TaborBlog

“All things biblical” from the Hebrew Bible to Early Christianity in the Roman World and Beyond
July 27, 2012

Tisha b’Av (9th day of Av, the 5th month): Its Meaning in History and Tradition

As sunset falls on this eighth day of the 5th lunar month, known in Judaism as the month of Av, Tisha b’Av–that is, the 9th of Av–is marked on the calendar. Since it falls on a Shabbat this year it is observed one day later, beginning at sundown Saturday through sundown Sunday. This particular Shabbath, the one before Tisha b’Av, begins the reading of Deuteronomy and is called Shabbat Chazon, which means the “Sabbath of Vision,” taken from the first word (חזון) of Isaiah 1:1-27, which is the reading from the Prophets for this day. These opening words of Isaiah set the tone for remembering Israel’s sinfulness that brought about the destruction of the holy city of Jerusalem.

Tisha b’Av is mentioned in Zechariah 7:3 and 8:19, as the “fast of the fifth month.” It is observed first and foremost to commemorate the destruction of both the 1st and 2nd Temples of Jerusalem, in 586 BCE and 70 CE respectively–first by the Babylonians, the subsequently by the Romans. Josephus, the Jewish historian, who records the history of the latter, and lived through it, makes the connection between the strange coincidence of the Temple going up in flames on the same fateful day on the Jewish calendar (Wars, 6:249–50).[1] Those twin destructions marked the day as a time of sorrow and mourning forever after, marked by solemness and fasting without food or drink for 24 hours. The customs associated with Shiva, the Jewish mourning for the death of a close relative are followed, and the book of Lamentations is read in a special mournful chant. Ironically, according to some rabbinic tradition, the Messiah either was or will be born on Tisha b’Av, as a way of affirming that Light comes in the midst of the deepest Darkness and Despair. Those who take this literally, that he has already been born, believe he is hidden away waiting for the time of redemption (y. Berachot 2:4; Eichah Rabbah 1:51). Over the centuries this day has grown large in both history, legend, and tradition, remembered as a dark day of dire news and impending disaster. What follows below is a summary of some of that tradition, compiled by Yoram Etinger and based on many sources:

The Roman Destruction of Jerusalem by David Roberts

1. The 9th Day of (the 11th Jewish month) Av is the most calamitous day in Jewish history. Fasting on that day commemorates national catastrophes, in an attempt to benefit from history by learning from critical moral and strategic missteps, thus preventing future catastrophes. It was first mentioned in the book of Zechariah 7:3.

2.  The Passover holiday of liberty and the fast of the 9th Day of Av are commemorated on the same weekday.  The fast of the 9th day of Av is succeeded by the 15th day of Av – a holiday of love and rapprochement. The 9th Day of Av is treated simultaneously as a day of lamentation and holiday, thus highlighting a cardinal lesson: In order to fortify liberty and advance deliverance, one must commemorate calamities, avoid wishful-thinking and be mentally and physically prepared to face crises, and never lose optimism.  A day of destruction/oblivion is the first day of the path toward construction/deliverance. A problem is an opportunity in disguise. According to the Jerusalem Talmud (Berachot 2:4), the Messiah is destined to be born on Tisha Be’Av.

3.  Major Jewish calamities occurred on the 9th Day of Av (Tisha B’Av in Hebrew):

*The failed “Ten Spies/tribal presidents” (VS. Joshua & Caleb) –slandered the Land of Israel, preferring immediate convenience and conventional “wisdom” over faith and long term vision, thus prolonging the wandering in the desert for 40 years.

*The destruction of the First Temple and Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon (586BC) produced a massacre of 100,000 and a national exile.

*The destruction of the Second Temple and Jerusalem by Titus of Rome (70CE) was accompanied by a massacre of 1MN and a national exile.

*Bar Kochba (Great) Rebellion was crashed (135CE) with the fall of Beitar (in Judea & Samaria) and the plowing of Jerusalem by Quintus Tinius Rofus, the Roman Governor – 580,000 killed.

*First Crusade Pogroms (1096) – scores of thousands slaughtered.

*Jewish expulsion from Britain (1290).

*Jewish expulsion from Spain (1492).

*WW1 erupted (1914).

*The beginning of the 1942 deportation of Warsaw Ghetto Jews to Treblinka extermination camp.

4.  The centrality of Jerusalem in Jewish history is commemorated on the 9th day of Av.  It is highlighted by Psalm 137:5 – “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy.” According to the constructive/optimist spirit of Tisha’ Be’Av: “He who laments the destruction of Jerusalem will be privileged to witness its renewal” (Babylonian Talmud, Ta’anit 30).

5.  The Book of the five Lamentations (The Scroll of Eikhah which was composed by Jeremiah the Prophet, who prophesized destruction, exile and deliverance) is read during the first nine days of Av. The numerical value of the Hebrew letters of Eikhah (איכה) is 36, which is equal to the traditional number of righteous Jewish persons. The Hebrew meaning of Eikhah could be construed as a reproaching “How Come?!”, as well as “Where are you?”  or “Why have you strayed away?”  The term Eikhah stars in the first chapter of Deuteronomy and the first chapter of Isaiah, which are annually studied in conjunction with the book of Lamentations on the 9th day of Av. Thus the 9th day of Av binds together the values of Moses, Jeremiah and Isaiah and three critical periods in the history of the Jewish People: deliverance, destruction, renewal.

6.  The 9th Day of Av concludes a series of three Torah readings of Jewish calamities (two by Jeremiah and one by Isaiah), and launches a series of seven Torah readings of consolations, renewal and ingathering (by Isaiah).

7.  Napoleon was walking at night in the streets of Paris, hearing sad voices emanating from a synagogue.  When told that the wailing/lamenting commemorated a 586BC catastrophe – the destruction of the First Temple – he stated: “People who solemnize ancient history are destined for a glorious future!”

8.  The commemoration of the 9th day of Av constitutes a critical feature of Judaism. It strengthens faith, roots, identity, moral clarity, cohesion and optimism by learning from past errors and immunizing oneself against the lethal disease of forgetfulness. Memory is Deliverance; forgetfulness is oblivion. The verb “to remember” (זכור) appears almost 200 times in the Bible, including the Ten Commandments. Judaism obligates parents to transfer tradition to the younger generation, thus enhancing realism and avoiding the curse of euphoric or fatalistic mood.

9.  The custom of house-cleaning on the 9th day of Av aims at welcoming deliverance. Fasting expresses the recognition of one’s limitations and fallibility and the constant pursuit of moral enhancement and humility.

10.  The 9th Day of Av is the central of the Four Jewish Days of Fast, commemorating the destruction of the First Temple:  the10th Day of Tevet (the onset of the siege that Nebuchadnezzar laid to Jerusalem), the 17th day of Tamuz (the walls of Jerusalem were breached), the 9th day of Av (destruction of both Temples) and the 3rd day of Tishrey (The murder of Governor Gedalyah, who maintained a level of post-destruction Jewish autonomy, which led to a murder rampage by the Babylonians and to exile).

11.  The 9thDay of Av culminates the Three Weeks of Predicament (ימי בין המצרים), starting on the 17th day of the month of Tamuz, when the walls of Jerusalem were breached by Nebuchadnezzar (1st Temple) and by Titus (2nd Temple).

12.  The month of Av launches the transformation from Curse to Blessing.  The Hebrew spelling of Av (אב) consists of the first two letters of the Hebrew alpha-Beth.  These letters constitute the Hebrew word for “bud” and they are the first two letters of the Hebrew word for “spring” (אביב , which means the father of twelve month).  The first letter, א, stands for ארור (cursed) and the second letter, ,ב stands for ברוך (blessed). The Hebrew letters of Av constitute the letters of Father (אב) and the first two letters of אבל (mourning).  The numerical value of Av (Aleph=1 and Bet=2), which is three, the combination of the basic even and odd numbers (King Solomon: “A triangular string/knot cannot be broken”). The zodiac sign of Av is a lion, which represents the Lion of Judah, rising in the aftermath of destruction caused by Nebuchadnezzar, whose symbol was the lion. Moses’ brother, Aharon – the embodiment of human kindness – died on the 1st day of Av.

  1. The First Temple, built by King Solomon, was destroyed by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar in 586 B.C.E. on the 10th of Av, according to Jeremiah 3:12, whereas in the corresponding record in II Kings 25:8–9, the date is given as the 7th of Av. The Tosefta Ta’anit 4:10 (also Ta’an. 29a) explains this discrepancy by stating that the destruction of the outer walls and of the courtyard started on the 7th of Av while the whole edifice was destroyed on the 10th of Av. R. Johanan declared that he would have fixed the fast on the 10th of Av because it was on that day that the greater part of the calamity happened. The rabbis however decided that it is more fitting to commemorate the “beginning of the calamity.” The Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 C.E., on the 10th of Av, according to the historian Josephus (Wars, 6:249–50). This day is still observed as a day of mourning by the Karaites. The Talmud (Ta’an. 29a), however, gives the date as the 9th of Av, which became accepted as the anniversary of both destructions. The Jewish Virtual Library [↩]
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July 27, 2012

How Common Are The Names in the Talpiot “Jesus” Tomb: A New Study

The first and most frequent response one gets to any suggestion that the Talpiot “Jesus” tomb might be that of Jesus of Nazareth and his family is “But weren’t these names common in that time?” One hears this from academic colleagues, both high and low, from media people, and from the public, either at lectures or in comments all over the Internet. It is kind of amazing to me that this assertion, which has been shown to be demonstrably untrue, has become a virtual mantra, almost like the proverbial “knee-jerk” reaction.

The best recent academic studies of this subject, easily accessible on-line, are those of Mark Elliot and Kevin Kilty, and the overview provided by statistician Jerry Lutgen.[1] For anyone who wants to make informed comments these seem to me to be the place to begin:

M. Elliott and K. Kilty, “Inside the Numbers of the Talpiot Tomb.”

M. Elliott and K. Kilty, “Probability, Statistics, and the Talpiot Tomb.”

Jerry Lutgen, “The Talpiot Tomb: What Are the Odds?”

We now have a new study by Prof. Claude Cohen-Matlofsky, of the University of Toronto and the Sorbonne, a summary of which was just posted yesterday. Cohen-Matlofsky’s full study will come out in the forthcoming volume of papers from the 2008 Jerusalem Talpiot Tomb Conference edited by James Charlesworth.[2] Her piece view resets our question in a remarkable way by suggesting a new a more precise method of calculating “onomastics” or name frequencies in the late 2nd Temple period. I urge a careful reading:

“Onomastics and Statistics in Second Temple Judaism,” July, 2012

This work comes out of Prof. Cohen-Matlofsky’s larger work, published in her influential book, Les Laïcs en Palestine d’Auguste à Hadrien: étude prosopographique (2001). What Cohen-Matlofsky has undertaken is a much tighter chronological calculation (63 BCE to 70 CE.) of the occurrences of various Jewish names, both male and female, in the period, as well as a broader and more comprehensive sampling than just names on ossuaries. She points out, for example, that Tal Ilan’s most useful lexicon includes names from 330 BCE to 200 CE, which is a very broad chronological swath, and that is what many of us have relied upon.[3] Although Tal Ilan includes other sources beyond ossuary inscriptions Cohen-Matlofsky has been able to update, expand, and in some places correct, her tallies. Tal Ilan’s data on the Talpiot tomb names, as tabulated by John Koopmans, my researcher, is available here. Cohen-Matlofsky explains:

In my research, I drew names from the writings of Flavius Josephus and other ancient authors, biblical, and rabbinical sources, including the New Testament , the documents of Qumran, Murabba’at and other caves of the Judean desert and finally the archeological material, especially funerary inscriptions mostly found in rock-cut tombs excavated in and around Jerusalem.

Rahmani’s classic Catalogue of Jewish Ossuaries, only goes down through 1989, even though he published it in 1994, and it is restricted to those ossuaries in the Israel State Collection. The 227 inscribed ossuaries Rahmani includes must now be expanded to more than 600 as now listed in Cotton, et al., Corpus Inscriptionnum Iudaeae/Palaestinae. See my own tabulation of the Talpiot tomb names based on Cotton’s CIIP here.

One interesting result is that the name Yeshua, in its variables in both Greek and Hebrew/Aramaic, rather than being the most common ends up being the least common of the names in the Talpiot tomb. The name Matiah turns out to be quite rare while the name Miriam comes in behind Salome in its various forms, which is the most common female name. These results interesting to compare with those of Rachel Hachlili, who attempts to gather from a similar set of data bases.[4]

I commend Prof. Cohen-Matlofsky for this latest effort and  I look forward to reading the full account of her research in the forthcoming Charlesworth volume mentioned above. I also thank the editors at Bible & Interpretation for continuing to post the latest and best studies on the Talpiot tombs, reflecting all points of view and allowing respectful on-line discussion. I urge my blog readers to try a search at that site for “Talpiot” or the “James ossuary.” You will be amazed at the wealth of materials archived there.

  1. There is of course the peer reviewed foundational work of Andrey Fuerverger, “Statistical Analysis of an Archeological Find,” in Annals of Applied Statistics, 2, 2008, pp. 3-54. Although Fuerverger’s critics have raised some legitimate questions about his method and assumption his professional responses to them, published at the end of his article, have been too often ignored [↩]
  2. The Tomb of Jesus and His Family? Exploring Ancient Jewish Tombs Near Jerusalem’s Walls, edited by James H. Charlesworth and Arthur Boulet [↩]
  3. Lexicon of Jewish Names in Late Antiquity, Mohr Siebeck, 2002 [↩]
  4. Jewish Funerary Customs, Practices And Rites In The Second Temple Period, Brill, 2005, p. 196-200 [↩]
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July 27, 2012

Praying at the Kotel or Western Wall When Abraham Lincoln Was President

Here are two fascinating photos from the amazing Library of Congress collection of photos of Jerusalem. These are of the Western Wall or Kotel, called for centuries “The Wailing Wall” by non-Jews, the central place of prayer for Jews today worldwide. The first was taken in around 1860 by Peter Bergheim when Abraham Lincoln was President. The population of Jerusalem at that time was 8000 Jewish, 6000 Muslim, and 3800 Christian. What few realize today is that at the turn of the 19th century, say when Mark Twain visited, Jerusalem was under Ottoman rule and the Old City was a tiny isolated entity with almost nothing built around it, with a Jewish majority. Jews lived in areas outside the city both west and east, including what is today considered “Arab East Jerusalem.” The Mt of Olives, the City of David area, and Silwan, so densely populated today, were bare, as photos taken at that time clearly show.

The second is a wider view taken in 1946, the year I was born. It shows how restricted the space in front of the Kotel was. I first visited the Wall in 1962 as a teenager. At that time the entire Old City was occupied by Jordan so our family, on a Holy Land tour, like millions of tourist in that time, never entered Israel proper as we had an interest in seeing the traditional Christian sites. After the Six Day War the plaza that exists today was created and the Jewish Quarter, that had been destroyed by the Jordanians, was rebuilt.

Click images to enlarge for viewing

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