What Happened on the 17th of Tammuz?

A brief discussion of the historical origins of the ancient Rabbinic source for fasting on the 17th of Tammuz.
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[@olebrgesen795]

So interesting for me. I’ve learned a lot about Jewish holidays from my mother, because my mother’s father was Jewish. But this holiday I didn’t know. I’ve learned a lot by listening to your lessons Henry Abramson ❤

[@deborahakinyemi1693]

I'm a Christian but I truly enjoy all of ur amazingly informative videos. I was pleased to watch this one because of the inaccurate teaching my cousin's university professor regarding the origin of the word "Jew." He is currently teaching the word Jew is derived from the Jewish people being greatly involved in "Jewelry industry " in the Netherlands & Germany (after their migration to these regions.) I have no idea how he arrived to such an idiotic conclusion...especially being a History Professor! I knew he was incorrect but, my cousin believed this error hook, line & sinker...unfortunately. Thank you for providing further correct information regarding this matter.

[@deborahakinyemi1693]

Sorry...I left my comments under the wrong video.

[@karlschreiber9286]

Thank You Rav. 🏜

[@pheebsbee1280]

Thank you for an interesting lecture with great graphics.

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

Great, I'm glad that you enjoyed it! Thank you for being a Member and Public Subscriber!

[@reuvenzadik2443]

Very clear and interestin explanation as always from a great lecturer as him. Very good job

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

Many thanks! I'm glad that you enjoy the lectures.

[@MagnaMater2]

6:36 as far as I remember a white toga (I thought it was supposed to be coloured with saffron, but obviously I err) over the head means that a roman emperor is acting in his role as highpriest of the roman state-cult.

[@aoa4132]

Tammuz in persian Hazaragi dialog means Summer time!🤔🤔

[@levykatzman842]

That's so interesting, the Hebrew names for the months were only introduced during the Babylonian exile, where the latter period they were under Persian rule.

[@user-bo8nb2mi]

I suggest that you add c.e. or b.c.e. after each historical date that you relay to us e.g. 103.

[@danielsultan96]

Thanks!

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

You are very welcome! Thank you for supporting the research.

[@Miraculous_momentscaptured]

Love your classes! Do you have any classes on the Maharal of Prague?

[@MitzvosGolem1]

Roman Emporor Hadrian renamed Israel Palestine after Bar Kochba rebellion Betar against Rome was lost 135CE Yerushalum leveled. So actually 3 destructions occurred.

[@robsellars9338]

Yes Hadrians was in fact the most destructive and the only emperor who sought to wipe out the Jews from the Roman Empire for good, driving them into the pagan tribes that inhabited the border lands of the empire

[@MitzvosGolem1]

@@robsellars9338 Rabbi Berel Wein history lessons orthodox scholar of Judaism has details on this and all else תודה רבה שלום 👍

[@zafirjoe18]

Thanks Doctor!!! Some say that from the wording of the Mishnah ושרף אפוסטומס ׳ה׳תורה with the ה״א הידועה it can be inferred to the known special torah. Similar to how the Abravanel explains the Torah that חלקיהו הכהן found in the temple ( Kings 2) The wording of the verse reads ספר ׳ה׳תורה מצאתי the known torah not a Torah . Reason being this was the renowned Torah that Moshe wrote and was used to referencing and comparing the proper wording by the scribes. Here too there was a Torah written by Ezra Hasofer that was kept in the temple for the scribes to reference and compare . And this was the tragedy . For it would not be the first Torah or shul that was destroyed by the foes of Israel. Rather the tragedy was in the importance of the scrolls irreplaceability . In modern times it is comparable to the tragedy of losing parts of the Keter Aram Tzovah . The go to Chumash , acting as a cross reference for more than a millennia. See פי׳ תפארת ישראל על המשנה בתענית

[@robsellars9338]

It's hard to believe that in such times of danger, that such relics were not hidden away and replaced with copies to avoid such a thing. Just like the scripts from Qu ran appear to have been at some time (and they were not nearly as special as the ones you speak of). Of course even a copy of the holy texts would have been considered a disaster if it had been destroyed in such a way.

[@zafirjoe18]

@@robsellars9338Sure there were plenty of copies. But there was one in the temple which was used by the high priest when he read from it on Kippur and by the king at the Hakhel ceremony. Now this Torah was special as if a scribe was doubtful about a certain words correct spelling he can inquire by this Torah. According to tradition the Torah in the second temple period was written by Ezra the scribe . See also Mishna Moed Katan 3:4 Up until the 1950’s the scribes would consult the Aleppo codex ( Ben Asher) for any question arising. Today parts of it survive but some is lost . Thanks to the work of the Ibn Sapir and his inquiries the codex in part can be reconstructed.

[@robsellars9338]

@@zafirjoe18 thanks for info but my point was that surely they would have hidden such relics in time of troubles and replaced with a copy until the threat was gone. They were too valuable to risk and they must have had many hiding places for this version of the Torah?

[@zafirjoe18]

@@robsellars9338 I believe that we are talking about the time of the High Priest Menelaus who together with the house of Tobias, sold out the priesthood and sovereignty and with it the temple as you can read in the book of Maccabees. Antiochus Epiphanies v was more than happy to comply in forcing all jews to Hellenise and abandon their religion. So it was at this time that for thirty years that the temple served the Greek Gods with the help of the Jewish Hellenisers. It was the general Apostamos that burnt the Torah and set the Idol in the temple at the behest of their Jewish Kapos . This is what let to the Maccabean tevolt.

[@zafirjoe18]

There was another tragedy that should be added to the five . The destruction of the Jews in Barcelona at the pogrom of 1391 happened on the 17th of Tammuz . The capital of Aragon will never have a Jewish community again until the 20th century. R’ Chisdai ibn Crescas writes that there was no jew to be found in all of Barcelona after devastation of גזירות קנ״א

[@AaronMiller-rh7rj]

Interesting!

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

I'm glad you think so!

[@meeeka]

Just last week, there was an article about the 17th Tammuz 1941, about a series of terribly horrific, blood drenched pogroms in Lviv, Ukraine.

[@houseofsofia6650]

Amen 🙏

[@vincentwhite6707]

Can I ask an archeology level question? In the place where Moses broke the first tablets, wouldn't they still be there! In seeing that we have been looking for the ark for all these years. Why can't we finde the first set?

[@albertonvacation2462]

July 23rd 2024!

[@emmcee662]

Very interesting. I think the Emperor is wearing the white robes because he was also regarded as “pontifex maximus” (high priest)

[@terryhardaway3285]

Shalom, So, what naming conventions are used for the Hebrew months? I see Tammuz in connection with idolatry in Ezekiel 8:14,15. Av is "father." And Abib is now Nissan. When were the names changed? And what is their origins? Baruch HaShem! Be well and be Blessed, A fellow sojourner

[@Death-of-antichrist-is-at-hand]

Dear Abramson, great teaching. I greatly Enjoy your channel. I have a very important question. Please comment or would love a video on the historical reports found within the Talmud and other sources that these major events took place. Quotes below "Forty years before the destruction of the Temple, the western light went out, the crimson thread remained crimson, and the lot for the Lord always came up in the left hand. They would close the gates of the Temple by night and get up in the morning and find them wide open" (Jacob Neusner, The Yerushalmi, p.156-157). [the Temple was destroyed in 70 C.E.] "Our rabbis taught: During the last forty years before the destruction of the Temple the lot ['For the Lord'] did not come up in the right hand; nor did the crimson-colored strap become white; nor did the western most light shine; and the doors of the Hekel [Temple] would open by themselves" (Soncino version, Yoma 39b). [the Temple was destroyed in 70CE "Said Rabban Yohanan Ben Zakkai to the Temple, 'O Temple, why do you frighten us? We know that you will end up destroyed. For it has been said, 'Open your doors, O Lebanon, that the fire mav devour vour cedars' " (Zechariah 11:1)'. Sota 6:3 "In fact, we are told in the Talmud that at dusk the lamps that were unlit in the daytime (the middle four lamps remained unlit, while the two eastern lamps normally stayed lit during the day) were to be re-lit from the flames of the western lamp (which was a lamp that was supposed to stay lit all the time - it was like the 'eternal' flame that we see today in some national monuments) "This 'western lamp' was to be kept lit at all times. For that reason, the priests kept extra reservoirs of olive oil and other implements in ready supply to make sure that the 'western lamp' (under all circumstances) would stay lit. But what happened in the forty years from the very year Messiah said the physical Temple would be destroyed? Every night for forty years the western lamp went out, and this in spite of the priests each evening preparing in a special way the western lamp so that it would remain constantly burning all night!" (The Significance of the Year CE 30, Ernest Martin, Research Update, April 1994, p. 4). "and it has further been taught: 'For forty years before the destruction of the Temple the thread of scarlet never turned white but it remained red.'" (Bavli Rosh Hashanah 31b). "Forty years before the destruction of the Temple, the western light went out, the crimson thread remained crimson, and the lot for the Lord always came up in the left hand. They would close the gates of the Temple by night and get up in the morning and find them wide open" (also from Yoma 6:3 [33b)). Isaiah 1:18 "Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool." YESHUA prophesied the destruction of the temple 40 plus years before it happened Proving his prophecy was true. 2 And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.Matthew 24:2 in context. I am humbly asking for your historical evaluation on these references and how it may fit with the fact that YESHUA claimed to be the LAMB of GOD and messiah which offered HIS life on around the 30CE date being a possible link to the reports made by the Jewish people of strange things occurring knowing YESHUA prophesied the temples destruction. Rome then ripped every stone up to extract the gold

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

Hello, and thanks for the question. I think you would find the most engaging discussion of these sources on the channel of Rabbi Tovia Singer: www.youtube.com/@ToviaSinger1

[@wendyhughes2234]

I recently found this information, and it [might] be of interest to you, and some viewers. I hope it might be interesting. Josephus sees Armies in the Sky One of the most celebrated reports from antiquity of bizarre goings on in the sky appears in Josephus, History of the Wars relating to c. 65 AD.Besides these, a few days after that feast [of the unleavened bread], on the twenty first day of the month of Artemisius, a certain prodigious and incredible phenomenon appeared: I suppose the account of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those that saw it, and were not the events that followed it [the destruction of the temple in 70] of so considerable a nature as to deserve such signals; for, before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armour were seen running about among the clouds, and surrounding the cities (6,5,3).These sky armies have been marshalled over the years for many causes. If you ask a certain kind of Christian they are the angels of Revelation beginning the work of God’s kingdom. Jewish scholars, meanwhile, are quick to note that God is often associated with chariots. If you inquire of Erik von Daniken and his emulators they are ancient foo fighters jumping around the sky. If you ask unexcitable, over-rational sorts they will talk here about the fata morgana: an optical illusion in the heavens and the unexcitable, over-rational sources might in this case have a point - the fata morgana is perhaps more common at sunset and dawn. Could the chariots have even been ships projected into the sky by unusual atmospheric conditions?But this same event is almost always taken out of context. Beachcombing offers up here the entire passage where Josephus is describing the various portents for one of the most traumatic events in Jewish history: Vespasian’s burning of the temple and also the way in which the ‘stupid’ people misinterpreted them. For ease of reference Beachcombing numbers these portents in bold.(1) Thus there was a star resembling a sword, which stood over the city, and (2) a comet, that continued a whole year. Thus also before the Jews’ rebellion, and before those commotions which preceded the war, when the people were come in great crowds to the feast of unleavened bread, on the eighth day of the month Xanthicus, and at the ninth hour of the night, (3) so great a light shone round the altar and the holy house, that it appeared to be bright day time; which lasted for half an hour. This light seemed to be a good sign to the unskilful, but was so interpreted by the sacred scribes, as to portend those events that followed immediately upon it. At the same festival also, (4) a heifer, as she was led by the high priest to be sacrificed, brought forth a lamb in the midst of the temple. Moreover, (5) the eastern gate of the inner [court of the] temple, which was of brass, and vastly heavy, and had been with difficulty shut by twenty men, and rested upon a basis armed with iron, and had bolts fastened very deep into the firm floor, which was there made of one entire stone, was seen to be opened of its own accord about the sixth hour of the night… Besides these, a few days after that feast, on the one and twentieth day of the month Artemisius a certain prodigious and incredible phenomenon appeared: I suppose the account of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those that saw it, and were not the events that followed it of so considerable a nature as to deserve such signals; for, (6) before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armor were seen running about among the clouds, and surrounding of cities. Moreover, at that feast which we call Pentecost, as the priests were going by night into the inner [court of the temple] as their custom was, to perform their sacred ministrations, they said that, (7) in the first place, they felt a quaking, and heard a great noise, and after that they heard a sound as of a great multitude, saying, ‘Let us remove hence’.Some of these seven need no serious explanation: e.g. (2) the comet - a year? - was almost certainly a comet seen in the skies in 64 AD. Others can be likewise dismissed without too much concern. (7) and perhaps (5) involved earthquake activity and touched raw local sensibilities. Others can be dismissed with a little more struggle (4) the heifer giving birth to a malformed or peculiar calf in the wrong place at the wrong time. This game could go on. The point is though that this was an age primed for portents and that the Jewish people were about to enter a period of suicidal messianic revolt against the Roman authorities: something that could only add to that susceptibility even if retrospectively.Tacitus (H 5,13) has his own gloss on these events that is almost Beachcombian in its dismissiveness.‘Prodigies had occurred, which this nation, prone to superstition, but hating all religious rites, did not deem it lawful to expiate by offering and sacrifice. There had been seen hosts joining battle in the skies, the fiery gleam of arms, the temple illuminated by a sudden radiance from the clouds. The doors of the inner shrine were suddenly thrown open, and a voice of more than mortal tone was heard to cry that the Gods [sic!] were departing. At the same instant there was a mighty stir as of departure. Some few put a fearful meaning on these events, but in most there was a firm persuasion, that in the ancient records of their priests was contained a prediction of how at this very time the East was to grow powerful, and rulers, coming from Judaea, were to acquire universal empire. These mysterious prophecies had pointed to Vespasian and Titus, but the common people, with the usual blindness of ambition, had interpreted these mighty destinies of themselves, and could not be brought even by disasters to believe the truth.’__________________________________________________________________________________

[@IndigenousHebrew]

Is Tammuz 17 Biblical? I thought weeping for Tammuz was an abomination?

[@GuillermoMartinez-mw9cn]

Yes it is look at this story at 2 king 25: 1- and on.

[@myopinions1]

Yarmulkas are a relatively recent thing and not a mitzvah.

[@MitzvosGolem1]

Actually in Mishna and Talmud Shulchan Aruch law book. Titus arch in Rome Jews have kippah also. תודה רבה שלום

[@iprogramplus]

אמן

[@HenryAbramsonPhD]

ואמן

[@denizalgazi]

*06 July 2023

[@wendyhughes2234]

Armies of angels reported in the skies above Jerusalem MAY 2, 66 A.D. JERUSALEMA few days after the Passover feast on the 21st day of Iyyar (May 2nd) in 66 AD, Roman historian Tacitus and Jewish historian Josephus both record eye-witness accounts of angelic armies in the clouds above Jerusalem (Matthew 24:31). Tacitus also reports that "the temple [was] illuminated by a sudden radiance from the clouds" (Matthew 24:27). The wise publicly declared that this, along with other ominous signs, were signals foreshowing Jerusalem's destruction. It was these same angels that probably assisted the elect in escaping Jerusalem before the Romans besieged the forsaken city, similar to how Lot and his family were rescued before Sodom was destroyed (Genesis 19:15-16). Writing sometime before the beginning of the Roman-Jewish War (66-70 AD), the author of the letter to the Hebrews states that some believers have "entertained angels unawares" (Hebrews 13:2). Hebrew author of the Book of Maccabees, a chronicle of the Jewish victories against Antiochus Epiphanes IV, king of the Seleucid Empire (175-164 BC), recorded "people all over Jerusalem" who witnessed angelic armies "charging across the sky" for almost forty days:For nearly forty days people all over Jerusalem saw visions of cavalry troops in gold armor charging across the sky. The riders were armed with spears and their swords were drawn. They were lined up in battle against one another, attacking and counterattacking. Shields were clashing, there was a rain of spears, and arrows flew through the air. All the different kinds of armor and the gold bridles on the horses flashed in the sunlight. When the English Witnessed Battles in the SkySome claimed the battles were so fierce they could smell the gunpowder.On the night of March 6, 1716, people all over England witnessed a bloody war unfolding in the sky. Some claimed the battles were so fierce they could smell the gunpowder. Others saw flaming swords hanging in the air like Macbeth’s dagger.Even in the dead of night, the aurora was bright enough to read by. Sometimes the sky looked like a shattered mirror, with cracks of light running through it; at other moments the air seemed to be full of tumbling flakes of fire. To many, it seemed like the end of the world.“On Tuesday last,” one observer wrote, “about a Quarter before 7 in the Evening, one of my Servants came to me in a great Fright; and begg’d of me to come out immediately, for there were Two Armies fighting in the sky.” He rushed outside, only to find “a most Glorious Light, appearing thro’ the Intervals,” which was “Continually in Motion… sometimes Two different Lights came with great seeming Fury against each other; and having met together, each roll’d gently back, like two Waves that have dash’d themselves in their Opposition.”Some saw supernatural soldiers slaughtering each other in the air. Others saw simply a natural oddity.That quote captures one of the oddest things about the 1716 aurora: people around the country gathered to witness the scene, but although they all stared up into the same sky, they interpreted what they saw in dramatically different ways. Some saw supernatural soldiers slaughtering each other in the air. Others saw simply a natural oddity, a particularly vivid version of the Northern Lights.Among the second group was the astronomer Edmond Halley, who attempted to use the latest theories of magnetic effluvia to explain the eerie phenomena. But as he jotted down his observations, the spectators around him were making sense of the apparitions using their own reference points:Some likened it to that Representation of Glory wherewith our Painters in Churches surround the Holy Name of God. Others to those radiating Starrs wherewith the Breasts of the Knights of the most Noble Order of the Garter are adorned. Many compared it to the Concave of the great Cupola of St. Pauls’ Church, distinguished with Streaks alternately Light and obscure, and having in the middle a Spaceless bright than the rest, resembling the Lantern.Church vaults, flaming swords, glowing waves: the splatter of light and color seemed to demand interpretation. It is no wonder, then, that so many people saw soldiers on the march. By doing so, they were taking part in a long-standing tradition, one that dates back to the Bible. Consider 2 Maccabees 5:[I]t came to pass that through the whole city of Jerusalem for the space of forty days, there were seen horsemen running in the air, in gilded raiment and armed with spears, like bands of soldiers. And horses set in order by ranks, running one against another, with the shakings of shields, and a multitude of men in helmets, with drawn swords, and casting of darts, and glittering of golden armour, and of harnesses of all sorts. Wherefore all prayed that these prodigies might turn to good.Similar sightings proliferate throughout the popular literature of the early modern era. In 1659, one pamphlet reported a great march of warlike troops through the sky, accompanied by drums and trumpets. Another, in 1673, attested that the whole town of Posen had witnessed brigades clashing above their heads, punctuated with blasts of cannon-fire and screams.To the pamphleteers, these apparitions were omens, legible signs of God’s will. And they did not have to look far for the meaning of the 1716 aurora. Only a few days before, the Earl of Derwentwater had lost his head, in punishment for a failed uprising against the King. His body was interred on March 6, the day of the aurora. These celestial phenomena quickly became known as “Lord Derwentwater’s Lights.” To his supporters, the visions of armies in the sky were a clear message of God’s wrath at the Earl’s execution.But to Francis Dunn, an old servant of Lord Derwentwater’s, the apparitions in the sky did not suggest flaming swords or marching battalions. As he recorded in his diary:…[a] most Beautiful glory appeared over ye hearse, which all saw, sending forth resplendent streams of all sorts of colours to ye east & west, the finest yet ever I saw in my Life. It hung like a delicate rich curtain & continued a quarter & half an hour over ye hearse.

[@jeffreyschweitzer8289]

Tablets probably would have been inscribed in “paleo-Hebrew” script, though, not the square script shown by Rembrandt….just sayin

[@robsellars9338]

Yes and the Bible says that the 5 commandments on each stone covered both sides. So technically that would be split as 3 commandments on one side and 2 on the other (just saying!)

[@robsellars9338]

Why no mention of the mesopotamian celebration of this same day professor? Surely it must have some bearing calendrically on why the mesopotamian Jews celebrate the same days?

[@shaheedabdulazeez7366]

Judaism's strange G-ds: Michael Hoffman!

[@Jimlance199]

Tammuz and Hanukkah are simply man made holidays neither one is a Holy day.

[@ngatupomani5376]

All holidays are man made

[@NoRushpk]

Of course he wasn't wearing a kippah, that's a man-made rabbinic takkana which comes from turbans wore in the middle east. has nothing to do with fear of God.

[@masriembing70]

Dont stop learn the torah Jesus christ always protect jewish people..