HaMakom

It is amazing how quickly time can pass... So much has happened! The holidays of Sukkot and Simchat Torah, visit home to M and Ottawa in time for the Canadian election, which unfortunately did not go as intended (let us just hope that the current minority government will govern in the best interests of the whole populace), a wonderful presentation by Marci S. on "The Emergence of Women in the Scrum: Women Journalists Covering Politics and Public Affairs in Ottawa, 1930-1950" for the Friends of the Ottawa City Archives, food with family, return to Jerusalem, the arrival of fall wind and rain in all of its glory (this past week's Torah portion was Noah, and it is so interesting how what goes on in the elements adds to one's understanding of the narrative), and, of course, the arrival of school work in all of its glory.

Simchat Torah, which comes right after the end of Sukkot, marks the end of the annual Torah reading cycle (finishing Deuteronomy with the death of Moses and his final blessing to the Israelites preceding his death) , and of beginning anew with Bereishit/ Genesis' telling of the creation of the world. Genesis moves quickly- in the past couple of weeks Torah readings have moved from creation of day and night, to Adam and Eve, to Noah and the flood, the Tower of Babel, and the lineage of Abraham's ancestors. This week we are already at Torah portion Lech Lecha, where God tells Abram to leave his native land and his father’s house for a land that God would show him, promising to make of him a great nation, bless him, make his name great, bless those who blessed him, and so on.

In about a month from now we will be reading the coming of age story of Abraham's grandson Jacob (in parasha Vayetzei), when, after leaving his home to set out for his uncle Laban's place he falls asleep and dreams of a ladder with angels ascending and descending. In the dream God stands beside Jacob and promises to give him and his numerous descendants the land on which he lies, says that through his descendants all the earth would be blessed, and promises to stay with him wherever he goes and bring him back to the land. Jacob awakes afraid, remarking that surely the place is the house of God, the gate of heaven, and calls the place Bethel (house of God).

The Hebrew word for place - "makom"- in post-Biblical times also came to be a reference to God, and the interplay between being in a space and recognizing God's presence there is a key theme for Jacob. Biblical scholars and rabbis of old hypothesized that the place where Jacob dreamed was none other than the same place where the binding of Isaac took place, and the same place where the Temple mount, the holy of holies, would be located (i.e. not too far from me here in Jerusalem). In this interpretation the place where Jacob dreamt is a foundation stone of sorts for the world- the spot holding up the world and connecting the human domain to God's domain. I do not believe that any one place on Earth is fundamentally holier than than any other- God exists everywhere. But I do wonder whether certain places, where we have brought intention and focus for example through prayer or meditation or just being present, have the effect of in turn opening our eyes to things that we might not otherwise appreciate. Along these lines there are many people who claim that there is something particular about Jerusalem, that there is a mystical quality to the city that causes people who haven't seen each other in ages to run into each other, that Jerusalem is a city where the number of co-incidences that occur are higher than the rest-of-the-world norm.

I have not tested this hypothesis, but I do want to share a story of something that happened last week. Last Wednesday a friend and I were heading from school to the wonderful neighbourhood of Nachlaot to sit in on a course on the Siddur (prayerbook) at Simchat Shlomo Yeshiva. It was dark and cold and rainy outside (we remarked how interesting it was that the rain came at the same time as we were reading about Noah and the flood), and although we knew the route well we managed to somehow end up somewhere about 15 minutes off course (we say that we got caught in a vortex). Once we realized our error we turned back and proceeded to head in the right direction, cursing our folly at having made such a wet and cold mistake. A few minutes later, though, we heard a call for help. A woman was standing at the top of a stairwell leading down to an apartment entrance with her small child and some bags of groceries. She explained to us that she needed assistance to get to her apartment, as a taxi driver had dropped her off at the wrong entrance, away from her walker. The woman looked to have multiple sclerosis, or some other such neuro-muscular condition, and was unable to walk down the stairs in the wet with her child. My friend P. carried the child while I helped the woman on the steps. Within a couple of minutes the woman, her child, and her belongings were safe inside their apartment. As P. and I left to continue to the yeshiva, we both could not get over how clear the reason was for our earlier misjourney in the vortex! Both of us qualified the experience as a "Jerusalem moment"- enabled by the mystical something special about this place, this makom, that reinforces all that there is to appreciate and learn from where we are.