Rabbi Mitch and The Reverend Lemler with Jerusalem in Background
An hour before sunset, as Shabbat was about to descend upon Jerusalem, the members of our group stood in a circle and held hands as we prepared to welcome Shabbat Shekalim, our first of two Sabbaths together in the land of Israel. The city lay before us, an awesome sight. The Reverend Jim Lemler of Christ Episcopal Church led us in prayer, asking for God’s guidance in our interfaith endeavor while Rabbi Mitchell “Mitch” Hurvitz commented on the Torah portion for Shabbat Shekalim saying that the commandment for each person to bring a half shekel to the Temple signifies that all are equal in God’s eyes. We were standing on the hill where, in all likelihood, Abraham once stood and looked toward the place that God would show him, Mount Moriah in the distance, where he sacrificed a ram instead of his beloved son Isaac in the place where many years later Solomon would build the Holy Temple. In all likelihood, Jesus too looked from this hill toward Mount Moriah in the days when the Temple was still standing in the place where now we see the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock, holy to Moslems.
It was a special Shabbat in Jerusalem, if an unusual one for the Jewish members of our group. Saturday was beautiful, warm and sunny. I attended Shabbat Shacharit services, the Jewish morning services, with Rabbi Mitch and Temple Sholom youth director, Josh Altman. We went to an Orthodox Shul, the name of which can be more or less translated as the community of new song. The services were full of joyous song. And women’s participation was much greater than is the case in more traditional Orthodox synagogues. It was an uplifting experience.
We spent Shabbat afternoon following Jesus through his last hours. We began at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the Old City. According to tradition, this church marks the spot where Jesus was crucified. In the chamber commemorating the actual place of crucifixion, Jim Lemler offered a prayer, again in the spirit of understanding and sharing, a transcendence in our interfaith endeavor. Church bells were ringing out as we prayed. Rabbi Mitch, taking note of the bells, remarked on Jerusalem’s cacophony of sounds where church bells blend with the chants of the muezzin from the minarets, calling Moslems to prayer five times a day, and with the Hebrew sounds of Jewish prayer, the chanting at the Western Wall. We recalled the welcoming of the Sabbath there at the Kotel, the throngs of worshippers after sundown, the joyous sounds of song and dance.
Rabbi Mitch expressed the hope that our coming together in this interfaith endeavor might in some small way contribute to a healing of the world, the tikkun olam that is central to Jewish belief.
As we left the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, we walked the Via Dolorosa in reverse, stopping last at the first stations of the cross. Then we walked out of the Old City through the Damascus Gate into all-Arab East Jerusalem where we went to the Garden Tomb, an alternate site for the crucifixion of Jesus, frequented by Protestants, who, of course, have no place in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre which is dominated by the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Armenian Apostolic Church and the Roman Catholic Church. The Ethiopians and the Copts also have places at the Holy Sepulchre, with the Copts relegated to a roof space. These different denominations are not at peace with one another, and a Moslem family has held the keys to the church for generations.
We ended Shabbat with Havdalah, the Jewish service performed every Saturday after nightfall, the ritual that separates the sacred space in time that is Shabbat from the ordinary time of the rest of the week. We ended the Shabbat in a circle just as we had before Shabbat when we overlooked Jerusalem. This time we had our arms about one another as we sang Eliyahu Hanavi, a song to Elijah the Prophet, the harbinger of the messianic age, the song that is always sung after Havdalah.
The traditional greeting then is Shavua Tov – a good week. May this indeed be a good week for all. Shavua Tov.
