Sabbath and Politics

Today we spent with Coretta honoring the Sabbath, which mostly means resting, with a lot of walking and eating thrown in.  I observed it a little, in that I didn't get in a car, and I celebrated Shabbat dinner/lunch with her former host family.  I did take a few pictures, though, and turned on some lights.  Oh, and wrote on my blog... :)

The family that Coretta stayed with her first semester here was very welcoming.  They were a British family that has resettled in Israel.  They have four kids, and a very fun, relaxed vibe.  We prayed over the wine, washed our hands and ate blessed bread together, then ate a bountiful meal.  The meal ended with more prayers -- lots of singing!  For John's and my sake, they sang one of them to the tune of "Amazing Grace!"

After dinner, we walked up to the top of their apartment building, where the father of the family pointed out all the sites of Jerusalem.  The view was amazing.  I couldn't take any pictures while with them in honor of the Sabbath.  He did show me the dividing line between Israel and the West Bank -- a giant gray gash through the landscape.  I didn't say anything to him, but it was very clear that the land in front of the dividing line (the Jewish area) had many trees, while the land behind it was all desert, with hardly any trees at all.  Something tells me that's not entirely by accident.  I did ask him what he thought about Obama's proposition this week, that Israel should return to pre-1967 borders, which would mean that that gray line would become a national boundary.  He got a bit upset in hearing about that, saying that he liked Obama but wished he would learn more about what he was saying before he said it.  He showed us all the Arab and Jewish enclaves in the city, and said it would be nearly impossible to separate them all.  Religion aside, he said, it would be a hopeless task just in practical, technical terms.  His apartment would end up being on the border of the country.

This was the first openly political conversation I've had here.  I could tell that he was being reserved, and that he seemed to be a man who wanted everyone to live well, but that he was also very frustrated with the situation.  We were going to get more into it, I think, but his kids began tugging at him to go inside from the blazing sun.

We left soon after, and Coretta took us on a walk through a local park with equally amazing views of the city.  She said she often sees shepherds there with their sheep, but it was the middle of the day, and Coretta said that they were likely somewhere in the shade.  We saw many lizards, all of which were too fast for my camera.  We also saw a wide variety of flora: olive trees, flowering bushes, and thistles.  The thistle seemed appropriate for this beautiful and pain-stricken land.  In the photo below, you can see the landscape behind the thistles.  Look for the grey line going through the landscape horizontally -- that's the dividing wall to the West Bank.