One of the five tragedies we commemorate via fasting on Shiva Asar B’Tamuz is
the fact that the walls of Yerushalayim were breached by the enemy; the first
stage of the eventual fall of Yerushalayim and the destruction of the Beis
Hamikdash. The Shulchan Aruch[1] echoes the gemarra[2] in noting that in the era
of the first Beis Hamikdash this breaching actually took place on the ninth of
Tamuz, not the seventeenth. So where does the seventeenth come from? This was
the date in which the walls were breached during the times of the second Beis
Hamikdash. But the question arises; why do we fix the date according to the
second Beis Hamikdash and not the first? The Shulchan Aruch answers this too;
citing the Tur, he writes that ‘the destruction of the second Beis Hamikdash is
more difficult/tragic for us’ (she’churban bayis sheini chamir lan’). Why was
the destruction of the second Beis Hamikdash more of a tragedy than that of its
predecessor?
The Maharsha[3] on the above gemarra offers a reason. He cites the gemarra in
Yoma[4] which compares the sins of the generation of the destruction of the
first Beis Hamikdash to those of the generation of the destruction of the second
Beis Hamikdash. The gemarra asks whose sins were worse, and answers ‘let the
Mikdash prove it,’ i.e. the first Beis Hamikdash was rebuilt after seventy
years, whilst the second Beis Hamikdash is still to be rebuilt. It must
therefore be that the sins which led to the destruction of the second Mikdash
were worse. Therefore, says the Maharsha, the reason we fix Shiva Asar B’Tamuz
in accordance with the breach during the era of the second Mikdash is because
the sins which enabled such a breach to occur were worse during the second-Midkash
era. This is a valid and decent explanation in and of itself, but it does not
seem to fit the enigmatic explanation offered by the Shulchan Aruch. For the
Shulchan Aruch’s words were ‘the destruction of the second Beis Hamikdash is
more difficult/tragic for us;’ if he was echoing the explanation of the Maharsha,
he should have said ‘the sins which caused the destruction of the second Mikdash
are more difficult/tragic for us.’ So our question resurfaces; what does the
Shulchan Aruch (and the Tur) mean that the destruction of the second Mikdash was
more of a tragedy for us?
Let’s first deepen this question somewhat. If one compares and contrasts the
first and second Beis Hamikdash, one is struck by the fact that the first
Mikdash occupied a much higher spiritual plane than the second. The first Beis
Hamikdash was built by Shlomo HaMelech at a time when the Bnei Yisrael’s had
their own sovereignty and their name was known worldwide. Furthermore, the first
Mikdash’s dimensions were inch perfect to reflect the intricacies of the
spiritual realm in ‘housing’ HaShem in this world. The second Beis Hamikdash,
however, was built in two stages (more about that later) and the initial
building was only started with the permission of Koresh (king of Persia); it
occurred during a period in which we no longer had sovereignty and we did not
even have our Land. Moreover, its dimensions were not as precise as its
predecessor; it was a combination of the layout of the first Beis Hamikdash with
the dimensions specified (relatively cryptically) in the prophecies of Yechezkal.[5]
In addition, the gemarra[6] relates several key differences between the first
and second Batei Mikdash; unlike its predecessor, the second Beis Hamikdash had
no aron, no kapores, no keruvim, no Heavenly fire on the altar, no urim ve’tumim
for the Kohen Gadol, no Shechinah, and eventually no prophets either. If the
first Beis Hamikdash was the superior spiritually, why is the destruction of the
second Mikdash more difficult for us?
We shall give two answers to our question; each complements the other.
The first answer centres around a crucial difference between the circumstances
in which each Beis Hamikdash was built. The first Mikdash was built when Shlomo
Hamelech’s empire was tranquil and secure; he had money to fund the building and
there were virtually no hiccups along the way – everything went smoothly and he
was not dependant upon anyone else in building the Mikdash. The building of the
second Beis Hamikdash was just the opposite. The building began when Koresh gave
permission for a few Jews to go from Bavel to Eretz Yisrael to build the Beis
Hamikdash – but the vast majority of Jews remained in Bavel at this point. The
Jews who left for Eretz Yisrael (including Chaggai Hanavi) began the building of
the Mikdash, and staged a celebration at Sukkos time after they had laid the
building’s foundations. However, the Kuthim (a nation who had converted to
Judaism) did not want the Mikdash to be built, and managed to get Koresh to
rescind his permission. It was not until several decades later that the work on
the second Beis Hamikdash was restarted and completed; it took a prophecy from
Chaggai years later to get the people to restart the building work. Thus, in
many ways the building of the second Beis Hamikdash was our effort; it was not
as simple as the first Mikdash, in which HaShem had Shlomo presented with an
order to build the Mikdash and he set about building it. On the contrary, the
second Mikdash was contingent upon permission from a non-Jewish king and the joy
at the laying of the foundations was curtailed by the rescinding of the
permission. And who brought about such a rescission? None other than a section
of our own people (the kuthim) who we had allowed to convert in the first place.
It was the very fact that the building of the second Mikdash took much more
effort, and was fraught with struggle, disappointment, and ups and downs, that
makes us consider it a more tragic loss than its predecessor. [As a parable, you
get more upset when someone knocks down your pyramid of playing cards than when
someone knocks over your (empty) plastic cup, because you expended effort on the
former. So too is the former a greater ‘achievement’ due to the effort
involved.]
Our second strand of answer comes via the Meshech Chochmah.[7] He writes that it
is precisely because the second Mikdash had a lower spiritual voltage than the
first Mikdash that the kedusha of the second Mikdash era lasted for longer than
that of the first.[8] He compares this to a Kohen versus a Levi. A female Kohen
who has certain forbidden relations can lose her status as a Kohen lady, whilst
no such thing occurs with a Levi. The reason, he says, is because the Kohen has
a higher spiritual status, and thus its kedusha is more flimsy and vulnerable.
So too with the two Batei Mikdash; it was precisely because the second Mikdash
was at a lower spiritual level than the first Mikdash that it was to be more
permanent and durable – and this is why its destruction was so much more of a
tragedy than that of the first Beis Hamikdash; for even a ‘durable’ Mikdash was
shown to be capable of being destroyed.
In taking something practical out of this, we shall mention one aspect of
tragedy; particularly spiritual tragedy. Rav Yonassan Eibshitz[9] notes that
there are three stages of spiritual growth. First, HaShem puts everything on a
plate for you; He makes things easy for you in achieving a spiritual goal. Then,
He takes away that Divine help so you are made to do it by yourself and expend
the effoer yourself (like a father who lets go of his child so that the child
can learn to walk for himself). And the last stage is that you and HaShem ‘meet’
to accomplish things together. For example, Pesach was when HaShem did
everything for us, then was the fifty days when we had to work on ourselves with
less help from HaShem, and then we met at Shavuos. Thus, the star sign of Nissan
is a sheep (an animal which must be led and has no power of itself), Iyar is a
bull (the animal which does everything itself), and Sivan is twins (connoting an
‘equal-power meeting’). Similarly, the first Beis Hamikdash was essentially
built by HaShem (with special siyata dishmaya and no hiccups), the second
Mikdash was essentially left to us to build, whilst the third Beis Hamikdash
will encompass both aspects; we will build what we can and then HaShem will
complete the job.[10]
This is the role of (spiritual) tragedies; it is not pure punishment, but it is
rather to get us to work on getting up to a spiritual level ourselves via our
own effort, so we can really acquire the spiritual level and make it a part of
us.
Have a meaningful three weeks,
[2] Gemarra Ta’anis 28b
[3] Maharsha Ta’anis 28b ‘barishona’
[4] Gemarra Yoma 9b
[5] Rambam hilchos Beis Habechirah 1:4. The dimensions in Yechezkal are in
perakim 40-42
[6] Gemarra Yoma 21b
[7] Meshech Chochmah 15:16
[8] kedusha rishona kidsha lesha’ata velo kidsha le’atid lavo, kedusha shniya
kidsha lesha’ata vekidsha le’atid lavo; Rambam hilchos Beis Habechira 6:16.
[9] Ya’aros Dvash, drush on Elul
[10] Rav Nachum Partzovitz quoted by Rav Neventzal in Beyitzcahk Yikarei chelek
beis siman 39, Aruch Laner Sukkah 41a.
