Yesterday I traveled wide territory in an emotional sense. We started our day at the Herzl Museum and Educational Center a site that commemorates the founder of Zionism in its culmination in the form of the Jewish state. Several famous Israelis, including Herzl, Golda Meir, and Shimon Peres, are buried there. The museum part helps you understand why Israel was founded. I tried to imagine what my experience would be like if I were Jewish. The museum uses multimedia techniques where you feel like you are really part of the International Zionist Congress at the turn of the 20th Century, it reminds you of the anti-Semitism that existed in the world leading up to the creation of Israel, and then it highlights Israel’s achievements in more recent years.
I left the Herzl Museum feeling confused. I am forced to confront the fact that the Israeli narrative is so different than the Palestinian one. Both sides describe their feelings and attachments to the same land, but when you hear the narratives, you might imagine that either side were discussing a completely different place. It’s frustrating and causes a lot of dissonance.
From there we went to the Holocaust Museum, Yad Vashem, just over the hill from the Herzl Museum. The facility is only two years old, and the landscapes are incredible—reminding me of the trees of Lebanon and the wide-reaching mountains and desert. We began in a hall that commemorates the death of more than 1.5 million children. All the names they have are read inside a dark hall of glass and mirrors full of lit candles. You get the sensation of being in the night sky while being confronted with the senselessness of this loss of life. From there, the exhibits are laid out in switchbacks, and you have to walk through the entire exhibit to get to the end (no shortcuts). Each station had recorded personal anecdotes from Holocaust survivors. The emotional effect is similar to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in DC; you are riveted and left with few words after the experience. I wanted to cry throughout the museum, but I felt somehow that I didn’t have the right to. It was only upon leaving when someone asked me how I was that a sort of desperate sound of weeping escaped.
The only sort of answer I can provide to this is that there are things beyond my control that I can’t understand. I have to accept tragic, widescale suffering as part of my faith. And so during the three hours of free time during the afternoon yesterday, a colleague on the trip and I went to the Via Dolorosa in the Old City of Jerusalem to mark the steps of Christ’s Passion through the fourteen Stations of the Cross. Our trip leaders had to work to get special permission for our trip to be “sanctioned” by the embassy (we were told not to go during night hours as our only restriction).
We arrived at the Lion’s Gate and entered the Muslim part of Jerusalem (Jerusalem is carved into different sections since the 1967 War). There I heard Arabic again, was able to use my seven or eight useful words of Arabic, gave water to a beggar woman who asked for it (I think I mentioned the desert people culture in Egypt of asking freely for other people’s water in a former post). We found the first station almost by accident along the cobblestone pathways. It is marked with a small brass plate. From there we followed a group of Nepalese pilgrims for a few more stations. I bought a small pamphlet which labels each of the stations and tried to imagine Christ suffering through each stop. Then a small boy offered to show us the remaining stations, and we welcomed his assistance, as we got confused with the labyrinth of streets and alleyways (cars cannot pass through most of the Old City). We finally arrived at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher , where Christ died and was resurrected (if you believe the story like I do). Pilgrims from all over the world waited patiently for a moment to touch his tomb. We arrived when mass was ending. The final wafts of incense perfumed our entrance. I was humbled and amazed to think that I had actually seen these places which are fundamental to the practice of my faith. Certainly it helped me gain perspective on the earlier reflections of the day.
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We also observed the beginning of the Sabbath, yesterday evening (goes through today until sundown, or, more technically, until three stars can be spotted in the sky) with our Jewish colleagues in the evening. We witnessed some of the ritual singing and even took part in a bit of it in the evening. I wondered if our religious practices, despite being so distinct, could somehow unite us, transcend these political issues on the ground.
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Just a few final notes… We have also visited an artists’ village where I had to be pulled away. I could have hung out all night there. In the mountains, stone brick artists’ studios, lots of colorful art (many of it being Judaica as well). We’ve seen some amazing archaeological sites as well, including Caesarea and where David supposedly fought Goliath and where Armageddon is supposed to take place. I just don’t have the time to fill in the details. Rest assured that I am taking pictures and trying desperately to keep these good memories alive. The people here have been very kind. I am fighting to separate out the political and the conflict from the souls of all the people I encounter here, trying to make a space to understand and be understood.
Final note—when we went to the Via Dolorosa, we spoke with a man who lives in the West Bank at a small café. His story was just so polar opposite in the political terms. Yet he was also very peaceful and says he, too, wants peace.
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