A Memory and a Name

It’s not every day that you can travel through secret tunnels, let alone King Hezekiah’s tunnel! The day began with a quick lesson from Rich about David and Bathsheba’s promiscuous occurrence, and the attempted cover-up by David. We learned the importance of being where you’re supposed to be and doing what you’re supposed to do. Immediately, we descended into a tunnel originally dug to access the only fresh water source near Jerusalem as the Israelites were preparing for the Assyrian army to attack. We went into the wet tunnel which, at its deepest, was mid-thigh to waist-high depending on how tall someone would be. The tunnels were about an average of 5’9’ tall and 2’ wide with the water at ankle height for most of the exploration. Voices, screams and songs echoed throughout the tunnel while flashlights would flash, hide and shine again coming around corners as sixty people walked through the tunnel for 500 yards. The light at the end of the tunnel was the Pool of Siloam, which is translated to the Pool of Sending (or to send). What was being sent? Water. The spring of Gihon would send water to Siloam and create a holy source of water to be used as a mikveh, or spiritual cleansing before going 900 steps of ascent to the southern steps of the Temple Mount. We also learned the story of the blind man Jesus healed by putting mud on his eyes. He was sent (are you seeing a theme?) to Siloam to wash off the mud and regain his sight.

Like the priests 2000 years ago would have, we went to the Southern Steps for a debriefing and digesting of what we’ve been learning as a class so far (shofar). There seemed to be a common theme of being overwhelmed and underwhelmed simultaneously during this trip. Moments of power, spirituality, and amazement along with feelings of normalcy and regularity. Israel is undoubtedly God’s holy and chosen land, but the land is like any other place on earth, and is very small. The holy sites are special and historical, but the rock that it is made up of is standard rock. Like so many classes before have said, the Bible has become 3D and color has been added to the text. I have much more than a visualization of what things could have looked like, but I also understand the culture which was much more of a driving force behind the text than I thought. I spoke up at the very end of our debriefing. I felt the need to talk about the Shema. Throughout the year I was confused about why we say the Shema every single meal. It just seemed so routine. My mind would wander while I just blabber words from a weird language. But saying it so much nailed it into my head and it’s in my head and heart forever because of it. I kept on being reminded of it throughout the trip. Stories of the Old Testament were centered more around listening and obeying God more than I had realized. Momentum was a real thing then as it is now. People would cover up sin with more sin and then would being a downward spiral of habitual sin, yet it would be the same of the opposite. Those who did listen and obey would continue to do so because the first step of faith is the hardest. God would reward those who took the step of obedience, and it would get easier from there. Everything we see here, right now… is because men like Abraham and David just did what was asked of them. We closed with praying the Shema as we looked around at the Mount of Olives to our left, the Kidron valley in front of us, and the temple wall behind us and to our right. It was quiet after. The spirit of God was moving. It was a powerful moment for all of us to share our experiences together in community in a holy city, yet just a city.

The most powerful event of the whole trip ended the day. We had experienced so much of the history of God’s chosen people, except for the one that is very recent and one of the darkest in all of history. The Holocaust Museum, Yad Vashem (which means a memory and a name, referencing Isaiah 56:5) was an experience that was beyond sobering, entering a building where ashes of those who had perished during this dark time were buried in the ground. Walking through a monument dedicated to the 1.5 million children who were murdered by those who aspired such evil, but were blinded to themselves. The monument begins with walking into a large dark hall with large digital pictures of some of the children who died in the camps. Then a hall of mirrors with small candles that represented the 1.5 million lives that the National Socialist Party tried to put out and succeeded to do so. Meanwhile, names and birthdates of children were being spoken over a loudspeaker in Hebrew, English, and German. When the exhibit was finished, there were faces of confusion, sorrow, and distraught. Somehow, this was just a warm-up for the whole museum, an oddly shaped museum. It was an elongated pyramid and I was not sure why that was why the building was chosen, but I took it as it was. The museum began with a large triangular screen on one end of the building showing a video of Jewish life, before Hitler’s brainwashing of his Aryan race. Next, was a u-turn and another turn to the right to go into the first exhibit beginning before September 1st 1939 and was educating about anti-Semite propaganda, including anti-Semite thought dating back to 4th century, FROM CHRISTIANS! After that exhibit, the museum leads you back into the center of the triangle and across the way was exhibit two. The whole museum would go in chronological order in a zig-zag formation with the building opening back up into the triangle in the middle of each straightaway of the zig-zag. Exactly half way through the museum I looked back to the beginning of the movie in the beginning, and it hit me. This building was designed to make you feel how a Jew would have felt during these years of darkness. Looking back and thinking of what used to be and how times were much better. I looked to the opposite side and saw the exit and the light of outside looking to Israel. I immediately had a connection to how a Jew might have felt. I wanted to look back and be in the past times, but looked to the future and wanted it much more because of how painful it was to even learn and see the Holocaust as history. So much was going through my mind as I walked through each exhibit, but one story stuck out to me. A man describes an experience he had in the winter inside a camp: “I felt the need to urinate. But I held it in my bladder, just because I wanted to make sure I still had control. To make sure I was still human. But of course, I couldn’t control it. The warmth felt amazing on my legs, but within two minutes the urine froze around my feet and legs. Shortly, I innocently asked a guard what time it was. He innocently responded it is 2 A.M. I saw the emotion on his face and he had realized he had gone down to my level of a sub-human. He immediately slapped me twice and began to curse me…” There was so much to take in. Much more than the other two Holocaust Museums I had gone to in L.A. and D.C. There was much more information and power involved in these exhibits. I finally got to the end and walked outside and the triangle opened and bent outward. It was to signify the future of what the nation was to become and could possibly become. The Jews still believe and know they are God’s chosen people despite the suffering they had endured for those seven excruciating years. The museum depicted both horror and hope perfectly. Dear Reader, I implore you to come to Israel solely for this museum and get a better understanding of Israel’s past and future.

--Andrew Warnock