* Translation by Yehoshua Siskin
“Shalom Sivan, My name is Shani Levin and tonight I will be fasting of Tisha B’Av for the first time. I’m 21 years old and live in Tel Aviv. Until not long ago, I worked as a bartender in the Carmel Market — even on Friday nights. Recently, I stopped working on Shabbat and began learning a little more about Shabbat and other components of Judaism.
To be honest, I didn’t know much about Tisha B’Av. I always fasted on Yom Kippur, asking God for personal things, including the hope that I would finally build my own home and family. Then I realized there is a fast day for God’s House. How could I ask for my own home while being indifferent to His — to the Beit HaMikdash, the Holy Temple, which was destroyed on this day?
Sometimes I see videos and news headlines that leave me feeling deeply unsettled. I sense that we’re living in a kind of exile, with the frightening possibility of brother turning against brother. I don’t want to be indifferent to that. I care. My fast is my response to it — to the baseless hatred that led to the destruction of the Temple.
I have a religious study partner whom I met through the Kesher Yehudi organization. We study together and went through the laws of Tisha B’Av. I learned everything from the beginning, like a child — for example, that the fast lasts a full twenty-four hours, just like on Yom Kippur. It begins this evening and ends tomorrow after nightfall. I also took out a pair of non-leather shoes, since leather shoes are not worn on Tisha B’Av, and I started getting ready for the seudah hamafseket, the final meal before the fast. This evening my study partner surprised me by bringing me soup and rice before the fast. I was truly touched by this gesture.
I’m hearing about many other people who never really knew about this day, perhaps because it always falls during summer vacation in July, but who now feel that it matters much more. I don’t yet fully understand Eicha (Book of Lamentations) that is read on Tisha B’Av, or all the kinot (elegies) and customs of the day, but I’m deeply moved and motivated to become part of our people’s larger story.
They say that every mitzvah brings the final redemption closer. Maybe what has been missing is my fasting on Tisha B’Av?”
