I'm trying to decide at this moment whether I should drive into Yerushalayim and daven Arvit at the Kotel, as I've done the last two years, or stay here in Bat Ayin and daven in the shul with the community. I began going to the Kotel because I was tired of all the kids, ncluding my own, playing with the dripping wax, and the experience didn't awaken anything in me - my fault, for sure, but having said that, I've still got to do my Avodah. So I went to the Kotel two years ago, and suddenly, unexpectedly, I cried. Really cried. It wasn't without its distractions - it was, after all, the Kotel Show - and there was the inevitable TV camera filming someone right at the Kotel, imposing itself into everyone else's prayers, but I took my kids and gave them a short retrospective on why we're here (understand that on all levels), and it felt right (if one can say that about Tish'ah Be'av). Last year I went again, and I tried not to expect myself to cry. I didn't - at least at first - but I felt myuself really saying, I mean, really saying every word of the davenning. The feeling because stronger, and my hands lifted up as if powered by something else. I felt a strong light shining upon me... unfortunately, it was not that kind of illumination. It seems I had become the subject of the moment for the TV camera - without opening my eyes, all my senses, heightened by the experience, picked up the ancillary indications. CRASH! Sure, it tried to keep up the kavvanh, reign in any exterior sign of expression. But, the anti-party was over.
There are no forms and structures left for this day. Any model serves as its own shattering. The minutes tick by, the kids form parties on behalf of either option, and inside, I am as still and frozen as a stone.
Rav Yehoshua Kahan
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Rav Yehoshua Kahan taught at Yeshivat Bat Ayin from 1998 through 2008. He blogs on Parashat Hashavua here |