Today is Tsom Gedalia, a fast day instituted to remember the murder of Gedalia Ben Ahiqam, the governor of Israel during the days of Nebukhadnetsar, king of Babylon. Fasting is observed on the day after Rosh haShana.
Why do we fast today?
DESTRUCTION OF THE FIRST TEMPLE
When Nebukhadnetsar, the emperor of Babylon, destroyed the Temple of Jerusalem (586 before the common era), he killed a large part of the population of the Kingdom of Judea (Yehuda), whose capital was Jerusalem. He also took tens of thousands of Jews captive to Babylon. Many other Jews escaped to neighboring nations: Amon and Moab, today Jordan, or Edom, today part of the Negueb.
Once Jerusalem was destroyed, the independent Jewish state ceased to exist. And Nebukhadnetsar declared Yehuda a province of the Babylonian Empire. The Babylonians allowed a small number of the defeated Jewish population, very poor peasants, to remain in Israel to work the land and avoid desertification.
GUEDALIA BEN AHIQAM
To govern these few remaining Jews in Israel, Nebukhadnetsar appointed Gedalia ben Ahiqam, a Jewish nobleman who lived in Babylon, as governor of Judea. It was an unexpected positive gesture from Nebukhadnetsar, a miracle, that a Jew was appointed to take care of Judea. Gedalia belonged to the Shafan family, noble Jews who settled in Babylon in the exile of Yekhonia (597 BC) and had the emperor’s trust. The prophet Yirmiyahu (Jeremias) who had chosen to remain in Israel joined Gedalia in Mitspa and he promised loyalty to the king of Babel, hoping that one day he would allow the Jews of Babel to return to Judea. When the fugitive soldiers from Jerusalem and the refugee Jews who had escaped to Ammon, Moab and Edom heard that Gedalia was assigned governor, they returned jubilantly to Israel. They settled in the land, worked it and reaped its fruits with great success. With Gedalia in charge, the hope of returning to a normal life and rebuilding the Bet haMiqdash was now more real than ever
THE MAGNICIDE
But then the irrational and unimaginable happened. Ba’alis, the king of Ammon (today Jordan), a kingdom that joined Egypt against Babylon knew that with Gedalia as governor of Judea it would be easier for Babylon to conquer Ammon. Ba’alis designed a plan to get rid of Gedalia. A violent man, from the dynasty of King David, Yishma’el Ben Netania, opposed Gedalia, claiming that the latter did not belong to the David dynasty and therefore could not hold the position of governor of the Jews. Ba’alis, knowing Yishma’el’s ambitions convinced him that he should kill Gedalia, and offered his help for the murder and the political support to proclaim him as the new King of Judea. On the third day of the seventh Hebrew month (Tishri) Yishma’el and a group of armed men arrived in the city of Mitzpa, where they were cordially received by the noble Gedalia with the honors due to a descendant of the Davidic dynasty. Gedalia had been warned of the possibility that Yishma’el would attempt against his life, but he refused to give credit to that information, convinced that a Jew would never kill another Jew. And besides, why would someone with a minimum of common sense jeopardize the renewed hopes of Israel’s redemption when those were crystallizing? … But the inexplicable happened. Yishma’el and his men murdered Gedalia and the other men who were with him in Mitspa, including some Babylonian officers. This murder would be considered a blatant act of insubordination against Nebukhadnetsar, a Jewish coup d’etat to become independent from Babylon …
THE SECOND EXILE
When news of this terrible crime was heard, the Jews who had settled in Mitspa panicked and thought that their best option was to flee to Egypt for fear of reprisals from Nebukhadnetsar. They asked the prophet Yirmiyahu what to do. The prophet prayed and waited patiently for the word of God. On the tenth day HaShem revealed to Yirmiyahu that they should stay, and that He would protect them. And if they decided to go to Egypt, the sword from which they were escaping would find them there. Incredibly, people ignored Yirmiyahu saying: “You are not telling the truth; that is not what God said. You are tricking us into giving ourselves into the hands of the king of Babylon … “, and they fled to Egypt, where they found only more calamities, hunger, persecutions and death.
And so, the land of Israel remained virtually without Jewish population for 52 years. And the hopes of returning to Yerushalayim and rebuilding the Bet haMiqdash vanished. It was like reliving once again the exile that took place a few years ago. It was as if the First Temple had been destroyed a second time … Or worse, because this time, the exile was caused by ourselves …
Joshua J. Adler, formerly Rabbi of Chizuk Emuna Congregation in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, has lived in Jerusalem since 1972, and serves as managing editor of The Jewish Bible Quarterly. THE TRIPLE TRAGEDY OF THE GEDALIAH ASSASSINATION JOSHUA J. ADLER Chapters 40-41 of Jeremiah tell the story of Gedaliah son of Ahikam, appointed by the king of Babylon as governor of those Judeans who had not been exiled. This occurred some time after the Chaldeans had put down the Jewish revolt (c. 586 BCE), resulting in the destruction of the Temple and the exile of the social elite. Since the Neo-Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, was aware that many Judeans (such as Gedaliah and the prophet Jeremiah) had opposed the revolt, he was willing to give the Jews who remained a chance to live and rebuild their country. The new governor was supported by Jeremiah and many others of the peace party. Gedaliah intended to restore some semblance of normal life to the land while it was under Chaldean rule, and he invited Jews who had sought refuge in neighboring countries to return. However, this period of semi-autonomy was short-lived as Gedaliah was assassinated by Ishmael son of Nethaniah, a fellow Judean, whom Baalis king of Ammon had sent to kill him. Fearing retaliation by the Babylonian king, the remaining Judeans fled to Egypt, taking Jeremiah with them. The first tragedy in this story is the murder of a Jewish leader by a fellow Jew. The biblical narrative does not explain why Ishmael wished to kill Gedaliah. It seems likely that he regarded Gedaliah as a traitor, and the fact that Ishmael killed some of the Chaldean troops along with Gedaliah indicates that he may have wanted to continue the war against them (Jer. 41:3). We are also told that Ishmael was of royal descent (41:1), suggesting that he considered himself more fit than Gedaliah to rule. There is an additional element, however, since the text (40:14, 41:15) relates that he was sent by the neighboring king of Ammon, indicating that Gedaliah’s assassination may have been part of an Ammonite move against Chaldean interests in the region. When Johanan ben Kareah (of the peace party) discovered that Ishmael was bent on killing Gedaliah and warned him of this, the new governor simply dismissed it as an unfounded rumor (40:15-16). The Talmud (TB Niddah
JOSHUA J. ADLER JEWISH BIBLE QUARTERLY 24861a) cites Gedaliah’s naïve refusal to heed the warning as an example of the lesson that “although one should not accept this leshon ha-ra [evil speech] as a fact, one should take note of it.” Apparently, Gedaliah could not believe that a fellow Judean would want to kill him. While his optimistic attitude may have given him the strength to try and rebuild a shattered nation, he lacked the shrewdness needed to beware of enemies who did not share his vision. After the murder of Gedaliah and his allies, a group led by Johanan ben Kareah succeeded in freeing many of the hostages who had been taken by Ishmael, although the assassin and his accomplices managed to escape and find refuge in Ammon. The murder of his appointee enraged the king of Babylon and even the loyalists feared that he would now punish the survivors. These loyalists then asked the prophet Jeremiah, who had also opposed the revolt, if their planned escape to Egypt was approved by God. When the word of the Lord was not for the people to seek refuge in Egypt but to stay put, they refused to obey God’s command and even forced Jeremiah to accompany them to Egypt (Jer. 42-43). This was the second tragic outcome of Gedaliah’s assassination. The third tragedy involved a reversion to idolatry by many of the Judean exiles in Egypt, who started to worship the moon goddess known as the Queen of Heaven. They blamed all the calamities that had afflicted the people on heeding the admonishment of the prophets to worship only the God of Israel (Jer. 44:15ff). When Jeremiah heard these arguments from his fellow Jews, he realized that all the preaching and instruction by him and by prophets of the First Temple era had been in vain. This was the third tragedy resulting from the murder of Gedaliah and its repercussions, which deprived the Judeans of a leader in their own country. It signified a rejection of the God of Israel and a return to idolatry. These three tragedies mark a reversal of the Exodus from Egypt. Then, the people had been rescued from Egyptian slavery by the prophet Moses, fulfilling God’s command; now they had brought the prophet Jeremiah back to Egypt, ignoring God’s clear disapproval. The relapse into idol worship in Egypt recalls the prophet Ezekiel’s description of the Egyptian “fetishes” with which the enslaved Israelites had defiled themselves (Ezek. 20:7-9). Even the idea of Israelite infighting is mirrored in the period of Egyptian slavery,
THE TRIPLE TRAGEDY OF THE GEDALIAH ASSASSINATION Vol. 42, No. 4, 2014 249when Moses tries to break up a fight between two Hebrew slaves (Ex. 2:13). Although the Gedaliah episode may be seen as a minor tragedy when compared to the destruction of the First Temple and exile to Babylonia, it marks the dashing of any hopes of restoration, and a reversal of all that had been accomplished generations earlier by the Exodus from Egypt. עשהתורתךקבעTHE TRIENNIAL BIBLE READING CALENDARDEDICATED TO THE MEMORY OF CHAIM ABRAMOWITZ October Joshua 10 – 24 Judges ` 1 – 13 November Judges 14 – 21 I Samuel 1– 20 December I Samuel 21– 31 II Samuel 1– 17 January II Samuel 18– 24 I Kings 1– 22 February II Kings 1– 25 Isaiah 1 – 3
