If there is one thing our generation has become expert at, it is preserving pain. Every tragedy is archived. Every trauma is documented. Social media ensures that painful moments never really disappear; they are replayed, reposted, and relieved. Therapists rightly encourage us not to suppress our wounds, but sometimes our culture goes a step further—we begin to define ourselves by them. Our suffering becomes part of our identity. The Jewish people know suffering better than perhaps any nation on earth. And yet Judaism has always insisted on something extraordinary. This Wednesday night we will read Megillas Eichah, (the scroll of Lamentations) Jeremiah's heartbreaking lament over the destruction of Jerusalem. Curiously, unlike Megillas Esther, read on Purim, Eichah is generally not read from a handwritten parchment scroll. Instead, it is read from an ordinary printed book. Why? The great halachic authority Rabbi Mordechai Yaffe, (1530- 1612) the Levush, offers a remarkable explanation. Writing Eichah on parchment would give it an air of permanence. It would suggest that exile is our permanent condition. We deliberately refrain from doing so because we live with the certainty that Tishah B'Av will one day be transformed into a festival of joy. We refuse to give our national tragedy the permanence of parchment. That perspective has never felt more relevant. Since October 7, the Jewish world has endured one of the darkest chapters in modern Jewish history. The massacre, the hostages still languishing in captivity, the war, the surge of antisemitism across university campuses and city streets, and the painful isolation felt by so many supporters of Israel have left wounds that will remain with us forever. These events deserve to be remembered. They must never be forgotten. But they must never become the final definition of who we are. Significantly, the Torah often expresses remembrance in the future tense—"yizkor." Jewish memory is never merely retrospective. We do not simply look backward with nostalgia or grief. We remember the past as part of a story that is still unfolding, one whose ultimate destination is redemption. Memory is not an anchor keeping us trapped in yesterday; it is a compass pointing us toward tomorrow. Every act of remembrance is, in essence, an affirmation that the final chapter has not yet been written. That is why we do not write Eichah on parchment. We mourn honestly, but we refuse to canonize despair. We grieve deeply, but we refuse to believe that exile is the last chapter. We carry our pain without allowing it to become our identity. This is also the profound message of Shabbos Chazon. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev (1740- 1809) famously taught that on this Shabbos every Jew is shown a vision—a chazon—of the Third Beis Hamikdash. Before we enter the saddest day of the Jewish calendar, Hashem grants us a glimpse of how the story ends. Before we read Eichah, He shows us the future. Before we descend into mourning, He reminds us that redemption is already on the horizon. Hamas intended October 7 to become the defining image of Jewish vulnerability. Judaism refuses to grant them that victory. We will remember October 7 forever—but never as the final chapter. It will become another chapter in the long story of Jewish resilience, faith and redemption. We remember every victim. We pray every day for every hostage. We stand shoulder to shoulder with our brothers and sisters in Israel. But we do not write Eichah on parchment. Because the Jewish story has never ended with destruction. It ends with redemption. Shabbos Chazon reminds us that before we can see redemption with our eyes, we must first learn to see it with our vision. Good Shabbos and Shabbat Shalom, Rabbi Ruvi New
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