The Ninth of Av, or Tisha b'Av, is the most somber day of the Hebrew Calendar year and in this post I will do my best to explain why. Before I get started here, I just want to reiterate how much love and respect that I have for all of Jewish brothers and sisters out there.
There are several reasons why the 9th of the Hebrew Month of Av is considered to be such a somber day for the Jewish people, as it seems to be a day of judgment. I will not even attempt to speculate why, rather this purpose of this post is to educate others about the significance of Ninth of Av, and to give a bit of background info on the Hebrew Calendar in general.
The Hebrew (or Jewish) Calendar, ( הלוח העִברִ / HaLuah HaIvri )derived from the ancient Hebrew calendar, has remained unchanged since about AD 900. It is the official calendar of the modern state of Israel and is used by Jewish people throughout the world as a religious calendar. The starting point of Hebrew chronology is the year 3761 B.C., the date for the creation of the world as described in the Old Testament. Unlike our Gregorian Calendar, the Jewish Calendar is a Lunar Calendar, based on lunar months of 29 days alternating with 30 days. Instead of having a leap year, adding one leap day (on February 29) every four years, the Hebrew Calendar adds an extra month is intercalated every 3 years, based on a cycle of 19 years.
Here is the list of the Hebrew Months, both in Civil and Biblical Order:
Civil Order:
Tishri
Cheshvan
Kislev
Tevet
Shevat
Adar
Nisan
Iyar
Sivan
Tammuz
Av
Elul
Biblical Order:
1
ניסן
Nisan
30 days
2
איר / אייר
Iyar
29 days
3
סיוון
Sivan
30 days
4
תמוז
Tamuz
29 days
5
אב
Av
30 days
6
אלול
Elul
29 days
7
תִשׁרִי
Tishri
30 days
8
מרחשוון
Marcheshvan
29 or 30 days
9
כסליו
Kislev
29 or 30 days
10
טבת
Tevet
29 days
11
שבט
Shvat
30 days
*12L
אדר א
Adar I / Adar Rishon
30 days
*12
אדר ב
Adar / Adar II
29 days
*Please note that in a leap year, Adar is replaced by Adar II (also called Adar Sheni or Veadar) and an extra month, Adar I (also called Adar Rishon), is inserted before Adar II.
So, we may question why the Hebrew Calendar is based on moon cycles (lunar), as opposed to sun cycles (solar), like we are used to in our Gregorian Calendar. In Israel and according to the Hebrew Calendar, a new day starts sundown. This is how G*d set it up and if we investigate the first chapter of The Torah, we are told in Genesis 1:5:
"And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day." - Genesis 1:5 KJV
Although some of the Old English lingo in the King James Version can be difficult to follow, the flow of the language that is used is absolutely beautiful (especially the Psalms). Without a doubt, it is the most beautiful translation that we have. That being said, as with any translation, it is not perfect and much is lost from the original Hebrew and Greek texts (and some Aramaic as well).
Here is a more literal translation of the second part of this verse, to provide us with some further clarification of this matter.
ויהי־ערב ויהי־בקר יום אחד
And There Was Evening And There Was Morning, Day One.
ויהי־ערב
VaYaHee Erev
and There was Evening
ויהי־בקר
VaYaHee Boker
and There was Morning
יום אחד
Yom Echad
Day One
So, if we read this verse closely, can see that Elohim ( אלהים / G*d ) clearly defined Day One as Evening and Morning; thus Day One started in the Evening and the proper measurement of a day would be Lunar and not Solar. Technically, the new day begins at the appearance of the first three stars in the sky. This is yet another example of how upside down our physical reality actually is.
Not to get too far off topic here, I would just like to point out one other interesting word that is used here and that is the Hebrew word for Day, Yom ( יום ). Yom is basically a measurement of time, any measurement, and it can be more than a day. There are 10 instances in the Bible where Yom is used to describe a Year, 8 instances where it is used to describe an Age and 11 instances that the word Yom is translated as Forever. This info may be unrelated to this post, but I'm telling you this so whenever people try and tell you that "there's no way the universe was created in 6 days...and blah, blah, blah", you will know that the Bible is way deeper than what it reads on the surface. It's infinitely deeper, simply because it comes from an Infinite source; Our Beloved Creator, Blessed Be He. Ignorance is contagious, so when anyone says things that make you question your faith, tune them out as quickly as possible. The sole purpose of this entire site is to expose the hidden truths in scripture, and they just keep coming.
Now that we've established a little bit of background about the Hebrew Calendar and how it works, let's take a look at one particular day that I've recently been made aware of.
In last week's Parasha, Shelach-Lecha ( שלח-לך ) "Send Out For Yourself" - consisting of Numbers 13:1-15:40, we read about the Twelve Spies that Moshe sent to scope out the land of Canaan. Ten of these spies brought back a negative report, warning that the inhabitants of the land were Nephilim giants and warriors “more powerful than we”. Only Caleb and Joshua insisted that the land could be conquered, just as G*d has commanded.
First, we will establish who these twelve men were, as they were all said to be "distinguished leaders of each tribe".
Numbers 13:4-16
"These were their names: From Reuben’s tribe, Zaccur’s son Shammua;
From Simeon’s tribe, Hori’s son Shaphat;
From Judah’s tribe, Jephunneh’s son Caleb; from Issachar’s tribe, Joseph’s son Igal;
From Ephraim’s tribe, Nun’s son Hoshea;
From Benjamin’s tribe, Raphu’s son Palti;
from Zebulun’s tribe, Sodi’s son Gaddiel;
from Joseph’s tribe of Manasseh, Susi’s son Gaddi;
From Dan’s tribe, Gemalli’s son Ammiel;
from Asher’s tribe, Michael’s son Sethur;
from Naphtali’s tribe, Vophsi’s son Nahbi;
and from Gad’s tribe, Machi’s son Geuel.
These are the names of the men sent by Moses to explore the land...
..Moses renamed Nun’s son Hoshea to Joshua.
We should note that Moshe actually changed Joshua's name in this section, Numbers 13:16, from Hosea ( הושע ) to Yehoshua ( יהושע ). He added a Yud ( י ) to his name, giving it a whole new meaning and this addition of this single letter actually gave him spiritual protection on his journey as a spy in The Land of Canaan. Yud is the first letter of the most sacred name of The LORD ( יהוה ), which we refer to simply as THE NAME or HaShem.
The name Hoshea is a form of the verb for “salvation”, and the name Hosea technically means "He Saves" or "He Helps". The addition of the Yud ( י ) to the name Yahushua (Joshua) means "HaShem (YHVH or The LORD) Is Salvation. This minor change addition gave him the spiritual edge that he needed, in order to be saved from the conspiracy of the ten spies who were lacking the faith that G*d would deliver them into The Land of Canaan.
In Jewish tradition it is believed that Moses is changing Joshua’s name with an implied meaning of “May God save you from the conspiracy of the scouts.”
Please note that there are is no "J" in the Hebrew Language, so anytime you see a name in The Hebrew Bible that starts with a "J", a better substitution would be a "Y" or sometimes even an "I". We can see observe this if we refer this in the 1611 Version of The King James Bible, as the English name Jesus actually uses the name Iesus; so there was no "J" yet in the English language. Other than the explanation provided above, it should also be noted that The Jewish Messiah, Our LORD and Savior Jesus Christ, whose Hebrew name is ( ישוע ) Yeshua, is a short form of the name ( יהושע ) Yehoshua (or Joshua, in English).
I just caught that this the last time that I was reading through this section myself, so I figure that this is fact is often overlooked.
Now, let's get back on the subject of this particular post, which is the "The Ninth of Av".
I gathered the following details from Chabad.org, which is a wonderful site for Biblical research and I highly recommend it. I only changed the date nomenclature used from BCE (Before Common Era) to B.C. and CE (Common Era) to A.D. I don't support that new method of dating and I'm not buying into it, thus I refuse to you use in any of my writing. A.D. stands for Anno Domini, which is Latin for “In The Year Of The Lord” and of course, B.C. stands for “Before Christ”. Aside from the Nation of Israel, the entire world has adapted use of the Gregorian Calendar, which is absolutely based on the estimated birth date of Our LORD and Savior, Yeshua HaMashiach (Jesus Christ). It's nonsense like this that we must stand up and fight against as Disciples. "They" just keep removing anything holy from the secular world to please a small minority of non-believers and that's why the world is in the state of chaos that we are witnessing today...end of rant.
Significant Events That Occurred on The Ninth of Av (Tisha b'Av):
*The Spies Returned With a Bad Report - 1313 B.C.
"The spies return on the eighth day of Av and report that the land is unconquerable. That night, the 9th of Av, the people cry. They insist that they'd rather go back to Egypt than be slaughtered by the Canaanites. G*d is highly displeased by this public demonstration of distrust in His power, and consequently that generation of Israelites never enters the Holy Land. Only their children have that privilege, after wandering in the desert for another 38 years."
*Both Holy Temples Were Destroyed
"The First Temple was also destroyed on the 9th of Av (423 B.C.). Five centuries later (in 69 A.D.), as the Romans drew closer to the Second Temple, ready to torch it, the Jews were shocked to realize that their Second Temple was destroyed the same day as the first."
*The Battle at Betar Was Lost
"When the Jews rebelled against Roman rule, they believed that their leader, Simon bar Kochba, would fulfill their messianic longings. But their hopes were cruelly dashed in 133 A.D. as the Jewish rebels were brutally butchered in the final battle at Betar."
*The Romans Plowed the Beit Hamikdash
"One year after their conquest of Betar, the Romans plowed over the Temple Mount, our nation's holiest site."
*The Jews Were Expelled From England
"The Jews were expelled from England in 1290 A.D."
*The Jews Were Banished From Spain
"In 1492, the Golden Age of Spain came to a close when Queen Isabella and her husband Ferdinand ordered that the Jews be banished from the land. The edict of expulsion was signed on March 31, 1492, and the Jews were given exactly four months to put their affairs in order and leave the country."
*Both The World Wars Began
"World War II and the Holocaust, historians conclude, was actually the long drawn-out conclusion of World War I that began in 1914. And yes, amazingly enough, Germany declared war on Russia, effectively catapulting the First World War into motion, on the 9th of Av, Tisha b'Av."
This additional information came from Aish.com:
*Factory of Death (or the so-called "Final Solution")
On July 31, 1941 (The Evening of the 8th of Av), Hermann Goring signed a document to implement the "final solution of the Jewish problem," i.e. extermination. The Nazis had been killing Jews since the beginning, but not in a truly systematic fashion. Einsatzgruppen firing squads, which gunned down more than a million Jews, proved expensive and messy.
Ghettos were disease-ridden, a bureaucratic nightmare to run, and ultimately too slow achieving the goal of extermination. One year later, the beginning of the end of the Warsaw Ghetto coincided with Tisha B'Av. Indeed, it was the day of Tisha B'Av itself, July 23, 1942, that the first trainload of Jews arrived at their destination, Treblinka, and sent to the gas chambers.
So, my conclusion of this whole post is that there is obviously something very significant about this particular day, The Ninth of Av. Again, I'm not going to even attempt to guess at G*d's plan, as there is no human comprehension of such things, however it's eerie to observe all of these historical events that happened on this particular day throughout the years. It seems as if the the original transgression of those notorious ten unfaithful spies triggered some type of divine judgement that G*d constantly reminds Israel about. We all should be mindful of this and keep an eye on this particular date in the future.
Much Love and Blessings!
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