What do you do when something important breaks?
Not a plate or a phone screen. Something bigger.
A friendship. A sense of community. A bond with someone you used to feel close to and wanted to continue.
It’s tempting to walk away. To say, “Well, that’s over,” and carry on. Or maybe to blame others, circumstances, even ourselves.
But Jewish tradition asks a different question:
What can we do to rebuild?
This Sunday, Aug. 3, Jews around the world will mark Tisha B’Av, a day of fasting and mourning.
“Tisha B’Av is not only about what we lost. It’s about what we still carry.”
It’s not just a day on the calendar, it’s the day that both the First and Second Holy Temples in Jerusalem were destroyed — a day that came to represent all the heartbreak and displacement our people have endured over centuries.
The temples weren’t only architectural masterpieces. They were spiritual centers. Symbols of holiness, unity and connection.
Their destruction left more than a physical gap. It left an emotional one. A spiritual one. A fracture that still reverberates.
Why did it happen?
The Talmud doesn’t just talk about Babylonian armies or Roman sieges. It zooms in on something quieter … but more dangerous: sinat chinam, baseless hatred.
Families were divided, communities tore themselves apart. There were bitter feuds, baseless accusations, even violent clashes in the streets.
Instead of seeing one another as brothers and sisters, they saw enemies. The kind of hatred that blinds you to the humanity in front of you.
It wasn’t just what the enemy did from the outside. It was what we allowed to happen within.
How do you rebuild from that?
With the opposite: ahavat chinam. Baseless love.
It sounds fluffy, maybe even naïve. But it’s anything but.
Ahavat chinam doesn’t mean agreeing with everyone. It doesn’t mean tolerating harm or erasing boundaries.
It means choosing connection over judgment.
It means listening before assuming.
It means taking the first step. Even if you’re not sure where it will lead.
A woman once shared with me that she hadn’t spoken to her sister in more than a decade. Something had happened — neither of them even remembered the full details — but the silence had become permanent. Pain calcified into distance.
I listened, and I could hear how much it still hurt. And how much she wanted to try.
So, she did.
Right before a Jewish holiday, she sent a short message. Nothing dramatic. No long explanation. Just: “I miss you. I’d love to talk.”
She didn’t expect anything back. But an hour later, her sister replied. She had been thinking the same thing, just didn’t know how to begin.
They started texting. Then they spoke. It was slow. Sometimes awkward. But real. And it led to healing.
That’s what ahavat chinam looks like. A small, brave step. A soft word. A door cracked open.
Tisha B’Av is not only about what we lost. It’s about what we still carry.
The pain we hold onto.
The assumptions we let fester.
The distance we allow to grow.
But it’s also a call to action.
To ask ourselves: Who have I grown cold toward? What bridge have I let crumble? Where could I take one small step?
Sometimes healing doesn’t begin with fixing everything. It begins with choosing something (or someone) and saying, “Let’s try again.”
If hatred once broke us, maybe a little unwarranted love is what helps rebuild.
One word at a time.
One message.
One relationship.
And maybe, just maybe, one day, a world made whole again.
