The history of the Jewish experience since the Holy Temple was destroyed some 1,935 years ago at the hands of foreign invaders, is known as the exile. Exiled from their land and from their spiritual center - the Holy Temple - the Jewish nation has been marking time, waiting to leap, as it were, back into history, to take back its own destiny, and above all, to rebuild the Holy Temple - the house of G-d. The Jewish nation has seen to it that the Holy Temple was never forgotten throughout the darkest moments of her exile, and that her sons and daughters would one day renew the Divine service on Mount Moriah, and rebuild the Holy Temple.
Yet, along the way, forgetfulness and misunderstanding did creep in. To this day, many a Jewish household continues to observe the tradition of maintaining a half-meter square patch of wall scraped clean of plaster as one enters the house. For how can we complete our houses when G-d's house lays in ruins? Yet too many an observant Jewish homeowner wrongly believes that this patch of wall is commemorating the "destruction" and the the Temple itself: an ancient loss, but not a promised future. With remarkable tenacity the Jews have stuck to their memory of the Holy Temple. However, it is not the destruction that we are intended to commemorate, but the Divine promise that we will one day build the Holy Temple again. We weren't instructed to enshrine the 9th of Av as a day of permanent mourning for the Holy Temple, but as a day to remind us of our responsibility to rebuild the Holy Temple one day - maybe today - maybe tomorrow. We weren't instructed to commemorate its destruction, we are instructed to remember the Holy Temple in order to remain spiritually and intellectually prepared to rebuild it whenever the moment arrives. The following paragraphs, excerpted from The Odyssey of the Third Temple, by Rabbi Yisrael Ariel and Rabbi Chaim Richman of The Temple Institute, (copyright 1993, no longer available in print), tell the tale of a nation coming to grips with destruction, and by sheer force of will, shaping its every thought and action toward the day when that tragedy will turn to rejoicing - with the building of the Holy Temple. Read the rest on:
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