Questions on Tu BeAv to think about and discuss:

1. What happened on Tu BeAv to make it a day of celebration?
2. How did they used to celebrate Tu BeAv?
3. What is special about the date of Tu BeAv in the year?
4. Where else is the date of Tu BeAv mentioned?
5. What is the comparison of the two days of greatest joy  – Tu BeAv and Yom Kippur?
6. Is there any connection between Tu BeAv and Tisha BiAv?
7. The year for different things are counted from different times. (See the first Mishna in Rosh Hashana). Does the counting from Tu BeAv come into any of these different ways of counting a year?
8. There are so many reasons given for Tu BeAv so which is the main one?
9. What is the significance of Tu BeAv occurring on the 15th of the month – something that we find by many other joyous days – like Pesach on the 15th of Nissan and Sukkos on the 15th of Tishrei?
10. Why are there so many different reasons given for Tu BeAv, something we do not find by other festivals?
11. Where do we found no explicit mention of it as a day for festivity (besides for not saying tachanun on it)?
12. Tu BeAv usually falls around the week of Parshas Voeschanon. Is there any connection between them? Does it tell us anything about the essence of Tu BeAv?

Ideas for answers on Tu BeAv:

1. The Gemora (Taanis 30b) brings several reasons for the joy of Tu BeAv. 1) Permission was given for the different tribes to intermarry when learning that it only applied to the generation of the Bnos Tzolfchod; 2) After the episode of pilegesh begiva the tribes promised not to give their daughters for marriage to the tribe of Binyomin. On Tu BeAv this was rescinded after finding a heter that it only applied to that generation and not their children – both these reasons have to do with finding a heter on this day; 3) this was the day when the people of the generation of the desert who had to die finished dying; 4) the guards set up to stop people being Oile Regel, going to the Beis Hamikdosh for the three festivals, were removed; 5) On this day permission was granted to bury the dead of Beitar (that is one of the five tragedies of Tisha BiAv – the conquering of the city of Beitar); 6) they stopped cutting down trees for the ma’aroche, woodpile, on the Mizbayach.
2. The Gemora (end of Taanis) describes the ceremony that would take place on Tu BeAv. Traditionally, it was a day when single young ladies would wear special gowns of white in order to woo a groom. The white indicated that they were free from sin.
3. The world was created on the 25th of Elul (according to the opinion of R’ Eliezer in the Gemora Rosh Hashana 10b). This means that Tu BeAv is forty days before the creation of the world. The Gemora brings that forty days before a child is born a Bas Kol, heavenly voice, goes out announcing the future spouse of that person. Forty days before the creation of the world is therefore a time of …
4. The Mishna (Taanis  26a) says that there were nine times when wood was brought by individuals for the woodpile on top of the mizbayach. One of these dates was on Tu BeAv. This is significant since it stands out as being different from the other eight times in that on this day other people who were not associated with anyone were joined in.
5. There are two main sins that the Jews are still suffering from. They are the sin of the egel, the gold calf, and the sin of the meraglim. These are seen as the two posts that encompass the three weeks – the sin of the egel on the 17th of Tammuz that resulted in the breaking of the Luchos and the sin of the meraglim on Tisha BiAv. On Yom Kippur the sin of the egel sees a level of forgiveness seen in the receiving of the second Luchos and a time of atonement. Tu BeAv is when the sin of the meraglim that resulted in the decree of the generation of the desert having to die before allowing entry into Eretz Yisroel finished. Therefore both these days are connected in achieving levels of happiness for the stopping of the negative of these two major sins.
6. The decree of the generation not entering Eretz Yisroel due to the sin of the meraglim was done on the 9th of Av. Moshe sat shiva, mourning for seven days, from the 9th until the 15th, Tu BeAv. Only after the mourning had stopped, then could Moshe return to a level of simcha that enabled him to have again prophecy. This is way Tu BeAv is a special day of simcha. (Rabbeinu Bechai, Devorim, 2:16-17). The Gemora (Taanis 29a) brings that when Rosh Chodesh Av comes in we must decrease levels of simcha. This decrease of simcha and increased mourning continues and is climaxed on Tisha BiAv. However, after this comes seven days of more mourning for the original decree and then on Tu BeAv when the cause of all this mourning of the decree due to the sin of the meraglim has finished we return to the levels of simcha that existed before the entrance of the month of Av and hence the new found simcha of Tu BeAv. Perhaps another idea here lies in the fact that the Gemora emphasises that it is an especially good days for Yisroel, the Jews. Lots of other nations throughout history have seen great success and then they are crushed and disappear from existence. However, the Jews, even from the worst state as seen in Tisha BiAv, bounce back from despair and rebuild as seen in the celebrations of Tu BeAv when they got married and multiplied. It is a follow on from going down to going back up. R’ Tzodok brings that the cause of the churban of the second Beis Hamikdosh on Tisha BiAv was Sinas Chinom, hatred for no reason. To rectify this comes Tu BeAv when the different tribes were permitted to intermarry and this strengthens the achdus, unity, between them.
7. For counting the year of orla you need a  minimum of 44 days before Rosh Chodesh Tishrei, Rosh Hashana. Two weeks, fourteen days, for the actual start of the growth of the tree and then another thirty days to be considered a year. This means that Tu BeAv that is 45 days before Rosh Hashana is the last day for things to be planted to have an effect and count as a year of orla.
8. It is interesting to note that the Rambam (when explaining the Mishna in Taanis) only gives one of the reasons mentioned in the Gemora, that of the day when the generation of the desert stopped dying from the decree of the meraglim. This would seem to indicate that he thinks this is the main reason for the celebrations of Tu BeAv.
9. The fifteenth of the month is significant in that it is usually the time when the moon is at its fullest and the Jews count the lunar year. …
12. The Pnei Yehoshua (to Gemora Brochos 32a) brings a Midrash Pleiya that connects Parshas Voeschanon to Tu BeAv. Moshe davened 515 tefillous the gematrua if ואתחנ”ן. He makes a calculation that all these tefillous started on Tu BeAv and went until the 7th of Adar when Moshe died. This shows us that on Tu BeAv was opened up the gateways of tefilla. Perhaps we can add that on Tisha BiAv we read in Eicha (3:7) that the gateways of tefilla were closed (which is why we omit the Tiskabel tefilla on Tisha BiAv after Eicha). Instead of tefilla the gateways of crying are opened (see Gemora Brochos 32b). However, according to the above, the sadness of Tisha BiAv with the closing of tefilla goes on Tu BeAv when the pathway of tefilla is now opened!

Analysing the different reasons for Tu BeAv:

What is the common factor between all the different reasons for Tu BeAv? They are all a reason for increased rejoicing when some problem was overcome. Be it the intermarrying between the tribes; finding a solution for whom the men of Binyomin could marry; the Jews could now enter Eretz Yisroel after the end of the decree for the deaths of the generation of the desert; the guards preventing going up to the Beis Hamikdosh for the festivals were removed; the dead bodies left were permitted to be buried; the requirement to cut wood stopped enabling them to devote themselves to Torah (Rabbeinu Gershom to Bava Basra 121b).

What lies behind the dancing ceremony on Tu BeAv?

The Mishna (in Taanis) records how Tu BeAv was celebrated. The single women looking to marry would go to the vineyards dressed in white borrowed clothes and would dance in circles. What lies behind this seemingly un-Jewish style of shidduchim? Why should such actions be a sign of such a happy spiritual day? Why dress in white and why borrow the clothes? Why dance specifically in a vineyard and why in circles?

Ever action can be judged on two different fronts – physical and spiritual. What may look bad one way is good in the other way. This ceremony on Tu BeAv is an example of what physically may look bad but when viewed and done for spiritual reasons is actually good. The Mishna (ibid) actually says what form of conversation took place between the men and women. It was three reasons to marry them – for beauty, good stock of family or for pure spiritual reasons. These reasons seem contradictory as on the one hand they speak about beauty while then they say to marry even ugly ones for spiritual reasons? The answer is that not everyone can be on the same spiritual level and therefore these three options were speaking to Jews across the spectrum depending on their spiritual level. Some needed the physical beauty aspect while to others the good ancestry mattered. The highest level was to not look at the ugly exterior but the beautiful spiritual interior.

This is reflected in the wearing of white, the colour that symbolises spiritual cleanliness. It is also seen in the need to borrow clothes where we realise that nothing in this physical world is really ours but is all a present from Hashem. Perhaps a vineyard was chosen for this ceremony since it is used to compare the best type of marriage (see Gemora Pesochim 49a) – משל לענבי הגפן בענבי הגפן דבר נאה ומתקבל. The difference between the shape of a circle and a line is that a circle is different at every point while a line is the same. A line goes on and is left open to continue further while a circle closes in on itself and does not go further. Under the chupa a woman encircles a man. The man is compared to a straight line while the woman is compared to a circle. (This itself is a subject unto itself.) The woman as a circle is coming to contain and protect her husband…

 SOURCES FOR TU BEAV:

• Gemora Taanis (30b-31a)
• Gemora Bava Basra (121b)