Welcome to the Judaism community on Codidact!
Will you help us build our community of learners? Drop into our study hall, ask questions, help others with answers to their questions, share a d'var torah if you're so inclined, invite your friends, and join us in building this community together. Not an ask-the-rabbi service, just people at all levels learning together.
Origin of Three Weeks/Nine Days customs?
When discussing the period of mourning leading up to Tisha B'av, the Mishnah (Taanit 4:7) only discusses the "week in which Tisha B'av falls." This is codified even as recently as the Shulchan Aruch (Orach Chaim 551:3), with the Rema ad. loc. commenting there that "we have the custom to be stringent on all this from Rosh Chodesh until after the fast." Throughout the following sections, Rav Yosef Karo only discusses the laws associated with the Nine Days in conjunction with just the week in which Tisha B'av falls, the Rema occassionally noting on certain points that Ashkenazim keep those laws from 17 Tammuz (ex. Orach Chaim 551:4).
What is the earliest source which records extending some of these practices back to the beginning of Av or to the fast of Tammuz?
1 answer
I don't know about the earliest source, but the opening words of the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch 122:1 are:
.כֵּיוָן שֶׁבְּשִׁבְעָה עָשָׂר בְּתַמּוּז הִתְחִילוּ צָרוֹת הַחֻרְבָּן, לָכֵן נוֹהֲגִין קְצָת אֲבֵלוּת מִיּוֹם זֶה עַד אַחַר תִּשְׁעָה בְּאָב
Since the Seventeenth of Tammuz marks the beginning of the anguish of the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash, it is customary to observe a partial mourning, from that day until after Tishah beAv.
0 comment threads