As the Shabbat following Tishah b’Av, the fast that commemorates the destruction of the Temple and other tragedies, this week is given a unique name: Shabbat Nachamu, the Shabbat of Comfort. Figuratively, we rise from the ashes and mourning of the Three Weeks and begin the joyful process of revitalisation that culminates with the New Year at Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
But this theme of comfort is seemingly at odds with the opening thrust of our sidrah, which describes Moses’s desperate pleas to God to permit him entry into the land of Israel. God says no — a response both perplexing and even unsettling.
God’s denial of Moses’ request would seemingly belong more naturally with the bleak dejection of the Three Weeks of Mourning, not the jubilant path of renewal stretching forward to the New Year. How are we to reconcile this paradox?
Perhaps the answer lies within Tishah b’Av itself. In the book composed by the prophet Jeremiah witnessing Israel’s spiritual decay and physical destruction, we read something terrifying: “Even when I cry out and plead, God has shut out my prayer” (Lamentations 3:8). Hard truths cut both ways. After generations of rampant indifference to God, that same indifference was eventually reflected back.
At first glance, Jeremiah’s lament appears to echo Moses’s apparently ignored prayers. But there is one crucial difference and it is this that sheds light on what a stable process of comfort truly looks like.
As the destruction of the Temple loomed, our prayers weren’t answered with a “no”. Tragically, they weren’t answered at all. All supplications were met with a deafening silence. The once wondrous bond between the Jewish people and God had deteriorated almost beyond repair.
Almost. In Va’etchanan lies a comforting thought.
Moses’s prayers were not met with deafening silence. They were answered, albeit not with the answer he longed to hear. The answer was “no, you will not enter the land”. But do not despair! “Command Joshua, strengthen and encourage him — for he will cross over ahead of the people” (3:28).
To paraphrase Elie Wiesel, the opposite of love is indifference. The cold, terrifying indifference of Tishah b’Av. What follows on Shabbat Nachamu is a slight shift. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the ice begins to thaw. Those first delicate conversations may be painful beyond measure. We may say things that are difficult to say, hear things we don’t want to hear. But at least there is renewed dialogue.
The relationship begins to heal as we take the first steps gingerly down a path to a brighter future; a road ending at Yom Kippur, when God “descends” to be fully among us.
