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Jerusalem. a City and a Symbol
King, Jenny
The following essay by Jenny King, a 1998 graduate of Notre Dame de Sion High School in Kansas City, MO, received the 1996-97 Louise Humann Award in a writing contest marking the occasion of Jerusalem 3000. Jenny was then a seventeen year-old junior. She is now a freshman at Central Methodist College in Fayette, MO. This fine work, with its few inaccuracies, illustrates the desire and the effort of the new generation struggling to understand the complex history underpinning present-day conflicts in Jerusalem.
In Jerusalem the sun illuminates the city, washing over such magnificent structures as the Western Wall, a fragment of King Herod’s temple, the Dome of the rock, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. As the day progresses and the sun fades, silhouettes of churches, mosques and synagogues decorate one’s vision. Here, within the walls of this historically rich city, three religions have their roots
Jerusalem, the capital of Israel which sits among the Judean Hills, is a concept as well as a place; it is a symbol as well as a city. Jerusalem with its multi-ethnic population numbering over one-half million is as diverse as a collection of fingerprints. Throughout history, Jerusalem has known opulent and stable times as well as times of turmoil and conflict. As Jerusalem nears its three thousandth birthday, the world celebrates the city’s magnificent past while Jerusalem builds a future for its young generations
The magical story of Jerusalem began thousands of years ago when Moses descended from Mount Sinai carrying in his hands two stone tablets. Moses announced to his people, the Israelites, that these tablets were given to him from God, and engraved upon them were the laws God intended all people to follow. The Israelites placed the tablets in an elaborately decorated box and carried it with them as they wandered throughout the Middle East for many centuries.
At the young age of thirty, a renowned man named David was anointed king of all the Israelite nation. He captured the city of Jerusalem from a tribe known as the Jebusites, and in 1004 BCE, declared this city the capital of his country. King David placed the tablets, known more formally as the Ark of the Covenant, atop Mount Moriah, a religiously significant rock that lies within the city walls. Finally, the Ark of the Covenant had a permanent dwelling and the Israelites had a religious home. During his reign, David constructed a royal palace and strengthened the city’s fortifications. Jerusalem soon came to be known as a religious and political center of Israel. Solomon, David’s son and successor, continued to develop the young city. In 961 BCE, King Solomon built the First Temple which affirmed the city’s association to Judaism. He also assembled a new royal palace and a city wall to protect the many new constructions. Solomon expanded the city tremendously, and its newfound splendor became an attraction for people around the Middle East. Jerusalem continued its progress after Solomon’s death and its physical attributes soon matched its economic, political, and religious significance.
Solomon’s glorious city stood for nearly four centuries despite costly sieges and invasions. The eminence of Jerusalem was destroyed in 586 BCE when King Zedekiah, ruler of the Babylonians, overtook Jerusalem ending the Davidic dynasty’s hundred year rule. The Babylonians destroyed the city and all its beauty, leveling every monumental edifice they came across. The Jews of Israel were chained and taken as prisoners to Babylon. Fifty years later, Babylon fell to Persia and the Jews were emancipated. The Jews returned to their religious hub and began rebuilding the wondrous city their enemies had demolished. Jerusalem was no longer known as the capital of an independent Jewish nation; instead, it was distinguished as the capital of a Persian province in which the Jews were granted religious and cultural liberty.
Two hundred years later the powerful Greek armies directed by Alexander the Great conquered much of the continent including Jerusalem. Fortunately the city was surrendered without a battle, leaving it unharmed. For generations the Greeks ruled Jerusalem harmoniously. The peace ended with the coronation of Antiochus Epiphanes who declared the practice of Judaism illegal. His military eradicated the Torah, the whole body of oral and written teachings centralized in Judaism, and soon forced Jews to practice the Greek religion. The Greeks then desecrated the temple in mockery of the Israelites. An old Jewish priest named Mattathias along with his five sons, the Maccabees, organized a revolt in 167 BCE. Hundreds of other enraged Jews, tired of Greek oppression, joined the Maccabean cause, and soon the small army flourished into a great military force. The revolution was successful in that the Greek rule had come to an end; so, however, had the existence of much of the city. Once again, thousands of Jews joined together to rebuild the city and the temple that lay in ruins. In memory of its reconstruction, the Jewish festival is Chanukah is celebrated today. The new Jewish kingdom was a mere century old when the mighty armies of Rome invaded the city. The Jews delayed the Roman cause for three months and finally surrendered after Roman forces had leveled the city. In 37 BCE, the Roman King Herod began an ambitious campaign to rebuild and develop the city, a campaign that mirrored the construction movement of the former King Solomon. King Herod’s men completely refurbished the temple and its new appearance was one of beauty and magnificence that was previously unknown to Jerusalem.
During Roman rule a young Jewish man known as Jesus of Nazareth began teaching his beliefs on the subjects of love, brotherhood and forgiveness. Roman authorities were threatened by his potential political power and, consequently, captured and crucified him. After his death his disciples continued to spread his teaching to inhabitants of Jerusalem, the far reaches of Israel, and eventually to all nations of the world.
In 66 CE the oppressed Jews revolted against their Roman rulers. The battle ended in catastrophe four years later when the temple was obliterated, the city ruined, and the Jews enslaved and deported. The Romans established a new city atop Jerusalem’s ruins, the city of Aelia Capitolina, and prohibited Jews from entering the city gates. The Jews wandered the earth, passing on stories of their religious homeland to their children. They held onto the dream that one day they might return to Jerusalem and proclaim it theirs again; in fact, at the end of Passover each year, Jews would shout with hope, “Next year in Jerusalem”.
During Roman rule, Christianity became the official religion of the empire. Because this new religion was based upon the belief that Jesus of Nazareth was the son of God, Jerusalem, the site of his last days on earth and of his crucifixion, became the holy city of Christians as well as Jews. Churches sprang up in places Jesus had walked, and the face of Jerusalem was altered once again.
In the seventh century armies of Bedouin horsemen conquered a vast area of the Middle East including Jerusalem, and the city became a part of a great Arab empire. Arabs were interested in Jerusalem because they believe the prophet Muhammed ascended into heaven riding a fantastic stallion that flew up from Mount Moriah. Once they gained possession of the city, beautiful mosques, Islamic houses of prayer, were constructed and Jerusalem became the center of yet another major religion, Islam. The Muslims allowed the practice of Christianity to continue and opened the gates of the city to Jews.
For over four hundred years the Islamic Muslims ruled the city peacefully. The peace was disturbed, however, in 1099 when crusaders, Christian armies from Europe, descended on the city in a successful attempt to free Jerusalem from Muslim rule. The crusaders were in possession of Jerusalem for less than one century; their rule was interrupted by Saladin, a powerful Armenian ruler who restored Muslim rule to the city. A succession of Armenian monarchs kept the city under Muslim rule. Jews began to trickle back into Jerusalem, first under the rule of the Egyptian Mameluks and then under the Ottoman Turks. Ever so slowly, the Jewish population grew.
In the late eighteen hundreds a wave of antisemitism forced Jews eastward toward their ancient homeland. By 1900 Jews made up the majority of Jerusalem’s population. In 1948 the state of Israel was established and Jerusalem was declared the capital. Actually, half of Jerusalem was declared the capital; a new border was created that divided the city in half, Israel possessing the western half and Jordan the eastern half. In 1967, the Israeli army captured the Jordanian side of the city in a battle known as the Six Day War. Today Jerusalem remains in Jewish hands
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Followers of three religions, Jews, Christians and Muslims, continue to see Jerusalem as the geographical heart of their faith. Some followers of the same three religions also claim that Jerusalem belongs to only them. This tenacious desire to state just one religion’s commitment to the miraculous city has caused violence and strife that saturates Jerusalem’s history and exists even today. Many of the most horrifying atrocities have transpired because people “have put the purity of Jerusalem and the desire to gain access to its great sanctity before the quest for justice and charity”. More important than deciding who most deserves sole ownership of Jerusalem is the knowledge of the significance of the city to each religion and some implications of Jerusalem’s significance to each faith.
Like a quilt sewn of numerous squares of material, Jerusalem is a geographical quilt sewn of various people. Each square of a quilt relays to onlookers its individual story. Similarly, each religious and ethnic group in Jerusalem conveys to the rest of the world their individual ideas about the city’s importance. Jerusalem is a patchwork of many people, of many beliefs, and of many eras. It is saturated with visions that reach back to nineteenth century Armenia, seventeenth century Poland, Arabia and even modern America. The city has so many intersecting time zones from which beliefs have stemmed, that Jerusalem can only be considered a timeless sanctity. For these reasons Jerusalem remains one of the most controversial and most celebrated cities in the world.
Bibliography
Armstrong, Karen. Jerusalem, One City, Three Faiths. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1996.
Ashabranner, Brent. Gavriel and Jemal, Two Boys of Jerusalem. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1984.
Gilbert, Martin. Jerusalem, from a Dream to Destruction. The History Channel, 1996.
Hirsch, Ellen. Jerusalem. Jerusalem: Ahva Press, 1996.
“Israel Completes Jerusalem Tunnel, Sparking Violence.” The Kansas City Star, 25 Sept. 1996, A-4.
Mozeson, I.E. and Lois Stavsky, Jerusalem Mosaic, Young Voices from the Holy City, New York: Four Winds Press, 1994.
Waldman, Neil. The Golden City, Jerusalem’s 3,000 Years. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995.
