Tu B'Av - The Deep Meaning of the Day in Light of Chassidus

00:00 The Mishnah at the end of Tractate Taanis tells us about the great festival of 15 Av: “There were no days as joyous for the Jewish people as 15 Av and Yom Kippur.” The Mishnah describes what they would do: the daughters of Israel, or the daughters of Jerusalem, would go out and dance in the vineyards. That was the festival: the daughters of Israel would go out and dance in the vineyards, and they would say to a young man, “Young man, lift up your eyes and see what you choose. Do not set your eyes on beauty; set your eyes on family. Charm is false and beauty is fleeting; a woman who fears Hashem is the one to be praised.” We need to understand what 15 Av is really about. How did 15 Av come to be a day of which it was said that there were no days as joyous for the Jewish people? What is so special about it—more than Sukkos, Pesach, Shavuos, more than all the other festivals? Today, we do not see anything special being done on this day. The only practice is that we do not say Tachanun. The Shulchan Aruch says that from this day onward, we should increase our Torah study. This comes from the Gemara later in Tractate Taanis: “From here onward, whoever adds will have more added to him.” There is a reason to increase Torah study, because the nights gradually begin to grow longer again, so we study Torah at night. And as the Gemara says, “Whoever adds will have more added to him”: someone who increases his Torah study will have years added to his life. Fine, but what exactly is the essence of this festival of 15 Av? What is special about it? When we look at the Gemara, we find that it offers many explanations. In other words, the Gemara itself tries to understand what is special about 15 Av. It gives different explanations involving events that took place at entirely different periods in Jewish history, and all of them happened on 15 Av. When we look at them, on

02:18 the face of it, there does not seem to be any particular connection between all these explanations and reasons. Let’s briefly go through what the Gemara tells us. First, the Gemara says that 15 Av was the day on which those destined to die in the wilderness ceased dying. Every year on 9 Av—that day which became a day of weeping for generations—the spies had returned, and the people wept and did not want to enter the Land, because the spies had made the Jewish people afraid. Hakadosh Boruch Hu then decreed that on 9 Av, those in the wilderness who had reached the age of sixty would die. So, until the final year, every 9 Av was the day on which the people who had reached sixty that year died. In the last year, it did not happen. No one died, and they thought perhaps they had made a mistake in fixing the date of the new month by the moon. Perhaps they had not seen it properly. They waited another day, and another day. Then the fifteenth of the month arrived, when the moon is full—“when the moon reached its fullness.” In other words, the moon was full and its light was complete. They understood that there could no longer be a mistake. It was certain. On 15 Av, they realized that the decree had been annulled, and there was great joy. That was the first time in history that something special happened on 15 Av. The Gemara goes on to say that 15 Av was also the day when the tribes were permitted to marry one another. We know there had been a decree that members of one tribe could not marry members of another, because of the whole matter of the daughters of Tzelafchad. They had asked what would happen to their inheritance in the Land of Israel if they married men from other tribes: they would lose their inheritance. Hakadosh Boruch Hu then said that each tribe should marry only within its own inheritance. After a time, once the Jewish people had settled in the Land of Israel, the decree was lifted, and people from different tribes could marry one another. That was a reason for joy. After that, it also says

04:25 that the tribe of Binyamin was permitted to marry into the rest of the Jewish people. There was a very difficult story in Tanach, at the end of the Book of Judges—the story of the concubine at Givah. It led to the tribe of Binyamin being separated from the rest of the Jewish people, and they were not allowed to marry them. In the end, they were brought back. The tribe of Binyamin could once again marry into the rest of the Jewish people. That is another reason for joy. Then the Gemara continues with the story of the calves of Yeravam ben Nevat. Yeravam ben Nevat worshipped idols, and he made two calves so that the Jewish people would not go up to Jerusalem for the pilgrimage festivals. Jews going up for the festivals had to stop at those two places in the Land of Israel and worship idols, until Hoshea ben Elah came and broke the idols, broke the calves, and allowed the entire Jewish people to go up for the pilgrimage festivals. That happened on 15 Av. The Gemara then gives a fifth reason, from many years later: permission was granted to bury those who had died at Beitar. Beitar was a large city, with many thousands of Jews living there. There was a war, and the people of Beitar were killed. That was one of the things that happened on 9 Av: the war in which all the Jews of Beitar were killed. Their bodies lay there for years without permission to bury them. When was permission finally granted? On 15 Av, and so that is another reason for joy. So look at the periods involved. We have events from very different times, from the Jewish people in the wilderness, in the fortieth year, the year 2488, all the way to the burial of the dead of Beitar, many years later, after the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash. In other words, more than fifteen hundred years later. What is the real reason? But the Gemara does not stop there. There is another reason; we are not finished yet. The Gemara

06:39 says that something else happened on 15 Av: they stopped cutting wood for the altar. All right, so what happened? They would cut wood for the altar. Certain families—distinguished families, particular families—had the task of cutting wood and bringing it to the Beis Hamikdash so it could be used for all the offerings. The Beis Hamikdash needed a great deal of wood. There were designated families whose task this was, and the last day on which they could do it was 15 Av. So they finished cutting wood for the altar. Why? The Gemara explains that on 15 Av the heat begins to lessen, and worms might get into the wood, or the wood might no longer be so dry. Different explanations have been given, and that is why they stopped cutting wood for the altar at that point. So what is there to celebrate? The Gemara says that they would break the sickle. They called it the Day of Breaking the Sickle: they would break the axes, the sickles, the tools they used to cut the wood. They broke the sickle and said, “That’s it, we’re done.” This was because “the sun’s strength had weakened.” The sun’s power had diminished, and that is the reason for this celebration. We need to understand the explanation: what is the connection, and why should that be a reason for a festival? All of these things are stated in the Gemara, and there is much here that we need to understand. First, as we asked, what really is the essence of 15 Av? Second, with all these explanations, what connects them? They seem to be various good things. We do not see a special festival established for everything that happened in Jewish history, and it is no coincidence that the Gemara mentions these things that happened on 15

08:46 of Av, precisely. And it is no coincidence that this was a reason to celebrate. There must be something here, some thread connecting all these things. We especially need to understand why they celebrated in this interesting way that the Mishnah describes: the custom of going out and dancing in the vineyards. It was a day for finding a match, and they would say to the young men, “Lift up your eyes.” What does all this symbolize? How does it all fit together? Surely there is something much deeper, something much more wonderful here. And indeed, Kabbalah teaches that the central point of 15 Av is the moon: on that day, the moon is full. As the writings of the Arizal say, the essence of 15 Av is that “the moon stands in its fullness.” The moon is complete. That is the essential point of the day, and all the other reasons the Gemara gives are really consequences of it. But when we hear this, a very simple question arises: the moon is full every month. The fifteenth does not occur only in Av. There is a 15 Nissan, a 15 Iyar and a 15 Sivan. Every month has a fifteenth day, when the moon is full. So how can the great celebration of 15 Av stem from the fact that the moon is full? And the question is even stronger. The fifteenth of Nissan is also a day when the moon is full: Pesach. The same is true of Sukkos, on the fifteenth of Tishrei. Yet the Mishnah says there were no Yom Tov days like 15 Av. That means that, in a certain sense, the celebration of 15 Av is even greater than those of Nissan and Tishrei. How do we explain all this? So here

10:54 is a wonderful explanation the Rebbe gave at farbrengens on 15 Av. Through Chassidus, we gain a wonderful, profound understanding of this great day, 15 Av. It is also a very relevant day for us, a day that gives us strength, a day that gives us... If we understand the essence of 15 Av deeply, truly understand it, it will give us a great deal of strength. It will give us a great deal of hope and fortitude, especially in these dark days, at a time when we are all looking forward to, longing for and waiting for moments of salvation and joy. Reflecting on the essence of 15 Av gives each and every one of us much confidence and hope. In a few words, the essential point of 15 Av, as Chassidus explains it, is descent for the sake of ascent. “Descent for the sake of ascent” is one of the most fundamental expressions in Chassidus. When we see a descent, a situation of decline of any kind, we need to know that, G-d forbid, no descent is absolute. A descent is never for its own sake. Every descent, every low point, every negative situation, is always for the sake of a greater ascent. And of course, the ascent has to be greater than the state that preceded it. If it were only a matter of returning to where we were before the descent, why would we need all this upheaval? Why go through the descent at all? So clearly, when we say “descent for the sake of ascent,” we mean that the ascent after the descent is immeasurably greater than the previous state. And that is what we see in the moon. The moon symbolizes descent for the sake of ascent, because the moon has

13:08 something we see specifically in it: times of darkness and times of light, times of descent and times of ascent. This is the quality Hakadosh Boruch Hu instilled in the moon. From the fifteenth of the month onward, it wanes, losing more and more of its light, until the eve of Rosh Chodesh, when it becomes dark. Then a new light begins; a new light glimmers in the moon, and it begins to grow again and again until the fifteenth day, when the moon is full. The moon symbolizes the Jewish people. That is why, in Kiddush Levanah, we say the well-known words that they are destined to be renewed like it. The Jewish people are like the moon. That is precisely the difference between the sun and the moon. The sun is always the same. The nations of the world count by the sun; their calendar follows the sun. The Jewish calendar follows the moon. “This month shall be for you the first of months; it shall be for you the first of the months of the year.” When Hakadosh Boruch Hu took the Jewish people out of Egypt, He taught us about sanctifying the new moon. We count months by the moon, and from them we form the year. Of course, our calendar also takes the sun into account, but that is not our subject right now. Our subject is the essential point: the Jewish people are like the moon, with its ascents and descents. The Jewish people are well acquainted with rises and falls, with different periods. Again and again, the Jewish people pass through periods of exile and Geulah, exile and Geulah, light and darkness. There have been periods when the Jewish people reached the height of their ascent and greatness, and periods when they were at their lowest point. These are the rises and falls of the Jewish people, until the Geulah comes, when the ascent will be complete and absolute. That is what it means that they are destined to be renewed

15:23 like it: a great ascent, when “the light of the moon will be like the light of the sun.” The moon’s light, too, will be unwavering, shining in full force. So if we compare the Jewish people to the moon, we can understand the essence of the month of Menachem Av. Since the ascent corresponds to the depth of the descent, and Menachem Av is the month in which the Jewish people suffered their greatest descent, their greatest fall—as we read in Eichah, “She has fallen wondrously”—the ascent must be correspondingly great. On Tisha B’Av, with the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, the Jewish people experienced not just a descent but a staggering fall: the destruction of the First Beis Hamikdash, the destruction of the Second Beis Hamikdash, and all the other painful and dark events that befell the Jewish people on Tisha B’Av. So we understand that, because the descent was so extraordinary, so great, the ascent too—the leap, the rise out of the darkness—must be extraordinary. The light that emerges from the great darkness of the exile of Tisha B’Av is an exceptionally great light. That is why, as the Arizal says, the fullness of the moon on the fifteenth of Menachem Av is incomparably greater than its fullness on the fifteenth of an ordinary month. Precisely because it comes out of Tisha B’Av, out of such an immense descent, the ascent is also so great. So 15 Av symbolizes the Jewish people, who are destined to be renewed like the moon, and the unity and connection of the Jewish people with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. And here we come to the symbolism of the moon and the sun. As we see, the moon receives its light as a reflection of the sun’s light. So the light of the moon depends on the connection between the sun and the moon. So

17:35 That is the whole cycle of the month: on some days the moon is full, and on others it is dark, depending on where the moon stands in relation to the sun. So when we speak here about the sun and the moon, they actually symbolize the bond between Hakadosh Boruch Hu and Knesses Yisroel, the Jewish people. Hakadosh Boruch Hu and Knesses Yisroel are like a giver and a receiver, like a husband and wife, as described in Shir Hashirim. All of Shir Hashirim is a parable about Knesses Yisroel and Hakadosh Boruch Hu: Knesses Yisroel seeks Hakadosh Boruch Hu, Hakadosh Boruch Hu seeks Knesses Yisroel, and the entire book tells us about this relationship. There is “The voice of my beloved knocks: Open for me, my sister, my beloved, my dove, my perfect one.” Hakadosh Boruch Hu pleads with Knesses Yisroel, seeks them out, knocks on the heart of every Jew and says, “Come, I want to be with you.” And there are moments when Knesses Yisroel says, “I am dark but beautiful,” “I am asleep, but my heart is awake.” I am asleep in exile. Knesses Yisroel goes through different periods in its relationship with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The giving of the Torah was the wedding day. That is what the same Mishnah that discusses the fifteenth of Av tells us about Yom Kippur, when the second Luchos were received. Moshe Rabbeinu came down from the mountain with the second Luchos, and then Hakadosh Boruch Hu said, “I have forgiven, as you have said.” “His wedding day” is the giving of the Torah, so in fact it happened on Yom Kippur. That is why this is the day when the bond between the Jew and Hakadosh Boruch Hu was renewed. From Yom Kippur we go on to Sukkos and Simchas Torah, the great joy of a Jew rejoicing with Hakadosh Boruch Hu through the Torah. But the same idea, at an even deeper level, is what the fifteenth of Av is about in relation to the ninth of Av. After the entire destruction of the Beis Hamikdash: “How does the city that was full of people sit alone?”

19:39 “She has become like a widow”—but not a widow, G-d forbid; like a widow, like a woman whose husband has gone overseas. In other words, the Jewish people in exile are like a husband and wife where the husband has, so to speak, gone away from his wife, separated from her, but there has been no real severance. “How does the city that was full of people sit alone? She has become like a widow”—but not a widow; like a woman whose husband has gone overseas. During exile, Hakadosh Boruch Hu, so to speak, distances Himself from the Jewish people, and that leaves the moon in darkness. But the greater the descent, the greater the ascent. The fifteenth of Av symbolizes the repair, the ascent that follows the descent of the ninth of Av. Once we reflect on this, we understand that the fifteenth of Av is a day when the light of Geulah shines. This is explained in a maamar of the Rebbe Rashab about the fifteenth of Av, based on Kabbalah, on the teachings of the Arizal we mentioned earlier: on the fifteenth of Av, a radiance of Moshiach shines in the world. There is a glimmer of the revelation to come, when the moon—Knesses Yisroel—will rise to the highest place, to the deepest, truest and most complete bond with Hakadosh Boruch Hu. It will be a Geulah after which there is no exile, an ascent after which there is no descent: the ultimate perfection of the bond between the Jewish people and Hakadosh Boruch Hu, in the deepest, most complete and most enduring way. An eternal Geulah after which there is no exile. That is the essence of the fifteenth of Av. That is the reason for the great celebration on that day. Now that we understand this point, let’s go back and look at the reasons for everything the Mishnah and Gemara tell us. We will see something remarkable: every reason given in the Gemara connects directly to exile and Geulah. There are really two general themes. One is exile and the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, followed by Geulah: the conquest of Eretz Yisroel, the gathering of the exiles and the rebuilding of the Beis Hamikdash—all that

22:05 we are waiting for. That is one theme: exile and Geulah, destruction and rebuilding. The second is the cause of exile, the cause of the destruction. We all know it was baseless hatred. We all know the story of Kamtza and Bar Kamtza. Why was the Beis Hamikdash destroyed? Because there was baseless hatred in it. The Gemara says this near the beginning of tractate Yoma. The Gemara in Gittin likewise discusses the story of Kamtza and Bar Kamtza. We learn that, sadly, jealousy, hatred and rivalry—baseless hatred—caused the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash. That means the remedy, and Geulah, will come through the unity and closeness of the Jewish people. So if we now take everything the Gemara tells us and look at it point by point, we will see that every reason it gives relates to rebuilding and Geulah, and to the love and unity of the Jewish people. Of course, the first reason is the clearest. The story of the spies was really the cause of the whole observance of the ninth of Av. It is called a festival, a mo’ed—meaning that in the future it will become a festival. But the entire destruction, the weeping for generations, began on the ninth of Av because of the spies. What did the spies want? They did not want to enter Eretz Yisroel. In other words, they opposed entering Eretz Yisroel, where the Beis Hamikdash would stand, the place of the Jewish people’s Geulah. In the fortieth year, the decree ended: those destined to die in the wilderness were gone. Only the generation that would enter the Land remained. And as Rashi says, “But you who cling to Hashem your G-d are all alive today.” This refers to the generation entering the Land, who stood there whole, fit and ready to enter Eretz Yisroel. This was the generation that waited, wanted and longed to enter Eretz Yisroel. So this is exactly the opposite of exile: a generation that wants to enter the Land, build up Eretz Yisroel and build the Beis Hamikdash there. Let’s continue: the Jewish people and the tribes.

24:27 The tribes were permitted to marry one another, and the tribe of Binyamin was permitted to rejoin the community through marriage. Let’s look at this and see how both themes we discussed are present here. First, the wholeness of the Land. Eretz Yisroel becomes whole when the tribes are permitted to marry one another and the tribe of Binyamin is permitted to rejoin the community. As long as the tribes could not intermarry, each part of the Land belonged to only one tribe. Every inheritance, every place where the tribe of Yehudah lived, belonged only to Yehudah; no one else had a connection to it. Where Binyamin lived belonged only to Binyamin. Where Zevulun lived belonged only to Zevulun, and so on. When the tribes were permitted to marry one another, two things happened. There was unity and love; the Jewish people came together—the cause of Geulah. And Eretz Yisroel also became whole. Now Eretz Yisroel belonged to the entire Jewish people. When Eretz Yisroel belongs to the entire Jewish people, that is something entirely different. The symbol of wholeness, the symbol of conquest, is the complete conquest of Eretz Yisroel. Now they can build the Beis Hamikdash and make Eretz Yisroel a place where the Shechinah shines openly and fully. Let’s continue. What happened in the story of Hoshea ben Elah and the calves? Something remarkable. Here too we see both things. First, as long as the calves were there—quite apart from the terrible sin of the calves, the sin of idol worship, the sins and transgressions that led to the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash—there was also a very specific problem: the Jewish people could not go up for the pilgrimage festivals. The tribes, the ten tribes, were cut off from the Beis Hamikdash, from Jerusalem. It was impossible to go up for the pilgrimage festivals. Once Hoshea ben Elah broke the calves, all the Jews could come together. “Mountains surround Jerusalem”; “a city joined together as one,” for there…

26:33 The tribes of Judah went up, because all the tribes could go up to Jerusalem once Hoshea ben Elah broke the calves. The Beis Hamikdash in its fullness. Going up for the pilgrimage festivals. A second point: unity. One of the reasons Yeravam ben Nevat did not want them to go up to Jerusalem was not just the matter of the Beis Hamikdash. He also wanted to keep the two kingdoms apart, so that the ten tribes would have no connection with the tribes of Judah and Benjamin. He wanted to create division. Now that the calves had been broken and everyone could go up to Jerusalem, unity was created among all the tribes. So both the cause of the destruction and the destruction itself are rectified through the story of Hoshea ben Elah. He brings unity to the people and also enables the Jewish people to go up for the pilgrimage festivals. Let’s continue. Now we can understand the story more deeply. Let’s look more closely at what happened with the wood for the altar. Bringing wood for the altar was, in fact, what made the Beis Hamikdash complete, so that it could truly fulfill its purpose. The Rambam teaches us in Hilchos Beis Habechirah what the mitzvah of building the Beis Hamikdash is. The Rambam says in chapter one, halachah one: “It is a mitzvah to build a house for Hashem, prepared for offering sacrifices in it.” This is the mitzvah of “They shall make Me a sanctuary, and I will dwell among them.” What is the essence of the mitzvah of building the Beis Hamikdash? To build a house ready for sacrifices. And to offer sacrifices, you need wood. So 15 Menachem Av was the day when people could bring wood for the altar—the last day they could bring it. Families would come from everywhere, and anyone who wanted to could bring wood. First of all, this shows the completeness of the Beis Hamikdash. The Beis Hamikdash reaches its fullness. There is enough wood to use throughout the year for offering sacrifices, and then the Beis Hamikdash can truly fulfill its purpose.

28:45 And there is a symbol of love and unity here. The families who brought the wood did not bring it for themselves. They donated it for the entire Jewish people. All the communal offerings, all the individual offerings—all the sacrifices the Jewish people offer throughout the year—could be brought thanks to the wood for the altar that these families brought. So the families who brought the wood performed an act of pure Ahavas Yisroel. This was an expression of Jewish unity and Ahavas Yisroel. They brought wood, a great deal of wood, something extremely valuable, so that any Jew, whatever situation he might be in, who wanted to bring a sin offering, a burnt offering or a peace offering would have wood for the altar in the Beis Hamikdash. Thanks to those who brought it by 15 Menachem Av. So this day symbolizes both unity and the building of the Beis Hamikdash. And there is another point here. The Rebbe once spoke with great enthusiasm about something remarkable that will also explain another passage in the Gemara. Everyone asks: What is this business of breaking the axe? Breaking the knives? They called 15 Menachem Av “the day of the breaking of the sickle.” Today they break the axe. What is this business of breaking things? Why break them? There is a prohibition against needless destruction; you are not allowed to break things. Usually, breaking is something negative. Why did they break things here? And this brings us to something very, very special. This breaking is a breaking that brings about a rectification. There is breaking that is needless destruction, breaking that ruins something; but when the breaking is not destructive, and instead conveys a special message, the breaking itself is a rectification. What is the story? We know that when they built the altar in the Beis Hamikdash, they were forbidden to use iron. In fact, they did not use iron in building the Beis Hamikdash at all, as it says in Tanach. There was the shamir, which they brought to cut the stones, but especially

30:52 the altar—no iron was allowed to touch it. The Torah says, “Do not raise iron over it.” Why? Rashi tells us that iron shortens a person’s life. Iron was made for something negative. They did not want to use iron on the altar, which lengthens a person’s life. Wow. So they used axes, knives, sickles and other tools to split and cut wood for the altar, and for that they needed iron. But once the work was finished, once 15 Menachem Av arrived, they no longer needed the iron, the knives or the cutting. So they took the axe and broke it. The breaking here is a symbol meant to show that the Beis Hamikdash is a place that lengthens a person’s life. Once they were finished using those things, they broke them. It was a way of saying: We seek life. The Beis Hamikdash is a place that gives life to a person, a place that symbolizes unity and bringing hearts closer together—not, G-d forbid, war, division, murder or anything associated with them. That is why they broke the knife. This breaking was itself a rectification, and that is why they called 15 Menachem Av the day of the breaking of the sickle, the day when the Jewish people unite. All the events that happened to the Jewish people throughout the generations symbolize love and unity, bringing hearts closer together, building and Geulah. They symbolize the Jewish people building the Beis Hamikdash, going up for the pilgrimage festivals and uniting, until the entire Jewish people become one body, one family. Then the Land of Israel, in its entirety, belongs to the entire Jewish people. And this is what the Gemara goes on to say. That is why 15 Menachem Av is a day that gives life. “From this point on, whoever adds will have more added to him”—he will have years added to his life. The Torah study that begins on 15 Menachem Av is study connected with building, with life and with unity, and that study

32:57 adds years to his life. It gives a Jew new life, a special kind of life, and that is the wonderful inner essence of 15 Menachem Av. Based on this, we can now understand beautifully what happened on 15 Menachem Av, what the dancing was really about. Now we understand why the festival was established in this form. It follows quite naturally. As we said earlier, the Jewish people and Hakadosh Boruch Hu are like husband and wife. The wedding of the Jewish people took place at Mount Sinai. At the Giving of the Torah, we received the Torah: “On the day of His wedding”—that is the Giving of the Torah. And the building of the Beis Hamikdash is the fulfillment of the Giving of the Torah, of the unity of the Jewish people. That is what the cherubim in the Beis Hamikdash represented: they symbolized the perfect bond between Hakadosh Boruch Hu and the Jewish people, like the bond between husband and wife. And then comes 15 Menachem Av. After the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, there was, as it were, a symbol of separation between husband and wife. So on 15 Menachem Av, the daughters of Israel would go out. The daughters of Israel symbolize the souls of the Jewish people, the Jewish people as a whole, and they would go out and dance in the vineyards. Dancing in the vineyards represents the dance of the Jewish people, their unity. A circle dance, a circle dance. What is a circle dance? It means we are all one. It is a circle. Everyone stands together. No one is above or below, off to the side, inside or behind. We are all in the circle dance. They dance. A circle dance is a dance in which the entire Jewish people feel that we are all equal, that we are all together. The vineyard also symbolizes the Jewish people as a whole. It is like wine: when the grapes in the vineyard are pressed, wine comes out and brings joy. This is the love and joy that every Jew has in his soul. Exile is a kind of pressure, but that pressure awakens the Jewish people and brings them even closer together. So the Jewish people, the Jewish people as a whole,

35:16 They would go out and dance in the vineyards and say to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, the groom, the young man: Here, then, “young man” alludes to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, who is called in Shir Hashirim “a young man like the cedars.” It’s a verse in Shir Hashirim. Hakadosh Boruch Hu, so to speak—the chosen young man, “a young man like the cedars”—is our groom. The Jewish people say to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, “Young man, lift up your eyes and see.” We ask Hakadosh Boruch Hu, so to speak, to look at us from a higher vantage point. It’s true: because of our sins, we were exiled from our land. It’s true that the Jewish people are in the darkness of exile. From an outward perspective, you can look at a Jew and see the mud, the dirt, the sins and transgressions. But we say to Hakadosh Boruch Hu, “Young man, lift up your eyes.” We ask Him not to look at us with a superficial, outward gaze, at how we appear in practice. Or, as our Sages put it in the Gemara, “The daughters of Israel are beautiful, but poverty disfigures them.” The daughters of Israel are beautiful. Every Jew is beautiful, every Jew is whole, every Jew has a pure soul and wants to serve Hashem. Every Jew belongs to the family of the Jewish people—a son of Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov, a daughter of Sarah, Rivkah, Rachel and Leah. That is our true essence. “Young man, lift up your eyes and see”: What are you choosing? “Do not set your eyes on beauty”—don’t look at outward beauty—“set your eyes on family.” All the Jewish people, all of us, are one family. We all belong to Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov, Sarah, Rivkah, Rachel and Leah; we are the children of our forefathers and foremothers. The Jewish people are one great family, and that is our true essence. Today we see this more than ever: the unity of the Jewish people across every community. Precisely because of this, Hakadosh Boruch Hu will choose us anew. And that is why 15 Menachem Av is the wonderful, great day on which Hakadosh Boruch Hu once again

37:19 chooses the Jewish people, once again takes us and marries us. Then comes the great ascent, the great light of the complete Geulah that we are all waiting for. We will see it fully, wondrously and openly. With this, we can understand how the Gemara in tractate Taanis concludes. At the end of the chapter, after discussing 15 Menachem Av, the Gemara says, “In the future, Hakadosh Boruch Hu will make a circle dance for the righteous, and He will sit among them in Gan Eden. Each one will point with his finger and say: ‘This, this is Hashem for whom we hoped; let us rejoice and be glad in His salvation.’” That will be on that day, the day of the Geulah, when the Jewish people will join Hakadosh Boruch Hu in a great dance. Then we will all be able to point and say, “This is Hashem for whom we hoped”—the One we waited for throughout exile without giving up hope. And in the merit of that hope, in the merit of our trust, and in the merit of rising after Tisha B’Av, leaving the descent behind and looking toward the great ascent of the complete Geulah with trust, longing and great hope, may we truly merit to see these days transformed into days of joy and gladness and into festivals. May we merit, this very year, to celebrate on 15 Menachem Av the great joy, the great wedding of Hakadosh Boruch Hu and the Jewish people, in the complete Geulah through our righteous Moshiach.