Just this past Friday night we had a wonderful group of Young Professionals from the Essex area over for Shabbat dinner and I noticed that Stephen, a budding biophysicist was a bit distracted. When questioned as to the source of his distraction he pointed at a painting above our couch and replied, "Every time I come here I cannot stop staring at that beautiful painting".
I explained to him that the painting he was so enthralled by was painted by my amazing mother in law. It depicted Jerusalem during the second Temple era on the day before Passover as the Jews would trek from all over to visit Jerusalem and bring the Paschal offering on one of the three yearly pilgrimages, the other two being the Holidays of Shavuot and Sukkot.
Going up to the Temple was a central aspect of Jewish life and still holds relevance to us now. When the Jewish people were traveling for forty years in the desert there was one campsite. Although each tribe had its own defined area, a feeling of unity was felt and it was one massive encampment of the Jewish people. Once the transition was made to the Land of Israel, the Jewish people tended to remain within their respective tribes territory and there was a danger of a us versus them mentality developing. However, G-d required a Holy neutral ground, a central location. The Holy Temple served as an antidote to any extreme tribalism. G-d gave mitzvot which could only be carried out at the Temple, foods which could only be eaten in Jerusalem and the entire nation was to visit three times a year.
This engendered a feeling of unity and helped keep the Jewish people together.
An interesting historical titbit, is that when the Jewish nation broke into two kingdoms, the first decree of the evil king Jeroboam of the northern kingdom was to ban the pilgrimage to Jerusalem which was in the kingdom of Judah so as to quash any feelings of kinship with the rest of the Jewish people.
When we lived in Israel, we had a picture for a window. Not a literal physical picture instead of a window pane but rather a view that was so beautiful in our eyes that we could just gaze for hours at the beauty of a Jerusalem that is nearly rebuilt. Nearly, as it is still missing its crowning jewel, the Temple.
Continuing my conversation with Stephen it was mentioned that a request had been made of the artist to make the same exact picture but to substitute the people in 2000 year old dress, with pumped up kicks instead of sandals, with Ipod speakers instead of trumpets, with people riding on segways instead of camels. A painting filled with the Jewish Jerusalem of today – Ashkenazi, Sephardi, Yemenite, Ethiopian, Indian, English, Russian and so much more. A painting which shows how the Jewish people of today still embrace the centrality of Jerusalem as part of our national fabric and indeed of our very own selves.
I dream of the day when my picture window in Jerusalem will match that new painting and that the unity of the Jewish people united in our homeland will be a dream no longer.
This year in Jerusalem.
Amen
