Rockets and missiles. Ground troops and guerilla fighters. Women and children. Dead and wounded. Hatred and revenge. Jew and Muslim. Walls and razor wire. Oppression and freedom. Oppressor and opressed. East and West.
The problem is these are not polar opposites; they are mirror images. They represent vicious circles of violence, grievance, vengeance; of trauma, fear and lost trust; of memory, hatred and outrage; of Gaza, Israel and history; of Jew, Muslim and Christian.
During the renewed conflicts between Israel and Gaza I;ve been reading Yopssi Klein Halevi's book, At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden. A Jew's Search for God with Christians and Muslims in the Holy Land. This is a deep book, with revolutionary possibilities in the service of peace.
"There is nothing diaphonous or ethereal about the striving toward God. It is all about the striving for an end to the bloodshed in one holy, tortured corner of Earth".
This book is written by a Jewish soldier turned journalist turned spiritual seeker for peace amongst the three monotheistic faiths. This isn't a book about inter-religious dialogue for the sake of it; this is an account of how hope is hard won, tough minded, but in the end adamantine in its persistence, because hope is one of the essential persepctives of human being and humane living.
Here are some sentences from the end of this remarkable eirenicon.
More than ever, the goal of the spiritual life in the Holy Land is to live with an open heart at the centre of unbearable tension. Still, I regularly disappoint myself, unable to exorcise, except for brief interludes, the jinns of fear and rage…
The one enduring transformation that I carry with me from my journey is that I learned to venerate – to love Christianity and Islam. I learned to feel at home in a church, even on Good Friday, and in a Mosque, even in Nuseirat. The cross and the minaret have become for me cherished symbols of God's presence, reminders that he speaks to us in multiple languages – that he speaks to us at all.
Then, he takes his children to the church of the Holy Sepulchre, this Jewish soldier journalist who has spent months learning new language and discourse with those of other opposing faiths, and who has come to see that these faiths are not irredeemably hostile, but are different languages of faith and faithfulness to God,
This Jewish soldier finishes his book with these words, as he stands in the historic centre of Christian faith in the incarnate God in Christ:
I am suddenly aware of the muezzin , summoning me from the next hill. I get on my knees, press my forehead to the floor, immobile with surrender."
Not since reading Kenneth Cragg's The Call of the Minaret have I read a book of such deep understanding which has grown out of humility, courage and hopefulness. Courage to reach out seeking the other without fear, humility to listen to new visions and unlearn old prejudices, and hopefulness as goodwill and humane openness of heart and hand. And at heart a determined peacableness which sees those of other faiths, not as enemies, but friends, not as aliens but as neighbours, not as strangers but as family – "For this reason I kneel before the father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name.
Pray for the peace of Jerusalem – and Gaza.
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