The Blogs: Between Mourning and Dancing: A lesson from Kohelet

In memory of Rabbi Felipe Yaffe Z”L, my teacher of Tanach, who taught me to fall in love with biblical structures and narrative.
“For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven…” (Ecclesiastes 3:1–8)

A Calendar of Many Layers

For many, October 7th, 2023 will forever mark a turning point in Jewish and Israeli memory. It will be engraved not only in the secular calendar but in our sacred rhythm of time. Jews live between calendars: the Gregorian, shared with the world, and the Hebrew, which sanctifies the passage of our sacred time. Ironically, the word “October” itself comes from octo, “eight” in Latin—though it long ago ceased to be the eighth month. Perhaps that linguistic dissonance mirrors our own: living between histories, counting time differently, carrying both the world’s wounds and our own.

The massacre of October 7th fell on Shabbat morning and on Simchat Torah, the day of dancing with the Torah. It was the day that “our joy turned into mourning, and our dancing into lamentation” (based on Psalm 30:12). What should have been Z’man Simchateinu—the season of our rejoicing—became the darkest of Sabbaths, what some now call the Black Shabbat or the Simchat Torah Pogrom.

And yet, year after year, the Hebrew dates of that tragedy will almost always intersect with our holiest days—the Ten Days of Repentance, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, or Simchat Torah. How do we live with that? How do we hold joy and grief at once?

Learning to Weep and to Dance

Jewish life has long been a choreography of contradictions. Our calendar already moves seamlessly from Yom HaZikaron to Yom HaAtzmaut—from the tears of remembrance to the flags of independence, from gravesides to fireworks. We go from Hallel to Yizkor, from psalms of praise to memorial prayers in each one of our Holidays.

Even in our private lives, we have learned that pain does not erase joy, nor does joy disguise pain. As the Talmud teaches, “One should not laugh in a house of mourning, nor weep at a wedding” (Berakhot 6b). But what happens when we are all both mourners and celebrants at once? When Sukkot arrives and there are still hostages underground instead of schach above their heads? When Simchat Torah returns and thousands remain displaced from their homes? When Yom Kippur, the happiest day of our Calendar according to the Mishnah, falls on October 7th how would we be able to uphold both: the joy of forgiveness and the grief of the memories of that fatidic day?

The first response must be faith—emunah—and trust—bitachon. We believe, stubbornly, that wounds heal. That the blood still flowing will one day clot. That soldiers will return to their borders, hostages to their families, and that the weeping of this season will not be endless. One day soon, God willing, we will speak of October 7th in the past tense.

The Paradox of Ecclesiastes

It is no coincidence that our sages ordained that Kohelet (Ecclesiastes) be read during Sukkot—the festival of joy. At first glance, it is an irony: the most somber of biblical books, filled with existential fatigue and futility, read on the happiest of holidays. “All is vanity” (1:2); “What does man gain from all his toil?” (1:3); “The wise die just as the fool” (2:16); “Man has no preeminence over beasts” (3:19).

But perhaps, as the rabbis taught, this paradox is deliberate. Kohelet tempers joy with wisdom. It reminds us that unbounded happiness without reflection is hollow—and grief without perspective is despair. The true spiritual work is to hold both.

And at the heart of Kohelet lies chapter 3—that great poem of time and tension:

“A time to be born and a time to die,

a time to plant and a time to uproot…

a time to weep and a time to laugh,

a time to mourn and a time to dance.”

(Ecclesiastes 3:2–4)

The First Half

If we read those verses chiastically—in mirrored pairs—we can see our recent history of the last two years reflected in the first colon of each verse:

A time to die: Two years of loss of names and faces turned into headlines, the horrifying “Hutar LePirsum”.
A time to uproot what is planted: Kibbutzim and Gaza alike left desolate.
A time to kill: Brutal murders and shattered innocent lives.
A time to tear down: Cities and hopes reduced to rubble.
A time to weep: Endless funerals, tears that found no rest.
A time to mourn: A collective shivah as a people.
A time to throw stones: The intifadas of stones evolved into the terror of rockets and mass murderers.
A time to refrain from embracing: Polarization and anger kept us apart as a people.
A time to lose: Thousands of Israelis and Gazans lost everything to Hamas’s cruelty.
A time to throw away: Dreams of peace, shelved yet again.
A time to tear: We tore our garments in mourning—nationally, spiritually.
A time to keep silent: Speech failed before the unspeakable.
A time to hate: The hatred that followed the pogrom threatened to consume us.
A time for war: The war that has devoured our sons and daughters.

The Second Half

Yet Kohelet’s verse always has a second half, a mirror of hope. And it is my faith, my emunah, that we are approaching the turning point—the moment to begin reading the second column:

A time to be born: May new children fill the rebuilt kibbutzim of the South.
A time to plant: May trees once again give shade at both sides of the border.
A time to heal: May physical, emotional, and national wounds begin to close.
A time to build up: Let us rebuild—both the towns of Israel and the conscience of humanity.
A time to laugh: May God “turn our mourning into dancing” again (Psalm 30:12).
A time to dance: “We will dance again”—not as a slogan but as a promise kept.
A time to gather stones: May the stones once scattered become the cornerstone of peace.
A time to embrace: May estranged hearts find each other again.
A time to seek: May we never cease seeking peace and justice.
A time to keep: Let us keep faith in our people, our leaders, and our God.
A time to sew: May the stitches that mend our torn garments become the scars of growth.
A time to speak: May our speech be elevated, our discourse dignified.
A time to love: May love and mercy for the innocent outlast vengeance.
A time for peace: “And every man shall sit under his vine and fig tree, and none shall make him afraid” (Micah 4:4), for both Israelis and Palestinians.

A New Yizkor for a New Generation

Perhaps, then, our response as a people should be liturgical. Just as Kohelet teaches us to live between extremes, we must build sacred memory into our cycle of joy. From now on, Shemini Atzeret–Simchat Torah should include a special Yizkor—for the civilians and soldiers killed since October 7th. Poems, Kinot, and El Malei Rachamim should be added, not as acts of despair but as affirmations that Jewish time, like Jewish life, holds everything: mourning and dancing, exile and homecoming, silence and song.

Two years marked by et milchama must not become our identity; let them be our warning, and let our identity be et shalom.