GEDALIAH, FAST OF (Tsom Gedalyah). A minor Fast, observed on the third of Tishri in remembrance of the tragic fate of Gedaliah, the governor of Judah. His story is mainly told in the book of JEREMIAH, (40:5-41:3; cf.II Kings 25:22-26). After the destruction of the First Temple, the downfall of the Judean kingdom in 586 BCE, and the exile to Babylonia of most of Judah's population, the victorious Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, appointed an able Jewish governor named Gedaliah ben Ahikam to administer affairs in the conquered territory. Gedaliah was a realist who achieved much for the people who had remained in the country, but his governorship was brief.
The neighboring Ammonites, fearing the revival of a prosperous Judah, hired a certain Ishmael ben Nethaniah, an officer of royal descent, to kill Gedaliah. Despite advance warnings of the conspiracy, Gedaliah chose to entertain Ishmael and his men at his own home in Mizpah, where they treacherously murdered him and his bodyguards. The surviving Jewish loyalists, believing that Nebuchadnezzar would interpret the assassination of his governor as an act of rebellion, ignored Jeremiah's advice and fled to Egypt.
The Babylonian king did view their departure as a confession of guilt and he therefore carried more of the surviving population away to exile in Babylonia.
These calamitous events left Judah defenseless and shattered the last Jewish hopes for a peaceful restoration of the land. The murder of Gedaliah was accordingly associated with Judah's final collapse.
The Bible gives Tishri as the month in which it occurred and later tradition (RH 18b) records the actual date, 3 Tishri, which was subsequently observed as the "fast of the seventh [month]" (Zech. 7:5; 8: 19). Although this day immediately follows ROSH HA-SHANAH, the Jewish New Year, all the laws and rituals of minor fast days apply to Tsom Gedalyah.
Fasting is from dawn to dusk and SELIHOT are read in the Morning Service. Should it fall on a Sabbath, the fast is observed the next day.
FAST OF GEDALYA
