Tisha B’Av, the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av, is the saddest day on the Jewish calendar. It marks the destruction of both the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem, catastrophes that Jewish tradition holds occurred roughly 655 years apart on the same Hebrew date, along with a string of later tragedies in Jewish history that fell on the same day. This year, Tisha B’Av begins at sundown on Wednesday, July 22, and continues through nightfall on Thursday, July 23.
The fast is a 25-hour observance built around five prohibitions: no eating or drinking, no bathing, no wearing leather shoes, no applying lotions or perfumes, and no marital relations. Synagogues read the book of Eichah, Lamentations, on the night of Tisha B’Av, followed the next morning by kinot, liturgical dirges composed over centuries to mourn the Temples and the long list of calamities that followed their destruction. Many communities sit on low stools or the floor during the reading, in a posture of mourning drawn from the practice of a house of shivah. Tisha B’Av falls at the close of the Three Weeks and the more intensive Nine Days that precede it, a period in which weddings, haircuts, and music are traditionally set aside.
Two initiatives launching this year aim to give that mourning a shared, global dimension, reaching Jewish communities and Christian supporters of Israel simultaneously through live broadcast and film.
A Global Women’s Summit
Lev HaAm, together with Her Tribe Magazine, is hosting a Tisha B’Av Global Jewish Women’s Summit on Thursday, the ninth of Av, bringing together eleven speakers from around the world for a live, three-hour program of prayer, unity and inspiration. The event airs free on Zoom starting at 4:00 p.m. Israel time, 9:00 a.m. Eastern time.
The summit is hosted by Keren Miller-Yehoshua and features Rebbetzin Miriam Yerushalmi delivering a session titled “Lessons in Emuna” as part of a broader program billed as United Global Tefilah. Yerushalmi’s talk takes its title from the Hebrew phrase hakol beyadei Shamayim, “everything is in the hands of Heaven,” and asks whether that truth is something Jewish women actually see in their daily lives, or only affirm in the abstract.
Alongside Miller-Yehoshua and Yerushalmi, the lineup includes Avital Gastwirth, Nathalie Levy Riess, Rebbetzin Chana Bracha Siegelbaum, Milka Chaya Kiesel, Miriam Racquel Feldman, Rebbetzin Tamar Taback, Rivka Malka Perlman, Rebbetzin Nechama Laber and Rebbetzin Hannah Miryam Bejarano-Gutierrez.
Organizers are framing the gathering as a chance for Jewish women worldwide to mark the day together in real time, regardless of time zone or community, through a single shared broadcast. Registration is free and open now at https://tinyurl.com/GeulaNow.
A New Film on the Third Temple
OU Israel is premiering a new documentary, Beit HaMikdash: In The Making, tonight, July 22, at 8:00 p.m. Israel time, timed to the start of the fast. The film follows OU Israel director Rabbi Avi Berman and Jen Airley on a journey across Israel to meet the people, organizations, and visionaries devoting their lives to preparing for the Third Beit HaMikdash, the Holy Temple that Jewish tradition holds will one day be rebuilt in Jerusalem.
The film will stream free on YouTube through the OU Israel channel, at youtu.be/fB1cgEpA4FQ.
Both initiatives point to the same shift noted by organizers behind other Temple-focused projects this summer: a Tisha B’Av observed not only in private mourning but also through programming designed to reach the widest possible global Jewish audience in a single sitting on the day itself.
