Friends,
“Every question we ask reshapes the world just a little. In asking, we’re already beginning to heal the brokenness we see.”
Rabbi Rachel Barenblat
Last night I sat on the ground, among a few hundred other people of all ages, in the courtyard of the former Leper Colony of Jerusalem, converted in recent years into a beautiful, bustling and hip artistic culinary center.
But none of the restaurants or galleries were open last night. We sat under the hot summer sky, singing along to the public recitation of a 2,500 year old poem of lamentation, weeping for pains long past and the lingering losses that now impact millions of us on this holy land and way beyond. We wept for so many personal and public pains. We paused to ask tough questions that echo in the first word of this biblical scroll - ‘How is this possible?’
Chanting a litany of loss over a city in ruins - while sitting in that very city that has risen from the ashes is remarkable experience that helps one appreciate the arc of history, longevity of memory and the glimpse of some reality so much greater than what we think we know or understand.
It is also heartbreaking.
How has our long list of intergenerational traumas not taught us to be wiser, kinder, more just and loving towards each other and the others with whom we share land, live, love and loss? Why can’t we learn from the past to co-create safer presence and more hopeful futures?
Is the repeated practice of the rituals of grief on this day of sorrow, seared into our collective memory, meant as a measure that reinvokes our trauma so that we hold on to the ancestral grief - or teach us to prevent such traumas and destructions from slowly dismantling this miracle of homecoming - again?
It’s always both/and.
As we on this year-long course dedicate time to reflect on the original schism of our nation - how the kingdoms of Judah and Israel were born divided and our national narratives hold distinctly different directions critical for our continued survival - this pause on the calendar of business as usual offers important time for reflection, a sigh, and perhaps a conversation.
Where does it hurt?
Why did we get here?
What can we each do to help heal?
How is hope alive for you?
To help with this process of reflection - whether you are fasting today or not - I invite you to read some of the previous posts from Below the Bible Belt - with focus on two of the five chapters of Eycha - Lamentations.
Maybe there is hope, wrote the author of Eycha, the alphabet of our sorrows.
Yes, I say today, from Jerusalem - step by step, hand in hand, heart to heart.
May we be consoled and take part in the healing, for justice and peace.
Amichai
READ:
MAYBE THERE IS HOPE? Reading Lamentations 3
Maybe There is Hope?
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“To recite Eicha is to carry the past forward, but what do we do with its message of devastation? Can we transform lament into action, or do we remain forever exiled in its verses?”
Read:
hHowl! And other Lamentations .Reading Lamentations 1
Howl and Other Lamentations
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Take a deep breath. These next five chapters of poetic laments are going to hurt. That is their purpose. How else can we feel - and heal?