Today marked the fifth day of our Pilgrimage in the Holy Land. This is hard to believe for me because of the sheer volume of ground we’ve covered, the number of beautiful people we’ve met, and the overall amount of learning that’s been done. A lot of that learning has been done with heavy hearts as we have continued to dive deeper into the struggle the occupation is forcing upon the Palestinian people. And so today, after a particularly heavy day yesterday in Hebron, I think we were all a little relieved to hop in the bus and head to the Old City of Jerusalem and play good old fashioned tourists.
We had the pleasure of experiencing many historical and cultural monuments – from visiting the Wailing Wall to going to the Garden of Gethsemane. Certain experiences are hard to put into words; I would categorize the feeling that one gets when walking into a 1,300 year old Mosque as one of them.
Entering the Al Aqsa Mosque was a spiritual experience for me – and one that I didn’t necessarily expect. Born Jewish and raised Methodist, I have no lack of reverence for religions that are not my own. And yet it wasn’t until visiting the Church of the Holy Sepulchre – at the site of the burial place of Jesus – that I understood the spiritual nature of my feelings.
To paint my picture I’m going to fast forward a few hours to our meeting with Dalia Landau. Dalia Landau is an Israeli Jew whose story is outlined in the book The Lemon Tree, a book about how the home of an exiled Palestinian family – and the lemon tree they planted there – brought together the youngest son of the Palestinian family, Bashir, and the daughter of the new Jewish residents, Dalia. When talking to us, Dalia said more wonderfully insightful things than I would dare try to paraphrase; one of these things was the importance of being spiritual in your religion.
This was the difference, for me, between my experience at Al Aqsa Mosque (and the Dome of the Rock – a visually stunning piece of architecture) and The Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The Mosques, had no crowds of people taking pictures (except for us #AmericanTourists), there were no lines of people waiting in line to see the third most holy place in the Muslim religion, to see holy pillars and blessed stones; no, at the Mosques there was prayer. People came to talk to G-d, to find peace within themselves.
The church was quite the opposite experience. Everyone waited in line to take a picture of a holy monument and continued on to the next. As a place of artistic expression, the churches were absolutely stunning, but there was a void. There was an utter lack of praise or worship. What is a Church without these things? Can a church be a false idol in itself? These were the questions I pondered as a dodged out of the way of a photograph I knew would be taken home as evidence of the profound religious experience that didn’t seem to be happening.
I left the church a little frustrated with the madness of it all, and wishing we’d have been able to spend more time in the Mosque. Sitting in the Church of All Nations later in the afternoon, where there were no tour guides allowed to preach, it occurred to me that the grandiose exterior- the physical beauty – was attracting so many, and, like a bug to a bright light, we are drawn in – but to what effect?
It’s a little funny what can happen when we focus more on the spiritual than the religious – when we sacrifice our ego, our perceptions of sanctity, our desire for what we want, or what we think we deserve. It’s funny what can happen when we set idolatrous religion aside and look within ourselves. Take it from a Jewish Christian who found peace in a Muslim Mosque. Sometimes when you take a moment to forget all that and just talk to G-d, he just might talk back. And he might bring a sliver of peace with him.
Salaam/Shalom/ Peace be with you.
-Daniel Duquette
PS. I could have talked about Dalia for ages; I’d recommend checking out her website and letting that speak in ways brevity wouldn’t allow me.