Tisha B’Av – Do we Really Want the Temple Rebuilt?
Adapted from Rabbi Braun’s sermon in 5776
Today is Tisha B’av. We mourn the loss of two temples and many Jewish lives. We anticipate and look forward to the rebuilding of the Temple and pray for it daily.
Do we really? We certainly mourn the loss of Jewish lives. That is a pain that we unfortunately have to deal with today. We understand it, can relate to it and feel it acutely.
But do we really mourn the loss of the Temple per se? And do we really want to return to the Temple and the sacrificial order?
I spent a fair amount of time thinking about that this week. I listened to snippets online and read articles written by both professionals and laymen.
The questions were formulated differently and the answers varied. The only common denominator was that no one attempted to tackle the issue of sacrifice head on.
I found two different approaches to answer the question.
- The first is what I would call the – you don’t know what you are missing approach. It argues that the Temple brings with it a spiritual dimension that is unlike anything that we know and cannot fathom. We don’t really want for one of two reasons:
We are despicable animals who only care about the material.
b. We can’t really want what we don’t grasp, but if we could we would really want it.
http://www.makshivim.org.il/ask_show.asp?id=249896
I reject the first possibility – I think for the most part we are people with spiritual yearnings and desire looking for connections to Hashem.
The second is possible but not really helpful because we cannot imagine it!
- The second skirts the issue of the Temple entirely and argues that with a Temple and a messianic era, other things would change for the better as well. Some focus on the external threats and others on the internal ones.
I am not sure that this really answers the question, actually I am pretty sure that it does not, but it does speak to me primarily because it is something that we can relate to.
Externally:
Rambam writes that in Messianic times everyone will recognize that our God is the true God and that we are God’s people. Ostensibly they will stop trying to kill us, stab us, blow us up etc.
That would be an unbelievable thing. Imagine a world where Jews would not have to worry about anti-Semitism and terror. I can pray for that sincerely and constantly.
Internally:
I found a great piece written by Rav David Stav about the internal challenges amongst Jews and even within orthodoxy.
He writes: Do you think we are in a position to have a third temple. We have witnessed the disgrace and craziness surrounding separate seating on buses for men and women. Imagine he says what will happen when we have to separate between pure and impure. I imagine, he says, that there will be those who are tameh l’mehadrin and those who are only tameh according to the rabbanut and some who are tameh neo-reform!
Do we really want a Temple that will simply exacerbate the divisions amongst us! All it will do is make things worse.
We are living in a time, he writes, that matches the cause for the destruction of the temple as described by the Netziv.
The Netziv in his introduction to the book of Bereishit writes that there is a value is being a yashar, a person of moral integrity and general goodness in your dealings with people. Bilaam describes the Jewish people as yashar, Hashem is referred to as a tzaddik veyashar in Haazinu.
That was missing during the times of the Second Temple. The pious were well intentioned and even sincere but were not yashar.
At that time they were tzadikim and chasidim who endeavored and toiled to learn Torah. But they were not yashar in their interactions with the world. Because of the sinat chinam in their hearts for one another, they suspected anyone who did not follow their exact path in the fear of heaven as being a Sadducee and a heretic!… God is yashar and will not tolerate tzaddikim who are not yashar and because of this reality God destroyed the temple.
Rav Stav is right- we live in a world where everyone but you is wrong. Slight variations in Avodat hashem cause great strife and division amongst the Jewish people.
If the coming of Mashiach and the rebuilding of the Temple would usher in an era where Jews would respect one another and their differences, I would take the package deal, no questions asked.
That is something to daven for and work towards!
