By Rabbi Josh Wander

Every year, as the Seventeenth of Tammuz arrives, the Jewish people enter a familiar season. For nearly two thousand years we have repeated the same ancient tradition. We lower the volume of our celebrations, postpone weddings, avoid music, and begin a gradual process of national mourning. These are known as the Three Weeks. They intensify with the arrival of the month of Av, leading into the Nine Days, and finally culminate with the fast of Tisha B’Av, the day on which we mourn the destruction of both Batei Mikdash and so many other tragedies that have marked our long exile.

Generation after generation, Jews have faithfully preserved these customs. They have cried over what was lost, remembered Jerusalem, and prayed for redemption. This remarkable national memory has kept alive a hope unlike that of any other nation. For almost two millennia, we never accepted exile as permanent. At every wedding we broke a glass. At every Seder we declared, “Next year in Jerusalem.” Three times a day we prayed for the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the restoration of the Davidic kingdom.

For most of those generations, however, mourning was all our ancestors could do. They had no Jewish sovereignty, no Jewish army, no government, no control over Jerusalem, and no practical ability to restore what had been lost. They mourned because they were powerless to do anything else. But what if this year is different?

Imagine standing at the gates of Auschwitz in 1944. Jewish civilization in Europe was being systematically annihilated. The survivors had no state, no army, no government, and no realistic expectation that the Jewish people would soon reclaim their place among the nations. If someone had whispered into your ear that within just four years a sovereign Jewish state would be established in Eretz Yisrael, complete with its own government, its own military, and the first expression of Jewish sovereignty in nearly two thousand years, who would have believed it? It would have sounded like fantasy. Yet that is exactly what happened.

Now consider where we stand today. We are no longer a stateless people wandering among the nations. We have a vibrant Jewish state, one of the world’s most dynamic economies, a powerful military, Jerusalem once again serving as Israel’s capital, and nearly half of the world’s Jewish population living in Eretz Yisrael. Jews continue returning from every corner of the globe. New neighborhoods, highways, rail systems, and airports are being built to accommodate an ever-growing population as the ingathering of the exiles continues before our eyes. At the same time, we cannot ignore the tremendous sacrifices being made to protect this national revival. Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have answered the call to defend our people. Nearly every family has been touched by military service, injury, loss, or prolonged reserve duty. Their sacrifices remind us that Jewish history is no longer something we simply commemorate. It is something we are actively living.

So which transition is actually harder to imagine? The leap from the gates of Auschwitz to a sovereign Jewish state in just four years, or the next step—from a flourishing Jewish commonwealth to the complete redemption foretold by the prophets, including the rebuilding of the Beit HaMikdash? The first transformation would have seemed infinitely more improbable to those living through the horrors of 1944 than the second should seem to us today. We already possess many of the institutions our ancestors could only dream about. The foundation has been laid. What remains is its completion.

Yet we have become conditioned to believe that this year will be no different. The Seventeenth of Tammuz will arrive, we will observe the Three Weeks, enter the Nine Days, sit on the floor on Tisha B’Av, mourn the destruction of the Beit HaMikdash, and then quietly return to our normal routines until the calendar brings us back here again next year. After nearly two thousand years of exile, perhaps our greatest obstacle is no longer our circumstances but our expectations. We have become so accustomed to thinking like a nation in exile that we struggle to imagine ourselves completing the journey home. We instinctively expect another year of mourning because that is all our ancestors ever knew. Yet we are no longer living in their reality.

Perhaps the greatest barrier is a lingering galut mentality—a lack of national self-confidence. We have witnessed the return of the Jewish people to their land, the restoration of Jewish sovereignty, the ingathering of the exiles, the rebirth of Hebrew as a living language, and the flourishing of Eretz Yisrael. We have watched prophecy unfold in ways previous generations could scarcely imagine. Yet somehow we still hesitate to believe that the process could reach its next stage. We have become so accustomed to looking backward that we have difficulty lifting our eyes toward what may be directly in front of us.

The purpose of mourning has never been to become comfortable with loss. It is to awaken longing. If the Three Weeks end with another Tisha B’Av and then we simply return to business as usual, we have missed their purpose. Mourning is meant to inspire action. It should strengthen our commitment to Torah and mitzvot, deepen our love for one another, encourage every Jew who is able to return home to Eretz Yisrael, motivate us to prepare ourselves spiritually and practically for the rebuilding of the Beit HaMikdash, and remind us of Israel’s universal mission to teach the nations God’s moral law through the Seven Noahide Laws.

Perhaps this year we should spend a little less time asking how to mourn the destruction and a little more time asking how to prepare for the rebuilding. We should study the Beit HaMikdash, learn the prophetic visions of redemption, support the many practical preparations already underway, and ask ourselves what role each of us can play in bringing the next chapter of Jewish history closer. For nearly two thousand years, “Next year in Jerusalem” seemed almost impossible to imagine. Yet millions of Jews today recite those very words while already living in Jerusalem. History has a way of changing far more quickly than we expect when Hashem’s plan reaches its appointed time.

The Talmud offers a remarkable promise: כל המתאבל על ירושלים זוכה ורואה בשמחתה (תענית ל ע”ב). This profound teaching may contain a message that is especially relevant to our generation. Genuine mourning is not merely about grieving what was lost. It is about developing the vision to recognize what Hashem is already rebuilding. One who truly mourns for Jerusalem does not simply remember the past; he learns to see the beginnings of redemption unfolding before his eyes.

Perhaps that is our challenge today. We have spent so many centuries in exile that we have become conditioned to think like exiles. We instinctively assume there will be another Tisha B’Av, another year of waiting, another year of mourning. But what if the greatest obstacle remaining is not the absence of redemption, but our inability to recognize how far the process has already advanced? If we can free ourselves from a galut mentality and begin thinking like a redeemed nation, perhaps we will discover that we are already much closer to Geula than we ever imagined. We have returned to our land. We have restored Jewish sovereignty. We have revived our language, rebuilt our cities, defended our people, and witnessed the ingathering of exiles on a scale unseen since biblical times. Perhaps the final stage is not simply rebuilding Jerusalem, but rebuilding our confidence that Hashem is completing the process before our very eyes. Perhaps this year really can be different.