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Tampilkan postingan dengan label Israel. Tampilkan semua postingan
Tampilkan postingan dengan label Israel. Tampilkan semua postingan
Jumat, 30 Juli 2010
Senin, 19 Juli 2010
The Jewish Quarter
To go into the Jewish Quarter, you also need to go through a metal detector and a bag inspection. You emerge into a plaza where right in front of you stands the Wailing Wall, the most sacred place of Judaism. A little piece of wall. People write little pieces of paper with prayers and wishes because supposedly this is the place where the Schechinah, the female spirit of God, rests and it is therefore possible that the wishes will be granted. Having nothing to lose, I scribbled "peace" (and health, and love) on mine. It strikes me that everybody pretty much asks for the same thing, no matter what religion they believe in, or what stones they choose to touch or cry on. Tzuris are the same pretty much the same for everyone.
The other parts of the Jewish Quarter have been developed into residential areas, with yeshivas (religious schools) and synagogues. There are remnants of the Cardo, a Herodian shopping street that now boasts the ubiquitous bad religious art and religious object stores that overun a lot of nice ancient real estate in Israel.
One of the highlights of our visits to the Kotel, as the Wailing Wall is called in Hebrew, was a tour of the excavations of the wall, which follow it all the way through to the Lion's Gate, on the other side of the old city. There you see the original huge Herodian stones and you take comfort in the fact that there is more wall than that little stretch above. There is an ancient cistern and remains of stones of all the periods after the destruction, Roman, Crusader, Mameluk, Ottoman, etc. Israel is one place that makes Europe seem like a baby. There are stones in Jerusalem that date from 3000 years, so one feels the weight of history. Israel is the cradle of Judaism and it is the place where the Jewish nation should be. Period. Would it have been simpler to designate a solitary island in the Pacific surrounded by sharks and no human neighbors? Perhaps. But that is not where we come from.
The other highlight was attending on a Thursday morning and witnessing the Bar Mitzvah ceremonies, where many families bring their 13 year old male offspring to complete the Jewish rite of passage into adulthood (they look like pishers to me, but the Bible says that's when they become men). It is absolute mayhem, since the women are relegated to their little section and can't be with their children as they read the Torah. Families bring sweets to pelt the children with, and goodies to eat and everybody sings and dances and it is something to behold.
So that you don't think that I only get farklempt at churches, I must say that what is very moving about Israel is that you see Jews from different countries, all those children from the Diaspora, with different Jewish customs and foods celebrating rituals that remain basically unchanged for thousands of years. That 13 year old kids are still called upon to read the Torah is pretty amazing. And even though I am not a religious person, I believe in the rich culture and history and traditions of the Jewish people and I'm happy to see them thriving still today.
The other parts of the Jewish Quarter have been developed into residential areas, with yeshivas (religious schools) and synagogues. There are remnants of the Cardo, a Herodian shopping street that now boasts the ubiquitous bad religious art and religious object stores that overun a lot of nice ancient real estate in Israel.
One of the highlights of our visits to the Kotel, as the Wailing Wall is called in Hebrew, was a tour of the excavations of the wall, which follow it all the way through to the Lion's Gate, on the other side of the old city. There you see the original huge Herodian stones and you take comfort in the fact that there is more wall than that little stretch above. There is an ancient cistern and remains of stones of all the periods after the destruction, Roman, Crusader, Mameluk, Ottoman, etc. Israel is one place that makes Europe seem like a baby. There are stones in Jerusalem that date from 3000 years, so one feels the weight of history. Israel is the cradle of Judaism and it is the place where the Jewish nation should be. Period. Would it have been simpler to designate a solitary island in the Pacific surrounded by sharks and no human neighbors? Perhaps. But that is not where we come from.
The other highlight was attending on a Thursday morning and witnessing the Bar Mitzvah ceremonies, where many families bring their 13 year old male offspring to complete the Jewish rite of passage into adulthood (they look like pishers to me, but the Bible says that's when they become men). It is absolute mayhem, since the women are relegated to their little section and can't be with their children as they read the Torah. Families bring sweets to pelt the children with, and goodies to eat and everybody sings and dances and it is something to behold.
So that you don't think that I only get farklempt at churches, I must say that what is very moving about Israel is that you see Jews from different countries, all those children from the Diaspora, with different Jewish customs and foods celebrating rituals that remain basically unchanged for thousands of years. That 13 year old kids are still called upon to read the Torah is pretty amazing. And even though I am not a religious person, I believe in the rich culture and history and traditions of the Jewish people and I'm happy to see them thriving still today.
Atheism vs Theocracy: Round 1.
I was shocked to find so many more religious Jews in Jerusalem, and in Israel in general than when I left almost 30 years ago. Oodles of orthodox and ultra-orthodox, which are not very tolerant people.
But I have news for them. I am not tolerant of them either. I could give a shit about their delusional holiness. And I'm tired of secular Jews giving them the widest berth. They don't deserve it. And this unrequited respect secular Jews have for these people is going to come back and bite us in the ass very soon, if not already.
We went to the ultra-orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim in Jerusalem, a place in the new city where there are no holy places, just people who deem themselves holier than thou. They have massive signs on the street that say that "groups severely offend" the inhabitants of the neighborhood. Groups of what, I don't know. Humans who choose to live in the 21st century? People who dislike long sleeves and skirts in 100 degree heat? So I was wearing short sleeves and long pants. However, the Magnificent Arepa, tired of covering up at 105 degree heat in Aqaba so as not to incur the morbid stares of Arab men, was wearing a short skirt and a t-shirt. In any case, there we go walking down Mea Shearim street, nobody saying anything. Ultra Orthodox men are forbidden to look or speak at a woman that is not covered. Most ignored us, probably used to the fact that they live in a town with lots of tourists. As we went deeper into the neighborhood, a religious woman who looked old, as they all do, suddenly announces to us that it is forbidden to walk around on the street like that. I could have easily said, okay, we'll leave, but it offended me she used the word "forbidden". Because that is not the case. It may offend her, but there is no law that states that one cannot walk on the streets of Jerusalem wearing whatever one wants. So I said in my best smartass Hebrew, "it's not forbidden, why is it forbidden?" She said that it was written in many languages that it is offensive to the people of the neighborhood. I would have left it at that, had not appeared in the horizon a secular Jewish woman, with a professorial air, wearing pants and guiding a group of tourists whose women had obviously been asked to cover up their arms and legs. This woman started butting in at no one's request saying that we were disrespecting "us". "Who is us? I'm a Jew, a secular Jew", I said, "and I can wear whatever I want because this is a free country". "No, it isn't", she informs me. A screaming match ensued in English and Hebrew, and one of her charges, a meek looking tourist, decided to chime in: "I'm not Jewish and I'm wearing a long skirt", she said. So therefore she has gained a place in Heaven? This makes me a bad Jew? WTF? I bellowed at her, "I don't care what you are. There are also secular Jews in this country and we can walk down the street however we like. Don't look at her legs, if you find them so offensive", I said to the guide. She was about to have a conniption. She threw us out of "my neighborhood" and said something about the Palestinians which was so out of context and so utterly incoherent that all I could say was "give me a fucking break".
I was not about to retreat, so we burrowed deeper into that God-forsaken, medieval hellhole. I'm waiting for the day when God appears to these people. First thing It's going to say is, "Who told you to be so utterly benighted? So contemptuous of and disrespectful to women? So ignorant and stupid? Certainly, it wasn't Me".
But now I felt really uncomfortable and claustrophobic. I feared a retaliatory mob, despite the fact that nobody else batted an eye. We finally found a way to get out of there. Again, the super-orthodox did not say a word to us, but this four letter word that starts with a c, decided to become, as we say in Spanish, more Popist than the Pope, because who knows what crap she must have been saying to those poor tourists, stuck in a one horse town full of lunatic zealots that don't respect anybody but themselves but expect us modern citizens of the world to worship at the altar of their selfrighteouness.
They can kiss my Jewish ass.
But I have news for them. I am not tolerant of them either. I could give a shit about their delusional holiness. And I'm tired of secular Jews giving them the widest berth. They don't deserve it. And this unrequited respect secular Jews have for these people is going to come back and bite us in the ass very soon, if not already.
We went to the ultra-orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim in Jerusalem, a place in the new city where there are no holy places, just people who deem themselves holier than thou. They have massive signs on the street that say that "groups severely offend" the inhabitants of the neighborhood. Groups of what, I don't know. Humans who choose to live in the 21st century? People who dislike long sleeves and skirts in 100 degree heat? So I was wearing short sleeves and long pants. However, the Magnificent Arepa, tired of covering up at 105 degree heat in Aqaba so as not to incur the morbid stares of Arab men, was wearing a short skirt and a t-shirt. In any case, there we go walking down Mea Shearim street, nobody saying anything. Ultra Orthodox men are forbidden to look or speak at a woman that is not covered. Most ignored us, probably used to the fact that they live in a town with lots of tourists. As we went deeper into the neighborhood, a religious woman who looked old, as they all do, suddenly announces to us that it is forbidden to walk around on the street like that. I could have easily said, okay, we'll leave, but it offended me she used the word "forbidden". Because that is not the case. It may offend her, but there is no law that states that one cannot walk on the streets of Jerusalem wearing whatever one wants. So I said in my best smartass Hebrew, "it's not forbidden, why is it forbidden?" She said that it was written in many languages that it is offensive to the people of the neighborhood. I would have left it at that, had not appeared in the horizon a secular Jewish woman, with a professorial air, wearing pants and guiding a group of tourists whose women had obviously been asked to cover up their arms and legs. This woman started butting in at no one's request saying that we were disrespecting "us". "Who is us? I'm a Jew, a secular Jew", I said, "and I can wear whatever I want because this is a free country". "No, it isn't", she informs me. A screaming match ensued in English and Hebrew, and one of her charges, a meek looking tourist, decided to chime in: "I'm not Jewish and I'm wearing a long skirt", she said. So therefore she has gained a place in Heaven? This makes me a bad Jew? WTF? I bellowed at her, "I don't care what you are. There are also secular Jews in this country and we can walk down the street however we like. Don't look at her legs, if you find them so offensive", I said to the guide. She was about to have a conniption. She threw us out of "my neighborhood" and said something about the Palestinians which was so out of context and so utterly incoherent that all I could say was "give me a fucking break".
I was not about to retreat, so we burrowed deeper into that God-forsaken, medieval hellhole. I'm waiting for the day when God appears to these people. First thing It's going to say is, "Who told you to be so utterly benighted? So contemptuous of and disrespectful to women? So ignorant and stupid? Certainly, it wasn't Me".
But now I felt really uncomfortable and claustrophobic. I feared a retaliatory mob, despite the fact that nobody else batted an eye. We finally found a way to get out of there. Again, the super-orthodox did not say a word to us, but this four letter word that starts with a c, decided to become, as we say in Spanish, more Popist than the Pope, because who knows what crap she must have been saying to those poor tourists, stuck in a one horse town full of lunatic zealots that don't respect anybody but themselves but expect us modern citizens of the world to worship at the altar of their selfrighteouness.
They can kiss my Jewish ass.
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