Tenth of Tevet: our destiny is unsure

(Asarah B'Tevet): a little history

Oh, history. This is what happened, in a “nutshell,” not according to Josephus:

​This Friday is the 10th of Tevet. On Friday night, we read about Jacob’s death in Vayechi and will finish a “minor fast” day—maybe not so minor in the future.

Unique among Jewish fasts, the 10th of Tevet is observed even on Fridays, though it does interfere somewhat with Shabbat preparations.

The Tenth of Tevet, when Nebuchadnezzar surrounded Jerusalem, is viewed as the beginning of a chain of events that culminated in the destruction of the Temple and the subsequent exiles. We have never fully recovered from this, and even when the Second Temple was finally built, it never returned to its full glory.

Some Jews believe Israel’s existence is the Third Temple.

In recent times, 10 Tevet became the day to say kaddish for the victims of the Holocaust, many of whose day of martyrdom is unknown. Even more recently, we say Kaddish for the victims of the 10/7 pogrom by Hamas, many of whom were murdered on unknown days.

On the 10th day of the Jewish month of Tevet, in the year 3336 from Creation (425 BCE), the armies of the Babylonian emperor Nebuchadnezzar laid siege to Jerusalem.

Only a few decades before, Leonidas and a few unmarried Spartans had confronted Xerxes at Thermopylae, attempting to impede the Persian despot from advancing on the other Greek city-states long enough for them to unite and oppose Persia’s attempt at domination. Democracy resulted.

Ever patient, G‑d had delayed the Temple’s destruction to give the Jews yet another chance to repent. He repeatedly sent the prophet Jeremiah to admonish His nation, but they foolishly imprisoned him. Thus, 30 months later, on Tamuz 9 3338, the city walls were breached, and on 9 Av of that year, the Holy Temple was destroyed, and the Jewish people were exiled.

Our more observant brothers observe the 10th of Tevet and also commemorate two tragic events that occurred close to that date, which were incorporated into the Selichot of 10 Tevet:

One, to translate the Torah into Greek (following an unsuccessful attempt 61 years earlier), the ruling Egyptian-Greek emperor Ptolemy gathered 72 Torah sages, had them in 72 separate rooms, and ordered them to each produce a translation. On the 8th of Tevet of 3515 (246 BCE), they made 72 identical translations.

The Greek translation advanced the agenda of the Hellenist Jews, who wanted to bring Greek culture into Jewish life. Thus, the holy Torah became just another book of wisdom in Ptolemy’s great library.

Imagine that—- others, strangers, who could not read Hebrew or Aramaic could read the Torah.

Second, Ezra the Scribe passed away on the 9th of Tevet in 3448 (313 BCE), 1000 years after the Torah was given on Mount Sinai.

When Persia’s ruler Xerxes (Koresh Ro’i, Xerxes be my shepherd, from the Book of Daniel) commanded the Jews to return to Jerusalem and that he would rebuild the Temple, it was Ezra who led the Jewish people's return to the Land of Israel after the Babylonian exile, oversaw the building of the Second Temple, and helped stop the wave of intermarriage that afflicted them at the time.

This sequestration assured us of eons of genetic isolation from “the stranger” and guaranteed us the afflictions many of us are tested for today.

Many of us, among the 16 million, still sequester ourselves from converts, “the stranger,” perpetuating our inheritance in the name of continuing “authentic Judaism” among the Jewish people to this day, preferring to study and not fight for the rest of us.

Similarly, in the Diaspora, too few of us stand with the mélange, which is the IDF.

Assimilation won’t be what kills us. It will be the sequestration of our DNA and our unwillingness to bleed with our brothers and cousins:

Today, on the Tenth of Tevet, we Reform Jews should shed tears for the deaths of the unknown 10/7 murder victims and bow our heads in shame for not standing next to the young men pictured above (and the young women not pictured) a mélange, one that is only partially visible, because you never know what is inside of us.

Unlike our Bedouin cousins who believe “naseeb is naseeb” (destiny is destiny), ours is unsure.

Shabbat Shalom!

Philippe du Col © 2025