This past Wednesday night, Jews from across Los Angeles gathered at Wise to commemorate Tisha B’Av, perhaps the saddest day on the Jewish calendar. Together, we mourned the tragedies that have befallen our people by reading from the Book of Lamentations, with its haunting descriptions of destruction and loss.
Yet our journey through grief does not end with lament. The three haftarot – weekly selections from the prophets – leading up to Tisha B’Av are filled with rebuke. But by the Shabbat immediately following Tisha B’Av, the tone already began to change. We celebrated Shabbat at the beach, and we took comfort from the words of the Prophet Isaiah: “’Take comfort, take comfort my people,’ says your God, ‘Speak tenderly to Jerusalem and declare that her term of service is over, her iniquity expiated; she has received, at God’s hand, double for all her sins (Isaiah 40:1-2).’”
Thus begins a cycle of seven consecutive haftarot of consolation, messages of hope delivered to our ancestors in exile.
First, we lament. Then, we begin to imagine the possibility of repair.
In many ways, this cycle of grief, buttressed by hope, prepares us for the coming Days of Awe. Before we can change, we must be willing to look honestly at what has been broken. We must name our losses, our failures, and the ways we have contributed to the pain in our own lives and in the lives of others. The journey of t’shuvah, like the journey through Tisha B’Av, begins with lament.
But Judaism does not ask us to remain in our grief or guilt. The weeks after Tisha B’Av remind us that honest confrontation with the past can lead to repair. The voice of the prophets gradually shifts from mourning to consolation, from destruction to rebuilding, from despair to hope.
By the time we arrive at Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we have already been practicing the spiritual work of return. We have learned to mourn what was lost, to confront what went wrong, and to listen for the possibility that repair remains possible.
Tisha B’Av teaches us that t’shuvah – repentance – begins not with resolution, but with the courage to look honestly upon our mistakes and lament what could have been. The haftarot of consolation, meanwhile, remind us that telling the truth about the past can be the first step toward imagining and creating a better future.