Introduction

He has founded his city on the holy mountain.
The Lord loves the gates of Zion   more than all the other dwellings of Jacob.
(…) All my fountains are in you
Psalm 87;1-2, 7

At the Jaffa Gate, where guided tours of the Old City usually start, groups of multilingual tourists surround the guides, and once the visitors  have formed separate circles, the history whisperer, with a confident gesture, turns the wheel of time; then the lights over the city fade, and the journey back to the past begins. From this moment onwards, all stories will talk about the past. Facts, millions of facts strung, like beads on the thread of human fate… Thousands of years of history. Symbols, archetypes, myths, tales from the depths of dark valleys, “And this is the sarcophagus of King David himself”— (does it really matter that in fact some knight Templar rests in this sarcophagus?) “And this is the tomb of Jesus Christ”— (yet nearby lies another tomb of the same Jesus Christ). Yerushalayim, “the city and mother of Israel,” a cemetery where, unlike in any other city in the world, peace means—“we hate them with all our hearts, but because we still live side by side, we smile at them warmly” (overheard on Cardo Maximus Street). Every day I pass through each of the gates and I know that “what has been is now, and what is to be, has already been”, because linear time is pure fiction here; there, on the other side of the gate, time and space undergo—alternately—condensation and expansion, and the events that make up the city’s living history get  “entangled.” I see everyone who lived here centuries ago. And who still live here. I don’t mean that I see them in my thoughts; this is not a metaphor. I see them—so to speak—“in person,” on the street, face to face. I cannot explain this in any way; it’s just like that. Don’t make me believe that this is some “syndrome”; come live in this stone city, and you’ll see that I’m telling the truth.

When you want to meet someone, you arrange to meet at the gate; Whether you like it or not—in the gateway you will brush shoulder to shoulder with your mortal enemy, fall into the arms of friends, evade the judge’s verdict, steal a pita from a vendor absorbed in an argument, pray, bend down to a beggar, pay homage to the king, unveil your face to your destined one, dodge out of the way of speeding delivery carts and tractors piled high with the city’s trash; you hesitate, listening to the voice of your frightened heart; hidden in the cool shade, you create yet another tribute to eternity, and, significantly,  whilst living here you do not grow attached to dates or history—you are history yourself- you pay no attention to the architecture, either —you are one of the gates – your hands are worn by labor; your gaze is alert; you carry a gun tucked into your belt. You have lived here only for a moment, and you die endlessly.

Much of what humans do and call by name actually means something entirely different. We ourselves willingly accept this semantic lie. We say “Jerusalem—the city of peace,” whilst Yerushalayim is a classic example of a city where—except for moments too fleeting to grasp—there has never been peace. We say this either unaware or, on the contrary, fully aware that the word “peace” has no right to refer to the reality of the here and now, because this reality contradicts it with all its centuries-old cruelty. It is a utopia which—it is true—is much easier to believe in than to accept the painful reality held together by greed, hatred, and death. Only humans kill in the name of delusional ideas and religions. There is no other city in the world—and there never has been or will be— where, because of a belief in the exclusivity of grace, on a patch of stone smaller than one square kilometer, armies of God’s paladins incessantly make bloody sacrifices of themselves and their own families for salvation.

Yet, on the other hand, reality is the only parameter of the times in which we live, and despite the beauty of metaphors evoking the spirit of the past or the end times, we have no other reality. And we will not have one.

When describing individual “gates,” I often turn to metaphors that make it easier to explore the robust symbolism of this word. I am putting aside the knowledge that can be retrieved from a computer with a single click. Dates, facts, etc.—you may ask CHAT GPT about all these. For example – that the word “gate”/“sha’ar” appears 368 times in the Bible. There is (almost, almost…) everything that can be swept away from the surface of events. By choosing “gate” as the central theme of the Festival, I treat it as a metaphor for our festival Home, and ultimately – for myself – a passage between one dimension of reality and another. Between one corner of the room and another. In between – always in between.

As one of those who brought the Festival to life and continues to create it, I am, in fact, grappling with time, which wounds me deeply. For many years, I had been fascinated by the metaphor of a “bridge.” A bridge of encounters, a bridge of mutual respect, understanding, and reconciliation, however, turned out to be a fragile structure with an insufficient load-bearing capacity; its spans have cracked with the passage of time and the change of generations; now  the bridge is swaying, and it is only a matter of time before it collapses into a dark abyss.

I am not heading towards the unattainable.  One the “bridge” I see no one whom I would like to encounter in order to engage in fruitless discussions about a nonexistent past or future across the river of History. I prefer the apparent randomness of encounters at the “gate” – encounters either full of tenderness or aversion, yet always genuine. These encounters presuppose nothing, do not seek reconciliation, neither do they pursue any lofty and empty ideas – they simply are. In all their spontaneity, unpredictability, and truth – they just are. And perhaps it is from these encounters  that something will be born, a shared value that will give the metaphor of the “gate” a close, real meaning. I do not know.

The Gate of Mercy

The Lord said to me, “This gate is to remain shut. It must not be opened; no one may enter through it. It is to remain shut because the Lord, the God of Israel, has entered through it…
The Book of  Ezekiel 44;2

This is the oldest gate of the City. The Biblical Gate. Messianic Gate. Beautiful. The Golden Gate. Standing closest to the place where Abraham was to offer his son Isaac in sacrifice, and to the site where, within the HaKodesh HaKodashim, the Holy of Holies of Solomon’s Temple, the Ark of the Covenant rested for more than four hundred years

For me – the meeting point between the heaven and earth. The main entrance to the heavenly Yershalaim. To be entered solely through the left, southern arch of repentance. It was through this gate that the Shekhinah – the Divine Presence left  the Temple Mount in AD 70, and through this same gate She will return to Her beloved Zion. Next year in Jerusalem! the Jews pray. Thy Kingdom come! the Christians pray. Along the axis of unending prophecies, stretching between the Gate of Mercy and the summit of the Mount of Olives, lies an invisible stage where, in the appointed time, the final act of humanity’s miserable history will unfold: the Last Judgment.

In this city, the ability to read stones is priceless. The Gate of Mercy is a stone book/ sefer whose interior has been inscribed by time with countless layers of the treaty on love and death, war and peace, hope and despair, religion and faith, truth and falsehood. If you want to know its story, forget ChatGPT. Start digging in search for the source.

Today, because of its sensitive location beside the sanctuary of the Dome of the Rock, all archaeological works at the site are strictly forbidden by order of the Islamic Waqf, the authority responsible for administering the Temple Mount. To enter the interior from the side of Har Ha’Bayit/ Al-Haram al-Sharif, you must be a Muslim. For several years now, the interior of this extraordinary gate has housed yet another mosque, the sixth one on the Temple Mount, where until AD 70 there had only stood the Temple of Jerusalem.

Fortunately, long before that, a number of archaeologists succeeded in making discoveries that allow us to say with confidence: this gate stands upon the foundations of another, far older gateway known as Sha’ar Shushan Ha’Birah – the Gate of the Capital of Susa. According to the four Gospels, it was through this gate that Jesus, a Jew, made His triumphal entrance to Jerusalem, though riding a donkey; or, perhaps more simply, that Jesus, the Jew entered the Holy City in profound humility towards the sacred place.

I find myself drawn to this Gate. Literally. During the day and sometimes in the middle of the night. Even in my dreams. The silence, scorching sun, dry wind and greenery dusted with the desert dust. There are hardly any tourists here: perhaps they do not know its story or avoid the Muslim graves or perhaps they are simply afraid?  The eastern wall surrounding the Old City “is guarded” by a Muslim cemetery, dotted with graves, established by Caliph Umar around the middle of the seventh century. According to the Arab tradition, the whole thing was remarkably clever; a cemetery, as a place rendered ritually impure by death, was meant to prevent the Jewish Messiah – the descendant of King David, not a god but a man, a warrior and the Great High Priest—from entering through the Gate of Mercy. According to Jewish tradition, it is through this gate that he will ascend to the Temple Mount, where, on the ancient site—today occupied by the Shrine of the Rock—he will rebuild the Temple, where on the former place (today’s Dome of the Rock), he will rebuild the Temple, unite the Jewish people in the Land of Israel, establish peace throughout the world, and proclaim the end of an age of suffering and war. Jerusalem will become the spiritual capital of the world, and all nations will come to seek his counsel. For it is well known that no Jew of a family of priests – not even the Messiah Himself!—may enter a cemetery because he will become ritually impure. From that time onward, the cemetery of Bab al-Rahma has continued to  expand, until it spread across the entire area like a stone, cooled lava.

(As an aside, I must add that before the “true” Messiah arrives, a “false, good Messiah” will come and rule the world, expecting to be bowed down to, adored, revered, and given divine glory. Isn’t that exactly what’s happening right now?)

One night I went to the Gate of Mercy to watch the sun rise above the Mount of Olives. I sort of saw that time was moving on, but I must confess that I did not feel the passage of time. Hidden still below the horizon, the sun slowly set the skyline aglow with a crimson haze that gradually turned to gold, until at last it rose above the graves of Jews from every age, lying side by side in the stone tombs of the Mount of Olives. They had given away their fortunes for the privilege of being buried here, wishing to be among the first to rise from the dead and so their bones have turned to dust, lying here, but still they keep their anxious vigil, as the moment the blast of the Prophet Elijah’s shofar is heard, the true Messiah will come and the Messianic Age will begin. Then all will resurrect: here, in this very place, in the Valley of Dry Bones, in the Valley of Jehoshaphat lying beneath the Gate of Mercy. The Ancient of Days will judge both the living and the dead, and a river of fire will flow from Him. And they – the Jews of every generation, are sitting closest of all, before the threshold of the Gate. They have waited so long that surely they will enter eternal salvation. Then, “with thunder and earthquake and great noise, windstorm and tempest, and the flames of a devouring fire” (Isaiah 29:6), they will follow the Messiah. They will pass behind Him through the Arch of Repentance, beneath the radiant Golden Gate, which will remain open forever. And they will not be stopped by the fact that they, as descendants of their father Abraham, will be forced to pass through the graves of their Muslim brothers, the descendants of that same father, Abraham – the brothers (?) seemingly condemned to mutual hatred until the end of time, which is now drawing near.

The Gate of Mercy is the only gate sealed shut  forever. Since 1541, it has remained inaccessible. Stone upon stone, no human will move it. And who knows… perhaps it is this inaccessibility, the mystery that fills it, the hidden spring of some unknown gravity beneath its threshold, that draws me to it with such irresistible force. I go there at night and sit as close as I can to one of its two arches – sometimes I choose the Arch of Repentance, and sometimes the Arch of Mercy. I open the Book of Tehillim and wait… Though I should confess at once that I am not waiting for the Messiah, nor for the end of time. For, despite everything, I stay curious to see how the story of this world will unfold. The mysticism of ordinary life speaks more to me than eternity itself.

For in Jerusalem, eternity surrounds from all over the place. As dawn broke after that night, the Jewish graves upon the Mount of Olives glowed in the first light, and so did the Muslim graves on the eastern slope of the Kidron Valley. The first rays of the sun filtered through the massive ancient stones when, suddenly, from the direction of the Lions’ Gate, I heard a strange sound like the scrape of gravel.   Along the path that divides the cemetery in two, an elderly Orthodox Jew came running with his tallit billowed behind him in the wind; tefillin were bound upon his forehead and left arm, and in his right hand, held before his eyes, he carried a prayer book. From a distance, he looked like a bird startled at a daybreak. What an extraordinary sight… I hurried down the path between the graves to get a closer look.

This gate bears many other names as well: the Sheep Gate (since the days of Nehemiah, a sheep market was held here once a week), the Flowers Gate (although in fact it should rather to be called the Gate of Resurrection, the Gate of Awakening) and the St. Stephen’s Gate (for a time it was believed that Saint Stephen had been stoned here). And so on.

This gate is my shelter. For a long time I was not aware how powerful a tradition permeates these walls, nor what secrets are hidden within the buildings just beyond them. I only felt that I when I was crossing its threshold, an unexpected peace was overwhelming me. It was as if, all the way from the Damascus Gate to this place, I had been carrying a sack of stones upon my back, until suddenly a guardian standing at the Gate of Awakening barred my way and said: “If you want to enter here, leave your burden outside.”

I come back here at different hours, though never on Fridays, neither before nor after noon. Because through the Sheep Gate Muslims pass on their way to the great Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque. An endless, tightly packed crowd of thousands of men moves through it, nearly every one of them with a prayer rug — sajjada, slung across his shoulder, and a “rosary” —  misbaha in his hand. Their silence strikes me. One after another they pass through and disappear into the narrow passageway of the gate. I come here on other days, passing a fruit and vegetable stall, turn left, and after a few dozen steps I arrive at my destination — an old, authentic café steeped in tobacco smoke, a place that surely remembers the days of the Mamluks. I greet Mahmud and sit outside among elderly men smoking cigarettes. Some of them know me; whilst others see me for the first time and for a moment eye me up with a curious gaze before resuming their conversations. And only occasionally does one of them ask, “Where you come from?” And when I resolve their doubts, saying that I am  not from America, they nod their heads friendlily warmly and resuming their conversations. A moment later Mahmud places before me a metal tray with glasses of freshly brewed cardamom coffee and water. I look at the street. Tourists are here a rarity. They are clearly afraid: after all, this is the strictly Muslim northeastern “corner” of the Old City. Only few people have ever heard of the holy places hidden here and — unlike the surroundings of the Damascus Gate — you will not see a single soldier or policeman whose mere presence would make you feel safer.

Little girls in identical school uniforms return home from school; men hurry past carrying bundles in black plastic bags, while older Arab women step slowly carrying the weight of sacks filled with fruit, vegetables and meat. I feel well here. Far from the commotion of the Damascus Gate, from the shouting vendors and the mingling crowds, I experience a moment of blessed stillness. And I think about how little has changed here since the end of the nineteenth century, when I was here last, exactly at the moment when, Emperor Wilhelm II, clad in a white uniform with golden epaulettes and a white cloak draped over his shoulders, mounted upon a white horse whose coat gleamed in the sunlight like silver, was approaching majestically the Jaffa Gate, triumphally decorated. Then, lost in thought, I was watching Mahmud place a brass tray with glasses of cardamom coffee and water upon the low stool before me and then  disappearing for a moment to return shortly with a nargileh, lifting glowing coals from the hearth and arranging them on the stem. And I inhale the smoke deep into my lungs,   forgetting about rulers, massacres, rivers of blood flowing through the streets, and the death, ubiquitous in this City.

It was only after some time that I understood that my — as I naïvely call it — “bliss” has also another source. Hidden deep within the mystical tradition of Islam, like every spring: one must bend low in order to drink from it. It is Sufism. Soon I learned that I was drinking coffee next to a place that for eight hundred years has been a destination of pilgrimage for Indians, followers of Sufism, and Sikhs not only from India but from all over the world.

On October 2, 1187, Sultan Saladin conquered Jerusalem, bringing to an end the eighty-eight-year rule of the Crusaders over the City. Not long afterward, around the year 1200, an Indian dervish entered Jerusalem through one of its gates: it was a Sufi mystic revered by believers of many faiths. He was Baba Farid, known formally as Hazrat Farid ud-Din Ganj Shakar. The entire life of this mystic, preacher, and poet bore witness to humility and love rooted in uncompromising devotion to God. The wisdom of his teachings, the gentleness with which he instructed others, and the elevated, poetic language he used earned him the epithet – “Sweet Treasure.” He remains one of the greatest sages and poets of Sufism and is also revered by followers of Sikhism.

Baba Farid stopped somewhere here, not far from Herod’s Gate. First he fasted in solitude for forty days, and then he created a spiritual oasis. He was teaching and meeting people who were drawn irresistibly to him, and through his life he showed others how not to surrender to the deceptive charm of the material world, but instead to attain enlightenment through complete concentration and dissolve oneself in the love of God. No one knows how long he remained in Jerusalem before returning to Punjab. He left behind a living and enduring memory and therefore, every Muslim from India who passing through Jerusalem on the way to Mecca stopped at the place where Baba Farid had once stayed. In this place known as a zawiyah, shrouded in legend, the spirit of India revealed itself 800 years ago: a beautiful house was built there, and it stands to this day. This is Hindi Serai — the Indian Hospice for Muslim pilgrims from India, situated just beyond Herod’s Gate on the little street called al-Zawiyah al-Hindiyyah.

The seed of love and wisdom planted by Baba Farid in the stony soil of Yerushalayim quickly began to germinate. By the 17^th century there were seventy separate Sufi lodges operating within the walls of the Old City, and Jerusalem had become some kind of “Mecca for the dervishes.”

As I drink coffee in the shadow of the Indian Hospice, I remind myself yet again not to treat the media as an unquestionable oracle. It is hardly worth mentioning that objective journalism has all but ceased to exist. What I am getting at is this: in this city of permanent conflict and mutual hatred, there continue to appear “incarnations” of Sheikh Baba Farid, referring in their teaching and daily practice return to an idea as immortal as hatred itself: the idea of peaceful coexistence. One such persons — and I regret deeply that I never had the chance to know him — was Sheikh Abdul Aziz Bukhari. It would take many pages to write properly about him. This is not the place for that. Instead, I enclose this link encouraging you to discover him for yourselves.

Although the so-called “mainstream” media rarely speak of such things — for who truly cares about acts of goodness? — you should not be surprised to learn that Sufism is still alive in modern Israel and in Yerushalayim itself and one of its currents bears the name “El Tarika El Ibrahimiyyah” i.e. “The Abrahamic Way,” which is “The Bridge Between the Religions of the Middle East.” The Ibrahimiyyah is not — God forbid — a religious organization, because it represents no institutions, no churches, no states. I would compare it rather to the Tent of Abraham — yes, we raise such a tent every year during the Festival, too — where worshippers of the same God, children of the same father, Jews, Christians, and Muslims, meet one another directly. Not somewhere between the “pages of reports and pious declarations about peace”, but face to face. Not in order to build statistics, but in order to build mutual respect.

Without asking, Mahmud brings me another coffee and sits beside me. Inside his crumbling café only two old Arab men remain now. Bent over the table, smoking cigarettes, they are utterly absorbed in a game of backgammon.

Mahmud offers me a cigarette and slides a burning match toward me. We smoke in silence. I look toward the Gate of Awakening, where Baba Farid once gathered around himself diverse believers in the same God, knowing that all of us believe in the One, and what does it matter, then, that we believe differently? When night falls, I rise and make my way toward the exit. Standing in the threshold of the Flower Gate, empty at this hour, I catch the scent of incense smoke drifting from the direction of the Hindi Serai.

The Lions’ Gate

Our feet are standing in your gates, Jerusalem.
Psalm 122;2

I am not a religious person in the generally accepted sense of the word: the fervor of ostentatious prayer is foreign to me and external signs of group belonging get on my nerves. I am not bound by the ritual of weekly attendance at a house of worship. Neither do I not search for the intervention of higher powers in the ordinary course of life, nor do I abuse symbols in order to explain the common history of humankind… nevertheless, when I read Psalm 24, which says:

Lift up your heads, O gates! Be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of Glory may enter!
Who is this King of Glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle.

and when I think about what happened on the morning of June 7, 1967, I feel that the order of things preserved in historical memory reaches beyond the realm of merely human forces.

Before my eyes stand two images, two gates, close to one another in space, yet distant in time.

The end of May, 1948 – the capitulation of the Israeli forces in the Old City; the shattered dream of a united Yerushalayim, the final frame of the nightmare: a wave of Jewish refugees driven out by the Jordanians through the Zion Gate. Crushed together and terrified, they abandon their homes, their city, their beloved Zion, the whole of the life they had known until then, carrying their pitiful belongings and their fear in small bundles, they move forward. Some gaze with disbelief and terror in their eyes and others look back with longing and pain, for the one last time upon the Jewish Quarter, shrouded in black smoke. How many times in history have they been condemned to exile? How many times have they departed carrying in their hearts the hope that a day will come — in a year, in a century, whenever— they would finally return home forever?

They are driven onward, humiliated, like their forefathers in the year 70, when the Romans expelled them from the city; or as in 135, when Emperor Hadrian banished them almost forever: fearful chaos reigns here, suffocating crowds press together, and upon every face is written the same expression of dread and sorrow. One boy looks back over his shoulder, with expression of longing in his eyes. Another one braces his hand against the immovable wall, as though he wished at all costs to stop the inevitable. A little girl turns around, cringing like a wounded creature, silently screaming or sobbing… And in the middle, towering like a monument to victory, stands a Jordanian soldier, calmly eyeing up those expelled. One more moment the Gate will devour them all, like the gate on which such words were carved:

Through me the way into the suffering city,
Through me the way to everlasting pain,
Through me the way among the lost people…
Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.

(Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, Canto III)

And then — as has happened so many times before in history — the gate  will slam shut behind them for another long and unbearable season of the loss of Zion.

This is the blessing with which Jacob blessed his sons:

Judah, your brothers shall praise you; your hand shall be upon the neck of your enemies; your father’s sons shall bow down before you.
Judah is a lion’s cub; from the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down, he crouched as a lion and as a lioness — who dares rouse him?
The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,
until he comes to whom it belongs; and to him shall be the obedience of the nations.
Genesis 49:8–10

It is ten o’clock in the morning, June 7, 1967. Israeli paratroopers of the 71^st Battalion storm forward from the direction of the Mount of Olives and break into the Old City through the Lions’ Gate. Even today one can still see the twisted metal of the great doors smashed apart by one of the jeeps that crashed through them with full force. They burst out from the deep shadows beyond the frame of the photograph. Before them stands the gate, open and flooded with morning sunlight; dark silhouettes of soldiers rush forward — descendants of the Maccabees, of the Zealots, of the rebels of Bar Kokhba: an army of spirits resurrected from the nearby Valley of Jehoshaphat. The battle is vicious: for every house, every narrow alley. The command has forbidden the use of heavy weapons because of the holy places and monuments of the Old City (here, stones still matter more than human life). Through the Lions’ Gate run the children of Judah. Above them there are smoke-blackened stone panthers, the dynastic symbols of Sultan Baybars and the Mamluks — those who persecuted the Jews for centuries. And before them lies an open and unwritten chapter of history. This is the longest dream of a scattered nation coming true: sustained through countless generations by love and longing, faith finally takes on the tangible form for which it had prayed. And the fervent wish spoken out for nearly two thousand years on every continent during the final night of Passover and on Yom Kippur: L’Shanah Haba’ah B’Yerushalayim,  Next Year in Yerushalayim – are becoming reality at last.

The Lions of Judah are running onward, overcoming the weakening resistance of the enemy, and moments later cross the threshold of the Gate of Israel’s Generations   reaching the Temple Mount. Colonel Mordechai Gur transmits over the radio: Cease fire! The Temple Mount is in our hands. The Temple Mount is ours! The Temple Mount is ours!  (Moti Gur, Battle for Jerusalem, New York 2002, p. 353). A minute later, Colonel Arik Achmon climbs onto the Dome of the Rock and raises the Israeli flag bearing the Star of David above it.  After two thousand years of exile — This came true.

But it was not the Temple Mount that was their final destination: not all of them stop there, even though it was there that the First and Second Temples of Jerusalem once stood, and beneath the Dome of the Rock lies hidden the Foundation Stone of creation itself. Instead, they all run toward the place that has become the symbol of survival,  the place never abandoned by the Divine Presence, the Shekhinah, and therefore the holiest site in Judaism. They run toward those immovable stones filled to overflowing with prayers and tears; and to the stones that live and ceaselessly retell the story of greatness, downfall, return, and fulfillment – to the Western Wall,  to the Wailing Wall, to the Kotel HaMa’aravi.

“Wherever I go,” Nachman of Breslov used to say, “I am always going to Jerusalem.” And so I go. The road I  take leads me through gates of humility, rejection, community, fulfillment, love, silence, and peace…I know that I shall not pass through all the 49 gates. Even so, I still wish to pass through those that I can open myself before, filled with fear and hope, I stand before the final gate, the most beautiful and at the same time the most mysterious of them all, sealed forever and ever – the Gate of Mercy.

Before the gate closes,
before all that can be said has been said,
before I become another man.
Before wise blood turns still,
before things are shut away in cupboards,
before the concrete sets hard.
Before every flute falls silent,
before all the laws are explained,
before the vessels are broken.
Before the law gathers its strength,
before God closes His hand,
before we leave this place.

Jehuda Amichaj, Before

The New Gate

There was no other way – it had to be built. After the French had erected the lofty Notre Dame guest house,  they proved to the world (they did not prove anything in fact) that they were “trumping” over Jerusalem and  – who knows? – in the way started by their Crusader forebears, some perhaps even dreamed of seizing control of Jerusalem and entire Palestine. The memorable year of 1882 saw the first organized party of wealthy French “pilgrims” arriving in the Land of Israel. There were — no small number! — more than a thousand of them. It was a time when the Ottoman Empire was slowly sinking into decline, whilst France stood in clear ascendancy, having for centuries claimed the role of sole protector of Catholic pilgrims and the holy places of the city. The imposing Notre Dame complex (1884–1904) contained 410 rooms. Do you really think that its guests were expected to cover the extra distance to wander all the way to the Jaffa Gate? Oh, definitely, no. And so the French – with the explicit consent of Sultan Abdul Hamid II – dismantled a section of the walls directly opposite the guest house, in order to facilitate, as much as possible, the passage between the outside world and the (Catholic) holy sites within the walls as easy as possible. In time, this has proved to be an exceedingly practical solution. 

For many years, the New Gate had never particularly grasped my attention. A gate like any other gate. It simply was not on my way, for depending on where I happened to be living at the time, I usually entered the city through either the Jaffa Gate or the Damascus Gate. 

Once, back in the last century, I got to know a remarkable man, one of the true masters of Armenian ceramics, without whom the face of Yerushalayim would bear an unforgivable stain of lifelessness. I met him at a time when he and his brother were still running their (work) shop in the Armenian Quarter, just beside the entrance to the St. James’s Cathedral. They had opened the shop in 1983. After some years, George Sandrouni and his wife, Dorin, moved their workshop to the vicinity of the New Gate, lending the whole area an undeniable charm. They both possess such grace and warmth that even if they did nothing more than sit outside their shop, drinking coffee and watching the passers-by, it would still be enough to clear off the air — so often heavy as a convicting sentence — and make it breathable once again.  

In moments of clarity, when the so-called “world” turns its eyes towards Jerusalem, it perceives the city through the prism of the magnificent Armenian ceramics. Today, their cheap imitations reign supreme among the Chinese and Indian scarves (“handmade silk,” of course) sold in the souk that stretches along the streets of the City. I have nothing against buying such staff; on the contrary, I do it myself. Yet, there is only one place in the Christian Quarter where it is truly worth buying things with your eyes closed. Over the past thirty-four years, only a handful of plates and bowls in our home have got broken, and considering that we use them every single day, I buy them nowhere else. Always from the same place — unfailingly from the same man, a Syrian Christian known here by everyone: Eli Kuz. 

But my own beloved spot near the New Gate , is where I find myself surrounded by true beauty and friendship, and from which I carry home genuine works of Armenian art, the (work)shop of George and Dorin Sandrouni. Usually in the evening, after a long day spent wandering through the City, or out through the desert, the valleys, or the bustling lanes of Mahane Yehuda Market — I make my way to their place. Before stepping inside, I often pause unnoticed beside the wall opposite the entrance, and just  look. The sight of those two good and beautiful people bent over their work in the brightly lit shop, among white shelves overflowing with vividly colored ceramics, feels to me like a kind of blessing bestowed upon the moment itself.  

I let my eyes wander across the richness of Armenian art gathered on a surface of less than thirty square meters, and I think of how miraculous it is that so little time was needed for the very fabric of the City to absorb these colors: the alternating blues and cobalt evoking the heavenly sphere so fervently longed for by humankind; the countless shades of green, breathing with the abundance of life and reverence for Nature; the red indispensable to express  whose the energy of life itself; and finally the white, drawing forth every nuance from the other colors which, beneath an similarities, make each piece instantly recognizable by the hand of its creator. 

Today, very few remember (and almost no one knows) that the street signs of the Old City were crafted in the Armenian style more than a century ago, commissioned by the great master ceramicist David Ohannessian. 

He himself, together with his family, by some miracle, survived the Armenian Genocide committed by the Turks in 1915-1917. In truth, it was largely thanks to him that Armenian ceramics transformed and enriched, for good, the countenance of the city known in Armenian as Երուսաղեմ/ Jerusaghemi.  Its effect on the human senses is powerful. Armenian pottery — alongside Kotel Ha’Maaravi, i.e. the Western Wall, the Dome of the Rock, and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher make up the “trademark”, “brand” and “synonym” of the City, though those who fall under sensual spell of this art are seldom aware of this. Nearly everyone buys and takes home some small souvenir: a painted tile, a ceramic plaque or a little jug. 

The street called New Gate, running from the Gate itself toward des Frères street, is an almost extraterritorial space within the Old Jerusalem. It leads directly into the Christian quarter, yet its character is, one might say – profoundly cosmopolitan. That thanks to a number of cafés that attract travelers who are conscious of the spirit of the place: people eager to linger over coffee, wine, or arak, regardless of the pressure of one or another  festive day is  currently slowing the heartbeat of the City. It is a tiny, extraordinarily quaint  piece of Jerusalem’s Montmartre. 

Pop in there in the evening, say around six o’clock. Perhaps you will come across a stout gentleman with a cigar and a bottle of beer, his gaze betraying both a deep curiosity about the world and the quiet certitude that nothing can surprise him any longer…,  sitting at the end of the street at a small table at the wall. That is George Sandrouni. Come up to him and give him my greetings. Then step inside the shop. There, beside the turning wheel on which a raw vase, or some other future piece of art, will be waiting, sits a beautiful woman with a paintbrush in her hand, dipping the tool again and again into the dark well of an inkpot and, in deep concentration, lays the friendly colors of creation upon the clay vessel. That is Dorin Sandrouni. She will greet you with a smile and a glance that makes you feel somehow chosen. 

So then, please set aside all thoughts of rushing through the City: the churches will remain where they have always stood; the bells will not fall silent, nor will the muezzin cease his song; you will have time enough for all that has been allotted to you. You are in holy Yerushalayim; do not disturb the rhythm of the City with the trivial desire to see everything. That will never happen. Perhaps you will never return here again. So instead focus on what is before you now. Remain awhile in this Armenian sanctuary of beauty, free from all necessities. The only thing you must do now is pass through the welcoming threshold of the New Gate and stay there until, at the unseen side of the walls, another day of your new life begins to be born. As Nachman of Breslov said: The Architect of the world never makes the same thing twice. Every day is the day of an entirely new creation. Take from each new day as much as it has to offer. 

I have this in mind each time I cross the threshold of the New Gate.  

Many times have I watched this while sitting near the grave of the alleged architects who, upon the orders of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, erected walls around the city, only to be executed later on so that – God forbid – they might not repeat such a artifact anywhere else for other rulers. When the last camel appeared at the gate, a swarm of barefoot children emerged from the shadows and, heedless of the furious blows of a stick, laughed in the Arab’s face, stealing whatever they could carry in their small, frail hands. 

The Jaffa Gate is beautiful. Yet, the Jaffa Gate also bears another name – the Gate of the Friend. This is to honor of the patriarch Abraham, the father of Jews and Arabs, who was buried in Hebron. Not far away, just about 30 kilometers from here. 

Once ago, crowds of tourists from around the world  would throng here. However, since the pandemic, after October 7, 2023, and following last year’s and ongoing war with Iran, the world has legitimate reasons for apprehension. Thus tourists from around the world no longer throng here. 

Stop for a moment and listen standing at the Jaffa Gate, the one most frequently crossed.  Psalm 33 sounds beautiful inside the Jaffa Gate. Most often, I find young people there playing guitars and singing mainly in English. But when I’m lucky, I hear the sound of a harp and a crystal-clear voice as I approach the gate. Inside, on the right side under the niche, sits a beautiful girl in a white tunic with a harp. She sings Psalms in the language of this land and this people, in the language in which they were written, which hides the surpassing beauty radiating from every word and heard in its sound: 

א רַנְּנוּ צַדִּיקִים בַּיהוָה לַיְשָׁרִים נָאוָה תְהִלָּה׃  

ו בִּדְבַר יְהוָה שָׁמַיִם נַעֲשׂוּ וּבְרוּחַ פִּיו כָּל־צְבָאָם׃ 

ח יִירְאוּ מֵיְהוָה כָּל־הָאָרֶץ מִמֶּנּוּ יָגוּרוּ כָּל־יֹשְׁבֵי תֵבֵל׃
ט כִּי הוּא אָמַר וַיֶּהִי הוּא צִוָּה וַיַּעֲמֹד׃ 

י יְהוָה הֵפִיר עֲצַת גּוֹיִם הֵנִיא מַחְשְׁבוֹת עַמִּים׃
יב אַשְׁרֵי הַגּוֹי אֲשֶׁר־יְהוָה אֱלֹהָיו הָעָם בָּחַר לְנַחֲלָה לוֹ׃ 

כ נַפְשֵׁנוּ חִכְּתָה לַיהוָה עֶזְרֵנוּ וּמָגִנֵּנוּ הוּא׃
כא כִּי־בוֹ יִשְׂמַח לִבֵּנוּ כִּי בְשֵׁם קָדְשׁוֹ בָטָחְנוּ׃
כב יְהִי־חַסְדְּךָ יְהוָה עָלֵינוּ כַּאֲשֶׁר יִחַלְנוּ לָךְ׃ 

Ps. 33 

There is one night that I remember particularly well. It was October 8, 2023. I was walking from gate to gate, searching in the darkness for even the smallest spark of comfort. Just a few meters from the Jaffa Gate, I heard someone inside singing the Kabbalistic prayer Ana Bekoach  

The acoustics of the Gate are excellent, and thus the woman’s voice sounded strong and resonant. I sat down on a stone bench in front of the entrance and listened. I wanted to thank her, so when the song silenced, I stood up and came inside. There was no one in the Gate. 

I often hear the opinion that the Jaffa Gate, situated in the western part of the walls, welcomed and let in all the novelties and achievements of Western culture/civilization, especially over the last two centuries. Naturally, that was the case. For me, though,  the far more important thing is how much Jewish culture and civilization has given, and continues to give, to the West, and more broadly to the world – not over the course of centuries, but millennia. For where are all those civilizations today that once seemed to have an eternal presence? Where are their civilizations nowadays, and what do the Canaanites, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Crusaders, Mamluks, Ottomans, and Brits still offer to the world…? Their golden age has passed irrevocably. A mindful pilgrim will easily find their “dead” traces in the living fabric of the city. For Jerusalem, is not a “museum city.” Here, where camels roamed just yesterday, motorcycles and electric carts now speed by, heedless of tourists mesmerized by the past. Here, where just yesterday – that is, centuries ago – an Arab vendor touted his spices, a descendant of his, in a direct line, but centuries younger, does exactly the same today. 

Passover and Easter are behind us. Fragments of Iranian cluster bombs are falling on Jerusalem’s Old City, indiscriminately – on synagogues, churches, and mosques. And, as usual, “the Jews are guilty for everything.” Indeed, the list of Jewish “guilts” against the world is endless. A walking pang of conscience is the figure of Jesus.  Yeshua – as we should constantly remember and teach – was/is a Jew. He was born in Bethlehem, just 9 kilometers away from Jerusalem. Born to a Jewish mother. He taught, just as many other wise Jews taught. Many of them considered themselves to be the Messiah, and no one took offense at their being “sons of God.” After all, we are all His children. Jesus did not establish any religion, God forbid. The foundation of Christianity is the work of another Jew – Rabbi Saul of Tarsus. The world knows him as St. Paul. All the Evangelists, Mary Magdalene, Martha and Mary of Bethany, Joseph of Arimathea, Lazarus, Judas: all of them were Jews and practiced Judaism in its early, Temple-centered form. And like all Jews, they gathered during the three “Pilgrimage Festivals” in Jerusalem, where they offered sacrifices in the Temple. Jesus, as a God-fearing Jew, was doing the same. 

Yes, I think about all this at the beautiful Jaffa Gate. Not only the latest archaeological discoveries confirm that on the site of today’s Tower of David stood King Herod’s magnificent palace, where Roman governors, including Pontius Pilate, resided. Antonia Fortress – where Jesus is believed to have been tried – was merely military barracks, unworthy of a Roman governor. If this version is true (don’t ask me which is true), then the drama  of Passion unfolded right here. 

“His blood be on us and on our children” (Matt. 27:23). Two thousand years of persecution, humiliation, cruelty. Anti-Semitism that even the fire of the Holocaust did not incinerate and the wind did not disperse. Quite opposite. “His blood be on us and on our children” is the cornerstone of Christian anti-Semitism. It’s a waste of words. Of time. And a waste of lives. 

I walk through the Jaffa Gate, looking toward the story of Jesus the Jew and in my memory I hear Czesław Miłosz’s poem—“The High Priest’s Son”: 

Yes, my father was a high priest, 
but in vain do they now try to convince me 
that I should condemn my father. 

He was a God-fearing and righteous man, 
a defender of the Lord’s name. 

It was his duty to protect the Lord’s name
 from being defiled by human lips.  

The fervent expectations of my people
were met by false prophets and saviors. 

An unknown carpenter from Nazareth 
was not the first to claim to be the Messiah. 

My father became entangled 
in a tragic affair with no escape 

In the popular imagination, the coming of the Messiah 
had become the equivalent to the end of Roman occupation. 

Could the Sanhedrin allow an uprising to break out 
that would end in the ruin of the holy city? 

Even if my father had wanted to save the Nazarene, 
the Nazarene had wounded him deeply. 

He wounded his piety, the very essence of which 
was the conviction of the infinite distance 
separating us mortals from the Creator. 

Do you, Jesus’s disciples, not understand 
what your claim that this man was God 
means to the ears of pious people? 

Walking down the cobblestone street, I gently turn right and climb the stairs leading to the gate of the City of David. I sit at the top in front of the gate and read a poem by Yehuda Amichai—“Tourists”: 

Mourning tourists come to us,
they sit at Yad Vashem, grow solemn at the Western Wall 
and laugh behind the heavy curtains of their hotel rooms. 

They take photos with important deceased figures at Rachel’s Tomb,
at Herzl’s Tomb, on Mount Hatachmoshet, 
weep over the beauty of our youth’s bravery 
and crave the toughness of our girls 
and hang up their panties, 
so they’ll dry quickly 
in the cool blue bathroom. 

Once I sat on the steps in front of the gate of the Tower of David, 
placing both heavy bags beside me. There was a group of tourists
gathered around a guide, and I served as their landmark. 
“Do you see that man with the bags? A little to the right of his head 
is a Roman-era arch. A little to the right of his head.” 
But he moved! He moved! I said to myself: Liberation will come if 
they are told: Do you see that Roman arch? 
Never mind, next to it, a little to the left, below, 
sits a man who bought vegetables and fruit for his home.  

And so it has been for years. For two thousand years. 

The Zion Gate

Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion,
which cannot be shaken but endures forever
Psalm 125:1

This is the most lacerated gate. Deep bullet marks have carved ghastly furrows into its face. It has survived the worst and stands as a testament to the Jews’ unwavering love for Jerusalem. If I were to assign one of the Psalms to this Gate, it would be this one, Psalm 125. As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people, now and forever.

Zion – one of the seventy names of Jerusalem. Zion, one of the three mountains upon which Jerusalem stands. From Zion, there is a beautiful view of Mount Moriah and the Mount of Olives.

For unknown reasons, the engineers of Suleiman the Magnificent did not include Mount Zion in their plans to enclose it within the city walls. Therefore, the Zion Gate leads from the Old City to the southern slope, where the German Basilica of the Dormition of the Most Holy Virgin Mary stands proudly with its massive structure.

It was many years ago, I met a writer from Poland at the Damascus Gate. We wandered through the City together until we finally reached the Zion Gate. It was on the second half of a sweltering August day. We took shelter in the shade and apparent coolness inside the gate. Look – I said –we’re standing right in the middle of the symbol of Jerusalem. He shook his head and replied: “No, no… we’re standing near that symbol.” It turned out that for this writer, the symbol of Jerusalem was the nearby building of the former Nebi David Mosque, from where a small, pot-bellied minaret tower still rises toward the sky. Today, in the hall beneath the minaret, where Muslims have prayed for centuries, stands the Cenacle, while below this Cenacle, on the ground floor, is the hall housing King David’s sarcophagus. For me, this is a symbol; everything comes together here, because that is what Jerusalem is – he said. 

Indeed, the Zion Gate leads to this extraordinary place, where – as far as the facts are concerned – there was certainly only a mosque, so the site is authentic. The same cannot be said of either King David’s tomb or the Cenacle. But why do the findings of scientists matter, as they melt like snow in the fire of fervent faith, which carves its own, indisputable logic of history onto the walls? Here, the truth is often what we want and what we believe in. 

So which is the truth here? So what is the truth…? 

The truth is that Zion is the circulatory system of the Jewish people, and Jerusalem is its heart. And that blood is the seat of the soul. It must not be shed, and it must not be consumed. It is the source and symbol of endurance. Enough already of all sacrifices – altars, incense smoke. What was to be done has already been done. The sacrifice of Auschwitz surpasses the sacrifice of Abraham… Its sign is blood and ashes. 

The Jews are at home; this is their home – the land, the capital, Mount Moriah, and the holy Zion. This will not be changed by the verdicts of hateful courts that establish foreign laws on land which is not their own. Your decrees and resolutions of condemnation are nothing in the face of Israel’s existence and survival. In the face of an uncertain future which is still a future.  At the Zion Gate I feel it most completely – this burden of existence that compels us to look our enemies straight in the eye and anticipate their moves. Especially now, especially after October 7, 2023. We are here, and we will remain here. Am Israel Chai! 

One truth reveals its absolute purity at the Zion Gate, especially today, in the face of escalating anti-Semitism in the world, calculated – as we see – to destroy the State of Israel. The Jewish people have a historic right to the land of Israel, and no one will take it away from them. Never. Just as the Polish people have a historic right to their land, and no one will take it away from them. Never. 

That is why it is not surprising to me that whenever I stand at the Zion Gate, I think of the national anthems of Israel and Poland. Both anthems are, in a way, Psalms of Hope. Hope fulfilled. The Poles waited 123 years to regain their independence. Jews waited nearly two thousand years to return to their homeland. “Dąbrowski’s Mazurka” and “Hatikva”: 

As long as blood pulses in the heart, Poland has not yet perished
The Jewish soul quivers with life, As long as we live 

Sometimes, when night falls over Jerusalem and a yellow moon rises over the desert, I go to the Zion Gate, lean against its wall, and wait. Once, I happened to meet doctor  Jehoshua Ozjasz Thon, an outstanding Zionist from Kraków, at this Gate. His portrait still hangs on one of the walls of the Tempel Synagogue, where for over forty years (sic!) he held the position of a rabbi and a preacher. Rabbi Ozjasz Thon was a fervent Zionist and, at the same time, a zealous Polish patriot. He served three consecutive terms in the Polish Sejm. This is a concept incomprehensible for today’s political troglodytes under the banner of the fire extinguisher, the swastika, the hammer, and the sickle. He lived at No.: 5 Jasna/Bogusławskiego Street, in an apartment No.: 3 .Thus, he lived close from his “Mount Zion” to Miodowa Street – he only had to cross Dietla Avenue to find himself within the “walls” of Kazimierz. 

As the legend goes – and I confirm it, while waiting for the rabbi, taking the starry sky of the City of Peace to be my witness – when you stand in a specific spot in the Tempel Synagogue, beneath one of its stained-glass windows, and touch the cool wall with your forehead, you will hear a muffled yet distinct voice. It is the voice of Rabbi Thon, whose fiery sermons not only went down in history but penetrated deep into the walls of the temple and protect it until the coming of the Messiah. 

The God of Israel is a God of love. Could the love that God manifests in nature be neglected by human society? How much must human hearts have expanded when Israel, at the command of its God, thundered with a resounding voice that reached the deepest recesses of the soul: “Love thy neighbor as you do yourself.” (…) In this way, Israel became a force that morally shaped human posterities, giving them the foundations upon which they could continue to develop and build their coexistence. In this way, Israel became a blessing for humanity. These are the words spoken on October 17, 1896. 

At the Zion Gate, I am waiting for Rabbi Ozjasz Thon. He has never let me down. He comes here from the side of King David’s tomb and, along the stone path flooded in moonlight, he walks slowly towards me. Even from a distance, he extends his hand; I see a smile on his face and a golden glare in his glasses. Shalom, Mr. Makuch… how are you? Well… please tell me.

photo of the Zion Gate: Berthold Werner, Wikimedia Commons

A city without walls is naked, disgraced, at the mercy of the world. It is an object of mockery and contempt. A city whose gates are empty is like a body without a soul.

In 586 BCE, Jeremiah’s prophecy (Jer. 25:1-14) was fulfilled – the armies of Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon, attacked Jerusalem, plundered and destroyed Solomon’s Temple, carried thousands of Jews into captivity, leaving behind a burned, ruined city without walls or gates.

It was not until 70 years later that the balance of power shifted, and the King of Persia, Artaxerxes I, defeated the King of Babylon. He permitted Nehemiah to return to the ruined capital of Judah, provided him with resources, and granted permission to rebuild the walls, gates, and the Temple itself.

Nehemiah rebuilt the walls and reinforced the gates in just 52 days. No, not only by himself. It was the work of the entire Jewish community. The whole community.

Over the course of seventy years in exile, the generation of Israelites who remembered the Temple had died. But subsequent generations returned: Zerubbabel rebuilt the Temple. Ezra restored the awareness of the Law. Nehemiah rebuilt the walls and repaired the gates.

More than once – whether at dawn, during the day, or in the middle of the night, I would walk around the walls of Jerusalem, stopping at all its eight gates. I followed in Nehemiah’s footsteps: I arrived at night through the Valley Gate toward the Dragon’s Spring and reached the Dung Gate. (Neh. 2:13)

For me, the Dung Gate is  a visual symbol in the record of the long history of the Jewish people. A link between the Gihon Spring, the beginning of Yerushalayim – that is, the City of David and Mount Moriah, where only God witnessed human limitless faith and the birth of history, when the rock of sacrifice changed into the foundation of religion.

Most gates have a premeditated design and rich ornamentation, whereas the Dung Gate (like the New Gate) is merely a graphic pause in the dense alphabet of stones forming the walls surrounding the city. That is how I think of this gate, when I climb the road towards it from the Kidron Valley. A dash, a hyphen – I stand within the  passageway leaning against the wall and wondering whether it was near here that King David danced before the Ark of the Covenant? Probably not, as the original Dung Gate was much lower down, but—who knows?

The Dung Gate, located in the lowest place of all the gates, served over the centuries as the city’s indispensable anus. Once upon a time… it was considered by some rabbis to be the most abhorrent (?!), it regularly expelled all impurities, feces, rotten vegetables and fruit, and the ashes of sacrificial animals. This was all done so that the city’s organism could remain untouched by filth and could operate for the benefit of all its inhabitants. Today, a road leads through the gate leading to the holiest place in Judaism – to HaKotel HaMa’aravi. Though the truth is that this is not the “holiest” place in Judaism, because the “holiest” is located beyond the Western Wall, on Har HaBayit/the Temple Mount, where the Temple once stood;  within the Temple, separated from human eyes by a thick curtain—Kodesh HaKodashim/ the Holy of Holies.

And the Holy of Holies itself was erected in the center of the Rock of Sacrifice, i.e. on the Cornerstone of the World – Even ha-Shetiya, which today is covered by the golden Dome of the Rock. You can approach it by entering through the inconspicuous Dung Gate, and then –after passing through the checkpoint – across a makeshift wooden bridge through the Mughrabi Gate straight onto the Temple Mount.

Before you reach the Wall, before you lay your ritually clean hands on the Covenant stones and before you immerse yourself in prayer, think about this relationship between existentialism and excrementalism; do not be ashamed of yourself; during the day, recite not only the Psalms but also the blessing we utter after every bowel movement – Blessed are You, Hashem, our God, King of the world, who formed man wisely and created in him numerous openings and numerous crevices. It is revealed and known before the Throne of Thy glory that if one of them were [improperly] opened or one of them were blocked, it would not be possible to survive and stand before You even for a moment. Blessed are You, Hashem, who heals all bodies and works in wondrous ways.

Be aware of who you are, cherish the moment in which you find yourself, and as you pass through the Dung Gate, realize that it is not the body that possesses the soul, but the opposite – the soul possesses the body, which you should care for just as tenderly as you care for the soul.

And do not be condescending; do not despise others. Today you daydream to be more significant than a beggar who jingles coins in a tin cup at the Dung Gate, but the truth is that you yourself are the beggar, devoid by the excess of the ability to tell right from wrong. You judge the world by your own measure, which is a function of your  own ego. You deem the world to be friendly, if not subservient, if it fits within your system of logic, reflects the state of your knowledge, and flatters your intellect. But your logic is crude, your knowledge molded from clay, and your intellect a spider’s web that you weave ceaselessly, hoping someone will get caught in it. At the end of your life, you will beg for even a single day, for an hour. So do not do to others what you yourself would not want to experience.

An invisible scale hangs from the ceiling of the Dung Gate: you cannot escape judgment.

At the Dung Gate, I think of Nehemiah. About the moment when he stands before the assembly of Jews and says: Come! Let us rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, so that we may no longer be disgraced. And then the Jews replied—Agreed! Let us build!

And when the Arab Geshem mocked their intentions, Nehemiah replied him bluntly: Yes, we were and we will be here; we will rebuild life here, in our holy Yerushalayim to which you have no right and no connections with.  

The Dung Gate is an indispensable, blessed opening through which divine light falls from beneath the Western Wall. It leads from the world of our senses and daily bustle toward the sacred realm beyond human comprehension. Treat the very act of passing through the Dung Gate as an act of purification. Walk in humility and concentration and stand among those who are praying. Try, if only for a moment, to forget the world, which will claim you back anyway. It’s not about “rattling off” prayers. Who needs that? Pray solely in your own words. Or even through silence alone. The most important thing is – as rabbi Nachman of Breslov says – Pray with a focused heart, and you will see that all the gates of Heaven will open before you. There are many testimonies of transformed hearts, oftentimes harder than the stones of the temple.

Is this not what Jesus meant when he spoke of the “inner room/ chamber of the heart”? (Matt. 6:6) A prayer reflects the essence of life; you live within society and within a family, but you must live your life on your own, not necessarily in solitude, just as you must find your own path to God. Or to a place where you will find peace and reconciliation with yourself. No religion can do this for you. And remember, the true meaning of life remains hidden; it will only become clear after your death. For – as some poet, Dominik Opolski, once said – the obituary is the testimony of the school of life.

I think about life and death at the Dung Gate and recall the words of Rabbi Zusia of Annopol, which he uttered before his death: In the world to come, they will not ask me, “Why weren’t you Moses?” They will ask me, “Why weren’t you Zusia?”

In Yerushalayim, it is very often impossible to tell distinguish truth from myth. Thanks to astonishingly advanced technology, we are now able to follow relentlessly  the story of the world with relentless attention. More than that…, we can be almost everywhere at once and hold opinions about everything. But can we really? Take one example: the war waged by Russia against Ukraine has been going on for more than four years. We have access to information, and yet we know only as much as we happen to read here and there. The war with Iran, which was supposed to last no longer than the Earth’s journey around the Sun, has already been going on for over a month, and still we know nothing.

At the root of all disinformation lies a strategic lie. You are meant to believe what I want you to believe. Information chaos is so overwhelming that it becomes easier to adopt the version handed to you than to seek the truth for yourself. The machinery of lies does not function because it is so perfect. It functions because into its design human stupidity and the willingness to submit to manipulation are woven. That stupidity is disastrously coupled with an unshaken sense of one’s own value, which makes a lie once swallowed, and not spat out in time, dissolves into a someone’s intellectual and moral ecosystem and quickly hardens into the form called “dogma.” And dogma, once set, is rock-solid.