There is no event worse placed on the Jewish calendar than Tzom Gedalya. The fast has nothing to do with any of the themes we’ve been discussing over the past two days. It has absolutely zero to do with the much longer, more significant fast we will be observing on Yom Kippur next week. Instead, it has to do with the assassination of a Babylonian appointed royal governor of Judea by jealous members of the House of David.
Some of us may see this fast as a welcome reprieve from all the rich foods we’ve been eating over the past two days. But this is almost certainly not what the rabbis intended when they fixed the date. Presumably, the date marks the actual date when Gedalya was assassinated, and the Babylonians expelled the remainder of the Jews from the Land of Israel. The story is in the Tanach; it’s not entirely clear when the assassination happened whether there even was a Rosh Hashanah as we observe it today. Recall that for the ancient Israelites, Tishrei was often referred to as the seventh month of the year rather than the first.
Tzom Gedalyia is horribly inconvenient. The last thing anyone wants to do after two days and prayer and penitence is a fast day full of more prayer and penitence. But perhaps, that is precisely the point of its continued observance.
As we spend this week deep in reflection and atonement, we remember that there never really is “a convenient time” for major life events. We are frequently subject to forces greater than us and out of our control. How many of us get frustrated at the break in our regular scheduled programming when these kinds of things happen? People get sick. Loved ones die. Our lives get interrupted all of the time. No matter how much we want, we cannot schedule these things accordingly.
During this week of deep reflection, may today be an opportunity to reflect upon the unpredictable, unscheduled, messy nature of our lives. May we approach these moments with a little less frustration and more humanity when they happen in the new year.
