The Jews are Driven into Exile

"Thus says the L-rd, a voice is heard in Rama, lamentation, and bitter weeping; Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted for her children, because they are not. Thus says the L-rd: Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears: for your work shall be rewarded, says the L-rd; and they shall come back again from the land of the enemy. And there is hope for your future, says the L-rd, and your children shall come back again to their own border." (Jeremiah 31:14-16)

In a Midrashic teaching on these verses, our sages relate that when the Holy Temple was destroyed and the people of Israel were marched off into exile, the matriarch Rachel came out from her tomb (located on the road to Bethlehem) and cried bitterly over her children's fate, as they passed by her on their way to exile. These Biblical verses describe Rachel's crying, and G-d's answer to her.

This illustration depicts the scene: the Jewish captives, bearing the Temple Menorah, are force-marched into exile by Roman Legionnaires, as Jerusalem and the Holy Temple burn in the background, and Rachel observes it all and weeps.

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