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scholars believe he lived in the late
500s. The meaning of his name,
Kalir, is inknown.

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Many of the early kinot, especially
those composed by Kalir, are derived
from the Book of Lamentations and

bemoan the fall of Jerusalem and the

destruction of the Temple. Kalir's

knowledge of Jewish learning was
vast, and he makes frequent and intri-
cate allusions to Tanach [Bible] and

midrash [Bible interpretations]. Kalir
audaciously coined new words to fit

a rhyme. It is impossible to understand

his kinot without a commentary.
Quite often, the kinot we read were
written as acrostics, where the first let-
: ter of the first word in each verse fol-
lows the order of the Hebrew alpha-
: bet. Some were written as reverse
alphabetical acrostics; other verses
are arranged according to the atbash
scheme, in which the first letter of the
1 Hebrew alphabet is paired with the
last, the second to the second last,
and so on.
Many of the kinot draw upon vari-
ous periods and episodes in Jewish
I history that themselves were tragic or
that led to disaster. Thus, the kina,
"And Jeremiah lamented over Josiah,"
recounts how Josiah, against the
advice of the prophetieremiah, went
to war against Egypt. His defeat
weakened the kingdom of Judah,
which ultimately was destroyed by th e
1 Assyrians.
The major theme in this, as in most
of the kinot, especially those by Kalir,
is that Israel's neglect of the Torah led
to the nation's downfall.
One of the famous kinot is Arzei
HaLevanon, "Cedars of Lebanon,"
an anonymous depiction of the Ten
Martyrs — rabbis and scholars exe-
cuted during the Roman occupation
1 of Israel.
Included in the collection of kinot
are elegies composed in Europe dun-

ing the Middle Ages and the Cru-
sades. Mi Iten Roshi Mayim, "Would
That My Head Were Water," laments
the destruction of the Jewish communi-
ties of Speyer and Worms, Germany,
during the first crusade in 1095.
Shaali Srufa Vaesh, "Oh, By Fire Con-
sumed," was written by the renowned
Rabbi Mein of Rothenburg, who, dur-
ing the reign of Louis IX, witnessed the
burning of 24 cartloads of the Talmud
in Paris in 1242.

Recalling The Shoah

Various poets have used the form of

kinot to lament the Holocaust, or

Shoah, the greatest tragedy in Jewish

history since the destruction of the

Temple. In most of the standard mod-

: ern editions of kinot, two elegies are

included. One of them is Zichru Na

("Remember, Please"), composed in

1984 by a Holocaust survivor, Rabbi

Shlomo Halberstam, the Bobover Ray

(Bobov is the Yiddish pronunciation of

the Polish town of Bobowa, southeast

of Krakow).
HaZocher Mazkirav ("He Who
Remembers") is the other kina, written
• by Rabbi Shimon Schwab, a native
of Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany. In
1936, Nazi persecution forced him
out of Germany and he immigrated to
the United States. He composed the
kina in 1959.
The kinot for Tisha b'Av conclude
with Eli Tziyon ("Wail, 0 Zion"),
chanted by the standing congregation
to a traditional, mournful melody. The
final stanza of the kina includes the
ironically hopeful phrase, "Wail of
1 Zion and her cities, like a woman suf-
' fering from birth travail ..." Thus, even
in the greatest tragedy we see a new
beginning.

❑

In metro Detroit, Tisha b'Av begins at
i 8:43 p.m. on Wednesday Aug. 9,
just before sundown, and ends at
I 9:29 p.m., just after sundown,
Thursday Aug. 10.