(1) By the rivers of Babylon, There we sat down, yea, we wept, When we remembered Zion. (2) Upon the willows in the midst thereof We hanged up our harps. (3) For there they that led us captive asked of us words of song, And our tormentors asked of us mirth: ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion.' (4) How shall we sing the LORD’S song In a foreign land? (5) If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, Let my right hand forget her cunning. (6) Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, If I remember thee not; If I set not Jerusalem Above my chiefest joy.
"Jerusalem's a place where everyone remembers
he's forgotten something
But doesn't remember what it is."
- Yehuda Amichai
- How do Jews in our time "remember" Jerusalem?
- Why is Jerusalem so holy? Can one place be "holier" than others?
(טז) שָׁלוֹשׁ פְּעָמִים בַּשָּׁנָה יֵרָאֶה כָל זְכוּרְךָ אֶת פְּנֵי יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ בַּמָּקוֹם אֲשֶׁר יִבְחָר בְּחַג הַמַּצּוֹת וּבְחַג הַשָּׁבֻעוֹת וּבְחַג הַסֻּכּוֹת וְלֹא יֵרָאֶה אֶת פְּנֵי יְהוָה רֵיקָם.
(16) Three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the LORD thy God in the place which He shall choose; on the feast of unleavened bread, and on the feast of weeks, and on the feast of tabernacles; and they shall not appear before the LORD empty;
Tourists, by Yehuda Amichai
Visits of condolence is all we get from them.
They squat at the Holocaust Memorial,
They put on grave faces at the Wailing Wall
And they laugh behind heavy curtains
In their hotels.
They have their pictures taken
Together with our famous dead
At Rachel's Tomb and Herzl's Tomb
And on Ammunition Hill.
They weep over our sweet boys
And lust after our tough girls
And hang up their underwear
To dry quickly
In cool, blue bathrooms.
Once I sat on the steps by agate at David's Tower,
I placed my two heavy baskets at my side. A group of tourists
was standing around their guide and I became their target marker. "You see
that man with the baskets? Just right of his head there's an arch
from the Roman period. Just right of his head." "But he's moving, he's moving!"
I said to myself: redemption will come only if their guide tells them,
"You see that arch from the Roman period? It's not important: but next to it,
left and down a bit, there sits a man who's bought fruit and vegetables for his family."