Connecting the Land and the Book: the Omer and Ethics of the Fathers

A table for counting the Omer

In ancient Israel the first sheaf of the barley harvest was cut on the second day of the Passover festival and a measure of the grain, an “omer”, was taken to the Temple as an offering.   From this date Jews count the seven weeks that lead up to the festival of Shavuot -“the Feast of Weeks”.

“You shall count for yourselves, from the day after the Sabbath, from the day when you bring the Omer as a wave offering, seven complete weeks.  To the day after the seventh week you shall count fifty days ...” Leviticus 23, 15

During these early summer weeks between Passover and Shavuot it is the custom to study the six chapters of Pirke Avot, the Ethics of the Fathers, one chapter each Shabbat.  Ashkenazim continue to study these chapters of the Mishna until the Shabbat before Rosh Hashanah.

Pirke Avot opens by tracing the line of transmission of the Oral Law from Moses via the Prophets, who received their inspiration directly from G-d, to the Sages, the Rabbis and teachers who discussed and expounded the Law on the basis of texts and the oral tradition which they received from their predecessors.

“Moses received the Torah at Sinai and handed it on to Joshua; Joshua to the elders; the elders to the prophets; and the prophets handed it on to the men of the Great Assembly. ...” Pirkei Avot 1,1

Shimon HaTzadik was the last of the men of the Great Assembly.  From him the tradition was passed on to a man called Antigonos from Socho.

“Antigonos of Socoh received from Shimon HaTzadik.  He used to say: Do not be like servants who serve their master on condition of receiving a reward, but be like servants who serve their master not on condition of receiving a reward; and let the fear of Heaven be upon you.” Pirkei Avot 1,3

Socoh


Across the Elah Vally towards Sochoh. Photo: Ram Eisenberg

Tel Socoh lies in the Shefela, the low hill country of Israel, in the Elah Valley near Azekah.  In

ancient times this was the border area between Israelite and Philistine held territory.  Socoh is mentioned four times in the Bible.  It was part of the inheritance of the tribe of Judah, fortified by King Solomon’s son Reheboam and later captured by the Philistines.  Most famously it appears in the dramatic story of David and Goliath. 

“The Philistines assembled their forces for battle; they massed at Socoh of Judah, and encamped at Ephes-dammim, between Socoh and Azekah.  Saul and the men of Israel massed and encamped in the valley of Elah.” 1 Samuel 17,1

The rest of the story is well known.  The Philistines send out a champion, the huge Goliath of Gath, to challenge the Israelites to single combat.  No-one dares to take up the challenge until the young David, who has been sent from Bethlehem to bring supplies for his brothers in Saul’s army, accepts.  Goliath is scornful but David, armed only with his faith in G-d and his sling and a bag of stones, kills him with a single sling-shot.

A lemelech seal

More than 300 years later, in 701 BCE, the Assyrians under the leadership of Sennacherib attacked the cities of Judah and besieged Jerusalem.  Amongst the archaeological finds from this time are more than 2,000 seal impressions on the handles of large storage jars, known as Lemelech stamps because of the Hebrew letters למלך (LMLK) found on them.  LMLK means “for, or belonging to the king”.  One theory is that these jars contained emergency military rations collected in anticipation of the Assyrian siege.  As well as the letters LMLK each of the seal impressions included the name of one of four towns; Hebron, Ziph, MMST and Socoh.   We don’t know all the details but we do know that Antigonos’ home town of Socoh must have been a place of some significance.  Last year, for the first time, a team from Tel Aviv University carried out excavations at Socho hoping to learn more about the part Socho played in the administration and economy of Judah.  



Spring on Givat Haturmusim

Nowadays Tel Socoh is most popularly known as Givat Haturmusim, Lupin Hill.  It is a glorious place to walk and to picnic especially in the early spring when there is a brilliant display of wild flowers. 

From Antigonos the tradition was passed through five pairs of rabbinic teachers who lived in successive generations during the time of the Second Temple.   Each of these rabbis offers us ethical advice.  The second of these pairs of sages were Yehoshua ben Perahya and Nittai the Arbelite.

“Yehoshua ben Perahya and Nittai the Arbelite received from them. ... Nittai the Arbelite used to say: Keep far from a bad neighbour, do not associate with a bad person, and do not despair of Divine retribution.” Pirkei Avot 1, 6-7 

The Arbel 

Ruins of the Arbel synagogue. Photo: Bukvoed

The rocky cliff of Mount Arbel rises for 380 metres and looks down from the west over the Sea of Galilee.  Just south of the cliff lie the remains of the Talmudic village where Nittai lived and of its synagogue.  Modern Moshav Arbel is nearby. 

In the year 38 BCE Mount Arbel was the site of a spectacular battle between Herod the Great and Jewish rebels.  Herod had returned from Rome where he had been proclaimed King of the Jews.  Now, to take control of his kingdom, he had to defeat the Hasmonean Matathias Antigonos and his Parthian and Jewish supporters.  The last rebels still in the Galilee had barricaded themselves in caves in the almost vertical face of Mount Arbel.   The approach to these caves was so steep and dangerous that at first Herod was confounded.  He embarked on a creative and daring plan. 

“He lowered the strongest of his soldiers in cradles down the side of the cliff until they reached the mouths of the caves; they then slaughtered the bandits with their families and threw firebrands at those who proved awkward.” Josephus, The Jewish War 1, 315



Arbel Cliff. Photo: Lior Golgher

Herod was not known for his mercy but Josephus records that he tried to save some of the rebels offering them the chance to surrender.  They fought to the death rather give themselves into his hands.  One old man expressing contempt for Herod killed his own wife and seven children before throwing himself over the precipice.

Today the Arbel National Park and Nature Reserve offers wonderful landscapes, rare and beautiful
flora and fauna, spectacular views and a glimpse into the history of the Land.

Kaiser Wilhelm II, Vincent van Gogh and Herod the Great: Exhibitions of Genius and Madness

For 2,000 years it has been thought that there is a connection between genius and mental illness.  Seneca, the 1st century Roman philosopher, wrote “There is no great genius without some touch of madness”.   Does the evidence support the idea?  The jury is still out but, even if geniuses are more prone to mental illness than the rest of us, to have psychological problems is no guarantee of genius.

There are three outstanding exhibitions showing in Israel at the moment - two in Jerusalem and one in Tel Aviv.  Each focuses on an individual who was important and influential in his own way despite psychological problems and episodes of mental illness.  Two achieved greatness.  One led his country and the world to disaster.

The Kaiser is Coming!

Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1905

Kaiser Wilhelm II was the last German Emperor.  Wilhelm was undoubtedly intelligent but he was also insecure, bombastic, autocratic and prone to bouts of depression and hysteria.  He was quite unfit to be a ruler.  In 1898 he visited Jerusalem.  His aim was to cement relationships between the German and Ottoman empires. 
 
The Turks were as determined to honour their imperial guest as he was to strengthen his relationship with them.  He was welcomed with great pomp and ceremony.  Three great decorated arches were set up along his route to the Old City.  The section of the city wall between the Jaffa Gate and the Citadel was torn down and the moat filled in to allow his entourage, complete with horses and carriages, to pass through.  Beggars and stray dogs were banished from the city lest they give a bad impression. 

Wilhelm's Entourage by the Sultan's Arch

Wilhelm saw himself as the patron of the Protestant church and wanted to leave a religious and architectural legacy of his visit to the Holy City.  During his visit he dedicated the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in the Old City, acquired the land for the Augusta Victoria Hospice on the Mount of Olives and, in a gesture to German Catholics, laid the cornerstone of the Dormition Abbey on Mount Zion. 



Wilhelm's Tent Camp Jerusalem

On November 2nd Wilhelm formally received Theodore Herzl in the elaborate tent camp that had been set up for him in Jerusalem.  Herzl had timed his visit to coincide with that of the Kaiser and hoped to enlist his support for the Zionist cause.  The brief encounter left Herzl deeply disappointed.

Wilhelm’s erratic and reckless foreign policy led to the carnage of the First World War and the downfall of his empire.  He died in exile in the Netherlands in 1941.

There was huge press interest in the Kaiser's visit.  An exhibition in Jerusalem's Tower of David cleverly combines 21st century technology and contemporary reports and photographs to bring this encounter between European and Levantine empires to life and to explore its impact on the city.

“The Kaiser is Coming!” is at the Tower of David in Jerusalem until April 6th 2013.
 

Van Gogh Alive

Van Gogh - The Potato Eaters

In his own lifetime Vincent van Gogh’s work was not fully appreciated.  Today however he is considered one of the greatest artists in history.  He was born in the Netherlands in 1853 into a family in which art and religion were formative influences.  He began to draw as a child but worked as an art dealer, as a missionary in a poor coal mining district in Belgium and, briefly, as a teacher in London before applying himself more seriously to his art from 1885.  That year he produced his first major work The Potato Eaters.  It reflected the poverty of peasant life and was executed in dark, sombre colours.  His work changed radically when he moved to Paris in 1886.  Here he became interested in Japanese wood block prints and was exposed to the work of the Impressionists and the company of Post-Impressionist artists, notably Toulouse Lautrec, Seurat and Paul Gauguin whom he befriended.  He experimented with their brush techniques and adopted a palette of brighter, primary colours.

Van Gogh - Self Portrait With Straw Hat

In 1888 van Gogh moved to Arles in the south of France.  For a time he worked there together with Gauguin but their relationship became increasingly tense.  Van Gogh threatened Gauguin with a razor blade, but fled and used the razor to cut off his own earlobe.  He descended into delusions and hallucinations and was admitted to an asylum in nearby Saint-Remy where he remained for a year.  In May 1890 he moved to Auvers-sur-Oise, a suburb of Paris.  On 27th July 1890, at the age of 37 he shot himself with a revolver and died the next day as a result of his wounds.

Van Gogh left a vast artistic legacy.  He worked quickly producing over 2,000 works of art in ten years and averaging a painting a day during his last two months.  He used bold, dramatic brush strokes that gave a sense of movement and emotion and often applied paint directly from the tube.  Uniquely he used colour to express mood rather than realistically.

Van Gogh Alive is not a regular art exhibition.  It is a dramatic multi-sensory experience.  Large scale projections of over 2,000 of van Gogh’s works are synchronised with classical music.  It takes you on a spellbinding journey through his life, his work, his thoughts and his state of mind.

“Van Gogh Alive” is at the Maxidome, Israeli Trade Fairs and Conventions Centre, Tel Aviv until April 30th 2013

Herod the Great: The King’s Final Journey

Herod the Great

Herod the Great was King of Judea from 37 – 4 BCE.  He was one of the most ambitious builders of the classical world combining the most modern building techniques with a determination to defy nature.  In Jericho he diverted a river through the middle of his winter palace.  At Masada, in the middle of a desert with scarcely any water, he built a swimming pool.  In Caesarea Maritima he used hydraulic cement that hardened underwater to create a port where no natural harbour existed.  In Jerusalem he rebuilt the Temple of which the rabbis of the Talmud wrote "Whoever has not seen Herod's Temple has not seen a beautiful building in his life". 

Model of Herod's Temple Israel Museum

Herod was far more than a builder.  He was a skilful and effective ruler - the most successful client king of the Roman Empire.  He was also a difficult and dangerous man, famously paranoid.  Descended on his father’s side from Idumean converts to Judaism and on his mother’s side from Nabatean Arabs he married Mariamne, a princess of the royal Hasmonean line, to strengthen the legitimacy of his kingship.  She and two of Herod’s sons were put to death for Herod suspected even his closest family of plotting against him.  Caesar Augustus commented that it was “better to be Herod’s pig than his son”. 

Josephus the Jewish historian of the Great Revolt describes in graphic detail Herod’s death in Jericho and the procession that accompanied him to his last resting place in Herodium. 

 “There was a solid gold bier, adorned with precious stones and draped with the richest purple.  On it lay the body wrapped in crimson, with a diadem resting on the head and above that a golden crown, and the sceptre by the right hand.  The bier was escorted by Herod's sons and the whole body of his kinsmen, followed by his Spearmen, the Thracian Company, and his Germans and Gauls, all in full battle order.  The rest of his army led the way, fully armed and in perfect order, headed by their commanders and all the officers, and followed by five hundred of the house slaves and freed-men carrying spices.  The body was borne twenty-four miles to Herodium, where by the late king’s command it was buried.” Josephus, Wars, I, 33, 9.

Herodium from above

For over 40 years Ehud Netzer, architect and archaeologist, excavated sites that had been built 2,000 years before by Herod.  Herod’s tomb however remained elusive.  It wasn’t until April 2007 that Netzer and his team discovered the remains of a magnificent mausoleum and three sarcophagi on the slope of the hilltop palace fortress of Herodium facing Jerusalem.  Together with staff from the Israel Museum Netzer began to plan an exhibition of these recent discoveries.  Sadly whilst working on this plan at Herodium in October 2010 he fell to his death.

This world class exhibition represents Herod’s final journey from Jericho where he died, through the Judean Desert to Herodium where he was laid to rest.  The richly decorated throne room of Herod’s Winter Palace in Jericho and the royal box of his theatre at Herodium have been reconstructed together with his sarcophagus and elaborate mausoleum.  These and many other original artefacts are on display for the first time. 

“Herod the Great: The King’s Final Journey” is at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem until October 5th 2013

“Boney was a warrior...” - Napoleon in the Land of Israel and his Proclamation to the Jews

 

“Boney was a warrior...”

Napoleon Bonaparte as First Consul

“Boney was a warrior...” go the words of the old sea shanty and indeed Napoleon Bonaparte was a warrior.  He was such a great military commander that even today his campaigns are studied in military academies in many countries.  His expedition to the Middle East which brought him to the Land of Israel was not, however, his finest hour.  He failed to achieve his objectives and suffered defeat at sea, frustration on land and the loss of much of his army.  Despite this, within two months of his return to France he became First Consul and within five years was proclaimed Emperor.

 

 

Napoleon’s campaign to the Middle East

 

Ahmad Pasha al-Jazzar

In 1798 Napoleon Bonaparte set out for Egypt.  His major objectives were to establish a French presence in the Middle East and to disrupt Britain’s important trade route to India.   After initial victories in Egypt he suffered a major setback when the British fleet under Horatio Nelson captured or destroyed all but two ships of the French fleet in the Battle of the Nile.

To the north lay the Holy Land ruled from Acre by Ahmad Pasha “al-Jazzar” (the butcher).  Napoleon reasoned that without at least a truce with al-Jazzar it would be hard for him to maintain his hold on Egypt.  He made the approach but did not receive a reply.  He felt that he had no option but to set out on an expedition to defeat al-Jazzar.

Somehow the fate of this expedition was already sealed by the time it reached the coastal town of el-Arish in northern Sinai.  The French military intelligence was badly flawed.  Napoleon expected a town without any defences.  He found a fortress there held by al-Jazzar’s troops.  He took el-Arish only after a twelve day siege.   It gave al-Jazzar valuable time to prepare the defence of his headquarters in Acre.  In the course of the siege the bubonic plague that had broken out amongst the Turkish troops also infected the French camp.  It was to have dire consequences.

The Siege of Jaffa 

Napoleon visits plague victims

Napoleon took his army north to the port of Jaffa.  By the time he arrived some 4,000 Turkish soldiers had gathered there.  He prepared for a siege and sent two French officers to offer a last chance for the town to surrender.  The defenders’ answer was to seize the officers, kill them and display their heads on the walls of the city.  When the French forces breached the walls they massacred every man, woman and child that they found.  And when after some 30 hours the slaughter of civilians had stopped Napoleon ordered the execution of the thousands of Turkish soldiers who had surrendered to his forces.  They were marched out to the sand dunes south of Jaffa and taken off in groups to be shot.  When the French ran out of cartridges they killed them with knives and with bayonets.

By now the plague had really taken hold in Napoleon’s camp and had begun to spread through the town.  Dozens of his soldiers were falling sick every day.  He had the infected troops quartered in the Armenian Monastery and visited them there before pressing on to Acre, al-Jazzar’s capital, with the remainder of his army.

Failure and retreat

Armenian Monastery, Jaffa. Photo Ori~

Napoleon attempted a direct assault on Acre.  When this failed he laid siege to the city.  Al-Jazzar was supported by a British fleet commanded by Sir Sidney Smith.  The British bombarded the French army and prevented them from mounting an effective attack.  The plague continued to spread amongst them and their morale collapsed.  After a two month siege Napoleon was forced to accept defeat.  His campaign in the Middle East had come to an end. He began his retreat towards Egypt.

Napoleon worried that the Turks would overtake his retreating army.  In Jaffa a number of French plague patients remained in the Armenian Monastery.  Napoleon did not want to leave them to the mercy of the Turks.  Nor was he willing to take the risk that they would slow down the retreat.  Overriding the objections of his chief medical officer he gave orders that they should be poisoned.

What to see today

 

19th century cannon on wall of Acre

Jaffa and Acre are port cities, thousands of years old. They are fascinating places to visit.  Each one bears the marks of Napoleon’s campaign.  The room where Napoleon stayed in Jaffa is now incorporated into St Peter’s Church. The Armenian Monastery where his plague infected soldiers were billeted still stands by the sea.  The place where his soldiers breached the walls is noted in the alleys of the Old City.  In Acre you can find the remains of the city walls and cannons that helped to resist Napoleon’s siege as well as a cemetery where some of his soldiers were buried.  It also has a Napoleon Bonaparte Street.  Nearby is Napoleon Hill where he and his army camped.  The archaeological museum at Kibbutz Nahsholim has weapons and ammunition that his troops abandoned during their retreat.

Napoleon’s proclamation to the Jews

Napoleon grants freedom to the Jews

In May 1799, during the siege of Acre, the main French newspaper of its time, Le Moniteur Universel, published a brief statement:

“Bonaparte has published a proclamation in which he invites all the Jews of Asia and Africa to gather under his flag in order to re-establish the ancient Jerusalem.  He has already given arms to a great number, and their battalions threaten Aleppo.”

The plan was never carried out and historians argue as to whether the proclamation was indeed made and, if so, whether it was ever more than mere propaganda.  In 1940, however, the author Franz Kobler claimed to have found a detailed version of the proclamation that Napoleon had prepared.  His version, replete with quotations from the Prophets, claimed that Napoleon had established his headquarters in Jerusalem, described the Jews as “rightful heirs to Palestine” and invited them to re-establish there a Jewish state. Whether this document is genuine or, as some have claimed, a forgery there is no doubt that Napoleon had tremendous influence on the emancipation of the Jews of Europe and on the course of Jewish history.

Ezrat Israel: An Undiscovered Neighbourhood, the Coming of the Messiah and the Resting Place of Many Prophets

It’s not very often that I come across a whole Jerusalem neighbourhood that I have never seen or heard of before.  But that’s just what happened as I was preparing a tour of the Jaffa Road for Yom Ha’atzmaut.

The Ezrat Israel Neighbourhood
Photo by Ranbar

Ezrat Israel is a small neighbourhood tucked away between the Jaffa Road and Rehov Hanevi’im near to the junction of Jaffa Road and King George Street.  The whole neighbourhood consists of one narrow alley with a row of houses, originally two-storey buildings, on either side.  It was established in 1892 on the initiative of Rabbi Ya’akov Meir the Hacham Bashi – the Sephardi Chief Rabbi of Israel.  He was supported by a group of notable Sephardi and Ashkenazi rabbis; Rabbi Ben-Zion Meir Hai Uziel who succeeded him in as Hacham Bashi, Rabbi Nissim Elyashar, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, Rabbi David Kantorowitz, Rabbi Yaakov Mann and Rabbi Joseph Rivlin.  

Nabi Okasha Mosque
Photo: Yoninah

Cabbalists considered a hill just to the north of the site of this neighbourhood to be “Patcha DeKarta”, the entrance to the city, the seat of the Mashiach ben Yosef who would herald the arrival of the Messiah.  Before the neighbourhood was built a group of cabbalists, students of the Vilna Gaon, set up a tent there (the tent of Mashiach ben Yosef) and prayed there fervently for the coming of the Messiah.  In 1908 the International Evangelistic Church was built at the end of the neighbourhood facing Rehov Hanevi’im where the cabbalists’ tent had been.  The tent was moved to Nabi Okasha Park on Rehov Strauss.

When the neighbourhood was first built it connected the Jaffa Road and Rehov Hanevi’in.  It was also a convenient route between the established neighbourhoods of Even Israel and Meah Shearim.  Iron gates were installed at both its entrances and they were locked at night.  With the building of the evangelistic church the way through to Rehov Hanevi’im and Meah Shearim was blocked.

Hacham Bashi
Harav Ya'akov Meir

Ezrat Israel though small was home to some prominent people.  The Sephardi Chief Rabbis Ya’akov Meir and Ben-Zion Meir Hai Uziel lived there as did Yitzchak Ben Zvi, the second President of the State of Israel and Rachel Yanait Ben Zvi.  The authors Yehuda Burla and Yehuda HaEzrachi (Brisker) grew up in the neighbourhood.  There were three print houses in Ezrat Israel.  In one, the Co-operative or “Unity” printing house, David Ben Gurion and Yosef Haim Brenner worked and at times lived.  Jerusalem’s Freemasons’ Hall can still be found in the neighbourhood.   Today the little neighbourhood contains a mixture of homes, shops and offices and has a traditional or secular character.  Take the time to visit Ezrat Israel next time you are near the Jaffa Road.  It is a quiet and picturesque oasis in the midst of Jerusalem.



A street sign from the British Mandate
Photo: DMY

For those of you who wonder about Nabi Okasha: There is a Mamluk mausoleum and a mosque known as Nabi Okasha or al-Kimeria on Rehov Strauss.  Many traditions cling to this place.  It is the grave of Okasha, a friend of the Prophet Muhammad.  It is the grave of four sons of Kimer who fought with Saladin against the Crusaders.  It is the burial place of the major prophets of the three great Abrahamic religions: Moses, Jesus and Muhammad.  That is the reason that the British Governor Sir Ronald Storrs gave Rehov Hanev’im (the Street of the Prophets) its name. 

And the Egyptians ill-treated us...

One of the ways we describe the festival of Passover is “z’man heruteinu”.  It is the festival of our redemption, of our freedom from slavery in Egypt.  As a child this always puzzled me because my father ע"ה was born in Egypt, actually on the first day of Passover, and grew up there.  How did he sit with his family around the seder table celebrating having been taken out of Egypt when he was still living there?  It is a mystery to me!

The Bible tells us that the Egyptians enslaved the Children of Israel in Egypt.  The archaeologists and historians add that they ruled over the land of Canaan during the Late Bronze Age, from 1550 BCE to 1200 BCE.  In Biblical terms this was the time of Joseph in Egypt through the Exodus to the time when the Israelites approached the Land of Israel.  So where in Israel can we see evidence of those 350 years of Egyptian domination?

Megiddo

Megiddo City Gate Photo: Golf Bravo

Megiddo is a huge and impressive archaeological site.  It’s not surprising.  It was one of the mightiest city states in Canaan.  For thousands of years it dominated the ancient trade route between Egypt to the south and the empires to the north and east.  It has been the site of some critical battles.  The last of these was the British General Allenby’s defeat of the Turkish army in 1917.

Thutmose III attacks his enemies

from the temple at Karnak

In 1482 BCE the King of Mitanni was stirring up revolt in Canaan against Egypt.  Pharaoh Thutmose III marched north with his army to put down the rebellion.  The Canaanite forces gathered for battle near Megiddo.  Thutmose took the Canaanites by surprise by choosing the most dangerous but most direct route from the coastal road through the valleys to Megiddo.  The next day the two armies met on the battlefield.  When the Egyptian infantry charged the Canaanites fled and sought refuge in Megiddo.  Instead of pressing their advantage the Egyptian troops took time out to loot the Canaanite camp.  They lost the element of surprise.  It took a seven month siege before Megiddo fell to Thutmose.  Egypt continued to rule Caanaan for the next 300 years and established garrisons in Megiddo and around the country in Gaza, Beit Shean and Afeq.   In an inscription at the Temple of Karnak in Upper Egypt Thutmose recorded that 119 cities in Canaan had bowed down before him. 

Jerusalem

A letter from Tel el-Amarna

In 1887 a peasant woman was digging in the ruins of el-Amarna in Upper Egypt when she came across a pile of palm-sized clay tablets inscribed in cuneiform script in Accadian, the diplomatic language of the Late Bronze Age.  What she had discovered was Egypt’s Foreign Office archive from the time of Pharaoh Akhenaten.  These were mainly letters between the Egyptian administration and their representatives and client kings in Canaan and Amurru (modern Lebanon).  Six of the letters are from Abdi-Heba, the king of Jerusalem, to Pharaoh.  He pleads with Pharaoh to help defend against attacks from neighbouring cities and from nomadic fighters called the Apiru.  One letter opens:

“Say to the king, my lord: Message of Abdi-Heba, your servant. I fall at the feet of my lord 7 times and 7 times.  Consider the entire affair.  Milkilu and Tagi brought troops into Qiltu against me... ...May the king know (that) all the lands are at peace (with one another), but I am at war.  May the king provide for his land. ...”

In 2009, while the archaeologist Eilat Mazar was excavating a gatehouse tower in the wall of First Temple Jerusalem, a small fragment of a clay tablet with fragments of nine lines of Akkadian cuneiform script.  We don’t know for sure but this seems to be a fragment of one of Abdi-Heba’s letters to Pharaoh – a copy perhaps stored in his archive.  You can see it on display in the Davidson Centre in Jerusalem.

Anthropoid coffin from Deir el-Balah:

Hecht Museum, Photo: Hanay

At the entrance to the Archaeology Wing of the Israel Museum there is a group of strange anthropoid coffins from the Late Bronze Age.  They were discovered at Deir el-Balah, a few kilometres south-west of Gaza.  They may have been made for Egyptians but they certainly reflect the influence of Egypt in Canaan at that time.  The Hecht Museum in Haifa also has an anthropoid coffin from this period.

Beit Shean



Inscribed tablet governor's house

Beit Shean. Photo: Yukatan

Mention Beit Shean and most people think of the magnificent remains of Scythopolis, a Roman Byzantine city destroyed by an earthquake in 749.  At the northern edge of the Roman city is Tell el-Husn, the mound of ancient and biblical Beit Shean - an Egyptian regional centre for 300 years.  An Egyptian basalt stele (standing stone) was found here celebrating the defeat by Pharaoh Seti I of a group of Canaanite cities that tried to capture the city in 1318 BCE.  The governor’s house from the time of a later Pharaoh Ramses III was built in Egyptian style from mud bricks.  A bust of the Pharaoh stands in one of the rooms.  Over the doorpost was a stone tablet bearing the name of the governor, Ramse-Weser Khepesh, and his titles.  The stone artefacts on display are copies.  The originals are in the Rockefeller Museum in Jerusalem.

Timna Valley

Solomon's Pillars Timna Valley

Photo: Chmee2

Copper has been mined in the Timna Valley,in the south west Aravah about 30 km north of Eilat, for over 6,000 years.   In the Late Bronze Age the Egyptians established a sophisticated copper mining and production centre here.  Their mine shafts can still be seen.  Three huge sandstone pillars, known as Solomon’s Pillars, stand near the copper mines.  At their base is a small temple to Hathor, the Egyptian goddess of mining.  The engraved stelae in the temple contain a lot of information about the groups of Egyptians who came to mine here.  Above the temple on the side of one of the sandstone pillars is a carving of Ramses III with Hathor.

A Final Word?

Merneptah Stele
Photo: Webscribe

Mernheptah, the son of Ramses II, reigned from 1213 – 1203 BCE.  He was the last Egyptian king to personally enter Canaan to put down a rebellion.  In 1896 A basalt stone known as the Merneptah Stele was found at the Pharaoh’s burial temple in Thebes in Egypt.  A part of the inscription refers to Mernheptah’s victories during a military campaign in Canaan.  It includes the earliest known reference to Israel.  It reads:

“Canaan is captive with all woe. Ashkelon is conquered, Gezer seized, Yanoam made nonexistent; Israel is wasted, its seed is no more.”

The scholars tell us that “Israel” here refers to a people, the Ancient Israelites, rather than to a state and that the “seed” refers to its supply of grain.  Even so this is one of many times when our conquerors have underestimated our resilience.  As the Passover Haggadah tells us:

“For not just one alone has risen against us to destroy us, but in every generation they rise against us to destroy us; and the Holy One, blessed be He, saves us from their hand!”

Chag sameach!

Cook’s Tours: the Kaiser and the Father of Zionism ...and... A Note About Birds in Spring

In 1929 the Bezalel artist Ze’ev Raban designed a poster for the Society for the Promotion of Travel in the Holy Land.  To entice potential tourists he included this lyrical description of spring from the Song of Songs.

“For, Lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land.”
Spring began officially last week and with it our major tourist season opened.  About 3.5 million tourists come to Israel each year.   Thomas Cook & Son, the world’s first travel agency, pioneered the development of tourism to Jerusalem.  It also played a part in a historic meeting between Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and Theodore Herzl that took place here.

Thomas Cook

Sign for Thomas Cook's agency
on the wall outside the Jaffa Gate

Thomas Cook, an English cabinet maker and Baptist minister, founded his business in 1841 running railway excursions to temperance meetings.  In 1850 he led his first trip abroad, to Calais.  He was the first to develop many of the familiar features of package holidays including travel brochures, hotel coupons and traveller’s cheques.  By the mid-1860’s Cook’s Travel agency was already transporting tourists to Jerusalem.  The journey was not easy.  The road from Jaffa to Jerusalem wasn’t paved until 1867.  The construction was primitive and parts of the road were often washed away by heavy rains.   By the 1870’s, with improvements to the road and to security along it, Cook’s agency began to organise cheap group visits to Jerusalem – “Cook’s Tours”.  They set up tent encampments for their tourists along the way and, because there were as yet no good hotels in Jerusalem, outside the city walls - near to the Damascus Gate,  near the Jaffa Gate and on the Mount of Olives.  They even had servants available for the guests.  The agency opened a ticket office just inside the Jaffa Gate - now a busy centre of commercial activity. 

The Kaiser's tent camp

In 1898 Kaiser Wilhelm II, the last emperor of Germany, visited Palestine.  In Jerusalem streets were cleaned and public buildings repaired in his honour.  The wall between the Jaffa Gate and the Citadel was torn down and the moat filled in so that he could ride into the city with his entourage.  A huge camp with 230 tents was set up for him in Jerusalem on the street we now call Rechov Hanevi’im.   Magnificent tents were provided by the Sultan for receptions.  Prefabricated buildings were brought from Germany for the royal visitors to sleep in.  Furniture and carpets were appropriated locally.   The Turkish army guarded the camp.  All the arrangements for this visit were entrusted to Thomas Cook’s travel agency. 

The Kaiser's procession to the
Church of the Redeemer

The official reason for Wilhelm’s visit was to attend the consecration of the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Jerusalem’s Christian Quarter.   The Kaiser had more political purposes in mind.  He wanted to strengthen German national feeling amongst German Protestants and German Catholics in the Holy Land.  He presented his visit in heroic terms with himself entering the city like a Crusader.   The British satirical magazine Punch portrayed him in a cartoon as a “Cook’s Crusader”.

As demand grew, the services available for tourists improved.  By 1895, for example, the municipality required all tour guides in Jerusalem to take an examination in the history and geography of the city.  Those who passed received a diploma.  At the end of the 19th century several modern hotels opened in the Old City and outside the walls. 

The Kaminitz Hotel building today
Photo: DMY

Sandwiched between the Jaffa Road and Rehov Hanevi’im is the building of the former Kaminitz Hotel.   This was the first modern Jewish hotel in Jerusalem.  It was one of the hotels with which Thomas Cook and Son had an annual contract.  Eliezer Lipa Kaminitz had originally opened his hotel by the Jaffa Gate.  He moved it to these more spacious premises opposite the Alliance School in 1883.  It is dilapidated now but this was a five star hotel of its time with luxurious guest rooms, a large garden and a carriage drive leading up from the Jaffa Road.

Herzl on a boat en route
for Palestine

The Kaiser's entourage passes
through the Jewish triumphal arch

In October 1898 Theodore Herzl made his only visit to Palestine.  He had come to meet the Kaiser and to try to persuade him to support the Zionist cause.  Herzl arrived in Jerusalem late on a Friday afternoon.  He walked to the hotel from the railway station despite feeling unwell only to find that all the rooms had been taken by the Kaiser’s entourage.  Kaminitz took pity on him and found a bed for him for one night.  On Saturday afternoon he watched from the hotel as the Kaiser paraded through the two triumphal gates that had been set up to welcome him along the Jaffa Road.  That night the Stern family took Herzl to stay at their home on Mamilla Street where Steimatsky’s bookshop stands today.  The official meeting between Herzl and the Kaiser took place on November 2nd at the Kaiser’s tent camp.  Wilhelm was polite but made no commitment of any kind.  Herzl came away with nothing.

A Note About Birds in Spring

Cranes over the Hula Valley
Photo: אילת לב ארי שלי

With the start of spring the great migration of birds is also in full swing.  Because Israel sits at the junction of three continents, twice each year 500 million birds fly across our skies.   In the spring they journey north to enjoy temperate summers.  In the autumn they head south to find milder winter weather.   Eilat and the Hula Valley are regular refuelling points for the birds during their long migrations.  No wonder then that many bird enthusiasts visit to see the amazing number and variety of birds that pass through.  It’s a spectacular sight.  Timed to catch the peak of the spring migration, the 6th Eilat Bird Festival is on now and continues until April 1st.  The Hula Valley holds its bird festival in November during the autumn migration.

Blessings in Disguise

This year Purim coincided with International Women’s Day.  That seems fitting because the miracle of Purim came about through a woman.  Esther had both the courage to confront Achashverosh and accuse Haman of planning genocide and the wisdom to unify the Jewish people and bring them back to G-d in their time of trouble.   In a city holy to three religions and with as long a history as Jerusalem there are inevitably many conflicting traditions and confusions of identity.  As with Purim, not everything is as it seems.  Today’s post honours both Purim and International Women’s Day by looking at sites in the city connected to women whose identity is in some way in doubt.

The Chapel of the Ascension
Photo: Adriaticus

Rabia al-Adawiyya

Near the crest of the Mount of Olives in the neighbourhood of At-Tur is a small domed building surrounded by a wall.  It is known as the Chapel of the Ascension or the Mosque of the Ascension.  At its side is a burial crypt revered by each of the three Abrahamic religions.  All agree that it is the burial place of a holy woman but each one has a different opinion as to who is buried there.   For Muslims it is Rabia al-Adawiyya an 8th Century Sufi mystic born in Basra, Iraq.  Christians believe it to be the burial place of a 5th Century saint, Pelagia, who was born in northern Lebanon and who lived an ascetic life disguised as a monk.  Only after she died was it discovered that she was really a woman.  The Jewish tradition is that the 7th Century BCE prophetess Huldah is buried here.  Hulda is mentioned briefly in the Tanach in Kings and Chronicles.   The King, Josiah, had ordered the refurbishment of the Temple.  During this work a book of the Law was discovered.  The High Priest and royal officials consulted Huldah.  She confirmed that the book was authentic and prophesied the destruction of Jerusalem.  She reassured Josiah that, because of his piety, the destruction will not be in his lifetime.   

The eastern Hulda Gates today

At the top of the monumental staircases leading to the southern wall of the Temple Mount are two sets of gates that are now blocked up.   In the days of the Second Temple they were the main entrances to the Temple platform.  One name for them is the Huldah Gates.  Some say this is because of a tradition that Huldah is buried in Jerusalem.  Others point out that the Hebrew word “huldah” means “rat” and that on entering these gates you would walk like rats through underground tunnels up to the Temple plaza.

Imaret Haseki Sultan entrance

Endowment charter
of Haseki Sultan Waqf

Three women are also connected with a building on Aqabat et-Takiya (in Hebrew Ma’alot Hamadrasa Street) in the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem.  In the late 14th Century a woman known as Sitt Tunshuq built a palace in magnificent Mamluk style here to serve as a hostel for dervishes.  Across the street from the palace she built a tomb building (turba) for herself and was buried there in 1398.  Very little is known about Tunshuq though she was clearly a wealthy woman.  It is thought that she may have been the wife of a Mamluk sultan.  Haseki Hurrem Sultan, known in the west as Roxelana, was the favourite wife of Suleiman the Magnificent, the 16th Century Ottoman ruler who built the walls of Jerusalem.  In 1552 she endowed the building of a charitable complex that contained a soup kitchen, a mosque, a pilgrim hostel and an inn for travellers.  Haseki Sultan’s complex was built next to Tunshuq’s Palace which was incorporated into it.   In the 1870s the building became the Saraya, an Ottoman local government office that included the residence of the Pasha. 

Christians came to call the complex the Hospital of Saint Helena.  They believed that it had been established in the 4th Century by Helena, mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine, to house workers building the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and that it became a hostel for poor pilgrims once the church was completed.  The tradition that this had been the Hospital of Saint Helena or at least stood on the site of the former hospital persisted and was widely believed.  It was even reported in the 1906 edition of Baedeker’s Guide to Palestine and Syria.