This past week, we commemorated the fast day of the 17th of Tammuz, Yud Zayin BeTammuz, and in another three weeks, we will commemorate another fast day, the Ninth of Av, or Tishah BeAv. These two fast days were instituted by the prophets and the Sages to commemorate not only the destruction of the two Temples in Jerusalem, but many other negative events in Jewish history. According to the Mishnah, five calamities occurred on the 17th of Tammuz, and five others occurred on Tishah BeAv.[1]
The 17th of Tammuz and the Breaking of the Tablets
The first of the calamitous events occurring on the 17th of Tammuz was Moses breaking the first Tablets of the Covenant when he came down from Mount Sinai. The people had miscalculated when Moses was supposed to come down from the mountain forty days after receiving the Torah, and in their desperation, they made a golden calf to, as it were, replace Moses, as they felt a vacuum of leadership. When Moses descended with the tablets of the law, he broke them when he saw how they were dancing and celebrating around the golden calf.[2] This event mirrors the more archetypal event called the Shattering of the Vessels when the initial vessels of creation could not hold the incredibly powerful light and shattered. According to the Arizal, this world, which is known as the World of Rectification, is made up of the broken vessels of the previous world.
Tisha B'Av and the Report of the Spies
The first of the events that occurred on the Ninth of Av was when the twelve spies sent by Moses to scout the Land of Israel returned after forty days with their report. Ten of them discouraged the people with an evil report saying the people there were too strong for the Israelites to vanquish. The people responded by standing at their tents crying, wanting to go back to Egypt.[3] The Talmud reports that God who had continually promised the Israelites to bring them to the land he had promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, declared: “You are crying tonight for nothing. In the future, you will have what to cry about on this night.”[4] That night was Tishah BeAv, and as the Midrash predicted, over the centuries, not only five calamities occurred on this date, as the Mishnah records, but many other terrible events as well.
The 22 Days and the Hebrew Letters
If we look carefully, we see that Tishah BeAv is the 22nd day after the fast day of the 17th of Tammuz. Since there are 22 Hebrew letters, there is a direct correspondence between the letters and this span of 22 days. This is the reason that Jeremiah, who composed the Book of Lamentations, Eichah, which is read in public on Tishah BeAv, wrote most of its chapters following an acrostic using the 22 letters of the Hebrew alephbet. The acrostic was meant to remind the reader that Jewish people had turned away from the Torah written in 22 letters and had thus brought the destruction upon themselves.[5] Jeremiah is also the source for the name used to designate these 22 days on the Hebrew calendar, “Days Between the Straits”[6] (ימי בֵּין הַמְּצָרִים).
Attributes of Compassion
If we look closer, we see that these 22 days divide into two groups, one with 13 days, the second with 9 days. The first 13 days are all in the month of Tammuz—from the 17th of Tammuz until the end of the month. The second group of 9 days are in the month of Av—from Rosh Chodesh Av until Tishah BeAv—from the first day of the month until the ninth. The second group of 9 days is even referred to in Halachah as “the Nine Days.”
The 13 Days of Tammuz correspond to the 13 Attributes of Divine Compassion (Shelosh Esrei Middot HaRachamim) revealed to Moses after the breaking of the Tablets as a path to forgiveness.[7] The 9 days of Av correspond to the 9 Attributes of Divine Compassion that Moses expressed to intercede for the people after the Sin of the Spies.[8] Thus, we have the two incidents that brought upon us these two days of fasting—the 17th of Tammuz and Tishah BeAv—but we also have the antidote in the form of two sets of Attributes of Compassion showing the way for doing teshuvah to rectify these negative events.[9]
It is stated in the Zohar that in the merit of learning the inner dimensions of the Torah revealed in its teachings, redemption will come to the Jewish people with compassion.[10] Here again, we see the idea of compassion being the underlying force leading to teshuvah, rectification and redemption. This idea, that learning the inner dimensions of the Torah is directly connected to redemption and the Messianic era has become a cardinal belief in Kabbalah and Chasidut as we will now see.
The Pillars of Safed: The Ramak and the Arizal
In the 16th century, there was an explosion of Kabbalistic teachings in the city of Tsfat in the Land of Israel. The two personalities most responsible for this were the Ramak, Rabbi Moses Cordovero (1522-1570), and the Arizal, Rabbi Isaac Luria (1534-1572). They were able to revolutionize the learning of Kabbalah, the inner dimensions of the Torah, and to this day set the foundations for the study of Kabbalah.
The Ramak and the Arizal passed away in a span of just 2 years. It is interesting to note that Rabbi Moses Cordovero, passed away on the 23rd of Tammuz, the seventh and middle day of the group of thirteen days from the fast of the 17th of Tammuz until the final day of Tammuz. The Arizal, just a few years later, passed on the 5th of Av, the middle fifth day of the nine days from Rosh Chodesh Av until Tishah BeAv:
| Tammuz | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 |
| Av | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |
In the Temple in Jerusalem, two pillars, referred to as Boaz and Jachin, were erected before the entrance to the Sanctuary.[11] In a symbolic way, just like these two pillars were landmarks of the Temple, the Ramak and the Arizal were pillars of the Kabbalistic tradition. It is also interesting to note that they are buried adjacent to one another in the ancient cemetery in Tsfat, one above the other. These two “pillars of Kabbalah” symbolically represent the two sefirot of victory (netzach) and acknowledgment (hod), corresponding to the legs, the “pillars” of the body.
These two sefirot are also the source of prophecy according to the Zohar, which is why prophets would place their head between their knees when attaining prophecy. Thus, Rabbi Moses Cordovero and Rabbi Isaac Luria, by teaching and spreading Kabbalistic wisdom in the city of Tsfat, were like pillars supporting the return of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel, a process that was fueled by the revelations of the Torah’s inner dimension.
The Wellsprings of the Baal Shem Tov
Some 150 years after the passing of these twin pillars, the eschatological teachings of Kabbalah reached even simple Jews through the teachings of the Ba’al Shem Tov, the founder of the Chasidic movement. After living as a hidden pious man (a tzaddik) for the first 36 years of his life, the Ba’al Shem Tov revealed his teachings and unique persona under the direction of his heavenly mentor, Achiyah HaShiloni. He was able to transform the teachings of the Zohar, which served as the basis for the esoteric and difficult to understand Kabbalah of the Ramak and the Arizal, into a new system and language that quickly touched upon the lives of the Jewish masses and awakened the spark of Mashiach and the yearning for the Redemption in them.
On Rosh Hashanah of 1746 (5507), the Ba’al Shem Tov had an elevation of soul during which he entered the chamber of Mashiach in heaven. When in the presence of the soul of the Mashiach, he asked him, “When is the master coming?” The soul of Mashiach, responded by quoting the verse, "When the wellsprings of your teachings reach the farthest limits.”[12] Thus, the Ba’al Shem Tov, and all his subsequent followers were entrusted with the mission of spreading the inner dimensions of the Torah, all in the belief that they are a key instrument to bringing the final redemption to the Jewish people and the entire world, through compassion.
We should all endeavor to play our part in both learning and spreading the inner dimensions of the Torah to facilitate the spread of the spiritual energy and help it reach a critical mass that will bring about the long-awaited Redemption and lead us into the Messianic era.
[1]. Mishnah Ta’anit 4:6.
[2]. Exodus 32:15-20.
[3]. Numbers 13:1-14:4.
[4]. Ta’anit 29a.
[5]. Sanhedrin 104a.
[6]. Lamentations 1:3.
[7]. Exodus 34:6-7.
[8]. Numbers 14:18. The 13 Attributes and the 9 Attributes are the basis of our ongoing series of articles on the Nine Principles of Faith of the Torah’s inner dimension appearing concurrently in Wonders. This week, we focus on the fifth and sixth principles. The series began with the Shelach 5786 issue of Wonders.
[9]. Yaiyn Yitzchak, Shelach §6.
[10]. Zohar 3:124b.
[11]. 1 Kings 7:15-22.
[12]. From a letter the Ba’al Shem Tov sent to his brother-in-law, Rabbi Gershon of Kitov.
