There is Nothing to See

I recently spent a week in Jerusalem, thanks to M2 who brought me out to do some consulting.  Their offices are located in the southern part of the city, which is the part I know best.  So in between working, visiting friends and exploring old haunts, the week flew by and I realized that I hadn’t even seen the walls of the Old City.

I have a complicated relationship with the Old City of Jerusalem.  It is a complicated place.  But I suddenly felt a great yearning just to see those light-filled stones.  So early on my last morning, I set out.

On the way I “happened to” meet a beloved teacher, Melila Hellner.  “Oh,” she said, “I know the best place.  Go through the First Station, out the main door, just behind the bus stop.  From there you can take a big step up and then there are steps up Bible Hill.  You have the best view from there – and the squill is in bloom.”

So up I went, through the old train station that is now an outdoor meeting place filled with shops and cafés, scrambled up the hill and saw the fields of the squill, the tall lily-like flowers that herald the end of summer.  And there beyond, was the whole southwestern side of the Old City, from Mt. Zion up to the Jaffe Gate, soft in the morning light.

Of course, I couldn’t see the holiest sites, the Wall, the Church, the Mosque, hidden in the heart of the city.  But then I considered, even if it had been two thousand years ago and the Temple stood, I would not have been able to see into the Holy of Holies.  And even if I were the High Priest, the only one allowed to go into the Holy of Holies, the essence of that extraordinary spot was still hidden.  There was nothing to see. 

There is nothing to see.  And yet, there was something marvelous about seeing what hides the heart of it all, all the layers and coverings.  In my mind, I zoomed back out: from the hidden essence to the Temple that is no longer there, to the walls of the Old City, to the neighborhoods of Jerusalem, all the way back to my apartment in New York City where I face that hidden essence when I pray.  All those holy garments, playing hide and seek.

There was one more piece.  On the way back to the hotel in southern Jerusalem, I passed two lovely young Muslim women coming up towards the station.  They said, “Good morning” (in English) to me just as I said “Sabah alkheyr” to them.  We smiled warmly at each other. 

But as I continued, I knew that a sweet moment of encounter was just a moment and that the human reality is also so very layered with so much hidden.  I saw here too all that hides the heart of it all and it felt so holy that tears came.

We are almost at Rosh Hashanah, when we will recite Psalm 81:4: “Sound the shofar at the new moon, in hiddenness on the day of our festival.”   The year begins with the new moon, hidden in the evening sky.  The future lies hidden before us; who knows what it will bring? 

May those of us who seek a better world, a deeper connection, greater insight, come to see the sacredness of all that hides as well as all that reveals.  Shanah tovah umetukah!  Wishing you a very good and sweet year.