This Wednesday is the Tenth of Teves (Hebrew: עשרה בטבת, Asarah b’Teves), the tenth day of the Hebrew month of Teves, a minor fast day in Judaism. The fast starts 6:13 AM and ends 6:04 PM. Shacharis will be 6:25 AM, and Mincha/Maariv will be 4:55 PM.
History
It falls out either seven or eight days after the conclusion of Chanukah, depending on whether Rosh Chodesh of Teves that year is observed for one day or two. The Tenth of Teves commemorates the onset of the siege that Nevuchadnezzar of Babylonia laid to Jerusalem, an event that ultimately led to the destruction of the First Temple and Babylonia’s conquest of southern Israel’s Kingdom of Judah.
The text in II Kings (25:1-4) tells us that on the 10th day of the 10th month (which is Teves when counting from Nisan, the “first month†in the Torah), in the ninth year of his reign, (588 BCE), Nevuchadnezzar, the Babylonian king, began the siege of Jerusalem. Three years later, on the 17th of Tammuz, he broke through the city walls. The siege ended with the destruction of the Temple three weeks later, on the 9th of Av, the end of the first Kingdoms and the exile of the Jewish people to Babylon. The Tenth of Teves can thus be considered part of the cycle of fasts connected with these events, which also includes: Tzom Gedaliah (3rd of Tishrei); Shivah Asar B’Tammuz (17th of Tammuz) and Tisha B’Av (9th of Av). The first mention of the Tenth of Teves as a fast appears in Zechariah (8:19) where it is called the “fast of the tenth month†(Teves). Other references to the fast and the affliction can be found in Ezekiel 24:1-2 (the siege) and Jeremiah 52:4-6.
According to tradition, as described by the liturgy for the day’s selichos, the fast also commemorates other ignominious events that occurred throughout Jewish history on the tenth of Teves and the two days preceding it:
- On the eighth of Teves one year during the 200s BCE, a time of Hellenistic rule of Judea during the Second Temple period, Ptolmey, King of Egypt, ordered production of the Septuagint, the translation of the Hebrew text of the Torah into Greek. This was seen as a debasement of the divine nature of the Torah and a subversion of its spiritual qualities.
- Ezra the Scribe, the great leader who brought the Jews back to the holy land from the Babylonian exile and who ushered in the era of the Second Temple, died on the ninth of Teves.
Observances
As with all minor Jewish fast days, the Tenth of Teves begins at dawn and concludes at nightfall. In accordance with the general rules of minor fasts, and in contrast to Tisha B’Av, there are no additional physical constraints beyond fasting (such as the prohibitions against bathing or of wearing leather shoes). Because it is a minor fast day, halachah exempts from fasting those who are ill, even if their illnesses are not life threatening, and pregnant and nursing women who find fasting difficult.
A Torah reading is added at both the Shacharis and Mincha services, and a special Haftorah reading, and a special prayer in the Amidah (the Aneinu), are added at the Mincha services. At Shacharis and Minchah, Avinu Malkeinu is also said.
The fast can occur on a Friday resulting in the unusual event of a Torah and Haftorah reading at the Mincha service right before Shabbos. No other Jewish fast day can occur on a Friday in modern times (with the exception of the Fast of the Firstborn, on which the Torah and Haftorah reading at Mincha do not even occur).
The Tenth of Teves has been chosen as a “general kaddish day†for the victims of the Holocaust, many of whom lack identifiable yahrtzeits (anniversaries of their deaths).