Brushing away the dust

I was a little curious when I glanced at my stats this morning and noticed a series of ‘hits’ from the Department of Commerce in Boulder Colorado, starting at 6:45AM. Then it occurred to me that this was precisely the time I had finished my first cup of coffee… and suddenly it all began to make sense. You see, I am now vibrating at exactly the same frequency as the Cesium atom… and the folks who maintain the Atomic clock over there in Colorado were just checking in to make sure their clocks are correct.

In short... Always happy to help out the scientific community!

To quote a wonderful fiction blogger named Queenie: "Definition of me: Standing over the fresh pot of... coffee on my kitchen counter, my arms outstretched, exclaiming, "Look what I have created!""

Anyhoo… as the title of today’s post suggests, this entry is not about my renewed state of caffeination, but rather the more somber events of Tisha B’Av.

Monday night, a few minutes before sunset, Zahava and I put the kids into the car and drove twenty minutes into the Judean Desert. Our destination: the ruins of King Herod’s mountain fortress; Herodyon.

We weren’t alone in our journey.

Like the scene from the end of ‘Field of Dreams’ (where the long line of headlights weaved slowly through the cornfields at dusk)… we were near the head of a procession of cars winding through the desert landscape towards a mountain that looks for all the world like a volcano.

Along the way, the winding road took us through several Arab villages, so there was a reassuringly frequent encounter with army patrols, check points, and border police. Each time we came upon a uniformed presence, we were greeted with the traditional, “Tzom Kal” (translation: [your] fast [should be] easy). The overwhelming majority of these soldiers are not religiously observant. In their homes around the country, they may, or may not, have marked Tisha B’Av by fasting or reading the book of Lamentations. But being Jewish… and wearing the uniform of Israel’s modern army on the anniversary of the destruction of our ancient national aspirations… these teenaged Jewish soldiers offered this traditional greeting as if to acknowledge their connection to the date… the place… and the long line of their fellow Israelis winding towards Herodyon.

Another reason Jews traditionally wish one other an ‘easy fast’, is because one shouldn’t offer normal greetings (such as ‘Hi’, ‘How are you?’, etc.) on a day of mourning. Handshakes and hugs are not exchanged, and even within a crowd, one is encouraged to refrain from levity.

As we got closer to Herodyon, the volcano-like appearance became more pronounced. King Herod, who also built the mountain fortress of Masada, essentially took this mountain… sliced off the top… and scooped out the insides before constructing a desert palace for himself. Here is what it would have looked like in its day:

Long after Herod was gone from the scene, this fortress became a refuge for Jews fleeing the destruction being wrought in Jerusalem by Titus’ Roman Legions. The Jews who stood on top of Herodyon on Tisha B’Av in 70 C.E. were able to clearly see the smoke and flames from Jerusalem as the Temple was being destroyed. The feeling of hopelessness most have been overwhelming!

And so we came to the same spot to sit on the stones and on the ground… they way they most have sat… in order to continue mourning over those terrible events.

Since it was inappropriate to exchange greetings on Tisha B’Av, the hundreds of people streaming up onto the mountain acknowledged one another with nods, weak smiles and the inevitable ‘Tzom Kal’. This reserved behavior further emphasized the sense of loss, and set the tone for the scene inside the mountain fortress.

As we descended the stairs/ ramp into the fortress interior, the broken pillars, tumbled building stones, and whispering desert wind further hushed the assembled crowd until nearly all available space was filled with somber mourners, seated in the dust.

As the sun set in the distance, the assembled group of people got to their feet, turned to face Jerusalem and began the evening service (Aravit). The adults prayed, and the children wandered tentatively through the crowds. Even thought the kids seemed less aware of the specifics of the occasion (no hurry… they will learn the heartrending details soon enough)… they were markedly more reserved in this setting, and most took their cues from the demeanor of the adults.

After the conclusion of the evening service, the crowd broke up into smaller groups, seeking out little sheltered niches around the windy mountain and began reading the book of Lamentations aloud.

I have heard Lamentations read every year since I was 18, but have always had trouble connecting the comfortable surroundings of the synagogue with the destruction described in the book. Sitting in the dust with my back against a broken pillar… with a direct line-of-sight to the remains of the Temple mount in Jerusalem… I felt no such disconnect.

The circumstance separating the assembled crowd on this Tisha B’Av from the crowd that sat and mourned here in 70 C.E., is that we had a small glimmer of hope… ‘The first flowering of the redemption’… waiting for us outside this ruined fortress. There are once again Jewish soldiers manning the ramparts of a sovereign Jewish state, and despite the best efforts of those who would gladly see us once again led into slavery (or worse), we were privileged to brush away the dust… walk down the mountain… and resume writing the story that was interrupted almost two millennia ago.

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* All photos are from the Ministry of Tourism.
** Thanks to my friend Ben Chorin (no, not his real name), who spotted me on Herodyon and [correctly] assumed I would write about my experience.