Today in Jewish History

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Av 5 

 

Yahrtzeit of Rabbi Yitzhak Luria Ashkenazi (1534-1572), the father of modern Kabbalah, known popularly by the acronym, Arizal. He was born in Jerusalem, and later moved to Egypt where he studied under the great sages, Radvaz and Shita Mekubetzet. At age 22, he became engrossed in the study of the Zohar, and spent the next seven years in near-total seclusion and meditation. At age 36, he moved to Tzfat in northern Israel, where his colleagues included rabbis Yosef Karo (author of the Code of Jewish Law), the kabbalist Moshe Cordovero (Ramak), Shlomo Alkabetz and Moshe Alshich. Arizal taught extensively about reincarnation and transmigration of souls. His primary student, Chaim Vital, collected Arizal's lectures into a six-volume work entitled, Aitz Chaim (Tree of Life). Arizal died at age 38, and till today his tomb in Tzfat is a place of pilgrimage and prayer.

The 5th of Av is also the yahrtzeit of Rabbi Chaim Ozer Grodzensky (1863-1940), talmudic scholar and leader of eastern European Jewry. His father was a student of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, the founder of the Mussar ethics movement. Rabbi Grodzensky was gifted with an infallible memory (he could recite complex texts word-for-word), and he testified that he never experienced "forgetting." In the years between the World Wars, he was the central rabbinic figure in Lithuania, at that time the world center of Torah scholarship. He authored a book of responsa, entitled Achi'ezer, drawn from the thousands of questions sent to him from all parts of the world.

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Av 6 

 

In 1656, the Jewish elders of Amsterdam issued an excommunication notice against Baruch Spinoza. Spinoza was a philosopher who postulated that God and nature are equivalent, and that the Bible is purely allegorical. Spinoza is known as the "Jewish Atheist," and he is considered the founder of modern biblical criticism. Spinoza believed that there is no Divine intervention, and that all events are fatalistically destined to occur (thus there is no free will). For these and other heretical ideas, Spinoza was officially shunned by the Jewish community.

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Av 7 

 

In 1920, Keren Hayesod (United Israel Appeal) was founded. Its purpose was to provide financial investment for building and developing the Jewish homeland. Over the years, Keren Hayesod has assisted in bringing 3 million immigrants to Israel and facilitating their absorption. Keren Hayesod has also helped establish and develop over 800 villages and towns in Israel. Its managing director, Leib Jaffe, was amongst those killed in 1948 by a bomb explosion in the Jewish Agency courtyard.

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Av 8 

 

In 1942, the Nazis ordered the deportation of all Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto. The Warsaw Ghetto held 400,000 people (30% of the entire population of Warsaw), crammed into a tiny area. In its three years of existence, thousands of Jews died of disease and starvation. Yet despite all, the Jews managed to continue religious and cultural activities in the ghetto. Then on the eve of Tisha B'Av, the saddest day of the Jewish year, the Nazis began the deportation of 265,000 Jews, lasting for a period of two months, to the Treblinka death camp. When the Nazis sought to liquidate the ghetto, Jewish resistance fighters took action, digging hundreds of bunkers under the houses, connected through the sewage system. In the spring of 1943, some 750 Jewish partisans began the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, killing approximately 300 Germans in one month of fighting.

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Av 9 

 

In 423 BCE, the first Holy Temple was destroyed by fire, as Nebuchadnezzar's Babylonian troops conquered Jerusalem. Also on this day, the second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE. Tisha B'Av has long been a day of calamity for the Jewish people: On this day, during the time of Moses, Jews in the desert accepted the slanderous report of the spies, resulting in the decree postponing entry into the Land of Israel. Other grave misfortunes throughout Jewish history occurred on the Ninth of Av: The Spanish Inquisition culminated with the expulsion of Jews from Spain on Tisha B'Av in 1492. World War I broke out on the eve of Tisha B'Av in 1914 when Germany declared war on Russia; German resentment from the war set the stage for the Holocaust. On the eve of Tisha B'Av 1942, the mass deportation began of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto, en route to Treblinka. Today, Tisha B'Av is the Jewish national day of mourning, when we don't eat, drink or bathe. Lights in the synagogue are dimmed, and we read the Book of Lamentations, Jeremiah's poetic lament over the destruction of Jerusalem.

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Av 10 

 

In 2005, the government of Israel began the Gaza Disengagement, where 9,000 Jewish residents were evicted from their homes. Despite mass rallies against the disengagement, and an orange-ribbon campaign, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon implemented the plan with the hope of reducing security concerns and diffusing the demographic problem of Gaza's 1.5 million Arabs. Upon completion of the evacuation, all 21 Jewish communities in Gaza were bulldozed and destroyed. Only the synagogues were left standing; these were then torched by Arab mobs.

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Av 11 

 

Yahrtzeit of Rabbi Yitzhak Blazer (1837-1907), a leader of European Jewry prior to World War I and the author of Pri Yitzhak. At a young age, he became the rabbi of St. Petersburg, a position he held for 16 years. He was one of the leading disciples of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, the founder of the Mussar ethics movement. Rabbi Blazer spent the last few years of his life in Jerusalem.

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Av 12 

 

In 1263, the famous Disputation began between Nachmanides and a Jewish convert to Christianity, Pablo Christiani. King James of Spain had authorized the religious debate, to try to "prove" which religion is true. Nachmanides reluctantly agreed to take part, only after being assured by the king that he would have full freedom of expression. Nachmanides won the battle, but lost the war: His arguments earned the king's respect (and a prize of 300 gold coins), but the Church ordered Nachmanides to be tried on charges of blasphemy, and he was forced to flee Spain. At age 72, Nachmanides moved to spend his final years in Jerusalem.

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Av 13 

 

Yahrtzeit of Sir Moses Montefiore (1784-1885), outstanding Jewish philanthropist. Montefiore was also a leading stockbroker, served as the Sheriff of London, and was knighted by Queen Victoria. Montefiore retired from business at age 40 and devoted the rest of his life to humanitarian causes on behalf of the Jewish people. He traveled to the Sultan of Turkey in 1840 to defend the Jews of Damascus against a blood libel; to Rome in 1858 to try and free the Jewish youth Edgar Mortara, kidnapped and baptized by his Catholic nurse; to Russia, Morocco and other points to ask government authorities to stop persecution of the Jews. But it was the Holy Land that was dearest to his heart. He made the arduous journey to Israel seven times. His first visit to Jerusalem had a profound affect on him spiritually, and from then on he lived a life of Torah observance. In Israel, he dispensed charity, sought to promote industry, education and health, and sponsored several agricultural settlements. In Jerusalem, he built the first neighborhood outside the Old City Walls. (The area is recognized by a landmark windmill, though due to the lack of wind in Jerusalem, the windmill has never worked.) His tireless efforts made him a beloved folk hero; his 100th birthday was celebrated by Jewish communities around the world.

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Av 14 

 

In 1298, the Jews of Bischofsheim, Germany were massacred by Rindfleisch troops. Rindfleisch was a German knight who was unable to repay a loan to the Jewish community, so he concocted a slander and claimed to have received a mission from heaven to exterminate "the accursed race of the Jews." Rindfleisch stirred up a mob, and his band of his Juden-schachters (Jew-slaughterers) marched through Austria and Germany, from city to city, pillaging, burning, and murdering Jews along the way (except those who accepted Christianity). Within six months, thousands of Jews were murdered (many were burned at the stake) and 146 Jewish communities were decimated. Rabbi Mordechai ben Hillel (1240-1298), author of the Mordechai commentary on Talmud, and his entire family were among those murdered. The Jews of Germany, having repeatedly rebuilt their communities after such attacks, lost heart, and many migrated to the Land of Israel (then under Islamic rule). Rabbi Asher Ben Yechiel, a great sage known as the Rosh, survived the Rindfleisch massacres and moved to Spain. Rindfleisch was later arrested and hanged, and the cities in which Jews had been killed were required to pay fines.

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Av 15 

 

On this date, four historical events occurred: (1) the Jews of the Exodus generation stopped dying in the desert, (2) intertribal marriage was permitted to post-Exodus generations, (3) the tribe of Benjamin was saved from extinction, (4) the Romans permitted the burial of Jews killed in the Beitar revolt (138 CE). After the Romans had destroyed the Second Holy Temple, the emperor Hadrian planned to transform Jerusalem into a pagan city-state with a shrine to Jupiter on the site of the Temple. This led to the great Jewish revolt of Simon Bar Kosiba (Bar Kochba), whose guerilla army succeeded in actually throwing the Romans out of Israel and establishing, albeit for a brief period, an independent Jewish state. It required large numbers of Roman troops to crush the revolt. Bar Kochba made his final stand in the city of Beitar, located southwest of Jerusalem. It was estimated that hundreds of thousands of Jews lived in Beitar, and they were all massacred "until their blood flowed into the Mediterranean Sea." Further, the Romans did not allow the Jewish bodies to be buried. According to Jewish tradition, the bodies lay in the open but did not rot, until three years later on the 15th of Av, burial was finally permitted. Today, the standard "Grace After Meals" includes a special blessing recalling this event in Beitar.

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Av 16 

 

In 1946, the British government ordered all illegal immigrants bound for Palestine to be deported to camps on the island of Cyprus. According to the terms of the British White Paper of 1939, immigration to Palestine was limited to 75,000 Jews over a period of 10 years. Following the end of World War II, many Holocaust survivors had nowhere else to go, so they crammed onto old ships bound for the Holy Land. Some ships succeeded in slipping through the British naval blockade and unloading their human cargo on desolate beaches. Several ships sank in tragic circumstances. Other ships were apprehended and the passengers sent to British detention camps -- complete with barbed wire, military towers and guards. The Exodus is the most famous immigrant ship from this era. Today, one of the ships, the Af-Al-Pi ("in spite of it all"), stands in a museum in Haifa.

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Av 17 

 

In 1889, 800 Jews arrived in Buenos Aires, marking the birth of the modern Jewish community in Argentina. These immigrants were fleeing poverty and pogroms in Russia, and moved to Argentina because of its open door policy of immigration. By 1920, more than 150,000 Jews were living in Argentina. Juan Peron's rise to power in 1946 was an ominous sign, as he was a Nazi sympathizer with fascist leanings. Peron halted Jewish immigration to Argentina, introduced mandatory Catholic religious instruction in public schools, and allowed Argentina to become a haven for fleeing Nazis. (In 1960, Israeli agents abducted Adolf Eichmann from a Buenos Aires suburb.) Today, Argentina has the largest Jewish community in Latin America with 250,000, though terror attacks have prompted many young people to emigrate. In 1992, the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires was bombed, killing 32 people. In 1994, the Jewish community headquarters in Buenos Aires was bombed, killing 85 people. The perpetrators have never been apprehended.

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Av 18 

 

In 1929, Arab mobs attacked Jewish communities throughout Israel. False rumors -- fueled by inflammatory sermons in the mosques -- declared that the Jews were preparing to take control of the holy places, and that Jews were carrying out "wholesale killings of Arabs." Muslims mobs went on the attack, killing 17 Jews in Jerusalem and 18 in Tzfat. The worst atrocities occurred in Hebron, where only one British policeman guarded the entire city and was powerless to stop the rampage. In Hebron, 67 Jews including 12 Americans were murdered. The survivors were relocated to Jerusalem, leaving Hebron barren of Jews for the first time in centuries.

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Av 19 

 

On this date in 1955, Bar Ilan University was founded with the mission of blending ancient Torah tradition with modern scholarship. Bar Ilan is currently Israel's largest academic community with 32,000 students, scientists and staff. Bar Ilan has been at the forefront of archeological research, social work, and Torah-dissemination projects. The Bar Ilan Responsa Project places a vast computerized library of thousands of rabbinic commentaries at the easy disposal of scholars around the world. The university's name was chosen in honor of Rabbi Meir Bar Ilan (Berlin), who led Jews from the ashes of Europe to rebirth and renaissance in Israel.

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Av 20 

 

In 2001, an Arab terrorist detonated a guitar case filled with explosives in Sbarro's pizzeria at the corner of King George Street and Jaffa Road, the busiest area of downtown Jerusalem. The heinous attack killed 16 people and wounded 100. Among the dead were five members of the Schijveschuurder family, and Shoshana Greenbaum, an American who was pregnant with her first child. A few months later, Al-Najah University in Nablus opened a public exhibition, a gruesome reenactment of the Sbarro bombing, strewn with fake blood and body parts.

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Av 21 

 

Yahrtzeit of Rabbi Chaim Soloveichik (1853-1918), a Talmudic genius who developed the "Brisker" approach to Torah study. This is a method of highly analytical study, with emphasis on the legal writings of Maimonides. At the young age of 27, Rabbi Soloveichik was chosen as senior lecturer in the Lithuania's Voluzhin yeshiva, the center of Jewish scholarship at the time. His wrote a commentary on Maimonides, entitled Chidushei Rebbe Chaim HaLevi.

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Av 22 

 

In 2003, an Arab terrorist blew himself up on the #2 bus en route from the Western Wall in Jerusalem, killing 23 people and wounding 136, many of them children. The attack occurred on a double-length bus crowded with families on a summer vacation outing, and became known as the "family massacre." The bomber, from a Hamas cell in Hebron, was apparently disguised as an Orthodox Jew. Following the attack, the Israeli government decided to wage an all-out war against Hamas and other terrorist elements, and to freeze the diplomatic process with the Palestinian Authority.

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Av 23 

 

Yahrtzeit of Rabbi Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky (1899-1985), a Talmudic genius known as the Steipler Gaon. His father was widowed at age 60, and then remarried, fathering Yaakov Yisrael. Yaakov Yisrael was conscripted into the Russian army where he continued strict Jewish observance, despite the harsh conditions. After the army, he was appointed to a leadership post in the Novardak yeshiva. He wrote a multi-volume Talmudic commentary, Kehilos Yaakov, which is studied widely today. He married the sister of the saintly Chazon Ish, and later moved to Israel. Though he held no official position, he was consulted by individuals from all walks of life on every imaginable issue -- business, marriage, health, and matters of Torah law. His son, Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, is a leading Torah authority in Israel today.

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Av 24 

 

In 1938, the Italian government passed a law banning Jews from teaching in public schools. A few months later, Italian leader Benito Mussolini formed an axis with Adolf Hitler. Discrimination continued against thousands of Italian Jews, and in 1943 many were deported to German camps. Fortunately, 80% of Jews in Italy were spared during the war, having been interned in small camps in Italy or rescued by righteous Gentiles. Recently, anti-Semitism has again flared in Italy; in 2003, Holocaust archives were destroyed at a school in Varese, and school walls were painted with graffiti such as "burn the Jews."

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Av 25 

 

In 1315, King Louis X of France called back the Jews who had been expelled a few decades earlier by King Louis IX. This marked a theme in Jewish-French life: expulsions and subsequent invitations to return. The French monarchy was trying to establish their land as the "new Jerusalem," and to fulfill this mission attempted several crusades to Israel. In 1615, King Louis XIII ordered that Christians were forbidden to speak with Jews, upon penalty of death. Eventually, in 1683, King Louis XIV expelled the Jews from the colony of Martinique.

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Av 26 

 

In 1809, a group of 70 disciples of the great Lithuanian sage the Vilna Gaon, arrived in Israel, after traveling via Turkey by horse and wagon. The Vilna Gaon set out for the Holy Land in 1783, but for unknown reasons did not attain his goal. However he inspired his disciples to make the move, and they became pioneers of modern settlement in Israel. (A large contingent of chassidic Jews arrived in Tzfat around the same time.) The leader of the 1809 group, Rabbi Israel of Shklov, settled in Tzfat, and six years later moved to Jerusalem where he founded the modern Ashkenazic community. The early years were fraught with Arab attacks, earthquakes, and a cholera epidemic. Rabbi Israel authored, Pe'at Hashulchan, a digest of the Jewish agricultural laws relating to the Land of Israel. (He had to rewrite the book after the first manuscript was destroyed in a fire.) The location of his grave remained unknown until it was discovered in Tiberias, 125 years after his death. Today, the descendants of that original group are amongst the most prominent families in Jerusalem.

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Av 27 

 

In 1868, the Ku Klux Klan lynched a Jew, S.A. Bierfield, in Franklin, Tennessee. The KKK was created at the end of the American Civil War, and quickly adopted violent methods, murdering some 1,300 people in 1868. Enemies of the KKK included African Americans, Jews, homosexuals and others, scapegoated to explain the lack of economic success among whites. Even today, the KKK lists among its enemies the Jews, who they believe secretly operate the New World Order.

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Av 28 

 

Yahrtzeit of Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Yehuda Berlin (1817-1893), a leader of Lithuanian Jewry, known by the acronym of his name, Netziv (which also means "pillar"). Legend says that as a child he was in danger of dropping out of school, but he applied himself diligently to his studies and emerged as the star student. He married the granddaughter of Rabbi Chaim of Voluzhin when he was 14 years old. He was later appointed head of the Voluzhin yeshiva, a position he held for 40 years. The yeshiva became the worldwide center of Jewish scholarship, and it was said that 10,000 students studied there during the Netziv's tenure. Tragically, the yeshiva was forcibly closed by the Russians in 1892. The Netziv then intended to travel to Israel, but his medical condition made this impossible. He spent his final weeks in Warsaw, and is interred in a cemetery there. He wrote Ha'emek Davar, a commentary on the Bible, and other scholarly works that are widely studied today. His oldest son, Rabbi Chaim Berlin, was Chief Rabbi of Moscow, and his youngest son was Rabbi Meir Bar-Ilan, after whom Israel's Bar Ilan University is named.

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Av 29 

 

In the Hebrew year 2448 (1312 BCE), Moses carved the second set of Tablets out of sapphire, as recorded in Exodus 34:4. After seeing that the Israelites had made the idolatrous Golden Calf, Moses broke the first set of tablets (Exodus 32:19) and God then instructed Moses to carve new tablets. (The Midrash says that Moses was allowed to keep the extra scraps of sapphire, and from that he became personally wealthy.) The second set of tablets was placed in the Ark of the Covenant, along with the first broken set. This second set symbolizes the ability of every person to make amends and rebuild anew. In fact, it was on the day of Yom Kippur that Moses came down from Mount Sinai holding the second set of Tablets, and it is on every subsequent Yom Kippur day that we have a special opportunity to make amends.