A weekly feature of Torah Tidbits to help clarify practical and conceptual aspects of the Jewish Calendar, thereby better fulfilling the mitzva of HaChodesh HaZeh Lachem...

In case anyone is going to say Kiddush L’vana on Sun. night, he should break his fast first. It is notappropriate to say KL in the mood and mode of a day of mourning. (For Motza’ei Yom Kippur, one need not break his fast before KL, because the holy and happy atmosphere of Yom Kippur is paticularly appropriate for the monthly welcoming of the Divine Presence.)
ASARA B’TEVET, known in the Tanach as TZOM ASIRI (named for Tevet, the 10th month, rather than the 10th day), marks the beginning of the siege around Jerusalem by the Babylonians, before the destruction of the first Beit HaMikdash. It therefore represents the beginning of the CHURBAN process.

When the horrors of the Holocaust first became known to the public at large, the pre-State Chief Rabbinate in Eretz Yisrael proclaimed the Tenth of Tevet mourning for the victims of the destruction of the Jewish communities in Europe. In 1951, however, a different day, the 27th of Nisan, was designated by the Knesset as Holocaust and Heroism Remembrance Day.
The Chief Rabbinate has ruled, nonetheless, that the Tenth of Tevet be the day of reciting the Kaddish (mourner’s prayer) for those relatives, victims of the Holocaust, whose date of death is not known, and to mark the day with prayer and study. In Israel it is known as the Day of the General Kaddish.

Even now, after the State of Israel has been established to bring an end to Jewish suffering and exile, we remember when the sad tale of exile began: over 2500 years ago, on the Tenth of Tevet.

The last 3 paragraphs are from the Hagshama Dept. of the WZO website & were written by Artie Fischer.

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