Inspiring Jewish Pride through Relevant Judaism
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From the wreckage of a bus, from the fresh mounds in a tranquil garden
the call has the ragged voice of agony, of hot-edged pain, of turbulent tumbles of crashed expectations and hopes.
From the ancient stones of a wall that’s bigger than it seems
the call of the people arrives, profound in its aching, its searching, its yearning.
From the parks and playgrounds,
the call is comfortable in its bliss and safe jubilant exultation,
in the growth and sprouting of the fresh life, open doors of young opportunity.
From the south comes the sound
of blasting and a never-stopping juddering vibration,
a buzzing of terror fills their minds, clutches at their souls.
From the deepest loneliest parts of the souls of the people
comes a call, a quietened, desperate call,
a call to something beyond their beings, beyond what they are prepared to believe,
a call to connect to fill the empty watery womb
that surrounds them in its disquieting quiet.
From the heavens, or from the echoes of years passed by
comes the call of a woman, a mother, a sister:
soul-wrenching sobs, fresh in their bitter burning, today as always.
The heart-shuddering tears of anguished love,
of longing for the peace of her children, her dear beloved children.
And no-one can comfort her, no-one can dry her face from its rivers of salty tears:
not until her children come back, not until her land will rejoice in its celebrated filling,
not until her prisoners return home, until the people is complete,
until the land bears the treads of its long-beloved nation,
until our mouths will be filled with laughter,
until we gather in our tear-sown harvest
with the joy of coming home.
The ‘Three Weeks’ is one of the most difficult times in the year for me. Ashkenazi custom is not to listen to music, among other joyous activities, during the days between the 17th of Tammuz and the 9th of Av. This is because these three weeks are a period of mourning; the Talmud describes many national tragedies that happened on both of these days, which are designated as fast days, including critical stages of the destruction of the Temple, the Beit HaMikdash. The entire period is one of sadness, and one that has been reincarnated again and again over the generations as a time of Jewish tragedy — may there be no more! I, as a musician, find it very hard to leave my instrument aside and to minimize my music listening during these weeks.
I’m now living in Israel, and I must say that the Land is alive; there is a feeling of aliveness that is tangible in everything, and that pervades everything and every person. This sadness of mourning, too, is definitely tangible to me. While there are not many more things as joyful to me as to walk down Ben Yehuda street in central Yerushalayim, and to see Jewish men and women, boys and girls, rejoicing and celebrating life in Israel with Jewish music, my joy and pride is overshadowed with sadness and discomfort during these three weeks.
Have we forgotten that we need to be sad in this time? Have we forgotten what we need to be sad about, what we need to remember? Is the fact that the Beit HaMikdash is still in ruins, more than 2000 years after its destruction, a fact of life to be accepted as a given? What is a healthy balance between rejoicing in life, especially life as a Jew in Israel, and grieving for the destruction of G-d’s House on earth, and for our continued distancing from Him?
A living contradiction; a junction of opposites. How can you laugh and cry at the same time? How can you pray for the rebuilding of Yerushalayim, while thanking G-d for its continual rebuilding in our days? And… must we resolve these existential difficulties, or is it okay to live with them?
Silent boxes, grimly borne.
Underground torrents of tears suddenly burst up outwards
Heart-wrenching sobs tear through the air:
The sons have come home.
Clustering support, rallying comfort,
rays of light in an overwhelming darkness;
the pain of the excruciating unknown
has changed to embody their worst fear, and their secret silent hope:
The sons have come home.
Betrayed by murderers who cheer in excitement
as we give them back their men of evil to return to their wickedness;
in jubilation and celebrated hatred,
their monsters have gone home.
In two deathly silent coffins,
our sons have come home.
Their cruelly silenced soon deaths meant
no pain, no suffering, for these two gruelling long years;
but the moment-by-moment hair-whitening torture
that their close ones suffered
is only ended today,
when the sons have come home.
Ease your hearts, o Israel,
for the sons have come home;
cry, o Israel,
for how the sons have come home.
Seats are empty, places silent,
but spaces in hearts cannot be re-filled.
G-d, spare the mourners more suffering;
comfort them in their silent finality,
now that their sons have come home.
