It’s hard to
imagine religion without sacred spaces.
These sacred
spaces can be hills, mountains, rivers, caves, cities, trees and buildings—temples,
mosques, cathedrals, and other places of worship.
For
believers, these places are sacred because something religiously significant
happened there, usually hundreds or thousands of years ago.
Visiting these
places is an opportunity to draw closer to God or the divine, to find inner
peace and fulfilment, or to experience something deep and supernatural.
For others, however, they
are reasons to fight and kill. Instead of promoting peace, they are sources of
conflict.
That’s what’s happening
now in Jerusalem, over the Al-Aqsa mosque.
The
mosque, the third holiest site in Islam, is located on what Jews call the
Temple Mount—the holiest site in Judaism—and what Muslims call Haram al-Sharif, or the Noble
Sanctuary.
Muslims
believe that the Prophet Mohammed was carried on a flying horse from Mecca to Al-Aqsa
during his miraculous night journey. While there, he prayed with Abraham and
Jesus on the rock that is now said to be inside the Dome of the Rock, whose
golden roof dominates the Jerusalem skyline.
For Jews, it is the site of the first temple, built around 1,000 B.C. It
was destroyed 400 years later by the Babylonians. In the first century B.C., a
second temple was built; it, too, was destroyed in A.D. 70 by the Romans.
Over the
past 50 years, the site has been a source of tension between Palestinians and Israelis.
It is said the Second Intifada, which saw over 4,000 people killed, was sparked
by a visit to the mosque by Ariel Sharon, then a candidate for Prime Minister
of Israel.
This summer, the site has
been the source of unrest and conflict after Israeli authorities restricted Muslim
access to the mosque following the murders of two Israeli police officers. In
response, Palestinians gathered to pray, and protest—mostly peacefully—in the
streets surrounding the area.
Of course, the conflict is
over more than what people believe happened on the site centuries ago. Israelis
view it as a matter of security and safety, while Palestinians see it as part
of the larger effort to control and humiliate them.
Both sides can justify
their actions. But I still wonder: Are these principles worth killing and dying
over? I posed that question to a Palestinian friend.
He agreed that any deaths arising from
the unrest were terrible, but said answers are “not so easy when everything has
been taken away from you.”
He noted that, over the centuries,
Palestinians have welcomed and incorporated people from many nationalities and
faiths—Arabs, Turks, Berbers, Greeks, and Jews, among others.
“Those who came as pilgrims and
refugees, found space on the land. But an occupation is a different story.”
This is indeed a different story, for
Israelis and Palestinians alike. The Al-Aqsa mosque today stands for much more
than a holy place. Both sides, each for their
own political reasons, seem to be looking for more confrontation rather than
calm.
(And lest Christians think they are
above this sort of controversy, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre proves
otherwise. The Church, which is said to contain the tomb of Jesus, is
administered by six Christian groups under a centuries-old agreement. They
squabble constantly over who is responsible for what part of the church,
sometimes resulting in fist fights between monks. So bad are the relations
between them they don’t even trust each other with the
church keys; a Muslim family opens and closes the church each day.)
As for me, my mind keeps going back to the
prophet Isaiah, who delivers a message from God about sacred spaces.
As for me, my mind keeps going back to the
prophet Isaiah, who delivers a message from God about sacred spaces.
In chapter 66:1-2, God says through the
prophet: “Heaven is
my throne and the earth is my footstool;
what is the house that you would build for me, and what is my resting place?
“All these things my hand has made, and so all these things are mine. But
this is the one to whom I will look, to the humble and contrite in spirit, who
trembles at my word.”
I don’t know about you, but I
think the world would be better off if we had more of those kinds of people
today, and maybe fewer sacred spaces.
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