Monday was the deadliest day in Chicago in 13 years, and 10-year-old Tavon Tanner got caught in the worst of the gun violence as he played with his twin sister on the porch of his Lawndale home… Someone fired as many as nine shots in front of Tavon’s home…hitting the fifth-grader in the back. He collapsed as he followed his mother through the front door.
“I can’t breathe,” he kept yelling, banging his fists against the floor, according to his mother, Mellanie Washington. Washington and her sister, Harmonie Murphy, rushed to the boy’s side. “He started gasping for air,” said Murphy, 33. “His eyes rolled back.… He was telling us that it was burning.”…
Tavon’s twin sister, Taniyah, sat next to him, holding his hand, trying to keep him calm, according to Washington. “Twin don’t leave me, twin don’t leave me,” she kept yelling.
Tavon continued beating the floor with his hands from the pain. Then he went limp, weakening as he fought to hang on and started vomiting blood, his mother and aunt said…
Tavon was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital, where he underwent nearly four hours of surgery, Washington said. The bullet damaged his pancreas, intestines, kidney and spleen as it entered his lower back and lodged in his chest, she said.
Doctors removed the boy’s spleen and repaired the other organs but did not remove the bullet for now, Washington said. Tavon remained in critical condition and was heavily sedated.
Tavon was among 19 people shot Monday in Chicago. Nine of them were killed.
I’ve just read the opening paragraphs of an article published in the Chicago Tribune this past week reported by Alexandra Chachkevitch and Peter Nickeas. The story shook me to the core and I had to fight back tears when I first read about little Tavon Tanner. There are three reasons why I had such a strong emotional response to this story. First, Tavon is the same age as our oldest child. Second, as the parent of twins, I could not escape the pathos of Taniyah holding her twin brother’s hand and begging him to stay alive.
The third reason why the story touched me however emerged when I saw the location where this shooting took place. Tavon Tanner was shot just down the street from the corner of Polk and Independence. There is a grand, old building on the corner of Polk and Independence. It’s a Seventh Day Adventist Church, and as we speak, it is likely filled with worshippers. On the facade of that church is an engraving of the two-tablets of the law, the luchot ha-brit, which could evoke the commandment to remember and keep the Sabbath Day, something so important to the Seventh Day Adventists. But they aren’t the ones who carved the luchot on that building. That grand building on the corner of Polk and Independence used to be a shul. It used to be this shul.
And so, on the eve of the Fast of Tisha b’Av, on the actual calendar date of the 9th day of the month of Av, as we remember Hurban HaBayit, the destruction of the Beit HaMikdash, the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, I think it’s also appropriate to recall another hurban, another sanctuary no longer used for Jewish worship, another neighborhood that had sustained Jewish life for our parents and grandparents that is now bereft of Jews.
We were not exiled from Lawndale as we were from Jerusalem. We left of our own free will, seeking opportunity and a better life in more hospitable areas, such as Lakeview. Our mikdash me’at, our sanctuary, our shul, was not destroyed by a conquering army. It remains, lovingly cared for by a devoted congregation. But our exit from Lawndale occurred in the context of racial redlining, block-busting, and white-flight and our parents and grandparents were both victims of those processes, and at the same time complicit in a story that connects Tisha b’Av, the Hurban HaBayit, and little Tavon Tanner.
Every spring, Jewish newspapers publish a slew of essays and op-eds by writers declaring that this year they cannot celebrate Yom Ha’Atzma’ut, they cannot celebrate the birth of the State of Israel because of their disappointment in the State and what it has come to represent. And every summer, Jewish newspapers publish a slew of essays and op-eds by writers declaring that this year they will not fast on Tisha b’Av because the flourishing State of Israel makes mourning the destruction of the Temple irrelevant at best, and ungrateful at worst. One of my colleagues suggested that if only the authors of these essays could meet and compare notes, the entire genre of essays could be eliminated and we could get on with more important matters.
I’ve never had trouble celebrating Yom Ha’Atzma’ut and the relevance of Tisha b’Av at a time when the Jewish people are living in their own land is not a new question at all.
When the Second Temple was being built, during the reign of the Persian King Daryavish, the people asked the prophet Zechariah whether or not they should continue to fast on Tisha b’Av to mourn the destruction of the First Temple once the Second Temple was constructed. What should the policy be for the years of the Second Temple’s existence?
הַֽאֶבְכֶה֙ בַחֹ֣דש הַחֲמִשִ֔י הִנָזֵ֕ר כַאֲשֶ֣ר עָשִ֔יתִי זֶ֖ה כַמֶ֥ה שָנִֽים׃
“Shall I weep and practice abstinence in the fifth month, as I have been doing all these years?”
There is no clear answer provided by Tanakh, however, one chapter later, Zechariah says (8:19):
כֹֽה־אָמַ֞ר ה׳ צְבָא֗ות צ֣ום הָרבִיעִ֡י וְצ֣ום הַחֲמִישִי֩ וְצ֨ום הַשְבִיעִ֜י וְצ֣ום הָעֲשִיר֗י יִהְיֶ֤ה לְבֵית־יְהודה֙ לְשָש֣ון ולְשִמְחָ֔ה וֽלְמֹעֲד֖ים טובִ֑ים וְהָאֱמֶ֥ת וְהַשָל֖ום אֱהָֽבו׃
״Thus said the LORD of Hosts: The fast of the fourth month, the fast of the fifth month, the fast of the seventh month, and the fast of the tenth month shall become occasions for joy and gladness, happy festivals for the House of Judah; but you must love honesty and integrity.״
This verse was understood by Chazal to provide guidance on when and how we should mourn the tragic events of Jewish history (Rosh Hashanah 18b).
מאי דכתיב (זכריה ח, יט) כה אמר ה’ צבאות צום הרביעי וצום החמישי וצום השביעי וצום העשירי יהיה לבית יהודה לששון ולשמחה
קרי להו צום וקרי להו ששון ושמחה בזמן שיש שלום יהיו לששון ולשמחה אין שלום צום אמר רב פפא
הכי קאמר
בזמן שיש שלום יהיו לששון ולשמחה יש גזרת המלכות צום אין גזרת המלכות ואין שלום רצו מתענין רצו אין מתענין
אי הכי ט”ב נמי
אמר רב פפא
שאני ט’ באב הואיל והוכפלו בו צרות
דאמר מר
בט’ באב חרב הבית בראשונה ובשניה ונלכדה ביתר ונחרשה העיר
“What is the meaning of the verse in Zechariah? The days are called fast days and they are called days of rejoicing? The answer is that when there is peace, they are days of rejoicing, when there is no peace then they are days of fasting. Rav Papa said, this is the correct understanding: when there is peace they are days of rejoicing when there is government persecution then they are days of fasting. When there is no peace, but no persecution, then the fasts are optional. But, the Gemara asks, if so, would we say the same about the 9th of Av? Rav Papa says, the 9th of Av is different because the tzarot, the hardships and troubles were repeated on that day, as the Master taught: In the Month of Av the first and second temple’s were destroyed and Beitar was placed under siege and the City of Jerusalem was plowed over.”
My teacher Rabbi Nati Helfgot, in his book “Divrei Berakhah u’Mo’ed” summarizes the questions that the rishonim debate concerning this brief Talmudic passage:
What is the meaning of “shalom – peace” the condition when we should not fast? Does it refer to basic independence and freedom from foreign domination? We enjoy that independence today, but Jews had no political independence for virtually all of the Second Temple Period. Perhaps “shalom” refers to an existential completeness between humanity and God as is symbolized by the presence of the beit hamikdash?
What is the meaning of the phrase “Tisha b’Av is different since the calamities were repeated on that day?” What could that have meant during the time when the Second Beit HaMikdash stood? They didn’t know that it too would be destroyed on Tisha b’Av. Perhaps it refers to the significance of the destruction of the First Temple as an event worthy of mourning even in the presence of the Second Temple?
Was Tisha b’Av observed during the time of the Second Temple? According to Rabbi Shimon ben Tzemah Duran, known as Tashbetz, a fifteenth century halakhic scholar, Tisha b’Av was not observed during the period of the Second Temple. According to Rambam, however, our ancestors fasted on Tisha b’Av even when the Temple stood in Jerusalem. Tisha b’Av is not dependent upon the presence or absence of the Beit Hamikdash. Tisha b’Av depends on the degree of subjugation that we face. Rambam defines “shalom” as Jewish freedom whereas Tashbetz defines “shalom” as the existence of the beit hamikdash.
There is, I believe, a further element underlying the position of Rambam.
At the start of Chapter Five of Hilkhot Ta’anit, Rambam writes:
יֵש שָם יָמִים שֶכָל יִשְראֵל מִתְעַנִים בָהֶם מִפְנֵי הַצָרות שֶאֵרעו בָהֶן כְדי לְעורר הַלְבָבות לִפְתֹחַ דַרכֵי הַתְשובָה
“There are days when all Jews fast because of the misfortunes that occurred on those days in order to awaken our hearts and open them to the paths of repentance.”
For Rambam, we fast not as an expression of mourning, but as an expression of teshuvah and as a spiritual practice that is meant to inspire us and help us in the teshuvah process. And so the beit hamikdash is not as important in our need to fast as is the degree of our alienation from God. Foreign oppression is less significant than the degree to which the values of the Torah are able to shape the world around us.
Of course, Rambam insists, our ancestors fasted during the period of the Second Temple. The presence of the beit hamikdash did not stop Jews from acting towards one another with hatred and hostility. Hatred of another is only possible when there is alienation from God. The hatred and hostility alone that we express towards one another are themselves reasons to fast irrespective of the beit hamikdash.
If the insights of the Torah are not impacting the world, that is a cause for fasting, irrespective of the political situation that we find ourselves. The murder in this city, the staggering rivers of blood spilled through gun violence in our streets, a young boy fighting for his life, struck down only steps away from the building where our parents and grandparents prayed, is a massive desecration of the Name of God and a denial of the first principle of the Torah, a forgetting of the pillar of all wisdom, that each and every human being is a unique creation, fashioned in the very image of God.
I wish you all Shabbat Shalom and an easy fast.
Rabbi David Wolkenfeld 