NOTE: This is the fourth of a series of postings from Israel, a journal account of the Temple Sholom/Christ Church interfaith trip.
Yesterday (Wednesday, February 17) was Ash Wednesday. We marked this first day of Lent with a service in a mountain forest about 3 miles north of the city of Tzfat (Safed) in the Upper Galilee. It was already evening when we arrived for dinner at Bat Ya’ar, an American style ranch in the middle of the woods. It had been a long day that began with morning jeep rides over muddy, bumpy trails from which we could see the streams that flow from the Golan into Lake Kenneret (the Sea of Galilee), an important source of water for Israel. In the afternoon we had gone to the Golan Heights on the Syrian border, a place of strategic importance for Israel, and then to the Golan Heights Winery in Katzrin. By sunset, we were in Tzfat, the seat of Jewish mysticism, a mystical place in the mountains where the 16th Kabbalists lived.
We assembled before dinner to mark Ash Wednesday in an open area outside the Bat Ya’ar restaurant. The Reverend Lemler led the service, first explaining for the Jews in the group that Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent, a 40 day period culminating in Easter. He noted the significance of the number 40 in both Jewish and Christian traditions as a number associated with the theme of ’purification.’ The Israelites wandered in the desert for 40 years until they were spiritually ready to enter the land that God had promised to the patriarch Abraham. Jesus spent 40 days in the Wilderness until he was spiritually prepared to undertake the task for which he had been called. The 40 days of Lent are a period of spiritual preparation for receiving the Easter message.
Referring to Easter as a ‘Feast,’ the Reverend Lemler said that the crucifixion and resurrection are ultimately about life, even in death.
Rabbi Mitch told a story about two brothers, illustrating how caring for one another ultimately gives this life meaning.
Karen Halac, a member of Christ Church who has a Master of Divinity degree from Yale University, as well as a Masters in Sacred Theology, and who is now in the process of being ordained, read the 51st Psalm, a psalm of remorse and repentance that asks for cleansing and purification. Before she read, she asked us to stand in a circle, not in the amoeba-like form in which we had been standing. So, as has been our custom since we first arrived in Jerusalem, we were together in a circle as we stood in prayer before God. William Darling, a parishioner at Christ Church and a student at Brunswick, sang the 23rd Psalm … the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want… yea, ‘tho I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will not fear… You are with me … I shall dwell in the House of the Lord forever. William’s song was beautiful. Our Ash Wednesday service ended with the Reverend Lemler passing around a container of dirt for us to touch, or to take, as a reminder that we are dust and shall return to dust, even as we believe in eternal life.
After the service, as we sat down to dinner in the ranch dining room where Country and Western music was playing, David and George Darling of Christ Church, both students at Brunswick, recited the Lord’s Prayer and the Temple Sholom children sang Ha Motzi, the blessing over the bread.
It seemed to be the consensus of the group that the Ash Wednesday service had been a most lovely and moving way to close a long and tiring day.
It was also a good way to begin the next day, which from a Jewish perspective, had already begun, as the Jewish day goes from sundown to nightfall, based on the Genesis creation story in which there is evening first and then morning, one day. This was the day we would visit the sites where Jesus lived and taught in the Galilee.
