The Talmud has been focused on the laws of inheritance which introduced the topic of intertribal marriage. Consequently, it surfaced a mishnah we previously encountered in Tractate Taanit:
We learned in a mishnah there (Taanit 26b): Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel said: There were no days as joyous for the Jewish people as the 15th of Av (Tu B’Av) and Yom Kippur, as on these days the daughters of Jerusalem would emerge in white garments, which each woman borrowed from another, so as not to embarrass one who did not have her own white garments.
Not everyone would readily identify Yom Kippur and Tu B’Av as the happiest days of the year. But while most modern Jews view Yom Kippur as solemn rather than joyous, the rabbis explain that the Day of Atonement is a happy one for three reasons: because sins are forgiven, because it is the day on which the replacement Ten Commandments were given to Moses (after he broke the first set upon seeing the Golden Calf) and because on that day young single women would go out in white garments, borrowed from one another so potential suitors wouldn’t choose to court someone based simply on appearance of wealth.
This white dress event happened on Tu B’Av as well, but nothing else of note is mentioned in the mishnah for that day, so the rabbis of the Gemara are curious: What else makes the 15th of Av so joyous that it is mentioned in the same breath as Yom Kippur?
Rav Yehuda says that Shmuel says: This was the day when the members of different tribes were permitted to marry into one another’s tribe … and Rabba bar bar Hana says that Rabbi Yohanan said that this was the day when the tribe of Benjamin was permitted to enter into the congregation of the other tribes of Israel through marriage.
While intertribal marriage was typically forbidden (a mechanism designed to ensure tribal land holdings would remain consistent), on the 15th of Av the restriction was temporarily lifted. If a man from the tribe of Judah fancied a white-clad woman from the tribe of Menashe dancing in the field, he could propose. Similarly, but in an historical vein, the 15th of Av was celebrated as the day on which members of the tribe of Benjamin — who were temporarily excised following the gruesome episode of the concubine of Gibeah recorded in Judges chapters 19–20 — were once again permitted to marry the daughters of other tribes.
The rabbis also name Tu B’Av as the date those who left during the Exodus from Egypt stopped dying in the wilderness. Further, they record that on that day King Hoshea, the last ruler of the northern kingdom of Israel, decommissioned the guards that had spent 200 years preventing Jews from his kingdom going south to Jerusalem for pilgrimage festivals. Finally, it is said to be the day that those massacred in Beitar during the Bar Kochba Revolt were allowed to be buried.
At this point, you’d be forgiven for wondering what, exactly, is joyous about all this. The day seems associated largely with the end of death, isolation or plague. We might expect the response to these moments to be relief — but joy?
Maybe the problem here is our translation. In Hebrew, these are yamim tovim: good days. Good isn’t exactly the same as joyful, but it does recognize something as proper. Perhaps this is why our sugya concludes with the words of Rabbi Mattana:
On the day that the slain of Beitar were afforded burial, the sages in Yavne instituted the blessing: Blessed is He Who is good and Who does good (hatov v’hameitiv). “Who is good” is to give thanks that the corpses did not decompose, and “Who does good” is to give thanks that the slain ones were ultimately afforded burial.
The blessing of hatov v’hameitiv, traditionally said upon hearing good news, also acknowledges that even in the midst of tragedy there are things that can make suffering less terrible. In our own time, we have experienced this as well. On October 7, 2023, many Jews met their end in a massacre not far from Beitar, and in the ensuing days and weeks identifying the remains and releasing them to their loved ones for burial was a relief — a good thing. Did that make those later October days good ones? I don’t know. But it mattered.
Read all of Bava Batra 121 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on October 24, 2024. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
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