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Dear Friends, shalom,
Next week Jews all over the world will celebrate the 9th of Av (30th July) the day, 1939 years ago, when the temple was destroyed.
The celebrations are described in Lamentations; fasting, pouring ashes on our heads, wearing sackcloth and reading the descriptions of mourning and destruction.
The author of Lamentations did not describe these customs as a penance for sin to be carried out throughout all the generations.
This is the explanation of rabbis of the 12th century, influenced by Christian ideas of penitence common at that time.
He described them to express the sadness felt by the entire Jewish nation in the face of the tragedy.
These customs aren’t penance for sins that we committed, as many Jews, Christians and Moslems think mistakenly.
It’s about time we make it completely clear to the entire world, especially to the other monotheistic religions that we don’t take the blame for that terrible tragedy that happened 1939 years ago.
It’s about time that everybody understood that on the 9th of Av the Jews are mourning the evilness in the world not their own evilness. Their mourning is like the mourning for a lost, close relative not a way of repenting for a sin committed.
The temple was built as a place where sacrifices could be offered in atonement for Adam’s sin, which according to all monotheistic religions was a reason for God to destroy the world which He created.
According to Judaism as long as the temple stood and the Jews sacrificed there, at the place God chose He delayed ultimate punishment of Adam’s sin and kept the world in existence.
According to Christianity God delays destruction thanks to the crucifixion.
According to Islam God delays destruction thanks to the followers of Mohammad who pray 5 times a day.
1939 years ago the Jews mourned the destruction of the world because they believed the destruction of the world would soon follow unless they prayed fervently to God or it was rebuilt (the bar Kochba rebellion, 65 years after the destruction, was an attempt to do this but failed dismally).
Hence the Jewish custom of praying 3 times a day with a congregation.
The 3 daily prayers with a congregation is the Jewish way of pleading with God to keep the world in existence despite the sin of Adam, just like the three daily temple sacrifices were the reason why God kept the world in existence.
This is why, in Judaism, the three daily prayers with a congregation aren’t voluntary but a duty upon every male Jew.
Christianity doesn’t have such an obligation because Jesus replaces the temple. The Islamic obligation to pray 5 times per day has a similar function to the Jewish obligation.
Jews consider that by keeping God’s commandments and by praying to God they do their duty of obeying God’s commandments and therefore He doesn’t destroy the world and will, eventually, even rebuild the temple.
This is not the way Christianity and Islam see the situation; according to them the Jews sinned and so have forfeited their position as chosen people and they have taken over.
Jewish sacrifices and prayer aren’t effective any longer, according to them.
According to Christians Judaism has completed its task of saving the world.
By first being chosen then sinning they prepared the way for the messiah, Jesus who personifies the temple.
According to Christianity the Jews now only have the task of accepting Jesus and His sacrifice on the cross to guarantee the continued existence of the world.
According to Christianity anyone who doesn’t accept Jesus as the savior endangers the existence of the world.
Islam is very similar and also has its origin in the concept of Jewish sinfulness which caused God to reject them and destroy the temple. (The proof of God’s rejection of the Jews, according to Islam, is the destruction of the temple. This is why according to Islam the 2nd Temple couldn’t have existed and the hope of the 3rd temple is preposterous and outrageous.)
This is the time to come out with a clear statement that we are and have always been a righteous nation and the destruction and havoc which various nations wrought on us weren’t a punishment from God but their own misguided morality leading them to perform travesties of justice and terrible cruelty.
The conquest of Israel and the terrible destruction carried out by those nations was wicked and there are many nations like that to this day who unlike the Jews don’t live according to a Godly moral standard.
The great Rabbi Akiva danced and rejoiced on the ruins of the temple because he was convinced that the Jews were a highly moral nation and that eventually the nations of the world would adopt the same high moral standards and the sign that this had been achieved would be the reconstruction of the temple and ingathering of the Jews who had been exiled from their land.
The Jews didn’t endanger the existence of the world by sinning against God. Whether the world continues or ceases to exist doesn’t depend on Jewish atonement through prayer or sacrifice neither on the belief in Mohammad or prayer and neither on Christian belief in the crucifixion.
The existence of the world depends on us, human beings, the way we behave towards each other and the way we take care of the world.
The monotheistic religions need to find another reason d’être.
Wishing you a great no news day
Yours truly
Leon Gork
Come for a Jerusalem Walk with Leon Gork
Jerusalemwalks.com
legork@netvision.net.il
Tel: 052 3801867