This is what we must internalize: The primary lament for Yerushalayim isn’t for the loss of a city! We’re crying for the heart that was lost—and if there’s no Yerushalayim’dige heart, we also cannot have the city.
The entire joy and light of the city came from the type people who were there. Everyone was lofty and exalted, because they had found a city of kirvas Elokim.
After the great Churban, the Navi laments Eichah yashvah badad, alas, she sits in solitude. We can visit Yerushalayim, but where are the hearts of Yerushalayim? Where are the exalted people who were present there in her beautiful days?
When we lost the Beis HaMikdash and the korbanos, we also lost the Yid himself! It’s not only the korbanos we lack—it’s the results of these offerings; the purity and the holiness that came out of it! We haven’t lost only the experience of aliyah laregel—we lost the state of elevation and exaltedness that Yidden experienced when they journeyed to Yerushalayim! Yiddishkeit came alive! It became real! A Yid lived with, and percolated with, the Ribbono shel Olam! Everything else became trivial and silly to him.
