Hi,
One more thing before we leave the Golden Calf.
This story goes back 3300 years ago.
Moshe came down from Mount Sinai with the Tablets. The Ten Commandments.
He saw the Golden Calf. And smashed the Tablets.
The date?
Seventeenth day in the Jewish month of Tamuz.
According to Jewish tradition, that day was set aside for future tragic events.
… Fast forward around 1400 years. To July in the year 70 C.E.
The city of Jerusalem is under brutal siege by the Romans.
And the Roman army finally breaks through the walls of Jerusalem.
Three weeks later they destroy Jerusalem and the Jewish Temple.
The day on which the walls ofJerusalemwere breached?
Seventeenth day in the Jewish month of Tamuz!
… And for the next 2000 years?
Jews have fasted on the 17th day of Tamuz.
(The 17th of Tamuz is this Sunday.)
It became a day to reflect on the tragedy of Jerusalem’s destruction.
A day to mourn for Jerusalem. A day to pray for a better future.
And a day to express confidence in our return to Jerusalem.
… It’s the power of Jewish ritual.
Ritual preserves our national memory.
And in this case it did something really amazing.
It took the day that would have been the “beginning of the end forever”?
And turned it into something else.
… A day that guaranteed that we would never forget Jerusalem.
That insured that we would some day return.
And it’s a day that helps explain a very big miracle.
The State of Israel.
All the best,