After exploring the notion that enormous suffering will precede the coming of the Messiah, the Talmud offers a midrashic commentary on the opening verses of Lamentations, a biblical elegy written in response to the traumatic destruction of the First Temple and exile of the tribe of Judah. In these opening lines, a personified Jerusalem sits alone in her grief:

Bitterly she (Jerusalem) weeps in the night,
Her cheek wet with tears.
There is none to comfort her
Of all her friends.
All her allies have betrayed her;
They have become her foes.

In the original Hebrew, the verb “weeps” appears in a doubled form as two words with the same verbal root. Grammatically, this adds emphasis, which is why the translation above begins with the word “bitterly.” For the rabbis, this doubled verb is an opportunity for additional interpretation.

Why two cries? Rabba says that Rabbi Yohanan says: One is a cry over the destruction of the First Temple and one is a cry over the destruction of the Second Temple.

Although historically written in response to the destruction of the First Temple, Rabbi Yohanan suggests that Lamentations speaks also of the future destruction of its replacement. Both tragedies, past and future, come together in this moment of deep grief. 

Rabbi Yohanan continues by turning to the last word of that same verse in Lamentations — night — and connecting it to yet another defining moment in Israel’s history:

“At night” indicates that the crying is over matters of night, as it is stated: And all the congregation lifted up their voice, and the people cried that night. (Numbers 14:1)

In Numbers 13, God instructs Moses to send scouts to reconnoiter the promised land in preparation for the Israelites to enter and possess it. The scouts return with an accurate report that the land is fertile, but then greatly exaggerate the size and ferocity of the inhabitants who dwell there — going so far as to claim the land is inhabited by a race of giants. Numbers 14:1 records that when the Israelites heard this terrifying account of the land they were supposed to inhabit, they wailed all night long. After a night of terrified sobbing, the people declared they would return to Egypt and turned on Moses and Aaron. God became enraged and nearly destroyed them, but Moses interceded. In the end, the people were not annihilated, but God consigned that generation to die in the wilderness; they never entered the promised land.

It is the Israelites weeping through the night that attracts Rabbi Yohanan’s attention. He connects the word “night” in Numbers and Lamentations to bring these two tragic events together, casting the false report of the scouts as a calamity on par with any other in Jewish history. 

This is not the first time we have seen the rabbis connect the story of the spies to the destruction of the two Temples. A mishnah we read on Taanit 26 identified all three events as having taken place on the Ninth of Av, Tisha B’Av. 

Both in Taanit and on our daf, Rabbi Yohanan suggests that this confluence of tragedies was no mere coincidence, but divinely ordained on the night the scouts brought their false report:

Rabba says that Rabbi Yohanan says: That day that they heard the spies’ report was the evening of the Ninth of Av. The Holy One said to the Jewish people: You cried an unwarranted cry, and so I will establish for you a reason to cry for generations.

The fearful wailing of the Israelites gave way to a complete loss of faith. It was this lack of faith for which God punished them. They were declared unworthy to set foot in the promised land. But they weren’t the only ones who were punished that day: future generations would also suffer for their sins on the very same day.

The biblical text offers a troubling portrait of God apparently losing control and acting with (in our view) undue severity. The midrash, rather than attenuating that portrait of God, enhances it, stating that as the people wept, God prepared to conflate the punishment of future generations with those that came before. It’s a troubling way to think about God, and not easy to reconcile with a loving deity in relationship with a chosen people. Perhaps we can think of this midrash, then, as a reflection of how its author is feeling in a particular moment: a bit like Jerusalem, all alone. Judaism tells us that God loves us, but it does not require us to feel that way at all times.

Read all of Sanhedrin 103 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 31, 2025. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.