Israel: he who strives with God
- Linda Chen
- Jan 23, 2019
- 11 min read
Updated: Jun 9, 2019
I can’t image 16 days have passed just like that and I sincerely feel really sad about leaving this country. I don’t know how to write about it because I have so many thoughts in my mind. Therefore, I decided to just put down what I can write.
1. Israel
Is it safe in Israel?
Short answer: very safe. Safe like Vancouver.
Long Answer:
There are two types of danger. One type of danger is like you are walking in a sketchy neighborhood. Another type of danger is political danger. It means this place has a greater risk to be at war or greater risk to have political instability.
The first type of dangerous threatens your day to day life all the time, for example, you better not wear a hot short walking in the street of India as a single girl. while the second type of danger does not affect your day to day life as a normal civilian unless the state is at an emergency state, like at war or have some crazy policies. People often mix up these two types.
Israel belongs to be the second type because it does not have a friendly relationship with its neighbors, and the religious significance of this country. However, the first type of dangerous DOES NOT exist or belong to Israel, at least in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
Some people say you’d better dress more conservatively when you are in Jerusalem but since it is winter time now, I never experienced the problem. I don’t need to wear a headscarf. I wear whatever I normally wear.
In Tel Aviv, you can wear whatever expensive bag that you have, that you like without the fear of getting rob any minute. You can also wear whatever you like, shorts/tank top; you can walk by yourself as a girl and I feel safe to leave my stuff on the table for a couple minute when I go order something at the counter.
People on the road always give ways to pedestrians and everything is so well organized. And at first, I was so not used to this politeness since I stayed 4 months in China. It is so comfortable to live here that I honestly have been finding jobs in Israel on LinkedIn.
What about Palestine? The West Bank? Is it like a War Zone there?
No, it is not a War Zone like area, at least from where I entered. I went from Jerusalem to Ramallah, where is considered to be the center of the West Bank. It is pretty safe and easy to go in and out.
The experience of Palestine was eye-opening to me. You can go to the Palestine side as a tourist without a problem. You just show them your passport and you can pass. I saw the local people can also pass the border by showing a kind of ID card. There is no need to go down the bus and pass a custom or something.
The reason why I say it is crazy is that as soon as you pass the wall, you can see people’s lives are completely different there. The streets are much dirtier (pretty much like Bolivia, the poorest country in South America), the city is much more underdeveloped, and people rarely speak any English. The same meal is more than 50% cheaper than what you would pay for in Israel.
The Israeli Sim Card does not work after you enter the city, the language also changed from Hebrew to Arabic, and one local told me that it is their own municipals managing the city. In other words, the Israeli government is not responsible for anything in the city. However, they use the same currency.
There is a physical wall separates the West Bank from Jerusalem. If you look at the map, you will see it is actually a very long wall. And it really makes me think that Trump’s idea of building a wall to separate Mexico and the U.S. is not such a ridiculous idea. It really is not.
When I told my roommate in Tel Aviv about this, who is from Germany. She looked at me and said: that’s crazy. That is exactly like Berlin (other than the language part).
One more finding adding to the complexity of Palestine is, there are 25% of Christians living in Ramallah. And I found that the streets in the Christian area are very clean. Nice cars and restaurants; nothing like what it is in the city where there are fewer Christians and mostly Arabic people.
Gaza: One of the girls that worked at my hostel, she used to serve at the Gaza Stripe area. And according to her, people who live there are under terrible conditions.
And I will leave this topic here.
What is the most interesting that you see/learn in Israel?
More than one. Let me mention some of them.
1. It is very common to see young adults in full military uniforms and with big guns on their shoulders as they are waiting at the bus stop or walking on the street. I was like… what the fuc*. A local girl told me they actually have bullets with them too (but definitely not loaded).
The reason is all Israelis who turned 18 have to serve in the army for 2 – 3 years (girls are 2, boys are 3). They can come home from once every 2 weeks to once a month, depends on their jobs in the army.
And when they come home, they can choose to bring their gun back with them. So that’s why.
2. There is no Starbucks in the country and most taxi is Mercedes-Benz, those very nice ones. The reason is that people do not want to buy German cars after WWII, Merced saw the opportunity and offered great discounts to Jewish. Now, the discount disappeared but the taxi industry still carries this fancy tradition.
3. They have something called the democratic schools in Israel. It means kids in the school can decide everything. They vote for what schedule they want if they want uniform or not and basically all the decisions. These schools are not like rare finds that nobody has heard of. These schools legitimately exist, and everyone knows them.
This is very interesting to me because on one hand, this country has people that are extremely orthodox and on the other hand, you have extreme liberals.
My tour guide once told me that she thinks her kids are much more Israeli than American (my tour guide is American and grew up in America, but her kids are born and raised in Jerusalem). I asked what she means by that. She replied: I think the Israeli kids have a rebellious spirit in their blood. No one tells them what to do.
I also learned that one of their biggest festival in Jewish, like Christmas in the U.S., Chinese New Year in China is the light festival. And the tradition of the light festival is everyone put their own favorite things inside a transparent mailbox-like container outside of their door so that everyone can share their joy.
However, you see, everyone has their own different favorite things. I think this tradition reconcile with the rebellious spirit among the Israeli kids really well.
Finally, the Holocaust.
The Holocaust museum is a must for everyone who is going to Jerusalem. Though most of the people know the history pretty well already, everyone should still go. I didn't stay long there but I am glad that I went. It was for the victim and for the history.
The Holocaust education is huge in Israel. There are definitely multiple messages that the educator wants to convey through these educationos but one of them is particularly interesting to me.
A local girl told me that the message is to be grateful. We (the Jewish people) should remember and appreciate their sacrifice because their sacrifice gave birth to Israel, home of all Jewish people. We exist because of them.
This drastically contradicted the message that I learned from Holocaust when I was young. We also have holocaust education in China because of the Nanjing Holocaust that happened during WWII. A key message that I remember very clearly was: This is what you get if you are weak. Therefore, we need to be strong so that others cannot do this to us ever again. (落后就要挨打）
The slogan of "Remember the history but do not pass down the hatred." was not being prompted until 2008 or something recent.
I think this is the first time that I hear a message about Holocaust that is not about the conqueror but completely focus on its own people. And a message that is not only neutral, but positive and grateful.
Suggesting what to do, is always more helpful than suggesting what not to do.
2. Jewish People
Before, I had very limited knowledge about Jewish, who they are and what they believe in. The only thing that I knew is that they are the victim of the Holocaust.
One thing that I am very surprised by the Jewish was how important the role of women is regarded in Jewish culture. For example, if your mom is a Jewish, then you are a Jewish. There is nothing like half Jewish. And the dad side does not really matter.
This is the complete opposite of Chinese culture or in many other cultures, which the children follow the bloodline of the dad’s side or the whole family change their last name to the last name of the father in the family.
One important message of Sabbath, which is every Friday night right before the sunset and runs until Saturday night, one of their most important holidays (how important? Streets are empty, shops all closed, and public transport all stop in Jerusalem on Sabbath), is to remember the virtue of feminine power.
While I was at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, I overheard a male group right next to me, the senior in the group was educating the young men that: please remember Sabbath is to bring back the feminine spirit to us. Do not try to dominate others. Do not be aggressive or violent. Be like a female, tender and caring.
3. Religion
Obviously, you cannot avoid talking about religion while you are in Israel. However, this trip really gave me some new insights into religion.
Jewish
Jewish believes in the God Yahweh. And Yahweh stands for “I am”. The reason for this name was because:
Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am.”
Therefore, the Jewish God is a God with no name, and no picture (and you are not allowed to make any picture of God).
During Sabbath, I saw people were organizing themselves in a group, singing, and dancing. I asked a woman who was standing before me. She was elegant, well dressed and speak perfect English. She was pointing and explaining everything to a little girl beside her.
Therefore, I asked her: will there be any ceremony later? Like some figure similar to the role of a priest in Christian and do a mass?
She answered: no. Everyone just gathering in groups and self-organizing themselves. Me inside my heart: wow… surprised.
As I was walking out toward the Jaffa Gate with two gentlemen who were directing the way for me, they told me that Jewish is a very decentralized religion compare to others. No one in this religion has absolute power like the pop or priest in Christian. No one can or should represent or interpret God for others.
I also found it interesting of how King emerged in this religion. So, the story goes, back in the age when everyone has no King, only tribes, the world was a mess. Tribes fight to each other, power struggle within the tribes and so on. Therefore, people pray to God to please grant us a King.
God disagree that there should be one absolute power and did not want to do that. However, since people requested it, God said: ok, then I will select one man from the smallest/weakest tribe to be King. The next man from that tribe that walks pass the hill will be the King. Thus, a King was born.
I don't know if you can see the pattern of Jewish by now: God disagree with absolute power, no ceremony like the mass, rebellious Israeli kids and etc. I think all these say a lot about the culture of this country.
Christianity
Christian only started after Jesus and Jesus actually born, raised and died as a Jewish. And the reason why Jesus was such a figure was that Jesus believed people at his time all interpreted God in a wrong way.
During the era of Jesus, Jewish has developed into something different. One type of Jewish is very rigorous, and another type is more relaxed. My tour guide used an example to explain.
For example, it is believed God said everyone should wear blue on Friday. The ambiguity is how do you define Friday and the color blue. The rigorous one will say there is only one type of blue that is allowed, the type that everyone agrees it is blue, and Friday starts after the sun is set on Thursday so that we don’t miss it. The more relaxed one will believe that any type of blue will work, and Friday starts whenever you wake up on a Friday morning.
Then Jesus comes in and says you guys are all wrong. Jesus believes we should not just look at the text, which is to wear blue on Friday; we should look beyond the text. For example, we should know that the reason to wear blue on Friday is to remember the spirit of the ocean, which is to be inclusive and clam (I made this up myself to use it as an example).
Two stories in the bible about Jesus also was left a mark in my mind. Not exactly word by word accurate but the gist of them goes like this. One is that Jesus came to Jerusalem. When he saw some authorities were collecting money from people who want to go to the temple, he turned the table off and cried this is corruption; this is wrong.
Now you see why he is being crucified. When I heard this story, the execution of Socrates actually appeared in my mind.
The second story was when Jesus was walking to be crucified, he said to a woman who was crying: Don’t cry for me, cry for yourself.
Muslim
Muslim did not start until about 400 years ago and it started only after the Prophet Muhammad, who started to receive messages from God after he turned 40. Quran is written based on the messages that Muhammad received from God.
Abraham, who is regarded as the father of all Muslim in the Quran, is being portrayed very interestingly. According to the Quran, Abraham is a rebellious teenager that questions everything and is someone that strongly against idolatry. He once asked his father, what is the point to pray to those idol sculpture that cannot hear and cannot see.
He searched for the truth and finally regarded Allah, who created the Earth, the Moon, the Sun and everything in the world as the one and only God.
Rebellious, questioning, against idolatry, seek the truth… humm… very interesting.
I wonder what truth he would come up with if he seeks with our current technology and he himself is a scientist. Nonetheless, cheers to the spirit.
My thoughts
It just so happened that I have been reading Russell during this trip. Russell is a great philosopher, a great logician, and a great many other things. He is also someone who is very logical, intelligent and strongly against religion. He is so outspoken about it that he wrote a book called: why am I not Christian. He does not give a damn about political correctness as he wrote another essay called: Free Thought and Official Propaganda.
One of his books that I am currently reading is called “The Conquest of Happiness.” The start of the book quoted a poem by Walt Whitman. The end of the poem goes like:
Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of owing things, Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago, Not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth.
I looked back to the three religions. The oldest religion, Jewish, prompts God with no name and no picture; Jesus asked others to not to cry for him and disagreed with authority; the Quran approve the behavior to against idolatry and to seek the truth. I think, maybe, just maybe the core spirit of religion was not against many of our modern-day progressive values. It is just … people took them onto another path.
-- Jan. 23rd, 2019 @ Madrid Airport layover. Next flight: to São Paulo.
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