Tisha B’Av has always been the figment-of-my-imagination fast day. I have observed Tisha B’Av in so many places that I could never recall them all. I dressed in white, in black and in brown, depending on where I was. I helped my campers build the “Temple,” and then my friend’s campers burned it to the ground.
Tisha B’Av has had it tough because it falls in the summer, when many of us are on vacation. The heat can turn one’s fast into an ordeal.
However, that first time over a half a century ago when my late wife, Rita, and I fasted here in Jerusalem and peered from the roof of David’s Tomb at where the Western Wall was supposed to be – that Tisha B’Av was one of the moments in the Jewish year that kept us focused on return to our land. Tisha B’Av was not a figment of my imagination; it provided, annually, a poignancy in time which lifted us from the ruins of the past and deposited us in a new Israel.
When I was young, I always heard about being at the Western Wall for the fast day. Finally, our family made aliyah in August 1977. During the passing years, I have been to the Wall for Tisha B’Av frequently, waiting to feel the fast day deeply. Then it occurred via, a recollection I read in the pages of The Jewish Chronicle, published weekly in Great Britain.
Isaiah Raffalovich, a committed Zionist from the 19th century, returned to Eretz Yisrael in the 1890s, after being a resident for about 10 years and then going abroad to study. What was wonderful for a reader like me was that he made sure to arrive on the day before Tisha B’Av so he could carry with him to the Western Wall that night the memories of the past and the hopes of the future. I want to quote his words and spiritual sentiments, which touched me so.
His family moved to Jerusalem in 1882, when he was 12. It is not known exactly where they lived, but the assumption is that they were in housing built in Nahalat Shiva, near Zion Square today.
The members of the family were very active Jews, and they assisted Eliezer Ben-Yehuda in his efforts to get a Hebrew newspaper started and in his campaign to have everyone speak Hebrew.
Isaiah was a good student, and he went to high school at the French School, while studying Talmud in a yeshiva. He also wrote a few early pieces for the Ben-Yehuda newspaper since he loved Hebrew so.
In 1890 Raffalovich went abroad to study in England, where he was ordained a rabbi or reverend, as the Jewish clergy were labeled in those days. His first and best-known book, appearing in 1904, contained pictures of Eretz Yisrael with a written commentary of the sights of the land based on biblical sources in particular.
Returning to England just after the turn of the century, he served as a rabbi in various congregations. After World War I, he spent many years in South America, encouraging local Jews there to espouse the Zionist cause.
This item appeared in the Chronicle on August 8, 1902. Raffalovich, the author, penned this recollection in 1896 as a part of his “Zionist Diary” series:
The arrival to the Port of Jaffa
“The steamer entered the harbor of Jaffa, and the passengers flocked on deck ready for landing. The picturesqueness of the little town looming out between the orange and lemon groves, with its white flat-roofed rows of houses, was quite enchanting. To me however, the place had a different charm on this eventful day.
“I was carried away to the time when on this day the country was overrun by the Roman legions landing at this very place, intent to shatter the bulwarks of the Jewish defense and to crush the independence of Judah. I could see them, even now, with their polished helmets glittering in the burning sun, marching along in exemplary order and their banners with the Roman eagle fluttering in the clear air, my brethren fleeing before them, taking shelter in the caves and in clefts of the rocks and waiting for the momentary danger to be over, to join again the ranks of their fighting compatriots.
“I could hear, almost distinctly, the joyous shouting of the conquering enemy mingled with the cry of anguish that came from the breasts of the vanquished Israelites, whose blood was streaming in an endless pool along the parched valleys.”
Raffalovich did not want his initial descriptions of the victory of the Roman soldiers to be the final word, so he moved to the present.
“I felt a sudden change come over me; the blood rushed quicker through my veins. My back, bent for centuries in ghettos and pales, straightened itself, and my whole being clamored for revenge. To avenge the wrongs of my people and to replant them on the beautiful but desolate spot before me was my desire....”
Raffalovich continued, “But then my dreams came abruptly to an end. A rough hand was laid upon my shoulder, and I was unceremoniously shaken by a burly Arab who, wildly gesticulating, shouted to me in an unintelligible tongue. Before I could realize what all the noise, which became now universal on board the steamer, meant, my luggage was shoved into a gaily painted boat, and in another moment I was also hustled and deposited in the boat amidst trunks and diverse other things.
“After an hour’s jostling, bargaining and bribing, I succeeded in settling in a carriage of the newly built railway, which was to take me to Jerusalem, whereto I was bound to join in the evening of the mourning of the fall of Zion.”
“The sight of [the] Sharon and the mountains of Judea awakened in me again memories of olden times, when the brave zealots, besieged by Titus, defended heroically their ancient city, and fought bitterly for their treasure, the Temple of God.”
The train carried him and the other passengers around the curves, finally turning its goal into reality, just in time for Tisha B’Av.
“Jerusalem!
“At last I reached the goal of my journey. I am at last in the place for which all Israel has yearned these last 1,800 years.
“It was not evening yet, but the city, with its narrow lanes and covered streets, seemed to be clad in deep mourning. The sun in the west looked like a fiery ball, and the minarets and the steeples of the many churches were streaked with gold. The effect was marvelous. It seemed as if the whole of Jerusalem was wrapped up in flames, and it forcibly reminded one of the time when, on this very evening, the city was illumined by the flames of its burning Temple.
“The twilight does not last long in the East, and the city was soon wrapped in semidarkness. The imams from the tops of the mosques called the faithful for prayers, and when I reached the Jewish Quarter, the inhabitants, barefooted and in tatters, were hurrying to the Western Wall, there to pour out their hearts in prayer and supplication.”
As Raffalovich pointed to the local population and how they were dressed, I felt immersed in Jerusalem of centuries ago, and for the first time perhaps I could mourn properly.
“The paved little space before the wall was crowded with men, women, and children. In a corner a band of Morocco Jews, squatting by the wall, responded in tones difficult to describe, to the lamentations read by the hacham, now and then raising their hands pathetically heavenwards. At the other end a group of calm Sephardim were singing the same verses to the tune not unlike that of the megillah. Just in the middle, and nearer to the wall, hundreds of Ashkenazim rent the air with their cries. I was bewildered.
“In front of me stood the ancient monument, as eternal testimony of former greatness. Nine rows of huge and gigantic stones is all that is left of Israel’s glory.”
I knew that, finally, I was standing there with my fellow Jews at the Kotel in Jerusalem.
“The crowd became denser, and the weeping and wailing was deafening. From one to the other the cry was heard: ‘The crown is fallen from our head; woe unto us that we have sinned.’ And sobs and lamentations broke out afresh. I also wept. I wept bitterly. I wept not only for the destruction of the city but also for the fall of the people.
“And as in harmony with my thoughts, someone cried out: ‘Remember, O Lord, what is come upon us; consider and behold our reproach.’ A reproach indeed that a people who boast to be ‘a wise and understanding people’ should not be wise enough to recognize that after 18 centuries of wailing and lamenting, it is time to rise and do something for the regaining of the old greatness.”
To be honest, Raffalovich emphasized, “I actually planned aliyah; it is still a dream for me. Since my wife and children have labored much, much more than me in the last 36 years, they are among those helping this nation to regain the old greatness of our country.
“At midnight fresh bands of people came to spend the night at the sacred spot whence the Divine Presence has never departed.”
Raffalovich then brought us with him to feel what he experienced. “I remembered the legend that at midnight foxes are seen to walk about the place. I could not see traces of foxes except in the form of Arabs who stood there – apparently greatly enjoying the ‘fantasia’ – mocking and laughing at the poor ‘Yahud,’ who thinks to retake their country by such means.”
He recalled an oft-quoted tale about Rabbi Akiva. “He was seen smiling when perceiving foxes running about Mount Moriah. When asked for the reason of his cheerfulness, he said that when seeing the first part of the prophecies fulfilled, he was convinced that the time draws near for the fulfillment of the other part.”
For Raffalovich, that Tisha B’Av night, the “fulfillment” had begun. ■