiously enough, the Eastern Orthodox marriage service has about the same words. In Bessarabia-Romania, some Christian Orthodox rituals, in the 19th century, included the Hebrew word said to the bride, showing a strong ritual proximity (when the bridegroom gives the ring to his bride).

In the Jewish tradition, the whole service recalls that the "chatan\חתן - bridegroom" is welcomed by his wife, as entering the Temple (Mikdash\מקדש): "Ve'ani berov chasdekha\ואני ברב חסדך (and I with Your abundant love) avo veytecha (enter Your house)" (Psalm 5:8). Then, she is given the Ketubah/bill of marriage ("writ") that is strictly legal and aims to protect her financially in case of a divorce. A second cup of wine is given with seven blessings about, God's glory, man's fashion, the barren (ekeret\עקרת) fertility, children and the return to Jerusalem (Jeremiah 33:10-11) climaxing in the full jubilance (10 different words) of the new "one flesh" (Isaiah 62:5) as each marriage restores this unity of joy between Adam and Eve (Tractate Bava Bathra 75a). Thus, "chatan\חתן = to covenant, tie, be connected, protect" means "bridegroom" who "by his fructifying rain" (Berachot 59b), gladdens his "kallah\כלה = fulfillment help-mate", contrary to "ba'al\בעל" (husband) who exercises apparent power (Taanit 6b). The cup of wine is then broken, which is usually considered as a memorial of the Temple destruction.

Judaism insists, on Shabbat eve that the husband praise his "eshet chayil\אשת חיל - woman of virtue" by reading verses from Proverbs/Mishaley 31:10-31. Indeed, he acknowledges: "Batach bah lev ba'alah\בטח בה לב בעלה /in her confides the heart of her husband - veshalal lo yechsar\ושלל לא יחסר / and he lacks no good thing - g'malat'hu tov ve lo ra kol yemei chayeiah\כל ימי חייה / she is good not bad to him all the days of HER life" (Proverbs 31:2-3).

The Eastern Orthodox marriage celebration consists in two parts: the betrothal is followed by the wedding. The interesting point is that all the readings come back again and again to the fact that the bridegroom leaves his father and mother in order to cling to his wife. And these portions show the importance of the spiritual clutch that is set up, in one flesh - progressively into a new family entity. In contrast with the Roman Catholics who often celebrate a mass, the Byzantine tradition cancelled the Liturgy a long time ago (11th c.), considering that the new spouses dedicate themselves, individually and to each other. There is also a cup of wine and the kiss. Strangely enough, people show very shy. It is the first "life" kiss. The last one is given during the burial of a dead person.

There is a tremendous paradox: Jews - and thus the Christians - have described how womanhood saves humanity and manhood. Women pay a huge price for the sake of their identity and dignity. Male power and stubborn machism often disregarded marriage, somehow deconsecrating themselves. "No man can live without a woman, nor a woman without a man because both of them cannot live without the Presence of God (Shechinah)." (Talmud Berachot 9:1).

טו באב is, on the 15th of Av, the Day of love... Wooing, flirting, dating, speed dating or matchmaking can evolve into wedlocks, i.e. unity, oneness as God with us. Marriage is not horizontal. It is a typical move toward high verticality toward the Most High.

Jewish Yemenite wedding

Jewish Dutch wedding (Rembrandt)

Greek Eastern Orthodox wedding (crowning)

Tu Be'Av: Love me, tender...

It is a hit, because it only can be a hit and we are so mild and cute, nice and lovely: "Mi ohev otach yoter mimeni\מי אוהב אותך יותר ממני = who loves you more than I love you" is the sort of syrupy, ever broadcast song sung by many local singers.

We are so much in need of care, cuddling, hugging. Our hearts wnt to share with a soul mate, a sweetheart, beloved, girl/boyfriend. We plan our dates - now speed-dating because we run, run, have no time... Just to get a boo, someone we can love more than anybody else... Is it the price of solitude? Or are humans really born to love? The rape of the Sabine women is a Roman Empire saga. It supposedly consisted in the abduction of women. Indeed, the abduction conducted to raping. Moses firmly condemned the raping of Rape of foreign women in the name of God because it is an act of idolatry.

As time passes, it is so amazing and weird to read the news about the development of different attitudes in Israeli society. Rape, incest, men raping their wives, women raping men at times, children or teens submitted to sexual assaults. The head of the State crashed down for forced carnal temptations which were not that evidenced.

The Semites are inspirited by violence and baseless instinct of possession. This is what is softly meant by "yoter mimeni\יותר ממני = who loves you more that I do?". Good enough: a very honey-honey song with sugar and slow-slow rhythm but the guy does possess the girl and that's it. And girls can possess guys and guys think they own their friends. Dat's love, nu-nu?

Tu Be'Av\טו באב is the 15th of the month of Av (08/15.16, 2008). It is usually called "Chag HaAhavah\חג האהבה = Feast of love". We are very fond of such feasts that allow giving flowers or presents to our special ones. It may happen that the special one may grow to two, well… say no more, but there can be no special one at all. The worldwide celebrated Saint Valentine’s Day, in February, would seem rather parallel. This is not really the case. Tu Be’Av\וט באב (like Tu bishvat\טו בשבט = New Year of the Trees) falls on the 15th day of the Jewish month. Jewish Love Day falls in the middle of the month of Av, i.e. one of the most tragic months in the Jewish history with the Ninth (tisha) of Av that for ever memorizes the “saddest days” of the two destructions of the Temple and of the city of Jerusalem.

The 15th day always marks in the Jewish calendar the short time of the lunar cycle monthly recurring “full moon” (“Hayireah bimlu’o\הירח במלואו”). This is why the indefectible faithfulness of God was disclosed so many times throughout history as mentioned by Talmud Taanit 26a, 30-31b. Disasters, destructions, death, exterminations never abate Jewishness. On Tu Be’Av, in the heat of the summer, should be the most joyous day of the year when the moon is full as ready to birthing new times and seasons.

We are a society that permanently faces despair with “va’irbu smachot be’Israel\וירבו שמחות בישראל = let joys multiply in Israel”. Joys and hope overcome any drifting to despair. Sarah’s laughter, lack of faith and lie (“I did not laugh” she said to the angels), Yochanan Ben Zakkai’s bursting into laughter at the sight of the foxes creeping out of the Devir\דביר/Holy of Holies inaugurated times of hope and redemption. Do we have the same spirit in the present? Balloons, hagigot\חגיגות/festive encounters overwhelmingly constitute a positive point of our society. There is more: Tisha Be’Av is the destruction that aims to reducing God’s Presence to nil. Iremind the project to annihilate Her, defile and abate the spiritual nuisance shown by Jewish existence and faith. This itches and rebukes the pagans.

Let’s talk a bit about tradition: it is said that Yom Kippur and Tu Be’Av are the two happiest days of the Jewish year. This relies upon the related birthing process that overleaps death and opens up new months and times (Taanit 4,3). On that very day of the 15th of Av, in the fortieth year in the wilderness, the Israelites stopped dying in the desert.

It is a clear sign of joy shown by the reply of the women to the punishment imposed by God to those who did believe the spies who slandered against Moses. Indeed, men were and remain too important for women. Here is the interesting point of “the feast of love”: the daughters of Zelophehad came to speak with Moses and the priest Eleazar and they were upset (Num.27:1-11). Their father had died in the desert, there were no men and they wanted men and inheritance! This is the very Hebrew counter-point to “the rape of the Sabine women”! This also became a day of loving and wooing freedom in a very tribally structured society.

This developed after the destructions of the Temple. TYu Be'Av is also a way to reconnecting with God as the Living One/Loving One. young girls and women could dress humbly and go dancing through the streets and on the squares and look for some nice lad and possible bridegroom. It was a “duty-free” day in the sense that women could marry any member of any tribe as also, the sons of the tribe of Benjamin.

As the Zohar states, the Jewish people can be compared with the moon: going up and falling down, wander here and there and, right out of a sudden, they will be reaching goals before getting lost again. But every step allows enhancing the quality of a new rise toward God and the Mitzvot.

“Veahavta lereacha kamocha\ואהבת לרעך כמוך – and you shall love your fellowman as yourself” (Vayikra 19:18). We are submitted to “love” because human beings and feelings were shaped in the image and likeness of God.

We just remembered the destruction of the Temples on Tisha Be'Av. The first Temple was ruined because of rational and conscious hatred that infected the priestly nation. The second Temple was razed out of a baseless / irrational hatred. Now what happens if we compare these two reasons that prevailed for the destructions with the joyful “full moon” matchmaking festival of the “feast of love”. Sex is very important in Judaism because flesh, carnal desires are normal in the Jewish tradiiton. But intimacy constitutes a very small part of what love implies and encompasses. Nonetheless, at the present, in Israeli society, it shows to prevail as it always did throughout the TaNaKh: with much confusion of feelings, irrational pulses or slanders. True love relies on stability, patience, pardon, abandonment. Quite a challenge in a "one shot society"!

When the daughters of Zelophehad came to petition Moses, they did not ask for love: they asked for men and inheritance, which means they wanted to birth babies and be secured as women. Women do need to be financially and socially secured even if they often initiate or support business developed by men.

These daughters had a basic request: we need men to prolong the tribe – indeed all the tribes – that died in the wilderness and we need money, land, properties. At this point, it is evident that Tu Be’Av is a feast for women as they choose their partners, friends, special ones or husbands. Men often don’t get to that. It is at times horrible to observe or even to audit how women are treated with much disregard and total lack of respect in Israeli society and Jewishness. It is incredible that the number of battered women, as also men and children continues to increase. Each sex is more and more victimized by rapes, incest and this is in full contradiction with the realm of the Mitzvot a proper and traditional, usual family and lifestyle.

Love does not only consist in lovemaking... with condoms, pills, abortion. True, intimacy is often reduced to a speechless relationship without sincere and open talk. It may show a self-centered egoistic pleasing relationship. There is often nothing to share except bones playing with bones under skin. The Jewish tradition has developed a highly positive view of sexuality. At the present, the situation is a bit confused. Personalized desires of groups, individuals, egoistic and rather childlike behaviors tend to unbalance the relationships in new couples.

I recently heard two female newcomers explaining that, according to the tradition, they were only obliged to have sex with their husbands on a regular basis, wash up the dishes, keep the house clean and get the more possible money. Plain and simple. This is another aspect in a country where it is rather difficult to marry and, till today, to find love outside of one’s own tribe (Ashkenazim, Sephardim, Mizrachim… and why not any other tribe living in Eretz Esrael).

Love is a gift, a real gift sent by God. Love is a true miracle that prolongs everyday and "מחדש מעשי בראשית \ renews the work of the first commencement". Love shows at any age. A woman physician was visiting Jerusalem with her daughter who was leaving for the Army. They were not Jewish according to the Halachah. The mother suddenly asked: “Is it so important to be Jewish?” Her husband had abandoned her. She was surprised when I replied: “Don’t you think that love is more important than anything else?”. A rabbi contacted me once. He did not know what to do: his wife got fascinated by the Gospel right out of the blue moon. We had exceptional discussions. Yes, he was entitled to divorce her, but, she was still Jewish and, by the way, did he love her? He decided not to quit her.

Jesus started his preaching by assisting at a marriage in Cana of Galilee (John 2:1-11) and he never rejected the two Jewish miztvot/commandments of marriage nd priesthood. “Love” is a major motto for any Christian believer, just as “joy” (Saint Francis of Assisi, Saint Seraphim of Sarov). “Love” became a "human and divine reality" in Christendom that changed the heathen world into milder, more caring, compassionate collectivities. We don’t have any idea of the hideous violence that existed in the Barbarian society. It should compared with the recent emergence of new paganism.

This year, on Tu Be’av it would be so sweet to be so tender, like God: “HaShem, El rachum vechanun, Lord, Lord of mercy and loving-kindness\יי יי אל רחום וחנון”.


av Alexander Winogradsky Frenkel
August 11, 2008 – י דאב תשס"ח

sunbird (Israel)

The Lord has loved him

Prophet Isaiah has a short verse: "The Lord has loved him - אהבו ה - HaShem ahevo" (Isaiah 48:14) which has different meanings with regards to liturgical cycles and God's love granted in prayers. This was an essential quotation for the Khazars (see below). I do hope that this verse will now be the share that the Lord will share with His servant Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn who passed away on Aug. 3/July 21, 2008. He reposed at the Academy of Sciences in Moscow before being buried in the Donskoi Monastery on August 6th.

Two major aspects of the life of the great Soviet and Russian writer: he was firstly a scientist, a mathematician and a teacher of physics. When he was sent to jail after the war, all his fellow inmates were scientists of high rank, a specificity which is typical for the Soviet culture based on rational sciences and "computerization, calculation, supputation". He was born into a pious family and his mother taught him the articles of the Eastern Orthodox faith. Nonetheless, he followed the normal route of the Soviet atheistic youth and joined the pionners and the Komsomol when he was a teen.

He returned to faith and "repented", converting to the Orthodox faith that is so deeply rooted in the Russian soul and culture. "Repented"? Penance is at the heart of the Russian spiritual ways of reflecting the relationship beteen God and the believers. During all the Eastern Orthodox services, a litany quests: "Grant us to spend the rest of our life in peace and penance, we ask to the Lord - Прочее время живота нашего в мире и покаяний скончати у Господа просим". "Pokaianie/покаяние" refers to some mystic and inscrutable movement of penance from sin to pardon. In Russian, "Kaius'/каюсь" firstly refers to sinful, weird and emotional matters. It does mean "I regret, I confess and repent". It does not sound like Greek "metanoia" which means "conversion" but essentially "a revolving move of conscience (nous)", which is postiive and does not focus on irremediable sin and judgment of awe. Hebrew "teshuvah\תשובה " is the original root and means "response, conversion as an answer to God by renewing one's mind and soul ("shuv\שוב - anew, to rotate). Thus, Solzhenitsyn fundamentally turned to the creed of the Russian Orthodox Church in the context of a full apostasy shown during the atheistic period of the communist system. He repented and this sealed his soul in this tormented and though joyous faith of the Russian Church, marked by violent passions, cruel fates, love and hatred, distress and despair.

He repented and tried to break through this civilization of doomed inmates infected by some unescapable destiny. The Christian Orthodox faith is far more joyful and full of hope. But in his repenting, he became a man of conscience. He took up the horrible burden of apostasy that affected Russian society.It should be noted that Western Churches can hardly reach this point of getting aware of a parallel apostasy during the time of the Nazis. This apostasy happened in christened countries during the Nazi regime.

Indeed, it makes sense that Aleksandr Isayevich slept into death during the celebrations of the 1020th anniversary of the baptism of the Kievan Rus', as the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrated the vigils of Saint Maria Magdalene's feast.

True, Solzhenitsyn was as strong as these immense Russian forests, strong as an ox, which recalls the biblical "oaks and terebinths" and the sacrifices offered in the Temple (cf. Psalm 51:21). No human political, ideological system has ever been able to dissect or cut down the writer. We can say that Aleksandr Isayevich is brought into the Russian earth as he was in the likeness of the Soviet Man by his education, culture, language and speech. He reposes in this Russian soil and his burial prolongs the long-term process of disappearance of the communist system that connects with much subtlety his era with the 21st century.

Solzhenitsyn asked to be buried at the Donskoy Monastery/Донской монастырь. This is a significant sign of the continuum that exists in the development of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian culture as a specific walk of civilization. The holy icon of the Lady of the Don had been found in that place. Saint Sergius of Radonezh had his church there. The icon of the Lady of the Don was brought in procession during the famous Kulikovo battle in 1380 and, as a consequence the Tatars left without combating.

Interestingly, the monastery is located on the way to Crimea on a borderline that always faced the challenge to stopping the invaders that often arrived from Asia. The Lithuanian and Polish or Ukrainian cosacks, in particular in the years 1612 and 1628 tried to seize the monastery.

The Donskoi monastery is also linked to the roots of the revival of the Russian Orthodox Church by the time of the Bolshevik Revolution and the re-establishment of the Patriarcate of Moscow. Saint Tikhon was the first patriarch elected just before the revolution. He could not carry out the huge project of spiritual "perestroika" that he highly wanted to implement by launching the council of the Russian Orthodox Church. This project is on hols at the present, but we should note that the Church officially came out only less than 25 years ago. Patriarch Tikhon was imprisoned in the monastery and he remained there. He was killed in 1927 and his relics were found in the monastery in 1989, only one year after the millenium of the baptism of the Rus. This creates a long-term continuum with the destiny of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian way to adhere to the creed.

It has often been said that Solzhenitsyn was a Russian nationalist bording some sort of Slavic fanatism or stubborn framing toward other cultures. Indeed, we have the problem in Israel. The Soviet newcomers to Israel usually left their faraway Russian style and walks of living and arrived in Israel, keeping them in mind and a bit afraid of the local Israeli and intercultural situation. Soviets were framed and facing lies in place of truth in the former Soviet Union. In Israel, lies and truth mix but mainly frighten people who jumped from the plane and do not know the world. Say, they know it but reluctantly look at it. They would take the best and the worse. Aleksandr Isayevich, in a repenting move, condemned both the Soviet and Western styles alike with much insights. But this led to a lot of misunderstandings.

His language is composed of sophisticated highly esoteric words and phrases. Russian is very flexible and as many other Indo-European languages (German, Icelandic) allows creating new words by using ancient roots. German went through this system slightly during the Nazi period, by the way. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn scarcely wrote with the same views. Still, he loved and corrected the Russian dictionary. He enhanced the vocabulary. He acted in accordance with the Slavophile movement that is very ancient, both nationalistic and showing the profound love and connection of the Russian people with their tongue and its dialects. His long life of solitude and "intelligentsia outcast" has influenced his literary insights and increased his abilities to widen the Russian Slavic weltanschauung. Curiously, the most famous and undoubtedly best Russian writer was Aleksandr Pushkin, poet and novelist. His tongue was clear and he could write short as well as long paragraphs. He was of Ethiopian origin...

Solzhenitsyn was a nationalist in the sense that Russians are "lost" when they are cast out and obliged to live "abroad". He was somehow connected in his Slavophile style with Ivan A. Bunin (1870-1953) who was awarded the Nobel Prize of Literature in 1933 and was also a Russian purist and word-creator.

Solzhenitsyn returned to Russia in 1994 as a writer and reporter. He started to analyze the development of the Russian society. He came as an Eastern Orthodox believer, definitely participating in the spiritual reinvigoration of the Russian Orthodox Church. His faith is inscribed in the same line as Hans Urs von Barthasar's views detailed in his broad-minded book "Der Glaube Christi/the Faith OF Christ". The writer could be repenting in the footsteps of the Russian tradition. The link with Hans Urs v. Balthasar is not so subtle in fact. The German theologian highlighted our age and our continuum in history as a positive consequence of the glory of the Cross and the Resurrection that grants us a "surplus of grace" by keeping the human in life.

Aleksandr Isayevich had been touched by the grace of God. God's finger had given him the grace of being cured and saved from cancer and hatred in the society obsessed by destruction and death. We think that everything has been written about the labor camps (GUlag), cancer wards or psychiatric units. Thus, only faith - real and not ritual faith - could help survive beyond personal egos and overcome the indescribable slaughtering of humans.

Is Israeli society concerned by the passing away of the biggest Russian writer of the past 50 years? Israeli media are rather "neutral" and do not thrillingly comment the event. Good enough... Solzhenitsyn was a nationalist and showed at times "anti-Semitic". In his books, the author avoid to describe the sufferings of the Jews as in "A day in the life of Ivan Denisovich" and the only Jewish character is too close to the tormentors. There are some anti-Semitic elements in the "GUlag archipelago" and no statement about the sufferings of the Jews in "August 14".

In fact, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn had been fashioned in the century-long tradition of rejection and disregard toward the Jews. It is a very delicate and tricky relationship that combines hospitality and live, rejection and hatred, irrational psychotic will of power and erotic attractiveness. These are simply the usual standards. Jews gave Jesus of Nazareth. They also "infected" Holy Russia with the messianic hope of a proletarian international socialism. Marx and Engels, Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg entered tzarist Russia via Lenin-Trotsky(Bronstein) and numerous socialist preachers that participated in the creation of the communist party.

How did Solzhenitsyn consider Judaism? How Aleksandr Isayevich, being a Russian Christian Orthodox believer could sympathize with the destiny of the Jews? He did write a book ("Two centuries together") about his views on the rlationships between the Russians and the Jews. At least, he was really courageous to face a problem that is mostly hidden. The emancipation of the Jews after the Revolution evolved into a system of mixed marriages. The screen neutralization of the two nations slowly drowned into in the fraternal realm of the Soviet "comradeship".

I hear all the time a very special and unbelievable statement in the Russian-speaking Israeli society. "We are simply anti-Semitic by nature", declare some simple faithful. This group is often composed of uncertain, low-gear people sitting put on quicksands. Some are more Slavophile and Orthodox than any Russian citizen. Others adapt their style to Israel and slightly depart from Mother Russia. This will be over in one or two decades. But the connection with the former Soviet Union is significant. This is the point.

Israelis will not show much compassionate toward any society that went through some hell that are seemingly similar or parallel. The pogroms, the revolution, all the wars, deportations and psychiatric asylums are carved in the human and spiritual memory of any Israeli of Jewish descent. Some of our citizens are not Jewish and still went through these events. Slowly, the non-Jewish citizens get closer to the meaning of such an experience and they take it over. Thus, Israel has taken up so many Soviet camp survivors that Solzhenitsyn's essential testimony may not be correctly valuated. Too banal; ordinary experience.

Israel must also build up her own Jewish heritage and look forward, not only backward. I often visit the Diaspora Museum (Beyt HaTfutsot\ית התפוצות ) in Tel Aviv with former Soviet-new Israeli citizens. They often show a mal d'etre that must be taken into account. What with the Jews, would they say when the Soviet Union lost 60 million people during World War II? It sounds a bit weird to hear such statements in Israel. They are free to discuss the matter and this is great.

It seems that Solzhenitsyn was never challenged as a historical witness, writer, thinker and believer by the re-emergence of the State of Israel. He knew about the Jews. Israelis were not "real" as inducing an era of ingathering of the exiled.

Today, Israel is the "second Russian country in the world" (L. Putin). This is not exact. Indeed, the Israeli society has been built upon the pattern of East-European and Russian ways of living. Some people will go through great difficulties, as any other tribe coming back to Zion. The Ethiopians have their problems. Pushkin's pupils jump into the building of another collectivity. And this also concerns the way the Israeli Christian Orthodox may participate in a solid structure. Solzhenitsyn noted - as a lot of specialists of Russia did over centuries - that the Russians are too versatile and lack a substantial sense of structuring organization.

How strange! Aleksandr Isayevich is married to Natalya (Svetlova; a nickname = bright). Natalya's mother was Jewish. This means that, according to the Law of Return in force in the State of Israel, she might virtually be able to emigrate to Israel according to the fundamental law of the State. True, this is entirely imaginary... They married in an Orthodox church just after the writer divorced his first wife (Natalya). But this family pattern is just ordinary in Israel. A lot of newcomers arrived in Israel in the same family context as the Solzhenitsyn's. The scenario is really banal though ignored or unknown. Subsequently, Solzhenitsyn's children could potentially become Israeli because their mother is ("ethnically") Jewish. The family is profoundly Christian Orthodox.

At this point, we track back like boomerangs into history and the spiritual development of Russia. From the 7th to the 10th century, the Turkic tribe of the Khazars adopted Judaism. They lived in the South of Russia, the Crimea up to the North of Caucasus. They were known as very pious Jews and had close relationships with the Persian Jews. They strongly influenced the ritual and spiritual tradition of official Judaism as the Spanish theologian Yehudah Halevi wrote in his "Kuzari".

Khazars and Christians had conflicting relationships. Saint Cyril, the Greek apostle of the Slavs, had imposed the Slavic-Slavonic tongue as the liturgical language with the blessing of the patriarch of Constantinople and the bishop of Rome ("Patriarch of the West"; the title was recently suppressed by the Roman Church). He tried but failed to convert the Khazars to Christianity.

When Saint Vladimir/Volodymyr decided to be baptized and obliged his nation to adopt the Christian faith, the Russian Legend accounts that he called the Jews, the Roman Latins, the Muslims. He chose the Greek Byzantine rite or Oriental rite and rejected Judaism and Islam. This rejection developed in the Russian Eastern Orthodox Church into a constant fear of any form of "Judaization" of the Russian creed and rituals.

It may be important to have an Israeli approach to the death of Solzhenitsyn. He is a major writer and witness, a fighter, a man of courageous protest, compelling to reach out to the truth. He combated as a Christian Orthodox believer who raised from the Russian soil. Interestingly, he inherited in the Church the same questions about "the others" that showed from the first commencements of Christendom. How can we teach freedom when people desperately require to be in bondage and afraid of the others.

Interrogated about the personality of A. Solzhenitsyn, Fr. Aleksandr Borisov (Moscow) declared that Aleksandr Isayevich left an important mark in the society. The priest compares the writer to Metropolitan Anthony of Surozh, Fr. Aleksandr Men, Andrei Sakharov, concluding: "He intervened in the moral awakening in Russia. His actions, at this point, have a huge ("colossal") historical dimension" ("Его роль в правственном пробуждении России. В этом его колоссальное историческое значение").

Av Aleksandr

August 8th/July 25th, 2008 - ז באב מנחם תשס"ח

sun eclipse in Siberia (August 2008)

Tikvateinu - Our hope beyond hope

We arrive to some sort of "end of time, end of year" period. Every year, in the summer, the four/three-week Tammuz to Av recurrence should bring the attention of the Jews to the meaning of "kaytz\קיץ - summer", connected with "ketz\קץ - end. There are the “K'tzey haolam - the end of the world as a space" and the prospect of finishing the year, a time of harvesting (Bereishit 8:22 or Tehillim 74:17: "You have fixed all the bounds of the earth; you made summer and winter). Shabbat "Devarim\דברים" is directly followed this year by the mourning Tisha Be'Av day.

We should note and with much awareness that the fifth Book of the Written Torah encompasses many actions that all exclusively deal, at first glance, with the achieving part of the exodus and the final entrance of the Israelites into the Land of Canaan after some 39 years of wandering and various tribulations in the wilderness. This is correct but not totally exact.

Indeed, the Book suggests that God reminded Moses of all the historic data that happened since the flight from Egypt. He recalled how the Jewish people erred in the desert before being allowed to cross the Jordan under the leadership of Joshua Bin Nun. Moses concludes his own mission and gets ready to die “somewhere” on Mount Nebo, reckoning all the events that he carried out with a God's predilection.

But the Book is called “Mishney Torah\משנה תורה – repetition of the Law” that wrongly became in all translations “Deuteronomy = the Second Law”. Why is it slightly inexact? “Second Law” might be misinterpreted as a new or different giving of the Torah, as supposedly accomplishing what was not perfect and complete at the Mount Sinai. This has some veracity but is still not the real purpose of the Book. Then, from the Second Book of the Chumash (Five Books of Moses), the actions are trying to develop in view to allow the Israelites to return to the Land of Canaan and penetrate the region that was promised by God to the Avot (Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob-Israel). Long series of a journey full of hardships and misunderstandings among the Israelites as regards how God meant to implement this redemption project and what benefits the Israelites can get having “anshey chayil\אנשי חיל – men of power and judgment”. Then they were given the Written and Oral Laws (Matan Toratenu) after they behaved as childlike troubleshooters with the Chet-ha-egel\חטא העגל (the golden calf sin). It was more a kind of accessories and jewelry melting party.

But Moses intervened and repeated the major elements of the Divrot\דברות – Ten Commandments, the building of the Mishkan\משכן -Tabernacle. VaYikra\וקרא is the Book of the Levites or how to get closer to holiness by sanctifying God as a priestly nation. Finally, BeMidbar-Numbers shows how the Israelites did finish the construction of the Mishkan/Tabernacle but were not able yet to penetrate the Land. Some tongues have specific ways in expressing the idea of what appears “secondly”. Russian has “vtoroi\второй = second as following first and introducing a third thing, if any”. But “drugoi\другой = second in the sense of “other, different” as “inyi\иный”. “Mishney Torah does not really refer to some second, third or more Torot/Laws’. Indeed, Moses undertook to expound how God spoke to the Israelites at Horeb. But his account is not showing some yearning for the past. On the contrary, although this might sound like a paradox: this account opens the way to the future. “Mishney = elements to be repeated” because the Book of Devarim – Deuteronomy includes a sort of “eleventh” Mitzvah/commandment: “Shma’ Israel\שמע ישראל” (Deut. 6:4-9). “Leshanen\לשנן = to repeat” is a pedagogical method. God insists that specific Commandments have to be repeated constantly by the Israelites, maybe thus with more insights and prophetic capacities. This is why, “kaytz\קיץ – harvest, end” allows envisioning as true factors the capacity for the Jews to get enhanced harvesting seasons in the future. Moses apparently recounts what has happened during the exodus and the wandering in desert.

In fact, he anticipates how the Israelites will have to comply with the Mitzvot. He recalls the tests they overcame in searching their way to reaching out to the Land of Canaan. Again, the Land of Canaan or Eretz Kanaan/Israel, is not a “new” conquest. It will turn to series of fighting confrontations with the local inhabitants. But, it is indeed, in an unusual manner, the return of the Avot/ancestors’ descent to their native homeaccording to a Divine promise. This defies time, space and human understanding.

The spiritual experience of Israel is that “destructions” as those of the Temples (Ninth of Av) are timeless and lead to time and motion comprehensiveness of repairing actions. God accepts and tolerates us but “ad matai – until when?” (Tehillim 4:3). The Jews are normally trained to exert their living memory as looking through the tragedies of the past in order to repair and create anew what have been destroyed of damaged. Many contemporary rabbis have underscored the strong connection that ties up the weekly portion with the haftarah (prophetic portion) read on Shabbat Chazon (Shabbat of the “Vision”) in Isaiah 1:1-27. Tisha beAv (9th of Av) marks a peak since the year 70 (C.E.) in the symbolic and emotional, spiritual life of the Jewish experience. History and calamities rushed at Judaism and 9th of Av corresponds at the present to events definitely linked to a special period of history, i.e. the emergence and spreading of Christianity, the pretence of false messiahs (Bar Kochba) and the penance of famous Jewish Sages (R. Akiva). Thus, the following events are supposed to have happened on the 9th of Av: Destruction of Jerusalem by Titus in 70; plowing of the Temple Mount by Turnus Rufus and Jerusalem became the pagan city of Aelia Capitolina in 71; the defeat of Bar Kochba in 135; the first crusade launched by Pope Urban II in 1095; the expulsion of the Jews from England in 1295 and the final expulsion of all Jews from Spain and Portugal in 1492. This expulsion was later followed by the slaughters that led to the Shoah and the project to erasing the Jewish presence in Europe, North Africa, Soviet Union and the related states.

We should never forget that Jews read the Prophet Isaiah’s Chazon/vision on the Shabbat before Tisha BeAv for a reason that has nothing to do with the Nations’ attitude and abominations against the Jews.

He wrote, hundreds years after Moses’ last account in Devarim: “Oy, goy chet/ oy - sinful nation / am kaved avon – people laden with iniquity… Your country lies desolate; your cities are burnt with fire…What is to Me the multitude of your sacrifices… I do not delight in the blood of bulls, of lambs or of goats” (Is. 1:4.7.11). “Eycha hayta lezonah/ Oy how the faithful city has become a whore” (Is. 1:21) include the title cry of the Hebrew Book of “Lamentions – Eycha\איכה” – read on the 9th of Av. Is it not strange and spiritually highly significant that the Devarim/Deuteronomy starts with the same cry of lament and interrogation uttered by Moses about the Israelites: “Eycha essa levadai\איכה אשא לבדי – how can I bear the heavy burden of your disputes all by myself?” (Deut. 1:12). “Eycha – how, how come?” also shows in the Song 1:7 (“eykana\איכנה” in Song 5:3; Esther 8:6). This refers to the main quest after the meaning of life in good as in evil.

Indeed, “eycha” is firstly to be found in the Book of Bereishit/Genesis as Adam and Eve have disobeyed to God commandment not to eat from the fruit. It should be noted that Judaism as the Oriental Christian Churches do not accept the concept of “the origin sin”. The sin consisted in disobeying God’s word. Thus, in the Gan Eden, God’s call to Adam at the end of the day was: “Ayecha\איכה (eycha) – how, where are you?” (Gen. 3:10). When God exclaimed this question and summoned Adam rather softly to hear the truth, “eycha” implies a fault, a rupture between God and His creature. Thousands of years still leave Judaism in a sort of incapacity to admit we have to be obedient to God and not to what we think, in our opinion, that God is willing. There is a profound experience of cry from the entrails in this very short and exceptional word.

This is why Devarim/Deuteronomy is indeed “Mishney Torah”: We will see that the Book does not repeat many Mitzvot/Commandments and this is a very intriguing point too. On the contrary, Devarim brings forth new commandments. The Book achieves and implements the destiny of the Jewish nation but there has been a harsh dispute why not to start the TaNaKh with Bereishit, i.e. the creation of the world and every human being created “in God’s Image and Likeness” (Gen. 1:26).

It would be rather short-sighted, narrow-minded to focus, on these days of fast and penance, on the tribulations that Christianity imposed upon Judaism. Judaism did suffer a lot and with much cruelty from the pre-Christian anti-Judaism and the first destruction of the Temple on 9th of Av 587(bce) and that day (1312 bce), the spies/scouts dissuaded the Israelites to penetrate the Land of Canaan (Taanit 9b). We are going through nine days of fast till Tisha BeAv, not because the others did harm, attack, imperil, slaughter, kill and destroy, in many ways, the different traditions and the faithful of the Jewish communities.

But the task of Judaism is not to roll up into some shelter and, in return, only accuse the Christians of the wounds and scars of history against the Jews. Some Christian Churches have taught with much despise and ignorance of the Scripture that the Jews had killed Jesus of Nazareth. The Gospel, as the catechism of the Orthodox and the Catholic Churches show that all mankind (both Jews and Gentiles) have put Jesus to death. It would be pitiful and not be responsible not to combat the deep mutual ignorance that separate most religious communities. On these days of fast, the Jews focus on the abominations that led to the destruction (churban) of the Temples. The Jews have been scapegoats from the time of the exile in Egypt, so it is incumbent on the Jewish spiritual leaders and communities to avoid any scapegoat-making in return or by some kind of revenge. Christian catechism as the transmission of the Jewish faith face the immense task to correct their spiritual attitudes. This is only possible in the light of the Divine Presence. How can we today, in Israel, tame each other in a peaceful reflection? We apparently cannot dialog at the present, Catechism comes from Greek “to echo”, similar to “mishney torah – repeat repeatedly" and looking forward, ahead of who we are.

“I have set the land before you: go in and take possession of the land that I swore to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give to them and to their descendants after them” (Gen 1:8). “Eycha! How, where in the world! How come?” It is such an extravagant and awesome event that turns death into life and we are really born to bless, only expecting any echo of faith (= “amen”) …

Tisha Be'Av and reconstruction

On the 9th/10th Av 3829, the Beyt HaMikdash בית המקדש /Temple of Holiness, was destroyed, plundered by the Roman soldiers led by Emperor Titus. The kelim\כלים (instruments) were brought in triumph to Rome. One year later, Trucus Rufus ended up the work of capture by plowing the Temple Mount, apparently erasing all marks of sacredness from the site and the city of Jerusalem.

1939 years have passed and Tisha BeAv became the central memorial day for the destructions of the two "Batim\בתים". The Beyt HaRishon- בית הראשון/First Temple had been exterminated in 5173/72 as Nebuchadnezzar firstly ruined the Temple, inhabited by the Shechinah/Divine Presence. It was built by King Solomon as to definitively fix God's housing in the city that linked the “Shalayim\שליים”: the “Peace of Above and the Peace on earth/nether world”. For the pagan world, it consisted in eradicating the Jewish nation and the House where they were worshiping a God Who both attracted and galvanized the jealousy of other empires. In terms of history, the construction of the First Temple showed the Jews settling in the Land of Canaan/Israel. Again, they passed from a nomadic culture inherited from the wanderings through the wilderness and termined for the ages to come the place where the Avodah/Divine Service should be performed perpetually. Thus, the Mishkan/Tabernacle would no more be on a journey, but reside for ever in a meaningful site.

This notion of installation of the Shechinah in a stable location is a real question: how and why the Only-One God, life-giving and Redeemer of the world, should abide in a non-movable place that would moreover in gather all worshiping forces and priestly call of the Jewish communities. A very interesting transfer occurred from the time the Israelites built the Mishkan/Tabernacle in the wilderness and could carry it everywhere they journeyed and the moment when David was told by God that he would not built the House, but his son Solomon. Both committed sins that usually mixed sex and leadership with idolatry, thus reducing the existence of the Living House. The Beyt HaSheni\בית השני has also been restored, but not to the full and as a consequence of the decree promulgated by the pagan Messiah Cyrus allowing the Jews to go up to Jerusalem and rebuild there God’s House. It should be noted that it is the last word of the Jewish canonical TaNaKh that ends with this prospect: “Whoever is among you of His people, may the Lord His God be with him! Let him go up/vaya’al\ויעל”\ (2 Chronicles 36:23).

Tisha BeAv\ט" באב is considered as the “saddest day” of the Jewish history (Taanit 6b) because God’s Batei Mikdash\בתי מקדש - Temples were far more than stones. They were “kayam\קיים-ים – existent”. In both cases, the Temple only lasted for two periods of ca. 400 years, which is terribly limited in consideration of history. But these years have shown to be times of intensiveness and sins. Or, let’s say that “abomination – to’avah\תעובה“ merely happened to be stronger than faithfulness and desire to comply with the Mitzvot.

Thirty years ago, I was working with of one of the most intriguing and brilliant re-builders of the post-Shoah Jewish communities. We usually met for long travail sessions abroad and then in Jerusalem. The city had only been under Israeli control for ten years. By that time, the local inhabitants and the Churches (not to speak of the Muslims) were in shock and convinced that the Jews would “be kicked out or leave speedily”. The local Churches had never had any special reflection about any spiritual development and deployment of God’s prospects and looked astoundingly dazed at the new situation. True, the problems of belongings and properties constitute a constant matter of challenge for the faithful. All the local Churches have sold and bought properties (churches, monasteries) that they had entrusted to other Christians while their people were facing wars, hungers or epidemic diseases in their homelands. In return, it allowed some Churches to seize some places. Some Churches refused to give them back to their original owners which raised conflicts, still pending at some courts today. But nobody could even think that there is no “certificate of property” as regards God. The Jews had experienced this throughout history and they also had enough faith and insights to disconnect temporary properties from long-term promises given by God.

Thus, as I worked with this rabbi, we did agree that very soon the Jewish communities of Israel will show a real will to get closer to the Temple Mount. It could not be sufficient to go to the Kotel/Western Wall that we had discovered as a sandy and dusty place in Iyyar 5727/June 1967. There should be a move that would lead to require more, i.e. to ask for the re-observance of the daily sacrifices and the rebuilding of the Temple. Don’t say this is weird or ridiculous or that we are "World Wildlife fans" at the present, i.e. against animal sacrifices. This is inscribed in the irrational part of human nature and identity.

Indeed, the very first steps were taken at that time by collecting the money in order to shape again the Kelim כלים /instruments, the great Menorah… Interestingly, the rabbi, as many rabbis of other parts of the world were absolutely aware that these problems could be considered as “light-hearted’ and somehow unrealistic conversations at that time. We were just convinced that, in some unexpected manner, this huge issue would powerfully develop among Israeli society over the coming years.

We were not members of any specific group. We were simply describing what history had always proven: the return in mass of the Jews to Eretz Israel in conformity with some blessing from the Nations (as Cyrus represented Persia) includes the necessity to positively reckon on the Temple’s primacy in both the Jewish and the non-Jewish life, as by the time of the destruction of the Mikdash in 70 ce.

Today, the question grew to a serious concern and became a harsh political issue. This had and still has nothing to do with our method of thinking three decades ago. Faith and religion in Israel are systematically patterned in narrow boxes or niches. Judaism is much diversified; still “tevot\תבות – boxes” are apparently very convenient. From Noah’s Ark to the boxes protecting the tefillin and, in some way, the Temple housing God’s Shechinah\שכינה (only in the First Mikdash according to the tradition), there is a permanent trend to “lock without locking up” the Divine Presence or Her related instruments in manually controlled places or objects.

There might be a sort of constant misunderstanding or confusion today. We see some slowdown in the celebration of the fortieth anniversary of the entrance of the Israel Army into the Old City and their taking over of the Temple Mount. It did allow free access to anybody to the Western Wall and the State of the Jews exercises, for the first time since 70, a legal control of the Churches, which was totally unheard or unthinkable . 5727/1967 marked a turn in the Jewish conscience that will require years and decades of patient dialogue with the other faith bodies and vice versa. Just as we cannot leap over centuries of hatred and estrangement, we definitely cannot compel – not even ourselves as Jews and Israelis – to get aware, accept, comply and agree with what has happened forty years ago. Again, any political point of view about this issue is biased and vain. But the Old City of Jerusalem tracks back to the very roots of what deals with the Jewish faith before the time of King Solomon’s First Temple.

On the Feast of Rosh HaShanah, the Jews are told to remind that they were strangers and that “my father (Abraham) was a wandering Aramean” (Deut. 26:5). This allows the existnce of two tendencies: first, stability in a definite location; secondly, journeying through the world bearing in mind the Land of Canaan. Without any reference to any other religion, Judaism has been and is still confronted to hatred and will of extermination, as if their own being could impulsively drift the Nations to a mental, spiritual, physical extermination and erasing process of Israel. Sadly enough, this alien desire of annihilation goes along with some crude and recurrent self-hatred shown by the Jewish communities who would tend to trespass or capture God’s gifts and miracles… and destroy them. Thus, the First Temple was ruined, according to the Sages, because of a “conscious hatred – sichliyut.שכליות)”. “Sechel\שכל = wit, intelligence, awareness”; from radical “achel\אכל = to consume) is means “destruction: “I created the angel of death to work destruction (mesakel\משכל)” (Numbers Rabba 16:24). Are humans so spaced out that they can hate each other with awareness? Thus, the Shechinah left because of humane pretence to replace Her. As regards the Second Temple, it was destroyed by a “sinat chinam\שנאת חינם – baseless hatred or rather an irrational hatred”. There are definitely times when humans lose any sense of spiritual orientation.

They would desperately be in need of some coaching, guidance. The Temple was frequented by the Jews as also a lot of international Gentiles and proselytes, later by the first Christians (Acts of the Apostles 2:46). “Churban\חורבן” is the usual word used for “Temple destruction”. It is a “desolation that devastated the vineyard” (Kilayim 4, 29c).

Indeed, we maybe in a situation of confused destruction process. On the one hand, “Churban\חורבן” applies to the murder and physical eradication of the Beyt/Temple as the living and acting Mishkan\משכן or Dwelling of God. Forty years after the entrance of the army of the Jewish State, Moshe Dayan’s attitude to given back the Mount to the baffled Muslims was not only a wise and tactical move. The Jewish authorities would not have been able to bless the Jews to go up the place. Today, after 40 years, the tendency is to allow going up there without any overall consent. We are searching our way… as if going out of the wilderness after 40, 400, 4,000 years… But the Churban is a very specifically Jewish concern that will require time. Again we are without clocks or delays. The destructions of the Temple constitute the first and major element of the Jewish memory that also extended throughout history to the will to wipe out the Jews.

On this particular day, I presume it would be better to disconnect Tisha BeAv from the Shoah (Holocaust, Katastropha in Greek/Russian). At this point, the Shoah directly refers to the attitude of the Christian faith and Churches towards Judaism. On the 9th of Av, Jesus’ words: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up… He was speaking of the temple of his body”.(John 2:19) might pre-suppose for the Christians that the time of the Temple is over and that the Churches are not concerned by the destruction. The misunderstanding continues as the Christians would consider that the Holy Sepulcher – Empty Tomb or place of Resurrection (Anastasis) has unconditionally replaced the Living House where Jesus himself used to come daily (Matthew 26:55).

Whatever friendly relationships between Judaism and the Churches that seemingly develop in many places – but hardly in Israel because of this permanent political hindrance – Tisha BeAv is a major rift between the community of Israel and Christendom. In fact, it opens up to true hope that God may build up agnew, rebuild, reconstruct, shape and shape for ever. And there is no split between creeds in God at such a level, because it only depends on Him.

One can regret that theological stiffness and recent decisions taken by some Churches as regards their own traditions continue to sustain either fear or distrust from the part of Judaism. The rift of splitting is a long-distance, long-term one. How in the world can any Church tradition positively consider the reconstruction of the Temple? The Amidah\עמידה/18 benediction prayer “Boneh Yerushalayim\בונה ירושלים – building (the two) Jerusalem” refers to “Build the House” (Berachot 2:3) that certainly dates back to the pre-Maccabean times. The prayer is found in the Birkat HaMazon\ברכת המזון (3rd blessing, graces after meals).

On the 9th of Av, we may become aware that, in anyway, any time, anyhow, i.e. in unexpected ways God might “soon and speedily\בעגלא ובזמן קריב . " One day is comparable to thousands years” is a psalm verse that reverses history, comfort/nachem or have mercy/rachem upon the community of Israel. It also removes the veil of pretence that blindly freezes any believer. Faith implies to enjoy the dynamics of being together. And to go up, “vaya’al\ויעל”!

av Aleksander Winogradsky Frenkel
July 29, 2008 - כז דתמוז תשס"ח

rooster at Bar Ilan University (Galit).
the rooster crows at daytime/1st Jewish morning blessing. it crowed 3 times when Shimon-Peter-Caiphas betrayed Jesus.

Musikah: The pen of the soul

All Jewish diasporas always loved and continue to love sounds. Eretz Israel might firstly be a place of interiority. Certainly not the same way in the Negev or Galilee, whose sea is the Kinneret\כינרת and has the shape of a kinor\כינור - lyre, we could even say a sort of a guitar (alas we did not find yet our Yochi Kinor, some freak happy-go-lucky to be our pop Johnny Guitar).

We live with sounds, tunes, voices, cries; we love talking, chatting, yakking then swinging on a rap. Still, there is an Israeli way to consider music, chanting or instrumental, orchestral concerts. How peculiar though that, as in Persian, we do not have any local word for "musikah."

In Persian, "muzik" is the "sound of music" and "musiqi" the "science that deals with musical arts"; but it really does not sound very "native" and comes rather recently from Greek "museke" via Latin "musica". It is a challenge to define what "musicness" means: "ars musica" was connected with poetry in the Western Antiquity, but the same art exists in Israel and in all the tongues and cultures of the world.

The root comes from "mousa," the woman muse who inspires the artists or artistically hooks deep down into our souls. And muses are related to pure arts and styles, forms, words, poetry and songs.

Music jigs us into a move that jets our feelings beyond words. It magnifies our feelings and inmost emotions. It may flow, rush, silently drizzle like our rainy tif-tuf \ טיפטוף or jingle up and dance, swing and twist our ears and brains. Music shakes and quakes our members with special effects. Pleasures to be felt on the borderline between humanity and deity.

We say in Yiddish that "music is the pen of the soul". Therefore it definitely fits with the Jewish spleen after in depth feelings that boom out beyond thoughts, reflections, words. It proceeds of sounds put together with harmony or dissonant series of tones and waves. Melody is thus cultural and appeals to a certain understanding of harmony.

In the Jewish tradition, Tanya\תניא (Teaching), the hassidic chef-d'oeuvre written by R. Shneur Zalman of Lyadi, the first Rebbe of the Chabad, describes the marvel of speech abilities as a result of sound combinations. He added that no human being would be able to explain how and why members like the mouth, the tongue, the throat, the uvula or glottis can create the untouchable consonants and vowels that are produced.

Music requires human skills that unite other immaterial tones like rhythmics, which are always new because no artist can play a tune, sing or chant twice likewise. This is amazing as concerns music instruments. Yes, instrumental music is as prodigious and peculiar as the letters created by human tongues.

In Hebrew, the Greek-Latin muse is a bat-hashir\בת השיר and the word is not pagan; it tracks back to shir - shirah\שיר-שירה = to sing, to sing a song, chant, recite audibly. Different words and roots are used in Hebrew and the Semitic languages to define what Westerners call "music". Loudness of sounds: tziltzul\צילצול = ringing, from tziltzel\צילצל = to vibrate, have a clear ring (Talmud Sukkot V, 55b) as for the cymbals of the Temple.

Moreover, Qol\קול = voice linked to qahal/qehilah\קהל-קהילה = to call a community to be gathered together: "The enjoyment of sound, sight or smell does not come under the category of misuse of sacred property" states Talmud tractates Kritot 6a/Pessahim 26a.Voices are to be listened and heard, they aim at uniting out of the sphere of speech as regards instrumental music, but also, to some extent, chanting and singing.

Shir - shirah\שיר-שירה that is comparable to a voice proclamation is a "chain, a string" of sounds and voice tones that also include verses of the Psalms, poetry or any music. Talmud Rosh HaShanah 28a explains that blowing the shofar\שופר (festive trumpet) is a musical action. The whole book of the Levites (Hebrew Vayiqra\ויקרא) describes the audible play of the instruments accompanied by the chanting of the Levites and thus includes all of the holy services. Apparently it deals with furniture, morals, thus barely connected with sacred music!

Israel has always sung or played various instruments to praise God. The nigun\ניגון is a sort of mental/uttered rhythmic breathing of the soul as a prayer, a supplication or tune that leads to strengthen the emotional and spiritual upheaval: music is universal. As long as the Temple was alive (qayam\קיים) = standing, it was normal to play the instruments. There was the famous magrefah\מגרפה, the musical instrument in the Temple (Talmud Arakhin 10b). After the destruction of the Temple, instruments were banned. Some modern congregations do play the organ, for example, but this is not the Orthodox view that considers we are still going through a time of mourning in the absence of the Temple. As a comment told me after the publication of the note, Orthodox Jews do not play music during the three weeks of mourning preparing to Tisha be'av\ט, באב the memorial day of the destruction of the two Temples and other persecutions submitted by the Jews.

This is why various traditional tunes developed in the diasporas; and it is possible to follow how deeply all the religious chanting traditions are interconnected. This started in the Temple. "Chanting voices" are commonly found in all ancient Churches, Gregorian and Greek, Syrian-Orthodox choirs. The Russian Church developed 8 "tones - glasy/voices\קולות" that are also rooted in the most ancient musical and poetic local celebrations.

Jews have always been present as artists, in particular as violinists and pianists. Both in the Jewish and the Gentile communities. And this happened not only in Europe where musical artists progressively began to play specific instruments. They were also present all over the Ottoman Empire, Iraq, Persia and the Ladino-speaking areas. This shows how Judaism got profoundly intermingled with all existing sorts of creeds and denominations, to begin with Christianity and Islam. It also generated interesting cultural musical categories as the Klezmer movement in Eastern Europe and the hassidic groups were strongly influenced by all the melodies of their local environments and vice versa.

In Israel, all tendencies co-exist. They arrived from more than 150 countries. The pioneers had the task to enculturate Modern Hebrew, mending East-Europe with Yemenite and Arabic-speaking singers who wrote more patriotic community songs. Yemenites have played an essential role as Shoshana Damari, Esther Gamlieli, Ofra Haza, Noa (who "swings" as well in English). This led to an immense creative work in folk music ("Songs of Eretz Israel") and some radio programs continue to propose, at night, to refresh our memory.

Israel is known for having exceptional orchestras and concerts are organized everywhere, at times also in the desert where acoustics enhances the quality of playing the instruments. Music plays an important role in the peace process as Jewish and Palestinian artists play together locally and throughout the world.

Modern music includes the world of rock and rap, metal rock and psychedelic trance in Hebrew and/or Arabic, mixing sounds in some advanced capacity to sustain cultural encounters between Jews and the Arab world, as also the native African Ethiopian styles. Music blows electrically, laser-empowered. It is just fantastic to note that some haredi (ultra-orthodox) or very religious singers succeed to cope with classical artists.

Concerts are often given in Churches and monasteries. Israelis read a lot and traditionally love books. Today this drifts to CDs, DVDs but most people love classical music. It is important for the Churches because they continue to make use of chanting, instrumental music and they developed special techniques. It would be great to study the numerous basic connections between all local communities (Greek, Armenian, Aramaic, Arab, Latin, European, African, Asian).

It should be noted that the Eastern Orthodox Churches ( e.g. Greek, Arabic, Russian, Romanian) never use any instrument during the services. Only chanting and singing are allowed - maybe somehow linked to the Jewish attitude that voice is the best medium "to let everything that breathes (kol haneshamah) praise the Lord\ כל הנשמה תהלל יה" (Psalm 150:6).

Music is sort of international Esperanto, eventually without words. It transfigurates human speech and it defects or failures.Singing incarnates the miracle of human sound production and uttering. At this point Hebrew got really prophetic for our generation and the comings ones.