Scouting Out Destruction, and Hope: Tisha B’Av 2024

Scouting Out Destruction, and Hope: Tisha B’Av 2024
Rabbi Angela Buchdahl

This week, we start a new book: Devarim, or in English: Deuteronomy, which literally means “repetition of the law,” and indeed, scarcely a few verses inyou hear a story repeated from just a couple months ago–of the 12 scouts, sent to assess the land of Israel. While the retelling is not exactly the same as in Numbers, the main jist of the story is: Even though all 12 scouts saw the exact same scene–10 of them came back despondent, overwhelmed, sure that there was no way that we could enter the land– filled with giants and fortified cities. Only 2–Caleb and Joshua had faith they could enter given all that God had done for them, they saw the possibilities.

This story, repeated here in parshat Devarim, has an extra resonance as it always falls before Tisha B’av, which comes Monday night, a day that commemorates the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem and other tragedies of the Jewish people, because guess what day the spies brought back their damning report? Why on Tisha B’Av of course, the Mishnah says!

In other words, the rabbis make a direct link between the tragedies of our people, and our hopelessness in the face of fear. The spies even suggest, “we should go back to Egypt,” preferring enslavement and oppression over their fear of the unknown.

Tisha B’av is hitting different this year, I feel more like the anxious and fearful spies in the wake of the destruction we saw on Oct 7 and the rising antisemitism worldwide in its aftermath. But one of the things that has kept me afloat –has been a WhatsApp group I have with a sisterhood of 5 rabbis. We live in far-flung cities: Los Angeles, Boston, Paris, Jerusalem and NY, but the challenges we face are surprisingly similar and we share the same dreams for Israel and our wider Jewish community. After Oct 7 we decided that we really needed to meet in person, and two weeks ago we gathered in Provence –a kind of midway point for us in an old farmhouse while the lavender fields were in bloom, and sitting under the shade of 2 large pine trees, and with Shifra our guide, talked about our challenges, our families, Israel (a lot!) and how we want to lead in this moment.

It was particularly resonant for us to be in Provence, which has had a Jewish presence since at least the Middle Ages. In the 14th Century, when when King Philip evicted the Jews from France, the Pope then seated in Avignon, not Rome, gave Jews asylum in Provence, they were known as the Papal Jews. And for centuries, Jews settled in 4 main towns which they called the arbah kehillot, the 4 cities recalling the sacred arbah kehillot of Israel: Jerusalem, Tiberias, Sfat, and Hebron.

The French rabbi of our sisterhood, Delphine, who was once an intern at Central 17 years ago, arranged for us to see the synagogue in Cavillon, one of the arbah Kehillot of Provence. While the Jews had been protected in these 4 cities, they were still discriminated against. They were allowed to live only on one small street with a dead end on one side and a gate that locked at night on the other. Cavillon once had a sizable Jewish community for the area, complete with all the things a Jewish comm needs: a synagogue and cemetery, a mikvah and matzoh oven.

Because Delphine is a famous rabbi and best-selling author in France, her inquiry for our visit created a bit of a buzz, and the Mayor of Cavillon herself and an entourage personally greeted our group and accompanied us to the synagogue.

Sadly today, there is not a single Jew left in Cavillon, but the non-Jewish tour guide had done a lot of homework in order to tell us all about the history of this once vibrant community.

She showed us right outside the door, the synagogue had 6 tzedakah boxes, one for each of the four communities in Israel, which they sent money to regularly. If I zoom in you can see here it says Tiberias. The last 2 boxes were for their poor and for burial of the dead.

We entered the sanctuary, which is now a museum, on the second floor of the building. You can see here that they have a very sophisticated security system. I think that key is literally from the middle ages.

As we entered–you see the sanctuary is a small jewel-box created in a French rococo style.

Because Jews were not allowed to be builders, their synagogues were built by the same craftsmen who built churches at the time. The main worship space is on the second floor of the building, with staircases on either side up to a balcony space.

We inquired if the women sat up in the balcony? NO. The tour guide explained–that’s the rabbi’s bimah up there. He would preach from up there down to the men gathered on the floor. SO…we asked, “where were the women?” “The basement.” Below the sanctuary. Where the matzah oven was. The guide apologetically said: the wood wasn’t treated so the sound carried pretty nicely down there!

Now the story could have ended here and my sermon would have been a rather sad story of a once vibrant, protected Jewish community in Provence that has since disappeared with only a museum remaining. How a group of 5 female rabbis from around the world came to visit this sanctuary only to realize that we would have been relegated to the basement, hearing the rabbi’s sermons from below the floorboards.

But in light of the story of the 12 scouts, and upcoming Tisha B’av, and the link our rabbis make between hopelessness becoming its own destructive force, I want to tell you how the story actually ended. 

The mayor explained that they do not usually allow anyone up to the balcony, old steps and insurance liability and all –but since we were a group of rabbis, and she saw that I brought my guitar with me, she allowed us up. It was Friday afternoon and the sun was just starting to lower in the sky and we suspected that if we sang L’cha Dodi, we could beckon the sabbath bride back to this abandoned sanctuary. And so we did.

The non-Jewish mayor of Cavillon, tour guide, and entourage looked up at us with mouths agape. They had been careful, conscientious guardians of their town’s Jewish history, but they had never really heard actual Jews praying in this space before. And it took 500 years but they saw a sisterhood ascend from the basement kitchen up to the rabbi’s balcony, ushering the Shabbat bride into this vanished community with women’s voices. No longer just a story of emptiness or destruction, we turned this story into one of redemption and possibilities.