The complications of Jerusalem

The Western Wall with the plaza in front of it
and the Dome of the Rock behind.

Jerusalem is a head trip. No where in Israel have I found the contradictions of this country more pronounced, numerous, and dependent on each other than in the Holy City. I expected the old-versus-new contrast, the traditional versus the modern, the Hasidim, side curls bobbing, texting their kids. But I wasn't prepared for so many complexities.

Even dates aren't straightforward: Jerusalem has been inhabited since about 4000 BCE. BCE = Before the Common Era. It's a non-religious reference that avoids the need to describe dates as being "BC" or "AD." "Before Christ" and "Anno Domini" (the year of our lord) don't have the same pizzazz to non-Christians. The irony, of course, is that either way, you're measuring time from the year that Jesus was born, whether he's lordly to you or not.

See what I mean? Israel is complicated. And this is just a simple complicated thing. Wait till we start talking about people.

OK, so...Jerusalem's been populated for 6000 years, making it one of the oldest cities in the world. According to Wikipedia, "During its long history, Jerusalem has been destroyed twice, besieged 23 times, attacked 52 times, and captured and recaptured 44 times." That amounts to a major plundering of some sort about every 50 years.

Considering this, I shouldn't be surprised to find fistfuls of contradictions here. Some of them are particular to the Old City (which is only a small part of greater Jerusalem, a town of 750,000), and others reflect the larger, sometimes-incongruous reality of Israel, magnified by the intensity of an ancient city that is, in some ways, the Center of Almost Everything.

Jews in front of the Church of the Holy Sepulcre,
which is tended to by Muslim families.

The Old City occupies a mere third of a square mile, but it is perhaps the most religiously significant and politically contested plot of land on Earth. Being the site of the Jewish Temple, Jesus' crucifixion, and Mohammed's ascension to heaven, one might expect the Old City to feel very spiritual. But sometimes the crowds of camera-toting tourists and fast-talking trinket salesmen can make the Old City feel more hokey than holy. A good primer for this sensibility is to enter the Old City through the five-centuries-old Jaffa Gate, most easily accessible by walking the length of a rather unpious, gigantic, glitzy shopping mall (pick up some new tennies at the Adidas store on your way). Once inside, you might head to the Church of the Holy Sepulcre, one of Christianity's holiest places, constructed on the site where Jesus was crucified. The church has been looked after for centuries by a pair of Muslim families, and if you visit at the right time of day, you'll hear the Muslim call to prayer from a speaker just above the steps into the church plaza.

Garments of the three Abrahamic religions,
keffiyeh, talit, and vestments,
hang peacefully side by side in an Old City shop.

It is this incredible mish-mosh of diversity that, for me, defines Israel, especially Jerusalem. Here, the sacred and the profane, the strict and the forgiving, the meaningful and the meaningless all exist side by side, just as every language, religion, desire, motivation, and expectation fill the air, not quite mingling but not quite separate, either.

Ironically (this is all about irony, isn't it?), the many contradictions I've sensed in Israel coalesced for me at the very place I expected to feel the most grounded; at the Western Wall, the holiest site in Judaism, the Big One that any Jew coming to Jerusalem is here to see.

Here's how it went: After a long day of touring the city, my cousin Lynn and I finally arrived in the plaza of the Wall. Crowds of people, many of them Orthodox, were praying there, their faces to the wall, their backs to onlookers. A short distance behind them, in a large and lively ceremony, a new battalion of several hundred Israeli soldiers-in-training were graduating into the armed forces. Army officials spoke to them of their responsibility to keep the nation alive. They got berets, and afterward would receive their weapons.

A new battalion of Israeli soldiers graduate while
behind them Orthodox (and others) pray at the Western Wall.
(click to enlarge photo)

Sort of a poetic scene; Jews in their most Jewish of places, attending to the spiritual heart and the national needs of their homeland at the same time. I confess to feeling kind of moved by it, until I started really thinking about how all the parts of what I was seeing actually fit together.

All Jews in Israel must serve in the armed forces (Christians and Muslims do not)--all Jews except the Orthodox. They're exempt from compulsory military service, and their exemption is defended by arguments that their studies at Yeshiva (study of Jewish texts, which all Orthodox men participate in) are vital to the continued existence of the Jewish people, and so take precedence over military service. Yet it's the military's defense of Israel that assures the Orthodox of a continued place to pray, study, and live freely, without discrimination. 

To complicate things further, the vast majority of the Orthodox don't consider the men and women who defend Israel to be Jews. Many Orthodox view themselves as the real protectors of the state's Jewish character. They tend to keep their lives within their communities, but remain active in the Israeli politics. At the same time, a significant number of them reject the idea of the state of Israel. Why? Two reasons: for some, religious belief dictates that Jews should be given a homeland only by divine, rather than military and political forces. A second reason is that at times Zionism has held Jewish nationalism in higher regard than the Jewish religion. The Orthodox prefer a religious state over a nationalist one. Despite this, many of them receive financial benefits from the state. which do not make them rich, but which allow them to stay in Yeshiva beyond the age at which they would be fit to train for the military.

And, whether the Orthodox agree with it or not, these benefits and the state that provides them are defended by both men and women in a society that is one of the most egalitarian in the world. At the same time, within Orthodox communities, gender roles are strict, and men and women are segregated in prayer and in other venues as well.

A section of the Via Doloroso, the path Jesus
walked as he carried his cross. Most of the Via
runs through the city's Muslim Quarter.

After pondering these contradictions, my vision of "Jews together" morphed into something a lot more confusing: here were bright young people, ready to be sent to the desert and the borders of the country to protect the place they live, including the rights of the people behind them to pray at that Wall. And the people praying practice a lifestyle and maintain a belief system that doesn't recognize these soldiers as members of the same religious group or necessarily consider the state something that should be defended. Despite the crazily incongruous nature of it, the situation seemed as it should be, an illustration of human nature and the complexity of passion.

And in the midst of this mix, I wonder where I fit--not Orthodox, not secular, but a practicing Jew from the United States who thought she'd connect to some identity in the Promised Land but is discovering that it's not as simple as finding some star-of-David-shaped hole to plug myself into.

My head is spinning, and it's a beautiful thing.

All my life, this small place called Jerusalem has had a huge mythology for me. "Next year in Jerusalem!" is what Jews say about their next Seder, their next birthday, their next whatever. This is the shining city on the hill in the Land of Zion, this is the destination of our pilgrimage. And by some magical stroke of events, one small scene made this place much less mystical, and much more human that I ever imagined. More than ever, it is, for me, the Holy City.