Roars of Anguish
All over the world, there are flourishing Jewish communities, blessed with thriving synagogues, bustling schools, and prominent yeshivot. With all of this vibrancy of Jewish life, do we truly feel the absence of the Beit HaMikdash? Are we aware of our state of exile and dispersion?
The prophet Jeremiah describes God’s grief in startling terms, as the anguished roars of a lion: “God roars from on high; He calls out from His holy dwelling, roaring over His habitation" (Jeremiah 25:30).
The Sages were able to hear these heavenly cries and translate them for us:
"Woe to My children! On account of their sins, I have destroyed My House and set fire to My sanctuary and exiled them among the nations of the world." (Berakhot 3a)
The Three Watches of the Night
The Sages also knew at what hour one could hear these heavenly cries. These roars take place during the three watches of the night. The darkness of night is a familiar metaphor for exile. And there are signs indicating the exact time of these anguished cries:
"The night consists of three watches, and during each watch the Holy One sits and roars like a lion.... The sign for this: in the first watch, a donkey brays; in the second, dogs howl; and in the third, a baby nurses from its mother and a woman converses with her husband."
What is the meaning of these strange signs - donkeys braying, dogs howling, babies nursing, and early-morning conversations?
The Flawed Service of Israel in Exile
We must first understand the significance of these night watches. The watches symbolize the world’s underlying spiritual workings. Each watch corresponds to an elevation of higher realms, brought about by Israel’s service of God.
With the Temple’s destruction and exile, however, the spiritual vitality of the Jewish people was greatly diminished. This decline has reduced the level of Divine providence in the world. The roars of heavenly anguish express the cosmic pain caused by this loss.
Why are there three watches? The three watches correspond to the three primary ways we serve God:
through our actions,
by refining our character,
and by deepening our understanding and knowledge.
Sadly, all three aspects have been adversely affected by the exile and the absence of the Beit HaMikdash.
Deeds and Traits
The first form of serving God is through our actions. When the Jewish people are on a lofty spiritual plane, their mitzvot and acts of kindness are guided by a deep awareness of God’s presence. Due to the detrimental influences of exile, however, our actions are tainted by an overall atmosphere of self-centeredness and materialism. This causes our service of God to lose its reparative quality of tikkun. Lacking the guidance of Divine wisdom, our material instincts are reinforced. This phenomenon is particularly evident with mitzvot that involve physical pleasures, such as the mitzvah to rejoice on the holidays.
For this reason, the sign of the first watch is the braying of a donkey (in Hebrew, chamor), indicating the awakening of materialistic tendencies (chomriut). This is a basic aspect of human nature - “For man is born a wild donkey" (Job 11:12) - that is bolstered by the negative influences of exile and its reduced spiritual life.
The second night-watch corresponds to our service of God through the acquisition of proper character traits, such as kindness, generosity, and humility. The current state of the world, with its lack of holy influences, fosters certain negative traits. This is not simply the result of the body’s physicality. Rather, we lack an accurate image of pure and refined traits. We are unable to faithfully model ourselves after God’s traits of kindness and compassion.
The sign for the distortion of this service is the howling of dogs. Dogs symbolize negative traits, especially insolence (see Isaiah 56:11). Greed and brazenness are the source for many other flawed traits.
Service of the Intellect
The final watch corresponds to the highest form of serving God - using our cognitive powers. This intellectual service has two levels: those who study Halakhah and the revealed parts of Torah, and those who delve into its deeper, esoteric teachings. Unlike the service of God in actions and character traits, Torah learning cannot be debased. As the Sages taught, “Words of Torah cannot contract ritual impurity" (Berakhot 22a). Therefore the signs of the third watch are positive ones, signs of Divine intimacy and beneficence: a baby nursing and a wife conversing with her husband.
Yet even this service is impaired by the exile. What is the heavenly sign for those who study the revealed parts of Torah? “A baby nursing from its mother." This suggests a state that is incomplete, an intellectual service not fully developed. It is therefore symbolized by a nursing baby.
Those who study on a deeper level, contemplating the nature of God with philosophical and mystical inquiries, are blessed with a revealed love of God. The sign for this level is one of love and affection: “a woman conversing with her husband."
But even here, something essential is missing. The Sages describe it merely as conversation (mesaperet) - telling stories without deeper and truer content.
Until Divine inspiration returns, even our deepest spiritual insights remain incomplete.
(Silver from the Land of Israel. Adapted from Ein Eyah vol. I on Berakhot 3a (1:6), sent by Rabbi Chanan Morrrison, ravkooktorah.org)
