The siege of Yerushalayim that began on Asarah B’Teves marked the beginning of the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash. Some time later, the walls were breached, the city fell, and ultimately, b’avoseinu harabim, the Mikdash itself was destroyed and set ablaze. On this fast day we commemorate the very beginning of the calamity. Its severity surpasses that of the other fasts commemorating the Churban, to such an extent that there are opinions that it would even override Shabbos (Abudraham, Hilchos Ta’aniyos, cited in Beis Yosef 549).
In truth, the beginning of the Churban already contains the entire destruction within it. Chazal teach (Sanhedrin 96b) that when Nevuzaradan set fire to the Beis HaMikdash, a Bas Kol proclaimed: “You are slaying a nation already dead; you are burning a Heichal already consumed; you are grinding flour that has already been milled.” We are compelled to ask: Why does the initial stage of the catastrophe already point to and foreshadow the entire Churban?
When we consider the nature of a siege, we see that it differs fundamentally from conventional weapons of war. A siege does not strike the enemy directly; it need not fire a single bullet. It does not confront the enemy head-on; instead, it severs every external lifeline, starving the enemy into submission. For a siege to succeed, one condition is indispensable: those inside the walls must be dependent upon the world outside. Only then does the siege become lethal. But as long as the inhabitants can sustain themselves entirely from within, without any external need, they will continue to exist; the siege is powerless and it cannot touch them.
A Jew is meant to experience and inhabit the world in a manner utterly unlike that of a non-Jew. The sustenance that gives him life is of an entirely different order than that of the non-Jew. For the Jew, the entire universe is a realm of avodah: his eating, his sleeping, and his entire existence are bound up with kedushah and avodas Hashem. The gentile, by contrast, perceives this as a world altogether alien.
In the beginning, Klal Yisrael’s vitality flowed exclusively from their inner identity as Jews, from the Beis HaMikdash that was truly Beis Chayeinu—our House of Life. No external source was required, and therefore no siege could ever prevail against us. But as the years passed, we began to require the outside world as well, no longer sustaining ourselves exclusively from our internal world. At that moment the Beis HaMikdash ceased, in a certain sense, to be fully Beis Chayeinu, and the siege began to exert its deadly pressure, rachmana litzlan.
This is expressed in the Selichos we recite on this day:
אבותי כי בטחו בשם אלו’ צורי גדלו והצליחו וגם עשו פרי, ומעת הודחו והלכו עמו קרי, היו הלך וחסור עד החדש העשירי.
“When my forefathers trusted in the Name of Hashem, my Rock—they grew great, they prospered, and they bore fruit.
But from the time they were exiled and treated Him with casualness, they became progressively diminished until the tenth month.”
When Klal Yisrael placed their absolute trust in Hashem and drew all nourishment from their being Jewish alone, they grew and flourished. But when they began to depend upon the outside world, and no longer trusted Hashem or drew complete fulfillment from their Judaism, they began to waste away until the siege could overpower them.
The shattering message of Asarah B’Teves is therefore this: the decay began within Klal Yisrael itself, the instant we required anything at all from the outside world, the instant we could no longer satisfy every need in a purely Jewish way. That small deviation—however minor it appeared—was already the beginning of the Churban, which foretells the complete destruction, just as a tiny mum disqualifies an entire korban completely, even though most of it remains intact.
Furthermore, when we live entirely from within, the nations of the world cannot even touch or approach us, because we are different and are not shayach to them at all. But the moment we draw sustenance from them as well and become dependent upon them, we lose that absolute otherness—and it is precisely then that their hostility is aroused and they seek our destruction.
Today, b’avoseinu harabim, the boundaries have become painfully blurred. Too often we seek nourishment from the outside. Therefore, especially in these days, we must ask ourselves: Can we live our lives without any involvement from the outside? Do we know how to cope with our lives in a wholly Jewish manner?
We must clarify what true Jewish sustenance is, and to learn once again how to be nourished by it completely—until no area of life remains dependent upon the world outside. In doing so, we will hasten the building of Beis Chayeinu, from which alone we will exist and live forever, speedily in our days.