Our Father’s House

I don’t wait until Tisha B’Av to feel separation anxiety for my beloved Jerusalem; this feeling haunts me even as I stand on my mirpeset overlooking the new and old cities of gold. I originally made aliyah in 1996, was here for three years, and had to return to the States for health, family, and work. I didn’t expect to be away from my beloved eretz Yisrael for so long but, thank G-d, I finally returned to resume my aliyah last year and I am richly blessed to live in Jerusalem with my young adult children.

All Spring and Summer, there are riots of color, with bougainvillea spilling over balconies, jacaranda trees blossoming just as beautifully as the ones in L.A. and crape myrtles as spectacular as those in Dallas. I almost can’t bear the sensory stimulation of walking in Yerushalayim on a Summer evening, the intoxicating scent of honeysuckle and the sound of hundreds of species of birds singing their individual parts. Those birds are descendants of the birds who sang here 110 years ago when my Zayde was a little yingele in Mea Shearim. Some of these are the very same trees my ancestors walked past. I lift my eyes and see the Judean hills that so impressed King David. I get teary just thinking that Moshe Rabbeinu, holy Moses, wasn’t privileged to experience any of this. I understand why Joseph wanted his bones carried back from Egypt, I really do. 

And I’m enraged that Kever Yosef, the tomb of Joseph, has been desecrated so many times, including the attack and arson just a few months ago. Poor Joseph, if anyone deserves to rest in peace it is that poor beleaguered soul. How can this be? How is it that Joseph is still subjected to so much derision and abuse?

This is an imperfect world. That’s all. Wish as we may, try as we might, we simply cannot get over ourselves enough to even preserve this world we have been charged with fixing. 

This is an imperfect world. That’s all. Wish as we may, try as we might, we simply cannot get over ourselves enough to even preserve this world we have been charged with fixing. How, from within our deeply personal darkness, can the Jewish people gather enough sparks to find our own way home, let alone be a light unto the nations?

Home? Even when we know where it is, we can’t find it, we don’t recognize it … or we can’t afford it … and if, miraculously, we find our way there, can we ever get comfortable? We can never stay long enough. And, oy, the neighbors.

One year, I was in the Old City when Tisha B’Av began right after Shabbos. A group of young women and I had eaten a lovely Seudah Shlishit and sung beautiful harmonies together, but when three stars appeared in the sky and it was fully dark, a terrible emotional pall overshadowed any joy we had felt just moments before. It wasn’t just the idea that it was the 9th of Av, it was the cries of the little boy next door.

“Abba! Abba,” he pleaded, knocking on the door to his family’s apartment. “Abba, I’m sorry! Pleeeeeeeaaaaase, Abba, please let me in. Please? Please, Abba? I’m sorry. I’m sorry!” He couldn’t have been more than five years old, this little yingele. What had he done? What could he have possibly done to so enrage his father? And why, how was his father ignoring these pitiful cries? 

“Abba, Abba…”

Where was the father’s tenderness for this beautiful child? Where was his rachmanus? 

“Open the door,” I wanted to yell.

“Hold him, wipe away his tears, kiss him, reassure him … how can you leave him alone in that frighteningly dark hallway?!”

This actually happened. There was a little boy crying outside his family’s door in the Old City of Jerusalem erev Tisha B’Av 25 years ago. Every year since, I spend the three weeks leading up to Tisha B’Av, apologizing to G-d, asking for rachmanus, begging to find favor in His eyes and praying to be welcomed home with a loving embrace.

Thank G-d for the flora and the fauna and the opportunity to live in Jerusalem, but please, G-d, let this year be the one when we celebrate Tisha B’Av in our Father’s house.

Judy Tashbook Safern is a literary and film publicist. Bred in the panhandle of the South Plains of West Texas, Judy lived in New York, Washington D.C., and Israel before moving to Los Angeles. She raised her children in Dallas and now their family lives in Jerusalem. You can reach Judy by email: jsafern@gmail.com.