Why We Once Fasted On the Fourth of July©
Rabbi David Baum, Congregation Shaarei Kodesh
17th of Tammuz 5778 (2018)
Does anyone know what happened on the 17th of Tammuz 5336? It was a day of joy, but most Jews were actually fasting. It was on that day, 242 years ago, that the Declaration of Independence was signed, July 4 1776. This past week Jewish Americans observed two holidays: the 17th of Tammuz and July 4th.
Most of us know what happened on July 4, 1776, but not so many of us know what happened on the July 12, 70 (17th of Tammuz 3830). These days seem to have nothing to do with each other – one day is a feast, the other a fast; one day signifies the beginning of independence, the other day is the anniversary of the end of independence. But these two holidays actually belong together as a message to us. I want to share a couple of stories – the little-known story as to why the Temple was destroyed, and a famous American document that we as Jews should be celebrating on July 4th...and I'm not talking about the Declaration of Independence.
On that day, July 12, 70, the walls of Jerusalem were breached, and on the 9th of Av, three weeks later, the second Temple was destroyed. What led to this moment? It wasn't because of Jews abandoned the Torah, it wasn't because of assimilation or intermarriage, it was because of Sinat Chinam – unbounded hatred.
The rabbis tell a story of Kamza and Bar Kamza, a story of mistaken identity when Bar Kamza, an enemy of a dinner host, was accidentally invited to his party because he was mistaken for Kamza. When Bar Kamza came to the dinner, the host refused to let him enter, even though Bar Kamza said he would pay for the whole banquet. One man could not put his pride aside, the other man could not put his anger aside. But the real story of the destruction of Jerusalem deals with an extremist group that more or less took over Jerusalem at the time, the Sicarii.
The Sicarii are mentioned in Josephus’ The Jewish War. Josephus, the first-century Roman Jewish scholar, mentions that the Sicarii treated the Jews who had submitted to the Romans as enemies, and plundered their property. Josephus goes on to say that although the Sicarii claimed that those Jews had given up their freedom out of cowardice, this was, in fact, a “cloak for the barbarity which was made use of by them, and to color over their own extreme greed for wealth.” They were given the name Sicarii for their weapon of choice: small swords much like the Roman or sickles. Here is what Josephus said they would do with their knives: “they mingled themselves among the multitude at their festivals, when they were come up in crowds from all parts to the city to worship God, as we said before, and easily slew those that they had a mind to slay.” Josephus reports that the first victim of the Sicarii was the high priest Jonathan. One of their leaders, Menachem, crowned himself high priest and king of Judea. Soon after, other rebel groups attacked him.
The leaders became absolutists – there was no compromise. And you know what, it worked. They fought off the Romans 66 CE, even driving them out of the Jerusalem, but it didn't last. In a way, I think the rabbis were giving their own commentary on this group through Kamza and Bar Kamza – compromise meant weakness – better to die on your feet than live on your knees. But the Sicarri's end came. When Eleazar, the Sicarii leader, realized that all was lost, he gathered the remaining defenders together, and told them what the Romans would do to them and their families if they were captured alive. By this means, he convinced them to kill their families, and then commit suicide. When the Romans captured the fortress, they found that all the Jews in the fortress, with the exception of two women and five children, had chosen to die by their own swords, rather than surrender to the Romans. You all know where this happened – at Masada.
July 4, 1776, was a much different group of leaders. They gathered together after exhausting their diplomatic efforts with King George III, and after days of debate, they wrote the following:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” It was a radically new idea – a society where inherited privilege and power were replaced by a fairer society that was open to talent. A society that was based on compromise, religious freedom and self-expression. In theory, if you bought into these ideas, you were part of the country, regardless of your background. Of course, we know that not all people were deemed as equal. This is part of the arc of justice that began on that day in 1776.
But as I thought about it, I thought about how different Jewish history would have been had the rabbis been the dominant voice and not the Sicarri. In the story of Kamza and Bar Kamza, Bar Kamza hatches his plan because the rabbis at the party saw what happened to him and did nothing to help. They let the extremist become the leaders, a leadership of no compromise, and of to the victor go the spoil.
The leadership of July 4th 1776 was much different. E Plurabis Unim – Out of many come one. It is part of the great seal of the United States of America. America welcomed in diversity, and it became our strength, and it changed the course of human history. Many people of course were excluded from the initial span of American liberty, most prominently slaves and Native Americans, but the offer of freedom proved one that was extendable to embrace the immigrant groups that entered North America in large numbers, many from the British Isles.
And one of those groups was us, the Jews. Perhaps the greatest sign of our acceptance in this new country came from George Washington, a man who could have made himself King of America but instead chose to start the institution of the presidency, an office with limited powers and a set time for ruling, eight years.
In his letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, a letter we should read every July 4, he wrote the following: “The citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for having given to mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy — a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support...May the children of the stock of Abraham who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the goodwill of the other inhabitants — while every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree and there shall be none to make him afraid. May the father of all mercies scatter light, and not darkness, upon our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in His own due time and way everlastingly happy.”
In our parashah this week, Balak, the King of Moab, describes Bnai Israel in the following way: “Now this horde will lick clean all that is about us as an ox licks up the grass of the field.” He saw us as animals. When he orders Balaam to curse us, God puts blessing in his mouth. When he stands on a mountain and looks at the entirety of our people, he says, Mah Tovu O'halecha Yaakov, Mishkenotecha Israel” “How fair are your tents of O Jacob, your dwelling places O'Israel.” The midrash states that Balaam saw how our tents faced in such a way that it gave privacy to the other. We were many, but we still had our own individual story. Balaam saw what George Washington saw. Out of many, come one. This is the strength of the Jewish people, and of America.
It is why we cannot only live under our own tents all the time, we have a responsibility to look out and realize that our tent is one of many, and our camp can grow.
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“May the father of all mercies scatter light, and not darkness, upon our paths, and make us all in our several vocations useful here, and in His own due time and way everlastingly happy.”
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