The Ninth of Ava (Hebrew) is considered the most mournful day for Jews. תִּשפעפה בפּאבב Tish'a be-av). On this day they don’t eat anything, don’t drink anything, don’t wear leather shoes. The fast begins on the evening of 8th of Av a few minutes before sunset and ends after the stars appear in the sky on the evening of 9th of Av.
Day 9 Ava — is also the only day of the year when a Jew not only is not obliged, but also does not have the right to study the Torah (after all, learning is considered a source of joy).
Initially, Post 9 Av is associated with the «sin of the scouts» — when Moses led the Jews to the borders of the Promised Land, they were afraid to immediately enter it and begged Moses to send scouts so that they, upon returning, would describe the country and the prospects for life in it. And although this request was an expression of doubt in God, who led the Jews out of Egypt and promised them this country, Moses nevertheless agreed to send the heads of the 12 tribes to investigate. Returning scouts reported that the country is «fortified to the sky» and inhabited by giants, against whom the Jews are «small, like grasshoppers». Only the heads of the two tribes argued that the promised land was beautiful and that it was worth entering it. The people believed, naturally, the majority, and all night from the eighth to the ninth of Av, the Jews cried, saying that God brought them to this country out of malice, and that it would be better if they died in the desert... Then God was angry and said that this time the Jews cried in vain, but now they will have many reasons to cry that night. This will be the punishment for the sin of unbelief.
And the first punishment was to prohibit the generation that came out of Egypt from entering the Holy Land. People who doubted God were doomed to wander through the desert for forty years — for a year for each day of reconnaissance and die in it, as they asked.
Secondly, because the Jews were afraid (despite all the miracles and signs) of the peoples inhabiting Canaan and refused to enter Israel at God's chosen time, it was said that now the Jews would be able to receive this land only after difficult wars, although they could receive it miraculously — without any effort.
And until the Jews repent of the sin of unbelief, this punishment will be with them, and more and more reasons for crying will appear on this day.
Here is a list of sad events that happened during the centuries of 9th Av:
• 9th of Av 2449 from the creation of the world (1313 BC) The Almighty pronounced a verdict according to which the generation that came out of Egypt was doomed to wander through the desert for 40 years and die without seeing the Countries of Israel.
• On the ninth of 3338, the creation of the world (422 BC) by Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar destroyed and burned the First Temple built by Solomon in the 9th century BC.
• On the Ninth of Av 3828, the creation of the world (68 AD) by Roman military leader (later emperor) Titus Vespasian destroyed the Second Temple, built in the 4th century BC.
• On the Ninth of Av (presumably in 135 AD), the last stronghold of Jewish rebels fell, and the leader of the uprising, Shimon Bar-Kokhba (Bar-Kuziva), was killed. According to the Roman historian Dio Cassius, 580 thousand Jews died in the battles of that war, 50 fortified cities and 985 settlements were destroyed; almost all of Judea turned into a scorched desert.
• On the Ninth of Av, a few years after Bar Kokhba's defeat (no more precise information available), the Roman ruler Turnus Rufus plowed the Temple and its surroundings. What was said by the prophet was fulfilled: « Because of you, Zion will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become ruins, and the Temple Mount — will become a wooded hill» (Micha 3:12). The invaders banned Jews from living in Jerusalem. Anyone who violated the ban faced the death penalty. Jerusalem became a pagan city called Aelia Capitolina.
• On the Ninth of Av in 1095, Pope Urban II announced the beginning of the first crusade, which resulted in the «warriors of Jesus» killing tens of thousands of Jews and destroying many Jewish communities.
• On the Ninth of Av in 1146, pogroms were organized in the Jewish communities of Germany and France during the Second Crusade.
• On the Ninth of Av, the expulsion of Jews from England began in 1290.
• The day after the ninth of Av, a decree was issued in 1306 expelling Jews from France, all of their possessions having to be abandoned.
• On the ninth of Av in 1348, European Jews were accused of organizing one of the largest plague epidemics in history («Black Death»). This accusation led to a violent wave of pogroms and murders.
• On the Ninth of Av in 1492, King Ferdinand II of Spain of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile decreed the expulsion of Jews from Spain.
• Ninth of Av in 1555 — Jews of Rome resettled in the first ever ghetto.
• On the Ninth of Av in 1567, the rest of the Jews of Italy were resettled in ghettos.
• On the Ninth of Av in 1648, the massacre of tens or even hundreds of thousands of Jews in Poland, Ukraine and Bessarabia by Khmelnitsky and his associates.
• On the Ninth of Av in 1882, pogroms of Jewish communities within the Pale began in Russia.
• On the Ninth of Av, World War I began in 1914.
• On the Ninth of Av, the deportation of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto began in 1942.
• Ninth of Av in 1942, the Treblinka extermination camp began operating.
And yet the Jews believe that someday this day will become the biggest holiday — when all Jews repent of their sins, then it is on this day that the Messiah will be born.