O'er the ramparts

Wednesday afternoon Jessica and I went into the Old City. We had decided to go on the Ramparts Walk, a walkway along the ramparts on the top of the Old City walls. On the walk you can look down into the Old City from above, or peer out into the new city on your other side. It was one of the more unique ways I have been around the city during my stay.

look how happy and smiley I am to have my picture taken

the lovely lady I brought with me

off we go!

company was a bit scarce on the ramparts

Jerusalem's sky smogline

Sundown Wednesday through sundown Thursday was Tisha B'Av, the commemoration of the destruction of both the first and second temples in Jerusalem. After spending the day in the Old City, in the evening we returned to the Kotel Masorti for Tisha B'Av services.

Several groups all met at the Kotel Masorti for Ma’ariv services and the reading of Aicha the book of lamentations (as apposed to our trip during the first session, when the yeshiva was the only group there). For me, even at the site where the bricks still lay after the Roman’s destroyed the second Temple nearly 2000 years ago, I found the service to be strangely unmoving. Much of it may have been do to the circumstances.

A tour guide from one of the others groups was the master of ceremonies. He spoke only in Hebrew, through one of the tour guide personal speaker systems – which of course was blown; it oscillated between garbled static and feedback. One of the other groups was a Russian-speaking contingent, which was either from or had just visited Natanya. Their Rabbi got up and addressed everyone in Russian. The chanting of Aicha was no better. The fanny pack speaker was used by each of the readers, rendering every chanted word unintelligible.

While the service itself was less than meaningful, thinking back on the occasion is intriguing. There we were, at the site of the 2000-year-old evidence of the destruction of the Temple, the place that was the epicenter of Jewish life and ritual for our ancestors. We mourned for the destruction of Jerusalem and the decimation of the Jewish people, even as we stood there in Jerusalem, the heart of the modern Jewish State of Israel.

Reflecting on all of the times in our history we have been massacred or expelled, it sometimes amazes me that we are still here. We have had every reason and every opportunity to disappear entirely, like so many other civilizations and cultures throughout history, but here we are. Thinking about that, much more so than the service, can be powerful indeed.