Entering Jerusalem on Orthodox Good Friday

After our morning in Zippori, we drove south to Jerusalem and I could feel the energy on the bus change. All of the Rabbi’s on the bus began to buzz with excitement about being in Jerusalem. They began to talk about where they wanted to shop, eat, walk, visit, go to shul. They had all lived in Jerusalem for some period of time and had an intimate knowledge of this city. Many of them had made numerous trips to Israel with family, to visit family, to bring their own synagogue members.
This is the first glimpses of the city from our bus window.

Our initial plan was to stop at the Mount of Olives to look at the entire city from this amazing vantage point. The Mount of Olives is the mountain due West of the Old City. It is the location where all three faiths (Judaism, Islam, and Christianity) believe that the Messiah will come, or return. Christians believe that this is the location of Jesus’ ascent into heaven (which we celebrate this Thursday), and this is where he will return in the second coming.

Then we were going to walk down the Mount of Olives, enter the Old City by Lion’s Gate, the western entrance, walk the Via Dolorosa, and end up at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

However, the Calendar for Orthodox Christianity changed our plans. May 3 happened to be Good Friday for the Orthodox community and every Eastern Orthodox Christian was trying to walk the Via Dolorosa and follow the footsteps of Jesus from the top of the city walls where Pilate would have sentenced Jesus to death by crucifixion all the way down to Golgotha. This is the original “Stations of the Cross” liturgy. Incidentally, the location of the first station happens to now be a Muslim school for boys.
The Christian quarter in the Old City became an “enter at your own risk” area for the next few days. The Old City is small… only one square kilometer. And three faiths have to cohabit, along with the variety of denominations within each faith. It gets crowded fast.
So, we had our first look at the expanse of Jerusalem from a different mountain slightly farther away, but no less breathtaking.

And here is our group shot.

Visiting Zippori

Just Northwest of Nazareth is an historic site called Tzipori or Zippori, or Sepphoris. This site holds many archeological excavations with impressive findings from the 2nd century Jews and Romans, as well as a citadel built by the crusades. It is believed that the Mishna was codified here.

The first site we visited was the synagogue where the mosaic tiles of the floor were excavated and visible. These mosaics depict some biblical stories, but also in the center of the design is a horoscope circle with the sun and a chariot in the center. This find has caused great confusion and concern for scholars who assumed that any synagogue would not have pagan images within it. Other scholars have decided that perhaps the Jews who worshipped here were not concerned the connections to paganism, but were representing the heavens and describing the vast expanse of God’s creation in the center of the mosaics.

One of the mosaic panels describes the binding of Isaac. You can clearly see Isaac and Abraham with the donkey that carried the wood. In the next panel, which is not complete, one of the interesting sections that is intact is the shoes of Abraham and Isaac, taken off and lying in the corner of the design. The idea being that when they approach the holy place where God spares Isaacs life, they take off their shoes. This detail is not in scripture and is a unique interpretation of the event from this place.

Outside of the synagogue room was the excavation of a Mikva.

We walked up the hill to another excavation site of a Roman home with an incredibly preserved mosaic floor that was done with exquisite detail.

Our guide explained that this was probably a wealthy Roman home given the content of the mosaic is all in Greek and the stories depicted are of Hercules and Dionysus.

Finally we visited the citadel constructed by the crusaders. Here is Joe Hart at the entrance to the citadel. I have no picture of the building itself, just photos from the top of the citadel.

There was a small museum of artifacts within the citadel.

As a complete side note, I am amazed by the plants here. All around Zippori were rosemary bushes that were huge like a hedge. Also, pomegranate trees and cactus and lavender. It smells amazing here.
The six foot tall bush next to Avram is rosemary… And it was a small bush. The tree behind it with orange flowers is a pomegranate tree.

Two churches on the Galilee- Feeding the 5k, and Sermon on the Mount

We drove from Capernaum a short distance around the edge of the Galilee to visit the church built on the site where it is believed that Jesus fed the 5000 with five loaves and 2 fish.

Before I go much further into the visit and pictures of these churches I need to talk about the complex reaction that I have to these churches built by Christians at various times to “mark the spot” where something happened.

First the good stuff: It is very meaningful to stand in a spot with generations of Christians and remember the same story and pray to the same God. Time sort of collapses in these locations because the common remembrance unites us across the centuries and connects us even to the event itself. Some of the churches are also beautiful (though not always) and that is nice too.

Second the difficult stuff: I have often felt that the church structure erected on the natural setting has obliterated the location of the original event. Feeding the 5000 happened in the wilderness where there was no food, but now, I can only stand in a building and remember the story, not standing in the wilderness on the mountainside. Also, the certainty of the location is not really the point for me. Is this the exact spot? Who cares. Somewhere around here, under centuries of dirt and the shifting of sands, Jesus stood. So, all the emphasis on the “right” location misses the point for me. Finally, these church buildings become tourist destinations and less pilgrimage sights. So rather that entering into the life of a community that worships and is a living breathing remembrance of this event in our faith story, I feel like I have to ignore the gift shop and the “tacky” stuff to get to the holiness of this place of worship.

Okay, enough kevetching, here is the church of Feeding the 5000.

I was fascinated by the mosaic tiles on the floor in this church. Also, there was a guy in the corner with a chizel tearing up tiles while we were there. Finally, I couldn’t stand it anymore because it seemed to me that he was destroying incredible art. A fellow traveler asked him, in Hebrew, what was he doing? He explained that many of these mosaics were restored over the centuries very poorly and he was taking up old tiles that were not done well, and replacing them with original tiles taken from another place in the church to restore the floor in the main sanctuary to its original glory. Whew! What a relief.

We reloaded the bus and drove a very short distance to the church located on the site of Jesus’ sermon on the mount – The Church of the Beatitudes.
THis building was more modern built by an admirer of Mussolini, a Franciscan monk Antonio Barluzzi in the 1930’s. He was the architect of many churches in the Holy Lands.

This church is surrounded by some beautiful gardens.

Inside of the church.

The mosaics on the floor were the seven virtues, in Latin.

Capernaum and the Sea of Galilee

After the serious conversations about military issues and defense of the borders, we went to a winery for lunch and a wine tasting. There is every extreme around here. The wine was delicious, the food was delicious. I have no pictures but the location was beautiful.

We then drove South to the Sea of Galilee and visited a Synagogue in Capernaum where Jesus may have come to teach and pray.

This is the Byzantine structure that was built over top of a 1st century synagogue structure.

Here is our group and our incredible guide Duron leading us in heated conversation about the Gospel text and Jesus’ interactions in the synagogues.

Next to the Synagogue is another archeological dig of an early church built on the site reputed to be Peter’s house.

Built over top of the archeological remains is a hideous church structure that looks like a alien space ship landed on top of the site.

We then walked down to the edge of the Sea of Galilee. The wind was blowing hard and the water was splashing us on the rocks. the people who had visited this area before said that usually the Sea is very calm.

Northern Security and Borders: Part II, Syria

We got back on the bus and drove up into the Golan Heights to reach the Syrian border on the East side of Israel at Kuneitra. As we ascended into the mountains, I was stunned by the agriculture and the terraced farming that is being done in the Golan Heights. The villages we passed were Druze people, another ethnic group that is very tight knit and insular and when I asked, “Are they Jews? Or Muslim?” The response I got back was, “They are Druze.”
“Oh.”
So, basically, the Druze are sort of Muslim, but neither they or the Muslims would agree to that. They are more like Amish in the US, live isolated, let their children choose in adolescence whether to stay or leave the community. Check them out on Wikipedia. Druze
in the North of Israel the Druze are mostly not Israeli citizens. (In the central and south of Israel they are citizens and fight in the IDF) The Northern Druze are Syrians, sort of. They have had a positive relationship with Syrian leadership under the first Assad, and for awhile with his son, Bashaar Assad. But in the current conflict and civil war in Syria, The Druze are not as positive about a relationship with Assad, and are beginning to distance themselves because of his slaughter of so many Syrians. In the beginning, the Assad leadership wanted a relationship with the Druze and many other minorities, so he invited them to attend University in Damascus for free. This was an incredible gift and generated great loyalty. But now, they cannot even travel to Damascus because it is too dangerous and they don’t trust Assad. The enemies of Assad are many and various and no one is really sure which group is fighting on what day.

Here is some Druze farming…

Once at the top of the Golan, we could see the Israeli intelligence control on top of the mountain. The joke is that from this height, the Israeli’s can see when Assad goes to the bathroom in Damascus.

We thought they were probably watching us too, so we waved. Facing out the other way, into the valley you can see the Syrian border, a line of grey metal fencing (very hard to see in the picture) that has recently been reinforced and rebuilt while the Syrians are busy with their own civil war. Kobi’s concern is that once war inside Syria is settled (BTW there are multiple ways this could happen, including the assassination of Assad. But who would be in power then? Who knows? Will the US get involved to help support a particular rebel faction? Will Russia get involved? Iran?) the Syrians will turn their attention back to the Israeli border and there will be a war. The Israeli’s have put their best IDF military in this region to prepare for that eventuality. Also, the UN has a presence in this location. They are the fenced in “Camp” just outside the Syrian fence to the right.

And here is a picture of me at the Syrian border. It is such a beautiful place, as we stood there, enjoying the breeze, the sun, the smells, it is tragic to imagine how much blood may still be shed in this place. I’d rather just be able to go camping here, and not with the IDF.

Northern Security and Borders: Part I, Lebanon

This morning we drove North from our hotel at the kibbutz Kfar Blum past the Sea of Galilee to the narrow region of Israel where Lebanon is to the West, and Syria is to the East.

This area is a distinct change in topography and vegetation from the more desert regions South of Galilee. The land becomes very mountainous, it is an old volcanic range. Called the Golan Heights, this is currently an area with tremendous terraced farming and spectacular vineyards. This area is also the southern tip of the Fertile Crescent, there is much more water here and the temperature variations along with the soil makes for great farming.
The northern most part of the Golan Heights in Israel is Mt. Hermon. This mountain is also the area were the borders of Lebanon and Syria and Israel meet.
Here is the view looking West where the Lebanon border is at the ridge of the mountain you see in the background.

So, first to talk about Lebanon. We drove up to an area where the Lebanon border was visible and we got out of our bus, on the side of the road to talk with Colonel Kobi Marom.

We were a little early for Kobi so, we got out of the bus and our tour guide began to explain to us about the presence of old land mines which make it unsafe to walk around in these areas where the borders between these three countries have been fought over for the last 50 years.

Our guide, Duron, explained that these are smart fences each section is electrified. Not to shock you, but rather to let the military know if you touch the fence. It sends a message to their headquarters. If you cut the fence, it sends another message and soldiers will be deployed to hunt you down led by a Bedouin soldier because they are excellent trackers.

The message here… don’t even touch the fence.

After a short while, Kobi arrived and we gathered around him to learn about these delicate borders. Kobi served in the IDF (Israeli Defense Force) as a commander in many posts and then became Regimental Commander. He is now in the reserves.

Kobi explained much history about the battles that have been fought between the Israeli army and the Hezbollah. As we stared out onto the valley he explained that the village of white buildings we could see was an Allewite village. The Allewite are a particular ethnic group in the area, that are Shia Muslim but would prefer to be considered Israeli and not Lebanese. So, after the war, they became Israeli citizens and lived happily and wanted to expand their village a little to the north. Israel said sure, and only later when the UN came to mark the lines between Lebanon and Israel did they discover that the village now sits in two countries.

So, some of these Allewite Israeli citizens live in Lebanon… This is difficult and confusing.

The Hezbollah have been very agressive at this border and caused all kinds of problems, but Kobi explained that in his view, they are behaving much more cautiously right now for two reasons. One: the last time they acted against Israel attacked them so swiftly and severely that their infrastructure was demolished and they know that any even small attack will result in the same kind of response from Israel. Two: the Hezbollah have much more power in Lebanon politically and they have more to loose if they get into a fight with Israel. Before they were a rebel group without much to loose, now they have some power and authority and they are interested in preserving that.
So Israel has to make sure that they put up a big threat of retaliation to keep the Hezbollah from attacking and they want to make sure that Hezbollah has limited military capabilities. The danger is that they do have rockets, long and short range. They could easily fire rockets from this border and hit Tel Aviv. So Israel has to pay attention to the Hezbollah behavior and who of their allies might sell them bombs… Iran and the Syrians.

As we got back on the bus, I was aware of the ironic beauty of wildflowers growing along the “smart fence” and mine field. Nature will find a way, won’t she…

Nazareth and the Church of the Annunciation

We drove from Haifa to Nazareth after lunch. Nazareth is a sprawling city, very built up everywhere. It has more of an Arab population which we noticed, that the further north we traveled, the more Arabs Israeli’s. In Nazareth our focus was on visiting the Basilica of the Annunciation.

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As we drove up to the church, our tour guide (who is an amazing scholar and guide for Jews and Christians), began explaining the annunciation to our Jewish compatriots and then we began to have a fascinating time trying to explain the annunciation further to them since we did not all agree in the importance of Mary’s virginity or the doctrine of the immaculate conception. I realized how much I take for granted that people know the Christian biblical story.

One wonderful thing about the church of the annunciation for me was seeing the many artistic representations of Mary and Jesus from the many nations.

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Another fascinating part of the church was seeing the remnants of the old Byzantine church of the annunciation that stood here before the current one was built. There was a lower level with remnants of the earlier church architecture and mosaics.

Haifa and interfaith intercultural life

We drove from Yemin Orde to Haifa, a quickly developing city of great diversity with Arabs, Jews, Christians all living together in a collaborative environment. There is also in Haifa the headquarters of the Baha’i faith. We met at the Beit Hagafen Arab Jewish community center with three faith leaders and the director of the community center. The emphasis was on creating opportunities for mutual understanding and conversation to counter the fear and anxiety that many people feel in proximity to Arab Israelis.

In Haifa is a shrine to the founder to Baha’i. He was martyred for his faith and his followers carried his crushed bones secretly for many years until they were able to bury them in Haifa and build a shrine. Over the years it has become more elaborate and a terraced garden built up the side of Mt. Carmel.

Looking down Mt. Carmel towards the coast line of Haifa.

Yemin Orde Youth Vilage

If I visit nothing else in Israel, the experience of visiting Yemin Orde is enough.

We began our time with a presentation by Dr. Chaim Peri, the director and incredible mentor, educator, father figure for all the youth who come to Yemin Orde.

Dr. Peri has created a center for orphaned youth (and any children without suitable parents or a home) to come and live in a healing and educating community that will be their home forever, they can always rely on the Yemin Orde to be there for them no matter what is going on in their lives, to celebrate, support, help if they are in trouble, co-sign a mortgage. Just like the commitment of a normal family. He emphasizes the need to create “parental” levels of commitment and trust for the youth so that they may heal from whatever trauma they have experienced, learn about belonging to a loving environment because they experience it, and be able to discover themselves as Jews (and some Muslims) from their particular culture.

His commitment is to create leaders… Leader of a household or leader of a nation, or leader of a business. He believes that children need to experience a community of teachers who believe in them so deeply that they believe in themselves.

The missional idea is that no Jewish child should be without a family. The youth have come from Israel, Ethiopia, Brazil, Darfur… Dr. Peri has expanded his vision to no child, whatever their faith, should be without a home. Each child needs to be educated and embraced in “The Village Way” to learn about community and love within a Jewish context and using all the skill and science of educators and psychologists. He advocates de-institutionalizing the institution to build on relationships and trust of community. And let go of the “processing” of children through a system, but rather loving them into wholeness. He has written a book, “Teenage Education The Village Way” you can find it on Amazon.com

The story of the Ethiopian children is a powerful story of Jewish Ethiopians seeking refuge in Israel, and immigrating at great peril across the desert. There were two major efforts from the Israeli’s to move the Ethiopians to Israel that were not always a successful relocation. The Ethiopians have had some difficulty assimilating into the Israeli society and they struggle with language, culture, and the obvious racial difference in skin color. Also, the Judaism that they practice is more “biblical” than current Jewish practice.
For example: The children who came to live in Yemin Orde were asked how they would celebrate Passover and they responded by telling Dr. Peri about slaughtering a lamb, just like the bible says. Dr. Peri explained how Israeli Jews had a plate with a lamb bone on it to symbolize the lamb, but that they did not actually slaughter a lamb. The children scratched their heads and explained again about slaughtering a lamb. So, he went out and purchased a lamb from a neighboring farm. The whole community became upset about the bloodshed that was going to happen and begged Dr. Peri not to do it. He said, “I got us into this, you get us out of it.” They ended up using this experience to teach the Ethiopian youth about democratic process and the whole community voted about whether to slaughter the lamb or let it live. After the votes were counted, the lamb lived to see another day.

There is a hut on the campus of Yemin Orde built to be like the dwellings of the Ethiopian Jews. This place is a recognition and honoring of the culture and life that these Jews have left in order to come and live in Israel. It is so important here to never loose touch with who you are and where you came from, that every part of your heritage is valuable and important.

The Muslim children in Yemin Orde were originally refugees from Darfur who fled all the way to Israel and were being held in Israeli prisons because they had illegally crossed the border. Dr. Peri knew that the children were being held and as he celebrated Passover with his community and read about liberation he felt he could do no other than get these children out of captivity and into his youth center. So he spoke with lawyers and judges and had them released to Yemin Orde. He said, “These Muslim youth are making us better Jews.”

I am profoundly impressed that this man and the community of staff (teachers, counselors, cook, janitors, everyone!) are creating a holy home for anyone who needs a home. I am also hearing God’s voice saying to me, isn’t this what we are trying to do at St. Marks? Making a faith home for everyone who needs one, whether there home is in Pikesville or Africa, or Caribbean, or Central America.

Breakfast in Tel Aviv- an international affair

After 9 hours of sleep, I feel like my soul and body have begun to reconnect.

Breakfast was an extravagant celebration of food.

I should also say that every meal I’ve had so far has been an overwhelming spread of fresh produce, breads, and meat.

But breakfast was overwhelming. It was a buffet with food from every place on the planet. As I stepped up into the buffet area, the offerings began with Asian breakfast including tofu, miso, rice cakes, fish, then a spread of cereals and milks, then fresh vegetables, smoked salmon, stuffed grape leaves, hummus, tahini, capers, pickled everything, olives of every variety, breads to many to mention, eggs in every form, then the spread of yogurts and cheeses . Oh, yeah and a bar full of more American delicacies like pancakes and waffles… I could have stayed there all day eating and sampling things.

As I sat down to eat, my breakfast companions were, Joe Hart, the chaplain from GBMC, John Deckenback, the UCC conference minister, Steve Gotow, a Reconstructionist Rabbi from Texas and president of the Jewish Council of public affairs.
Conversations are never dull.

Which brings me to last nights lecture, from Paul Liptz, social historian from Tel Aviv University and Hebrew Union College in Jerusalem. He immigrated to Israel, from Africa, the day before the 6 day war, June 4, 1967.
His talk was about the social and communal identity of Israel. Overall, he gave a very positive view of the culture and quality of life Israel.

Here is what my memory has to offer this morning,
The first issue that shapes life in Israel is that every border of this nation is full of danger and uncertainty. This issue necessitates a level of militarism that inevitably shapes the community. Every Israeli is expected to spend time in military service. You may be a conscientious objector, Orthodox, or an Arab Israeli and do public service instead. But most youth grow up with the expectation that part of their responsibility is to serve in the army. This shapes the culture and cohesive bond among the youth because of this common experience and commitment to the protection of their nation.

This is a middle eastern community and people define themselves by being pushy and argumentative. This is not considered rudeness, but rather how you build relationships and make friends. Western sensibilities about being polite and nice are considered quaint and naïve. Even the Hebrew language is very direct. The words please and thank you did not exist until a few years ago.

This place is very diverse and full of risk taking behaviors of a new nation trying to figure out how to make it work from scratch. There is an investment in democratic process and currently a situation that the a majority of newly elected politicians have no previous experience in politics.

Paul focused on the benefits of the quality of life in Israel. Even though people earn about 50% less than their American counterparts, the quality of life makes up for economic disparity. First, Health coverage for ALL. There is no question about this commitment, it is a given. Second is a commitment to family life and being in proximity to your loved ones. There is less of an individualistic spirit, and more of a serving your community and family that gives you purpose.

The difficulties of being an Israeli are poverty and tension with neighboring nations.
Poverty exists particularly among the Israeli Palestinians (22% of the population), the ultra Orthodox (9% of the population), Ethiopian Jews, elderly Russian speaking immigrants.

The Arab spring which we see from a distance as so positive is experienced as a more muddy and disconcerting upheaval here because of the uncertainty of the outcome.

Ok- all for now, I’m entering the kibbutz of Yemin Orde.