Jerusalem, My Happy Home: Part 3

My reason for coming to Jerusalem is connected to how Jerusalem got to be here in the first place. So before asking “why am I here?” I need to ask “why is Jerusalem here?”

The first written reference to Jerusalem is in an execrations (cursings) document of Egypt from about 1800 BCE. Think of that dreadful web site of Westboro Baptist Church, which lists all the people and places God supposedly hates. The execrations list is an Egyptian version of that, invoking the wrath of their deities on despicable people and places. Jerusalem and two of the city princes made Egypt’s hit list. Skeptics deny Jerusalem existed before then, but it usually takes people awhile to get to know me before they start cussin’ me. So I suspect Jerusalem is older. We haven’t found older archaeological evidence, but small simple places don’t leave a lot of evidence and what they left we may just not have found yet.

The oldest Biblical reference to Jerusalem is perhaps in Genesis 14. Abraham, in a Bronze Age style commando raid, rescued his nephew Lot from some marauders who were also crossways with the royalty around where Abraham lived. The local royalty were grateful to see their enemy bested.  One of the grateful local kings was also a priest – see being bi-vocational is not new. This priest-king blessed Abraham. That king was Melchizedek, the “King of Salem” – as in Jeru-salem. Melchizedek was the priest of an Amorite God named El Eljon.  It’s kind of an odd story -- Abraham a Yahweh-worshiper getting an El Eljon blessing. But it was an interfaith moment. Melchizedek was a Bronze Age inter-faith minister. In the New Testament, the Book of Hebrews calls him the spiritual ancestor of Jesus, who like Melchizedek was a priest connecting all of humanity regardless of religious affiliation, to the Divine. Today Melchizedek’s city is the Holy City of three world religions. It’s fitting.

Of course all of this is too far back to be tested historically. As for whether Jerusalem is where Melchizedek blessed Abraham, that’s possible but not proven. Eusebius writing in the 5^th Century said “yes.” Josephus writing in the late 1^st Century put Salem a few miles away. Who knows? But we can say this with certainty. Egypt was talking smack about Jerusalem in 1800 BCE. The troubles have been around awhile. It is commonly said that conflict in Jerusalem is caused by the intolerance of Jews, Christians, and Muslims for each other. But the hostilities and violence here go back before Judaism, Christianity, or Islam had been born. That isn’t to say religion isn’t intimately involved in prejudice and aggression. Our hands are far from clean. But it is to say; a simplistic blaming of religion won’t do to explain a human habit of hostility that has been around a long, long time.

There is a second story associated with the founding of Jerusalem. Rabbinic tradition has put 2 Chronicles 3, which says Solomon’s Temple was built over a threshing floor in Mt. Moriah, together with the Genesis 22 story of the sacrifice of Isaac on Mt. Moriah. Conclusion: Jerusalem was made holy in Abraham’s day as the site where Abraham was willing to kill his son, but God provided the ram for the sacrifice. That’s why David made this the capital and Solomon built the Temple here. Again, this isn’t certain. It isn’t clear that the word “Moriah” in Genesis and the word “Moriah” in Chronicles are the same word. But it seems highly plausible that Solomon’s Temple was built on a place of sacrifice for pre-Jewish religions. James Carroll sees Jerusalem as a place where religion and violence (as in human sacrifice) have been mixed from the beginning.

Our class began today. This afternoon we drove around the hills constituting the outskirts of Jerusalem. It was a full circle of looking down from hilltops across the valleys to the hill on which the ancient city is built. It was quite a view! I got what one comes here for – a sense of how the world looked to Jesus. It was profound to look down into the Kidron Valley from the Mount of Olives knowing that after the Last Supper, Jesus and his disciples sang a hymn, then walked across the Kidron Valley here to Gethsemane.

I will adjust but I was thrown off by a disconnect between the readings that had been recommended and the kind of presentation we had today. In pointing out significant locations, the teacher would say, “this happened here” and “that happened there.” But we don’t actually know the story with that kind of certainty. It made the Western skeptic in me cringe a bit. Tell me a place has been associated in tradition with part of the sacred story, and I will relate to that place as if the story had happened there. But tell me, as a fact that something has happened in a particular place and my lawyer’s mind begins taking measurements and saying, “Uh, I don’t think so.”

This visit to Jerusalem is an encounter with complexity. There is blood in Salem, the City of Peace. There was blood here before the city was founded. But there is also peace in the very midst of bloodshed. Jesus healed, forgave, and reconciled – not at Mt. Shasta, not at Esalen, not in Rhinebeck, New York or any blissy place of enlightened smiles – but here. There is truth and wisdom here, mixed with a naiveté, even gullibility that reduces religion to concrete literalism. Yet, that naiveté has a humility about it that is somehow more congenial than the cynicism I have encountered in academic settings or among religious intellectuals who are inordinately proud of what they don’t believe.

This is a mixed place. Being here is a mixed experience. But then so is the church. So is life. Augustine famously said, “If you understand it, it isn’t God.” If this place were comprehensible, it wouldn’t be Jerusalem.

To lighten the day’s reflections, let me tell you about a mischievous moment I got to observe. While we were surveying Jerusalem from a scenic overlook outside the city, I looked down and saw there was lower level of park beneath us. The part of the park we could see was secluded and three young Muslim women were there. They were the sort of hip Muslims wearing hijabs and jeans. They were assembling a couple of hookahs and getting ready to smoke. It was the Middle Eastern version of boys behind the barn rolling their own. Sometimes the complexity and incongruity of Jerusalem is playful and funny – but not often enough.

Jerusalem, My Happy Home: Part 2

“Pilgrims here do not bring decisions with them. They come here to seek prayerfully the decisions God wants them to make. And God will always surprise us.”                                                                                           

                                                              The Rt. Rev. Sulheil Dawani

                                                              Bishop of Jerusalem

speaking to GAFCON 2008

The surprises have already begun. But all in due course.

Jet lag mostly overcome, we awoke to another beautiful morning in Jerusalem. Blue skies. Birds singing. “Biblical plants” growing in gardens. Wandering about the old stone streets and sidewalks, crowded with a wide assortment of humanity, gives me a sort of Indiana Jones feeling. Yesterday, we found a neat little “Educational Bookstore.” All the books were Palestinian polemics – not saying that disparagingly, only to name a genre. It reminds me of leftist bookshops in Argentina -- and they serve espresso.

The best part of being here so far is Eucharist in the side chapel at the Cathedral, celebrated at 7 a.m., simply, reverently, no music, no sermon. Bishop Dawani presided today as the multitude swelled to 11. I love these services. I loved them at Harvard Divinity in 02, when Professor Coakley, an erudite systematic theologian with mystical leanings, would celebrate. (Gordon Kaufman, another famous theologian there, quoted Sarah from her student days as saying, “I am not good enough to be spiritual. I am religious.”) It was my favorite service as a parish priest. I miss this simple, reverent, quiet service so much!!! And yes, somehow the Eucharist feels special – the anamnesis more palpable  – do this in remembrance of me – here where it was instituted and first celebrated.

On our first day of unstructured time (before the class starts), we explored the heart of the Palestinian Quarter of the Old City, that being the site of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and the Russian Orthodox Church featuring excavations going back to the time of Jesus. On this second and last day of unstructured time, we ambled toward (but not much into) the Jewish Quarter of the Old City, that being the site of the Western Wall and the Armenian Patriarchate. It was a process of acculturation, which goes along with overcoming jet lag. All part of getting ready for the class beginning tonight – preparation along with reading.

One mystery I have been reading about is what Jesus did in the Temple, why he did it, and what, if anything, it had to do with his crucifixion. Huge question. It has to be set in the context of a general shift in religions around the globe in the 800 BCE to 200 CE era away from animal sacrifice toward something more spiritual like bhakti (devotion) or medication practices in Hinduism, study and practice of Torah in Judaism, etc. The Jewish shift away from Temple sacrifice and toward ethical religion goes back to the 8^th Century prophets, particularly Micah and 2^nd Isaiah. The idea of initiation into the people of God and the engagement of the Kingdom mission outside the Temple authority structure was certainly part of Jesus’ message. But it doesn’t explain what looks like an assault on the Temple.

Here’s a clue. Jesus’ call to repentance may have included repentance from violent nationalistic revolt. His prophesies often related to what would happen to Judah if they persisted in a path toward such an uprising. (Borg, Wright) The words that accompanied Jesus’ symbolic action were: “My Father’s house should be a house of prayer for all people, but you have made it a den of lestos.” “Lestos” is usually translated as “thieves” and understood to mean swindlers suggesting the moneychangers and purveyors of doves were ripping off the pilgrims.

“Lestos,” however, does not mean a swindler or general practitioner of theft by chicanery or slight of hand. It means one who robs by violence. It is a bandit or brigand. In 1^st Century Judah, brigands tended to be political outlaws, more like terrorists than simple thieves. Every time Josephus uses the word “lestos” it refers to such a political outlaw. Herod’s Temple was regarded as a symbolic symbol for the nationalist uprising in Jesus’ day, just as Solomon’s Temple had been in Jeremiah’s day. Jesus echoed Jeremiah in his critique of the Temple and, again like Jeremiah, foresaw its destruction not by supernatural second sight, but by counting the number of soldiers Judah had as compared to Babylon in Jeremiah’s case or Rome in Jesus’.  This analysis courtesy of N. T. Wright. For a long time, Jesus’ prophesies were interpreted literally as the end of space-time. Given that interpretation, he was simply wrong. A more historically coherent political read of his prophesies, he was tragically right. It all happened in 70 CE.

Tonight our class began with a surprise. 17 Episcopal Idahoans are here!!! I had somehow picked up there would be a couple of folks from the potato state – but I had figured they’d probably be Catholics or Presbyterians. Then my friend, Stephanie Crumrine of Twin Falls, asked me on FB if I had seen the Idaho contingent, so I knew they would be Episcopalians. Then they turned out to be most of our class. For those who don’t know, Linda and I became Episcopalians in Boise and regard Idaho as our spiritual home.

All of a sudden, titling this blog “my happy home” did not seem ironic anymore. We met briefly and headed to the Cathedral for Eucharist. There we sang just one hymn. It was Cwm Rhonda (Guide me O thou great Jehovah – only here they sub Redeemer for Jehovah, out of what I guess is a sensibility to the Jewish prohibition on speaking the Divine Name) – which is unto Wales as Danny Boy is to Ireland. And Wales is my ancestral home. I thought as Peter said, “It is very good for us to be in this place.”

Jerusalem, My Happy Home: Part 2

“Pilgrims here do not bring decisions with them. They come here to seek prayerfully the decisions God wants them to make. And God will always surprise us.”                                                                                           

                                                              The Rt. Rev. Sulheil Dawani

                                                              Bishop of Jerusalem

speaking to GAFCON 2008

The surprises have already begun. But all in due course.

Jet lag mostly overcome, we awoke to another beautiful morning in Jerusalem. Blue skies. Birds singing. “Biblical plants” growing in gardens. Wandering about the old stone streets and sidewalks, crowded with a wide assortment of humanity, gives me a sort of Indiana Jones feeling. Yesterday, we found a neat little “Educational Bookstore.” All the books were Palestinian polemics – not saying that disparagingly, only to name a genre. It reminds me of leftist bookshops in Argentina -- and they serve espresso.

The best part of being here so far is Eucharist in the side chapel at the Cathedral, celebrated at 7 a.m., simply, reverently, no music, no sermon. Bishop Dawani presided today as the multitude swelled to 11. I love these services. I loved them at Harvard Divinity in 02, when Professor Coakley, an erudite systematic theologian with mystical leanings, would celebrate. (Gordon Kaufman, another famous theologian there, quoted Sarah from her student days as saying, “I am not good enough to be spiritual. I am religious.”) It was my favorite service as a parish priest. I miss this simple, reverent, quiet service so much!!! And yes, somehow the Eucharist feels special – the anamnesis more palpable  – do this in remembrance of me – here where it was instituted and first celebrated.

On our first day of unstructured time (before the class starts), we explored the heart of the Palestinian Quarter of the Old City, that being the site of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and the Russian Orthodox Church featuring excavations going back to the time of Jesus. On this second and last day of unstructured time, we ambled toward (but not much into) the Jewish Quarter of the Old City, that being the site of the Western Wall and the Armenian Patriarchate. It was a process of acculturation, which goes along with overcoming jet lag. All part of getting ready for the class beginning tonight – preparation along with reading.

One mystery I have been reading about is what Jesus did in the Temple, why he did it, and what, if anything, it had to do with his crucifixion. Huge question. It has to be set in the context of a general shift in religions around the globe in the 800 BCE to 200 CE era away from animal sacrifice toward something more spiritual like bhakti (devotion) or medication practices in Hinduism, study and practice of Torah in Judaism, etc. The Jewish shift away from Temple sacrifice and toward ethical religion goes back to the 8^th Century prophets, particularly Micah and 2^nd Isaiah. The idea of initiation into the people of God and the engagement of the Kingdom mission outside the Temple authority structure was certainly part of Jesus’ message. But it doesn’t explain what looks like an assault on the Temple.

Here’s a clue. Jesus’ call to repentance may have included repentance from violent nationalistic revolt. His prophesies often related to what would happen to Judah if they persisted in a path toward such an uprising. (Borg, Wright) The words that accompanied Jesus’ symbolic action were: “My Father’s house should be a house of prayer for all people, but you have made it a den of lestos.” “Lestos” is usually translated as “thieves” and understood to mean swindlers suggesting the moneychangers and purveyors of doves were ripping off the pilgrims.

“Lestos,” however, does not mean a swindler or general practitioner of theft by chicanery or slight of hand. It means one who robs by violence. It is a bandit or brigand. In 1^st Century Judah, brigands tended to be political outlaws, more like terrorists than simple thieves. Every time Josephus uses the word “lestos” it refers to such a political outlaw. Herod’s Temple was regarded as a symbolic symbol for the nationalist uprising in Jesus’ day, just as Solomon’s Temple had been in Jeremiah’s day. Jesus echoed Jeremiah in his critique of the Temple and, again like Jeremiah, foresaw its destruction not by supernatural second sight, but by counting the number of soldiers Judah had as compared to Babylon in Jeremiah’s case or Rome in Jesus’.  This analysis courtesy of N. T. Wright. For a long time, Jesus’ prophesies were interpreted literally as the end of space-time. Given that interpretation, he was simply wrong. A more historically coherent political read of his prophesies, he was tragically right. It all happened in 70 CE.

Tonight our class began with a surprise. 17 Episcopal Idahoans are here!!! I had somehow picked up there would be a couple of folks from the potato state – but I had figured they’d probably be Catholics or Presbyterians. Then my friend, Stephanie Crumrine of Twin Falls, asked me on FB if I had seen the Idaho contingent, so I knew they would be Episcopalians. Then they turned out to be most of our class. For those who don’t know, Linda and I became Episcopalians in Boise and regard Idaho as our spiritual home.

All of a sudden, titling this blog “my happy home” did not seem ironic anymore. We met briefly and headed to the Cathedral for Eucharist. There we sang just one hymn. It was Cwm Rhonda (Guide me O thou great Jehovah – only here they sub Redeemer for Jehovah, out of what I guess is a sensibility to the Jewish prohibition on speaking the Divine Name) – which is unto Wales as Danny Boy is to Ireland. And Wales is my ancestral home. I thought as Peter said, “It is very good for us to be in this place.”

Jerusalem, My Happy Home: Part 1

Our feet are within the bounds of Jerusalem.

The trip was long and had a glitch on the front end. But all in all, it was not inordinately arduous – just long. Flying into Tel Aviv, my first impression was that it is green, very green. Immigration, customs, and security at the airport were all low key. I had expected more suspicion and firepower.

We took a cab from the airport to Jerusalem. The taxi driver was Iraqi. Felt like home. He asked where we were from. I said, “Las Vegas” and he turned around to look, impressed. That is always fun in international travel. They’ve all heard of us.

He drove us though the outskirts of Tel Aviv, which looks to be a modern high tech city. We hear the cool young Israelis live here. At first, I thought they sure have a lot of cell phone towers here. Then I realized these really are palm trees.[i]

On through the countryside. Green, verdant, in active agricultural production. We drove into the moonrise, a full moon over green hills. As we came through a canyon we saw the lights of a city on a hill. Isaiah 2.2. It is a small city on a substantial hill, but you certainly get the point. The lights are not our bright colored lights. They are simple white lights shining out over the darkened lowlands.  Matthew 5:15-16 is about letting the light of good works, the witness for justice, shine into a darkened world. Seeing Jerusalem across the valley called that text to mind.

Once we were in the city, the fireworks started. They continued into the night until we fell asleep. It is Purim. We were warmly greeted at the College by Honey, the minister of hospitality, a deacon who hails from New Orleans by way of Hawaii. She fed us left overs from a party earlier today, plied us with wine, and packed us off to our rooms – where we fell into bed and slept the night away.

Our first day began with Eucharist in a small holy dimly lit chapel of St. George’s Cathedral. There were seven in the congregation. I was the lector, and also coached the deacon on how to pronounce phylacteries. Bishop Dawani was there so we met him as well. It was a quiet, sacred Eucharist – my ideal way to worship these days. I already look forward to doing it again tomorrow.

After breakfast, we went to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. It leaves me confused. The overarching feeling is one of holy space. It has a numinous feel like John the Divine in New York only more complex and convoluted in an Orthodox sort of way. But there is the unseemly division of turf with various Christian sects “controlling” this part for a certain time and others controlling other parts for other times. The small-mindedness of trying to control and ration grace is in striking contrast to the feel of mystery in the building itself. But that is precisely what I am here to get a perspective on – the beauty of our faith and its troublesome off-putting shadow.

We stood in line to enter the structure that houses the putative burial place itself. There is something psychologically compelling about going into and out of a place so small. On the one hand, the notion that this is actually the place of the burial is so unlikely that I felt gullible and superstitious to go there at all. (I hope to go to the Garden Tomb – some distance away – which has a better claim to authenticity – but still a highly speculative one). On the other hand, I told myself that this place was rendered holy by the prayers of millions of people who had honored this as the tomb of Christ for hundreds of years. Facts matter less than prayers when it comes to bestowing sacrality.

But I was confused by the prayers too. People were weeping on the way into the tomb – and more were weeping on the way out. I am not even remotely critical of their emotions. But I do wonder what it was about. If they were weeping at the site of the crucifixion, I would have gotten that clearly – but this site commemorates the resurrection. I have known a lot of folks whose religion is so centered on Good Friday that they never make it to Easter. I wondered what was on their hearts and what hope they held for joy.

On the way back to St. George’s, we stopped at a souvenir shop. The owner said to me, “You are a bishop?” (I was not in clericals. I was in fact fairly unkempt.) “Yes, I said, but how did you know.” “I see it in your eyes,” he said. Hmmmm. I must give some thought to that one.

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[i] In Las Vegas, we disguise our cell phone towers as palm trees.