The Month of Cheshvan

In normal years, the month of Cheshvan brings with it a sense of winding down: after a month filled with Chagim and religious intensity, Cheshvan is the start of long winter months that bring with them the rigor of daily routine. Intensive religious practice and a renewed sense of constant closeness to God will resume toward the end of winter, as we celebrate Purim, Pesach, and Shavuot.

The Mishnah in Moed dedicates three tractates to the Tishrei holidays – Rosh Hashana, Yoma, and Sukkah; two additional tractates – Megilla and Pesachim – address Purim and Pesach. But what about the winter months?

The winter months are addressed in tractate Taanit. While the name of the tractate is not very encouraging, and indicates difficulty, the text brings tidings of the winter elements of avodat Hashem, serving God, and hints at the special connection between God and Israel during these months.

Tractate Taanit opens with the chronology of mentioning rain in our prayers (mashiv ha-ruach u-morid ha-geshem) and later, the direct request for rain (ve-ten tal u-matar li-vracha). First we mention rain, and only at a later stage, we request rain. We learn from Chazal that the three festivals are times of judgment, and that “on the festival (of Sukkot) we are judged with regard to the water.” However, they also teach us that throughout the winter we must continue to pray, beseech, and emphasize the manifestation of our relationship with God through rain.

The second chapter of Shema (והיה אם שמוע) describes the rain as a central means of communication between us and God, and throughout the winter we have a better measure of this relationship. We remind ourselves that God is the source of rain, and later beseech him for rain. Tractate Taanit also reminds us what happens when rain fails to come, initially detailing the dates by which rain is expected to fall, after which fast days are decreed – first for individuals, and then for the public. Later, the Mishnah relates to a situation in which “these (fast days) passed and (prayers) were not answered.” When the rain fails to come it is a sign of Divine disdain; the Mishnah’s formulation compares the human act of fasting (תענית) to the Divine response (מענה) through soundplay. Rain is not only a physical human need, but also a spiritual need that reflects our relationship with God. Indeed, the Mishnah teaches us that even in the summer months the rain serves as a mode of communication with God, signaling displeasure when it rains on Sukkot and we are expelled from the Sukkah, or when it rains during the harvesting and gathering seasons, and the rain damages the crops. Regardless, in the winter months the spiritual pulse of the nation is more acutely felt.

Of course, we do not always understand the calculations of the Divine. In the time of Ahab, the king who incurred God’s greatest wrath by importing severe idolatry into Israel, the rain came in its right time, until Elijah commanded the rain to stop. Throughout the period of kings that preceded Ahab, drought was never used to signal God’s wrath to the people. When the king and the people of Israel showed signs of repentance, the rain returned, despite the fact that they were only at the beginning of the road, with much work ahead toward improving their ways.

These very days, Am Yisrael feels God’s hand in the cruel war that was launched against us. War is also a signal and a call for introspection and spiritual amendment. In the book of Judges, external nations attacked Israel over and over as a punishment and warning for their sins; as Shlomo iterates in his prayer, “ If they sin against you—for there is no one who does not sin—and you are angry with them and give them to an enemy, so that they are carried away captive to the land of the enemy, far off or near” (1 Kings. 8:46).

We can only hope and pray that Shlomo’s subsequent words are fulfilled as well:

Then if they come to their senses in the land to which they have been taken captive and repent and plead with you in the land of their captors, saying, ‘We have sinned and have done wrong; we have acted wickedly,’ if they repent with all their heart and soul in the land of their enemies who took them captive and pray to you toward their land that you gave to their ancestors, the city that you have chosen, and the house that I have built for your name, then hear in heaven your dwelling place their prayer and their plea, maintain their cause, and forgive your people who have sinned against you and all their transgressions that they have committed against you, and grant them compassion in the sight of their captors, so that they may have compassion on them (for they are your people and heritage that you brought out of Egypt, from the midst of the iron smelter). Let your eyes be open to the plea of your servant and to the plea of your people Israel, listening to them whenever they call to you. For you have separated them from among all the peoples of the earth to be your heritage, just as you promised through Moses, your servant, when you brought our ancestors out of Egypt, O Lord God.”

We are witnessing Israel uniting toward a common goal, in our struggle to defend the Jewish people. We turn to God and remember our relationship with each other and with God; we pray and believe that God will remember us and give us strength, His name will be sanctified.

“Hear Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.”

“Who is like your people Israel, one nation on the earth!”