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On the tenth of Tevet, Nebuchadnezzar the King of Babylonia and his army besieged Jerusalem. This was the beginning of the end of Jewish sovereignty in the Land and culminated in the destruction of the First Temple and the exile of the Divine Presence. The fast was established to commemorate the siege. We take this opportunity to commemorate two other painful events that occurred around that date:
First, Ezra the Scribe died on the ninth of Tevet . Ezra was a leader during the rebuilding of the Second Temple and is considered second in importance only to Moses in transmitting the Torah. Ezra was involved in bringing Jews back to the Land of Israel, establishing how God would be worshiped in the Temple and in daily life, and finalizing the Biblical text. He also enacted ten significant ordinances, thus setting a precedent for the Sages to enact laws and make protective fences around the Torah.
Second, during the Hellenistic period, on the eighth of Tevet, King Ptolemy commanded the Jews to translate the Torah into Greek. This was a difficult day, as the Torah is our heritage, and translating it meant it became accessible to anyone and everyone.
After the Holocaust, Asara Be-Tevet merited additional importance. The Israeli Chief Rabbinate declared it as “Yom Ha-Kaddish Ha-klali” – the day on which Kaddish should be recited for Holocaust victims whose dates of death are unknown.
Rabbi Zvi Yehuda Kook taught that on Asara Be-Tevet, we should focus on three areas of improvement:
- In response to the siege of Jerusalem, we should strengthen the walls of Jerusalem and build up the Land both materially and spiritually.
- In response to the death of Ezra, we should work to glorify the Torah and bring the Jews back to Israel, just like Ezra the Scribe.
- In response to the translation of the Torah into Greek, we should encourage Israeli culture to return to its Jewish roots, and to cleanse itself of the foreign elements absorbed during our long exile under non-Jewish rule.
