Amish folks claim that Jews have made two great historic mistakes:
that we left the idyllic countryside for the polluted cities.
At least we could make up for this seven-plus days a year, provided there was no rain, by living in booths,
as we were commanded in Tora(h), to re-experience the dwelling we had during our forty-year journey
through the desert after the flight from Egypt.
The name of the Sukot holiday means 'booths', which is the feminine plural form of the singular *suka*.
This brief post-holiday report has been arranged chronologically, based on how I spent this first day of Sukot 5761 A.M (2000 CE). It was indeed a very laborious day of rest: so full of refreshing learning. Even though my day of joint Shabat-Sukot rest was very active and cognitively diverse, I had a chance to speak as usual, more or less, 10 languages: in this chronological order: Hebrew, Aramaic, Yiddish, Italian, English, Russian, Arabic, Persian, Rumanian, Italian; read also Ukrainian, Spanish, Greek, (Korean), Slovak or Czech. Despite the festive day my soul light has been dimmed with the events of last Thursday. Although, the Jewish tradition frowns upon the feeling of sadness on Shabat, yet for me, as an existential poet and full-time observer of the Art of Life, a profound grief can function as spiritual catharsis [Classical Greek: 'cleansing'] or deeper emotio-intellectual insight into the essence of being modified as (plus Animate) & (plus Human) and (plus Alive or minus Dead) part of familia humana has.
The Thursday event was the lynch of two local soldiers. It does not matter to me whether they were Jewish or Palestinian, white or black, my friends or unknown to me. What matters for me here is I cannot stand any cruelty whatsoever, no matter what its ethnic or religious or political modifier is. I am a Jewish person who first of all like any one on this earth is a human being and, thus, does not want to discriminate against any other human beings, for we are all one six-billion plus human family. BTW, does anybody know how many human beings, and Jewish subfamily of them, have existed so far throughout all the world history?
To worship my L-o-r-d on Sukot 5761 I went to the Italian Synagogue, which is a most favourite venue for my communication with The Almighty and Omnipresent Grand Architect of the World. At the Italian Synagogue met the Deputy Mayor of Jerusalem, Mr David Cassuto, who is one of its main important and learned characters. Had my kidush (Hebrew: 'evening and morning prayer on wine, grape juice, bread, or vodka sanctifying the Sabbath or other Jewish non-half-holidays') and meal in the adjacent Italian Suka. Regrettably, the synagogue's surrounding was spiritually and visually contaminated with big blood-red Satanic-like graffiti of last week.
'Cause of the light rain (whose first occurence in the City of Peace was several days ago) could not
make it to the Old City before sunset and stayed at the Green Line, opposite the Sheikh Jarrah Arab neighbourhood, with my friend Harun discussing the current MidEast politics, which is, BTW, a frequent hobby of many U.S.-born Rabbinical students with an academic background.
While living in Jerusalem you have a chance to hear Xian bells and Muslim muezzin calls for prayers a lot. These are your daily non-Jewish clocks that, non-/paradoxically, can keep you living up to your own pace of Jewish walk of life batter and better. Actually, we are all interconnected in this shrinking world.
And after the prayer there was a meal. The all-and-always-welcome Shabat home of Rabbi Mordechai & Henny Machlis plus their Wonderful Children and Relatives gave all our several dozen hungry Souls a lot of choice food for flesh and thought. There we could learn from the Rabbi's mouth a lot. We had an honour of being shared the Rabbinical wisdom about the Lubavitcher Rebbe. The Rebbe had taught the direct proximity of the fancy etrog fruit and the simple willow branch of the lulav, that the Jewish men ritually wave during the holiday, symbolizes the necessity of all kinds of Jewish people to unite, to meet together at the Shabat table for instance, for all Jews are co-responsible for each other. Each has got a unique task in life.
At the Shabat-Sukot table I shared a piece of the Talmudical hohme (Yiddish: 'wisdom') my own Rabbi taught me several years ago. This I savoured with my post-Modernist interpretation. The subject matter was the etrog, which is a sweet-smelling citrus fruit resembling lemon. The Marxist point of view says, 'From everybody according to his ability to everybody according to his needs'. Also, according to the Talmud, when due to the much higher demand for etrog than its actual supply the price is speculated very high, such an etrog is no longer kosher for this etrog cannot be aquired by an unwealthy Jew. And even though, he is so poor he cannot
buy a cheap one eitherl, yet he can fulfil the *mitsvat netilat lulav* (Hebrew: 'commandment of waving the four species, i.e. palm leaf, myrtle leaf, willow leaf, and etrog fruit') by receiving lulav as a gift. For according to the Jewish Law, which is usually very complex, casuistic, and precedent-like, on the first day of the Sukot holiday which does not fall on Shabat only one's own four species are valid for the performance of the mitsva(h) and the borrowed ones. Since this year first day of Sukot falls on Shabat, the etrog and lulav are to be waved the following day.
After the meal I visited a near-by yeshiva(h). A friend of mine over there , Tal Zimm, who is a keen local biker, made it possible for me to read a letter sent to him by a U.S. Senator. The letter was about the Israe-li-Palestinian Peace Process, which was a response to Tal's Jewish sociopolitical activism.
The holiday of Sukot proper is only one-day-long for the Israe-li Jews, but not so for the world Diasporal Jewish majority (excluding some expatriate Israe-li Jews). The latter observe it for two days.
The following days are semi-holidays, on which work is permitted. So I finished my holiday about
5:50 p.m. on Saturday.
After the Shabat was over (this year the first day of the Sukkot holiday fell on it), went to my friend's home and watched some live CNN and Skyline news. Also checked some current press at the Vatican-owned Notre Dame Centre to up-grade my brain CD.
Soon after got to know the International Xian Embassy of Jerusalem is just starting an annual seven-day-long Sukkot conference in Jerusalem's top conference venue: International Convention Centre. Wow! Must have been lots of funds put into the very rental of such a luxurious place! Actually, nowadays, quite a number of Protestant groups observe some Jewish holidays in their more or less own way; e.g., the Worldwide Church of G-o-d, founded a few decades ago in Philadelphia, PA, presided by the late Herbert Armstrong and his son.
Met Ed and discussed Xian-Islamic-Jewish the-ology with him. What I like about it is we are of
different religions; yet, still can learn from each other and enrichen knowledge and observance of our own respective faiths. Think...
Got hold of an Arabic-language translation of the Bible, which is going to be my other new tool,
although not that original as the Qur'an or Arab poetry originals, to study the beautfiul language of Arabia.
A sweet boy named Yoe-l, aged about 5 or 7, wanted me to play gym with him at my friend's. So, I helped him practise some acrobatic numbers. Soon we became friends for good. How much would I like to be a child again. So sweet, so innocent, so naively happy.
Saw some original books on the shelves there. Must tell you I am a keen bibilophile and love to read or watch any books in any languages on any issue, those openly against me included, for I believe in the main principle about the words: freedom of speech and ability of the truth to defend by herself. My attention focused on a controversial book by A. Koestler ('The Thirteenth Tribe'), as well as another on the non-Jewish Sabbatharians, and comparative Islamic-Xian manual.
After I had left, all of a sudden --I love suprises and life improvisational timetable a' la Arab *'insha 'Al-lah* or Hispanic *man^ana*-- I met in a street my friend Moshe, who, last Tuesday had earned another degree in the Life Wisdom, this time HD, Doctor of Happiness or Happy Father, when his Little Daughter was born to him by his Wonderful Wife Tamar on that day at 6:00 p.m. local holy Jerusalem time.
Then proceded to the Old City. Once entered its Xian Quarter saw some Arabic-language graffiti. So, decided to decypher it to enhance my dormant Arabic. The graffti read /h.arkat fatah./, which means more or less 'Fatah fight'. As you know the word /fatah./ is the Arabic abbreviation for the Palestine Liberation Movement (apparently, not identical with the PLO, as there are also other factions in it ). The Arabic phonetics lesson on the spot and free-of-charge was given to me by a local Palestinian youth; with whom I also discussed possibilities to study Arabic intesely at the special language programme for foreigners at the Bir-Zeit University in the West Bank (P.A.).
Right afterwards met by a Providential chance the youth Fabbricio of Calabria and Switzerland's Italian-speaking canton in the Old City's Xian Quarter. Then we had a nice European-style about 45-minute- long (or maybe 45-min-short) Italian-language discourse on Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Bible.
Then, about 11:45 p.m. on the way to the bus station (not to miss the last midnight one) saw about 12 Russian-Orthodox monks and nuns going fast from the direction of the Russian Compound to the Old City's New Gate. No. 12 reminiscent of Jayce's (not Joyce!) Twelve Apostles at the Last Supper; cf. the famous painting 'L'ultima cena' by Leonardo da Vinci. I guess it might have been some midnight pre-Sunday service at the Sepulchre Church, and not a walk to a Russ-Ortho church therein. Such one does not seem to exist, unlike the conspicuous presence of Greek-Orthodox church institutions wall-marked with the Greek script
Noticed in the passing police vans, sneaking out in the well-lit darkness of The City of Peace, a metal grids over their front windows. Apparently, a *signum tempori* (Latin: 'sign of time', 'symptom') of what is going on in the P.A. now.
To sum up, over the day met many friends in the street, as usual, for Jerusalem is not that big a city, considering majority of its cultural and religious events are focused in a relatively small night-ultra-safe (but not ultra-Ortho) central part, unlike the daytime-dangerous Central Park of N.Y.
Besides friends, on the way back home did I encountered different sizes and styles and architectural tastes of sukot built up just before or as early as some two weeks before the onset of the holyday.
I would love to write much more about those 24 plus hours but promised myself to finally cut my articles shorter to make the journalist deadlines and this way keep you, Friend, more up-to-date about what is going on in The City of Peace, especially so under the fast developing present political situation here. Besides, I would like to write one-point-focus reports proper rather than multifarous books, with a labyrinth of semantic puns inside them. Editor's Note see Moni Di MonteBianco's ebook "Forced from the Garden"
Let me hope this report was not too chaotic or boring for you, Our Every and Each Dear Reader: as
we cover the ACTUAL Jerusalem: not as it should be or it was, but just as it IS *hic et hoc* (Latin: 'now and here'): without any colouring, embellishing, or covering up blunt facts to justify one's own theories. Besides, in particular, I would like to focus on the small detail, that is usually marginalized in the factual big-format reports of many regular media. Those media primarly look for only those things that raise the adrenaline level in our veins. My question is why not to create a symmetrical alternative and to look only inter alia for such events that would lower that long-term unhealthy blood component.
ACTUALLY, the ACT-U-ALL JEW-R-U-SALEM wants to promote SALEM (?Aramaic; cf. SELL-'EM 'sell them [peace for free]') aka SALAM (Arabic; cf. SAL[AT]-AM 'prayer of a nation') alias SALOM (Persian; cf. [POETRY] S[L]ALOM 'fancy Persian poetry divan [= verse collection]') or SHALOM (Hebrew; [YE] SHALL-OM 'everybody is going to chant the mantras of His Beautiful Names to the All-Attractive G-o-d' ) in its postings: to show how much upper-case Peace and Love you can still discover in the Middle Eastern ethno-religious and political turmoil.
This is paragraph number twenty-six: hightime to finish. Actually, a very nice religious gematria
(Hebrew: numerical value of the word) as 26 is the sum of the The Four Letters of G-o-d's Name in Hebrew,
aka Tetragrammaton: Yud (10) Hey (5) be-Vav (6) Hey (5). And my suggested today's homework for you sounds very simple: you choose what you would like to see in the Actual Jerusalem stories. It is your own
free-of -charge Internet magazine and our choice of topics presented is heavily dependent on your personal
choices as our task is to serve you as best as possible, Our Dear virtual and/or real Visitor to Jerusalem
the City of Peace Everlasting....... AMEN.......
