(RNS) — That must be a trick question, you say.
Oct. 7 was, well, on Oct. 7.
True enough. But what is the appropriate date for its commemoration?
That was the question many of us were hearing, and responding to, this past summer in Jerusalem.
The question is not an easy one. Neither is it merely a matter of timing.
Rather: It is a question about Judaism itself.
Every Jewish holiday occurs according to the Hebrew calendar. Rosh Hashana, for example, is always on the first day of Tishrei; Yom Kippur, on the 10th of Tishrei; Sukkot on the 15th day of Tishrei, etc. That means the dates for those holidays, on the Gregorian calendar, are quite movable — as in the perennial: “The holidays (i.e., Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur) are early (or late) this year.”
On the Jewish calendar, the horrific attack of Oct. 7 occurred with the 22nd day of Tishrei, which is Simchat Torah, “the rejoicing of the Torah,” the festival upon which the annual Torah reading ends, and the new cycle begins.
So, now we have a controversy. Should Jews observe the commemoration of the attack on its Hebrew date, which will always be Simchat Torah (i.e., today) or on its Gregorian date, which will always be Oct. 7?
There is more to this controversy than meets the eye.
Most of the time, Simchat Torah is a raucous holiday — almost equal to Purim in its gaiety. People dance with the Torah scrolls; there is sometimes alcohol consumption; and there is the decades-old memory that the only day upon which Jews in the former Soviet Union would celebrate publicly was, in fact, Simchat Torah.
But not last year. As the grim news began to emerge, Simchat Torah came to American Jews under a cloud of darkness.
Therein lies the controversy. To mark the anniversary of the attack on its Hebrew date would be to perpetually condemn Simchat Torah, a holiday of mirth and utter abandon, to the realm of, well, shiva — a perpetual day of mourning.
As my regular readers know, I spent this Oct. 7 in Warsaw, Poland. I attended several commemorations of that day, including one at the Israeli Embassy that was attended by many Polish government officials. There was a particular power and poignancy to observe Oct. 7 in Poland, as I realized the last “worst days” in Jewish history had, in fact, happened on Polish soil.
In fact, that is how — and when — most Jews marked that day. As I look around the web, I notice almost every local commemoration of Oct. 7 happened specifically on Oct. 7 itself.
There are two reasons for this.
First, there is a certain elegance — albeit a grim elegance — in that date.
I keep returning to “Shiva: Poems of October 7,” the volume that Rachel Korazim, Michael Bohnen and Heather Silverman edited. I reviewed it here, and you can listen to a podcast with Rachel Korazim here.
People visit a memorial for victims of the Oct. 7, 2023, cross-border attack by Hamas militants on the one-year anniversary of the attack, in Tel Aviv, Israel, Oct. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Oded Balilty)
The editors are playing a wry word game with us. They called the volume “shiva” because “shiva” is the traditional term for the seven-day mourning period after a death.
Let’s stay with that word “shiva” for a moment. When we speak of what happened on Oct. 7, we refer to it as “shiva b’October.” Why not “shvii shel October,” the seventh day of October? Because the word “shvii” bears the echo of “yom ha-shvii,” the seventh day, which is Shabbat — and that echo of sanctity is simply too jarring for us.
So, there you have it. “Shiva b’October” — because a year ago, the entire Jewish people and its allies observed shiva b’October, a period of mourning in October.
We might even say we are still in shiva and might expect to be there for quite some time.
There is a second reason, and that whole shiva vs. shvii play reminds us of that reason.
It is simply this: Jewish custom forbids mourning on Jewish holidays. You don’t, in fact, sit shiva on Shabbat or other Jewish sacred times. There is a beautiful custom in traditional synagogues. On Shabbat, toward the beginning of the worship service in the synagogue, the congregation opens the door to welcome mourners into its midst, as if to say: “It is now Shabbat, and we invite you to set aside your mourning for one day.”
“Invite?” Too weak, I think. “The tradition commands … ” is closer to the truth. You are not permitted to stay within your shiva sadness on Shabbat or a festival. Is the tradition callous in saying so? Imperious in its management and regulation of the emotions of individual Jews?
Perhaps. Perhaps the tradition is overbearing, as well, when it says just as you cannot mourn on a day of Jewish communal rejoicing, so, too, you cannot celebrate at a time of Jewish communal mourning — say, in the three weeks of summer leading up to Tisha B’Av, the fast day that commemorates the destruction of the Temples in Jerusalem.
But here is the rule: The emotions of the community always take precedence over the emotions of the individual.
Which is, admittedly, a very difficult message for those who live in an individualistic culture to hear.
And yet, it is a Jewish message.
That is why I think that into the future (How long into the future? That is a separate question, isn’t it?) we will be marking Oct. 7 on Oct. 7, and not on Simchat Torah.
What will happen on Simchat Torah this year?
I cannot know (yet), but this question has a precedent.
I am going back 51 years ago — to the Simchat Torah that immediately followed the Yom Kippur War.
At that time, Elie Wiesel wrote these words (in his book “Against Despair”):
On the eve of the Simchat Torah following the war, rabbis in America were faced with a question of whether or not their congregations should celebrate this joyful holiday, and the answer was unequivocal: Yes, they should. Never mind that it wasn’t easy. Never mind that they didn’t feel like singing and dancing. Never mind that there were so many reasons against celebrating. We had to celebrate.
Yes, even if we don’t feel up to it.
Frankly, I hope we will.
Because I don’t want (expletive deleted here) Hamas to have the final word.
