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Believe in Her Blessed Oneness, True Everlastingness: Jerusalem
By Yoel Nitzarim
Can you hear the penetrating silence? Notice that I did not say "deafening." One can slice this silence with one word: Jerusalem. The more this one word slices through the Jewish presence here on Earth, the greater it penetrates Jewish memory. No other city in the ancient world as well as the modern world has such a profound depth of spirit as Jerusalem. No other city will ever have the presence of the Almighty hovering over it. G-d's city, Jerusalem, resonates with the voices of the prophets, tries Jews for all time on Mt. Moriah, slumbers in majesty with King David, whispers prayers at the Kotel with Agnon's Tehillah, bustles with Jews to and from work and study and shopping and schmoozing, dreams with its children, sees visions with its adults, and shudders with its every breath in the close proximity to The One Without A Name, the Master of the Universe. The L-rd’s Name Is One Forever! Listen! S-h-h-h-h….
Shema! In this city Jerusalem the words of the Shema Israel are almost imperceptibly uttered, yet their very essence spreads the world over. The heavens hear these infinite pleas, these piercing entreaties, these commanding proclamations of the One G-d! Every Jewish soul in Israel, in the Diaspora, in the past,in the present, and in the future--enters this world with these words on his or her lips and exits this world with this magnificent exclamation. Listen O Israel to the penetrating silence. Hear the glory and the majestic exultation of your regal city. Listen!
Look for the living G-d in Jerusalem. Look for all the prayers and yearning for a Jerusalem of Peace. Now listen to the beguiling words of those who would taint the truth Jerusalem calls out to her Jewish, Christian, and Muslim children - but especially her Jewish children. David paid for Jerusalem. Yes, he paid a Jebusite hard cash after the king conquered this great city and made it the City of the One G-d. For more than three thousand years Jews have lived in her domain and made it their holy city. Jews have faced her while they have prayed toward her from the four corners of the world. She contains the Temple Mount and the Holy of Holies. When Jews kiss the holy Torah, they also kiss the very white stones of Jerusalem; for her soul is the Word of G-d and her presence is eternal, like the Word of G-d. For every Jew, Jerusalem is made of gold; yes, she is the golden rule, the Ten Commandments--a gift of sunshine bursting through the darkness of evil, the blackness of human cruelty, the opaque state of ignorance. Jerusalem relentlessly provides the flame in the Jewish soul lit with the faith of the Jewish soul and the hope of the Jewish spirit.
Hear these words: Jerusalem must never be divided again! Jerusalem be remain one as her very perimeters enclose more than human destiny, more than human comprehension, and certainly more than just earthly soul. We Jews - all of us wherever we live on this planet - must again resolve with our illustrious ancestors to grasp the mundane Jerusalem and the ethereal Jerusalem from this day forth and forevermore. Let us prove the words true: we are the people Israel who bear the everlasting covenant our one G-d has bestowed upon us: by the outspoken words of our faithful mouths will we ensure Jerusalem's tutelage in our hands from strength to strength. Listen: Our ancestors’ grand wandering in the Sinai tested us — those Jews of the twenty-first century — to believe, to know that The L-rd is One, and His capital city is The City of David, Jerusalem, the indivisible, perpetual space of G-d’s presence here on earth, the Everlasting Gift of the Almighty to his children, the people of Israel. Selah!
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from the May 2008 Edition of the Jewish Magazine
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