One of the events that we remember on the day of Asara beTebet is the passing of Ezra haSofer. Seventy years after the destruction of the Bet haMiqdash, in approximately 516 BC, the Persian Emperor Cyrus allowed the Jews to return to Erets Israel. A total of 42,360 Yehudim came to Israel from Babylon led by Zerubabel (see the book of Ezra 2:64). Years later, more Jews made Aliya inspired by Ezra and Nehemia. Nehemia was the political leader who persuaded the Persian Emperor Artachshasta (Artaxerxes) to allow the walls of Jerusalem to be rebuilt in order to protect the city’s Jewish population and ensure the safety of the Bet haMiqdash (see Nehemia, chapter 1-2). And Ezra bore the enormous responsibility of re-educating the Jews who had come to Israel after living for three or more generations in exile in Babylon, without schools, without synagogues, and in the midst of the local pagan population.
Many Jews had forgotten the Torah, its laws, and its language and adopted the local culture’s values. Once in Yerushalayim, Ezra established the Anshe Kenesset haGedollah, the first Jewish parliament composed of 120 members: sages and prophets. With them, Ezra made a vast number of resolutions to revive the study and observance of the Tora and re-educate the Jewish people. Among other things, Ezra increased the days of the public reading of the Torah; he composed the text of the Amida (main prayer) because people had forgotten how to pray correctly; he modified the typeface (the “fonts”) of the biblical text (ketab Ashuri) to facilitate the study of the Torah by the masses; he established that at the time of the public reading of the Torah it was translated into Aramaic, etc.
Ezra also had to make very dramatic decisions, such as the exclusion of the Samaritans, a mixed semi-pagan population that had lived in Israel since the time of the exile of the ten tribes (722 B.C.E.) and who claimed to be accepted as part of the Jewish people. Ezra also had to deal with the issue of the intermarriage of many of the Yehudim who came from Babylon with their non-Jewish wives. This last dramatic event is narrated in chapters 9 and 10 of the book of Ezra.
Thanks to Ezra’s wisdom, courage, and non-negotiable principles, the Jewish people could survive and re-establish themselves in Israel as HaShem’s nation. Our rabbis considered Ezra as the historical link between the written Torah and the oral Torah. The oral Torah, the tradition that establishes how to observe biblical precepts, had been forgotten in the long Babylonian captivity and was recovered thanks to the efforts of Ezra haSofer. Together with Nehemia, he completed the construction of the second Temple or Bet haMiqdash; They built the protective walls around the city and helped the Jews to re-establish themselves in the land of Israel. Ezra died on a day like today, a 9 of Tebet. Our rabbis considered him the second most important leader of the Jewish people after Moshe Rabbenu.
TAQANOT EZRA HASOFER
TAQANOT EZRA HASOFERThe sages of the Talmud mention 10 Taqanot, or rabbinic decrees that Ezra established for the people of Israel who had returned to Israel after a long captivity of two or more generations.
We will now see a few examples.
√ The public reading of the Torah on Monday and Thursday, as well as on Mincha of Shabbat. Monday and Thursday, Tora’s reading is intended to prevent Jewish communities from being for three consecutive days without reading the Tora. And the reading on Mincha of Shabbat is designed for those who cannot attend the Torah reading on weekdays.
√ The establishment of rabbinical courts on Mondays and Thursdays were market days when people gathered in the cities to buy and sell their merchandise.
√ Washing clothes to be used on Shabbat on Thursday (or earlier) so that Friday is free for other Shabbat preparations.
√ A housewife should get up earlier on Friday mornings to bake bread so that there is bread available at home for the poor.
√ Women should wash and detangle their hair before using the Mikve.
√ Street vendors were allowed to go from city to city and sell jewelry, cosmetics, and perfumes to women so that they look their best (this regulation would avoid the monopoly of local merchants, that without competition, might raise the prices of these non-essential items).
WHO IS EXEMPT FROM FASTING ?
√ Minors: boys under 13 years old and girls under 12 years old are entirely exempt from this fast.
√ Pregnant women are exempt from this fast. Lactating women.
√ In many Sephardic communities, the tradition is that after giving birth, women are exempted from fasting for the next 24 months, even when they are no longer breastfeeding their baby. In other Sephardic and Ashkenazi communities, it is only excused from fasting mothers for 24 months while they continue to breastfeed their babies. Check with the rabbi of your community regarding the custom to follow.
√ A person who feels unwell, for example, with flu symptoms or fever, or a person with a chronic illness, such as diabetes, should not fast. Elders should check with their doctors to determine if fasting will affect their health. In which case they are exempt from fasting.
