Spirituality Corner

Matthew M. Umukoro

mattmukoro@gmail.com

 

“Jerusalem, my happy home, When shall I come to thee? When shall my sorrows have an end? Thy joys when shall I see?”, thus runs that beautiful Catholic Hymn 191 in twelve mellifluous stanzas, eulogising the Jerusalem of our dream. But there is ‘Jerusalem’ as metaphor, and ‘Jerusalem’ as a historic place with constantly changing political/religious status.  It is certainly one of the oldest cities in the world, with a history which dates back to more than 5000 years, from prehistoric to modern times. Which Jerusalem do Christians actually celebrate?

        The Biblical Jerusalem can be traced to the arrival of the Israelites from thousands of years of Egyptian captivity. Moses had led the Israelites out of captivity, but it was Joshua that completed the marathon journey into the Promised Land, proverbially flowing with milk and honey. The Promised Land was Canaan, extending to Jordan, Jebus, and environs, originally occupied by the Canaanites, the Jordanians, the Jebusites, and so on, who resisted the encroachment of the Israelites. “And the Lord brought us forth out of Egypt with a mighty hand, and with an outstretched arm, and with great terror, and with signs and wonders. And he hath brought us into this place, and hath given us this land, even a land that floweth with milk and honey” (Deuteronomy 26:8-9).  The Jebusites were the original inhabitants of Jerusalem, then known as Jebus, conquered by David, shortly after being anointed the Israeli King at Hebron, in succession to Saul. As stated in 1 Chronicles (11:4-5), “And David and all Israel went to Jerusalem, which is Jebus; where the Jebusites were, the inhabitants of the land. And the inhabitants of Jebus said to David, ‘Thou shalt not come hither.’ Nevertheless David took the Castle of Zion, which (became) the City of David.” Thus the Promised Land had to be fought for by the people of Israel, and not simply served on a platter. David thus established Jerusalem as Israel’s headquarters, where Solomon, his successor, built the first temple.  “Then Solomon began to build the house of the Lord at Jerusalem in mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared to David his father, in the place that David had prepared in the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. And he began to build in the second day of the second month, in the fourth year of his reign” (2 Chronicles 3:1-2), and the magnificent building took seven years to complete.

Unfortunately, Solomon’s temple was burnt down and utterly destroyed in the 6th century B.C. by Nebuchadnezzar when he captured Jerusalem in his nineteenth year as King of Babylon (2 Kings 25:8-11).

        Our focus shifts to the Jerusalem of the New Testament which coincided with the time of Jesus. Jerusalem remained the capital city of Israel, and most of the significant events in the life of Christ occurred therein. Herod the Great was King of Judea which he administered on behalf of the Roman Empire, while Augustus was the Roman Emperor. Herod, well known for wonderful structures, built a magnificent Temple in Jerusalem which took forty-six years to complete, and it became the centre of religious and cultural attention for the Jews. But on one occasion, “Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and found in the temple those that sold oxen, and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting.” He angrily chased them all out with cords, and overthrew their tables, saying “Take these things hence; make not my Father’s house a house of merchandise” (John 2:14-16). This was one of the rare occasions when Jesus demonstrated human temper, as He was part-man, part-God. And when the embarrassed Jews demanded of him to reveal the sign of his authority to do these things, he responded: “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:18-19). The temple that took forty-six years to build? They wondered. But he meant, of course, the temple of his own body, destroyed at Crucifixion, and raised up three days later at Resurrection. All these parabolic statements later made sense to his disciples.

        As early as age twelve, Jesus had begun his divine ministry in the temple at Jerusalem. He had followed his parents to Jerusalem for the Passover Feast when he stayed back and was declared missing only to be found in the temple after three days of diligent search by his greatly troubled parents. There he was, calmly engaging the elders of the temple in profound spiritual and intellectual discourse far beyond his age. How he even took care of his needs in those three days nobody knew. He simply taught his worried parents their first lesson in spiritual perception: “How is it that ye sought me? Know ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?” (Luke 2:49-50). Joseph and Mary became even more confounded, and began to realise that they had a mysterious son to cope with.

By the time of the marriage ceremony in Cana, Galilee, Mary had sufficiently understood her son to the extent of getting him to perform his first miracle of turning water into wine (John 2:1-11). Mary continues to intercede for us today, and we should always take advantage of this privilege.

Unlike his birthplace, Nazareth, where only a few minor miracles were recorded because of their lack of faith in him, Jesus performed some notable miracles in Jerusalem. These include: healing the ten lepers on his way to Jerusalem (Luke 17: 11-19); healing  on the Sabbath of the man bed-ridden for thirty-eight years and who was unable to avail himself of the instant healing provided by a certain mysterious pool for the very first infirm to step foot in it after being rustled by an angel - he had no one to assist him to get to the pool ahead of other struggling disabled (John 5: 2-9); the healing, on the Sabbath, of a man born blind, thus provoking the Pharisees against Jesus (John Chapter 9); and the raising of Lazarus from the dead (after four days of burial) in Bethany, about fifteen miles off Jerusalem (John 11: 1-45).

Jerusalem is also significant to Christians because the climactic moments of the earthly career of Jesus took place in that city. Most notable of these were his triumphant entry into Jerusalem, and his betrayal, arrest, prosecution, and crucifixion at Calvary, shortly after. Thus, his death and resurrection on which the entire Christian faith is anchored happened in Jerusalem, which has become a pilgrimage site for Christians willing and able to concretise their faith through physical contact with some of the major events in the earthly life of Christ.

Today, Jerusalem is embroiled in bloody conflicts between the Israelites and the Palestinians over the politics of ownership and control. But this does not diminish the significance of Jerusalem as one of the favourite spots Jesus visited during his earthly mission to save humanity. Since most Christians may not be able to afford the humongous cost of physical pilgrimage to Jerusalem, parishes and dioceses should endeavour to create alternative Jerusalem sites easily accessible to their members to fulfil their quest through spiritual pilgrimage, reinforced with photos and videos of those historical sites in Jerusalem.