The lion is the king of the jungle. He brooks no opposition. He demands to rule alone. He represents pride. The spies who were sent to the Land of Israel and who returned on the ninth day of this month, suffered from this fatal flaw.
Pride is rooted in the element of fire which seeks to rule at all costs.
The spies' pride and concern for maintaining their status distorted their vision of the Land. If the spies erred in their perception, making self-fulfilling prophecies of doom, the Jewish People were also at fault by listening to this distorted report. Even though Av is the saddest time of the year for the Jewish People, fraught as it is with tragedy, in the future it will be a month of great happiness. He will come from the tribe of Yehuda whose symbol is the lion. On this day the daughters of Jerusalem would go out into the vineyards, dressed in borrowed white garments, and dance.