Jerusalem

This week I went to Boston’s Museum of Science and discovered that in the Mugar Omni Theater the film “Jerusalem” was playing (until July 3).  The hook was: “Witness the beauty and majesty of this ancient and beloved city as you discover its many hidden secrets through the eyes of the young people who call it home.”  Having never been to Jerusalem but having read “Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How and Ancient City Ignited our Modern World” by James Carroll (2011) and “Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths” by Karen Armstrong (1996), I knew I had to join the throng of people (mostly teenagers with many teachers) to view the 50-minute film.

The film profiled the three faiths (Judaism, Islam, and Christianity) through the eyes and experiences of three young women.  The stories of these women confirmed what Karen Armstrong claimed: “In every major religion a 'holy place' has helped men and women define their own place, indeed their own importance, in the world.   Jerusalem has become that defining  place for adherents of the three religions of Abraham.”

Similarly, it confirmed James Carroll’s assessment: “Jerusalem having begun as the ancient city of Apocalypse, became the magnetic pole of Western history, doing more to create the modern world than any other city.  Only Jerusalem – not Athens, Rome, or Paris; not Moscow or London; not Istanbul, Damascus, or Cairo; not El Dorado or the New York of immigrants’ dreams – only Jerusalem occupies such a transcendent place in the imagination.  It is the earthy reflection of heaven – but heaven, as it turns out – cast a shadow… Jerusalem fever infects religious groups, certainly the three monotheisms that claim the city…Yet if Jerusalem is the fever’s chosen niche, Jerusalem is also the antidote.  Religion, likewise, is both a source of trouble and a way of vanquishing it.  Religion, one sees in Jerusalem as nowhere else, is both the knife that cuts the vein and the force that keeps the knife from cutting…”

The IMAX Dome screen made it seem as if we all were walking the streets, shopping in the marketplaces and worshiping in the churches, mosques, and synagogues – all three faiths/communities distinctly separate with no intermingling.  The film ended with one of the young ladies saying that someday the people in the different communities would get to know one another, “but not right now.”

Such is the city on the hill held holy by its Jewish, Christian, and Muslim inhabitants who consider it the sacred geography where they experience the divine.

Deacon David Pierce