"Jerusalem, the only city in the world
where the right to vote is granted even to the dead."
--Yehuda Amichai
Both of Israel's Chief Rabbis and the Mufti of Jerusalem issued unprecedented rulings last January, stating that the Temple Mount (which Muslims call the Noble Sanctuary or Haram-al-Sharif) belongs to their community exclusively, and that ceding possession to any other group would be a sacrilege. In other words--"Jerusalem is mine." Sheik Ikrema Sabri, Mufti of Jerusalem, declared: "The whole area of Al Aksa mosque, including the Western Wall, is a Muslim area according to Islamic interpretations and none other is allowed to control it or even practice religious rituals on it, or on any part of it." Israel's Chief Rabbinate Council, the rabbinate's highest decision-making body, countered: "Jewish law absolutely prohibits handing over any sovereignty or ownership, directly or indirectly, to gentiles on the Temple Mount. The sovereignty belongs to the Jewish people, so even discussing it would be a desecration of God's name."
These statements are essentially political. The Mufti's decree stands in perfect symmetry to a widely studied Palestinian textbook which falsely states that "the Jewish claim to historic rights to Palestine has no justification; it is a deceitful and disproved claim with no parallel in history, a blatant lie." In response, Jewish spokesmen insist that Jerusalem means more to Jews than to Muslims. Nobel Prize winner Elie Wiesel wrote in a New York Times editorial: "Jerusalem is the third holiest city in Islam. But for Jews, it remains the first. Not just the first; the only." Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, whose controversial visit to the Temple Mount in September 2000 is believed by many to have ignited the "Aksa Intifada," stated in an interview: "The Koran doesn't mention Jerusalem once. In the Bible it is mentioned six hundred and seventy-six times. Muhammad was never in Jerusalem. When the Muslims occupied Jerusalem, it was seven years after Muhammad's death. They say he came here and went to Heaven. Yeah--seven years after he died."
Sharon was alluding to a vague passage in the Koran that relates how Muhammad was carried to the "further mosque," where, according to Islamic tradition, he experienced a revelation and ascended to heaven (Sura 17). Jewish leaders note that the association of the "further mosque" with Jerusalem did not occur in Muslim sources until the seventh century, some years after Muhammad's death. They also press the point that Jerusalem is not mentioned even once in the Koran, while Mecca is cited with great frequency. Therefore, they insist, Islam's connection to Jerusalem is mired in myth.
If conflict resolution is the goal, it is irrelevant whether or not Muhammad actually ascended from Jerusalem, for this question fails to acknowledge the power of religious truth, as opposed to historical truth. In Islam, as in all religious traditions, historical reality is not an appropriate yardstick of religious significance. What if historians were to prove conclusively that the Hebrew slaves escaping Pharaoh did not cross the mighty Red Sea but a marshy area known as the "Sea of Reeds"? Would this revision of the biblical account invalidate the significance of the Exodus for Jews? Of course not. It does not really matter if the sea--any sea--actually parted for the fleeing slaves; we would continue to celebrate Pesach and tell the Exodus story at the seder table. The events recalled in the haggadah possess sanctity for us not because of their historical validity, but because of the religious significance our tradition has attached to them. History provides a seed. Subsequent reflections on that seed--elaborations, modifications, and amplifications--infuse the events with meaning among the faithful. Not knowing with "historical" certainty what transpired on Mount Sinai in no way diminishes our reverence for the Torah. If historians were to prove that there never was a Mount Sinai, Jews would continue to observe Shavuot and--hopefully--guide their lives by the commandments.
Moreover, those who dwell on the "historicity" of Muhammad's visit to Jerusalem as the sole basis for Islamic claims on the holy city are ignoring the fact that religions evolve. Much has happened in the thirteen centuries since Koranic times that has influenced the relationship between the Muslims and Jerusalem--and in religious truth, what matters is how Muslim tradition has imbued those events, imagined or real, with religious meaning.
The Muslims' religious truth about Jerusalem begins in the early seventh century CE, when it is said Muhammad's famous "night visit" took place. By the tenth century, Jerusalem was acclaimed by Muslim teaching as equal in sanctity to Mecca and Medina, the two cities in which Muhammad had lived. As the Islamic imagination flourished, a whole religious literature, Fadha'il al-kuds, emerged, with elaborate legends and beliefs about the beauty and importance of Jerusalem.
Jews may ask, even if one concedes that Muslims have a rightful claim to Jerusalem based on religious truth, can they legitimately appropriate as their own the holy site of a rival group? Actually, not only is this kind of appropriation possible, it is more the norm than the exception.
Religious traditions evolve by "borrowing" elements from one another. In fact, "religious archaeology" is one of the best ways to understand the formation of beliefs and practices. Each tradition builds on pre-existing strata from other traditions and cultures. For instance, the Christian Easter celebration derives from the Jewish festival of Pesach, which scholars suggest was an adaptation of the harvest celebration of the Israelites' ancient neighbors, the Canaanites. The floor plans of the great Christian cathedrals in Europe have been described as self-consciously aspiring to emulate the glory of the Temple in Jerusalem. The Temple, itself, was built on the ruins of a Jebusite site, which may have been sacred to even earlier inhabitants. Jerusalem became holy for Muslims precisely because of its centrality to its parent religions--Judaism and Christianity, which served as the model from which Muhammad fashioned Islam.
Unfortunately, recognition of shared provenance and ecumenical understanding often cease when the discussion turns to the control of sacred real estate. Christians are protesting plans by Nazareth's Muslim community to build a mosque in the vicinity of the Nazareth cathedral. Different Christian sects perennially dispute the allocation of space inside Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulcher. And ultra-Orthodox Jews continue to resist the presence of groups of liberal Jews at the Western Wall. It should not be surprising, therefore, that ownership of the Temple Mount--the ancient core of the holy city--has become such an explosive issue. "There is nothing more sensitive," commented Israel's Minister of Diaspora Affairs, Rabbi Michael Melchoir. "[The Temple Mount] can be the gate to heaven, but it can also be the gate to hell."
Even if the majority of Muslims and Jews ultimately accept the validity of each other's claims to Jerusalem, a compromise is by no means assured. Nevertheless, an understanding of each other's religious truths would move the two sides on a path toward reconciliation. Perhaps some day, when other enmities have begun to abate and bonds of mutuality have supplanted distrust, Jews and Muslims, together, will be able to fulfill the promise of Jerusalem as a city of peace.
On that day, the Jerusalem above and the Jerusalem below will be one.
Rabbi Daniel Polish, HUC-JIR class of 1968, is director of the Joint Commission on Social Action of Reform Judaism.
New Reform Mideast Peace and Justice Initiative
The Reform Movement has launched a major Middle East peace and social justice
initiative, funded by a $500,000 grant from the Ford Foundation. The three-year
project, entitled "Seeking Peace, Pursuing Justice," is designed to educate,
encourage, and mobilize North American Jewry to support the peace process and
social justice issues in Israel. The project will encourage the North American
Jewish community to examine the risks and potential rewards of peace for Israel,
the United States, and Israel's neighbors, and to undertake critical, constructive
public dialogue on the most pressing issues facing Israeli society--including
the status of Israeli minorities and other issues of inequality and discrimination
in Israel. Managed by Esther Lederman and overseen by the UAHC in cooperation
with the Central Conference of American Rabbis, the Religious Action Center
of Reform Judaism, the Association of Reform Zionists of America/World Union,
North America, Women of Reform Judaism, and the Israel Religious Action Center,
the project will provide publications, educational materials, and programs for
synagogues, youth groups, and local communities, including curricula, speaker
series, Israel missions, interfaith dialogues, a website, and an online e-mail
forum. For more information, contact Esther Lederman, (212) 650-4162, elederman@uahc.org.
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