During Tisha B’AvThe holiday on which the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem is commemorated through fasting and prayers. we commerate the loss of the Holy Temple, the brokenness we felt as a community as we watched our spiritual and cultural center go into ruin. In our society today there is a new brokenness, a new loss. We have witnessed a loss of love for our fellow human beings, children separated from their parents at our borders here in America, and worldwide there is fear of those who are different. This Tisha B’Av I give this poem as a declaration of Hope, employing the ShekhinahThe feminine name of God, expounded upon in the rabbinic era and then by the Kabbalists in extensive literature on the feminine attributes of the divine. as a mother wailer so that we can find “The Temple of Our Humanity” again, this love for the other which we have so forgotten.
The Temple of Our Humanity
Our Mother the Shekhinah mourns
She mourns because her children have forgotten each other
She mourns because she can no longer put her arms around us in solace because we have chosen not to see the beauty she sees within us
She desires her temple again amongst us, and oh how we cry for her presence!
Let us call upon compassion again and make it real
We have made many into the other and not undersood that we all have this same mother
Have we forgotten how EveEve, according to the book of Genesis, is Adam's wife, the first woman to be created. was unjustly blamed?
Have we forgotten how LeahThe third of the Jewish matriarchs, Lead is the eldest of Lavan's daughters and one of the wives of Jacob. She is the daughter whom Lavan tricks Jacob into marrying instead of his younger daughter Rachel, whom Jacob has requested to marry. Leah is mother to six of the the twelve tribes and to one daughter, Dinah. was treated by AbrahamAbraham is the first patriarch and the father of the Jewish people. He is the husband of Sarah and the father of Isaac and Ishmael. God's covenant - that we will be a great people and inherit the land of Israel - begins with Abraham and is marked by his circumcision, the first in Jewish history. His Hebrew name is Avraham.?
Have we forgotten how MiriamMiriam is the sister of Moses and Aaron. As Moses' and Aaron's sister she, according to midrash, prophesies Moses' role and helps secure it by watching over the young baby, seeing to it that Pharaoh's daughter takes him and that the baby is returned to his mother for nursing. During the Israelites' trek through the desert, a magical well given on her behalf travels with the Israelites, providing water, healing, and sustenance. was punished for speaking her mind?
Have we forgotten the time when we were all strangers?
It is time now to build; healing will come along with the building
It is time for the Shekhinah to feel safe dwelling amongst us again
She desires to embrace us in solace
Why do we cry as if we know not what to do?
We are all עם אחד/Am Ekhad: One people, One Humanity
Let us build our temple, destroy our biases, surrender our selfishness, reject our own apathy, and find our mother again so she may cry no more
All that we need is in our hands:
Here is brick, here is mortar, let us build it again.
