It is the Seventeenth of Tammuz again. Happens every year, it seems, although Your Humble Blogger hasn’t written about it since 2011. The observation of Tzom Tammuz begins the three weeks Between the Gates, a time of mourning and remembrance that culminates in Tisha B’Av. The fast coincides this year with Ramadan, which seems tragically appropriate: there is a group calling themselves Choose Life that is calling for fasting and prayer dedicated to peace, or conflict resolution, or something like that. I oughtn’t be snarky, as it’s undoubtedly a Good Thing for people to come together in support of peace, but the whole thing seems vague and aimless to me. My Rabbi, bless him, has written to our congregation about the situation, including both prayers for peace and a stirring defense of Israel’s actions. I’m sure there are loads of people sending out prayers for peace and stirring defenses of the actions of Hamas. All three cannot be correct at once. And certainly not during the Three Weeks.
Last week we read the parsha called Pinchas, named after, well, Pinchas, one of Aaron’s grandsons, who (in the previous week’s readings) drove a spear through Zimri (the head of the tribe of Simeon) and Cozbi (a Midianite princess) as they were having sex. This was evidently a Good Thing in the eyes of the Divine, who in this parsha rewards Pinchas by including him in the hereditary priesthood and giving him briti shalom, the Lord’s covenant of peace. Because peace, combined with stirring defense of violence.
[Num 25:16-17 KJV] And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, Vex the Midianites, and smite them.
Smite is clear, nachah to beat on something, wound or kill someone. Vex is tzaror—Rashi draws an echo in zachor, to remember, and shamor, to keep, both emphasizing the permanence of the commandment. The word itself, though, is from tzarar, to bind or to compress, to press upon, and thus to harass or oppress. This has a much clearer echo —the tz r root— to the name for Egypt, Mitzrayim. The Narrow Place. The Divine says, in vengeance, that Israel should narrow the Midianites, put them between the gates.
And here we are, ourselves starting the narrow path between the gates again hoping to come out again, in three weeks, to a place that it wider for everyone.
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.