Confusion and conflict

First of all, thank you all so much, I have over 1000 page views. Interestingly, 11 of those views are from France, 4 are from Japan, 3 are Hungarian, and one is from Belarus. All places where I'm fairly certain I don't know anyone.

Here is a blessing for warm days and sunny skys this summer for all my
readers in the snow-bound north. You were all in my thoughts this past
weekend and you will be in my prayers next weekend.

Thank you all, it is a pleasure writing for you.

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This past week I have thought a lot about why I am in Israel and what it means to me. I look at my time here and I find myself feeling very sure of my relationship with myself, but very confused about my relationship with the Middle East. I also feel very confused about my relationship with Israel. 

This week marks the midpoint of my adventure. I have been feeling every feeling that I know of, but mostly, I am sad to say, I feel unwell. To begin with, I feel physically unwell. I will focus least on this. Secondly, I feel emotionally unwell, and thirdly, I feel spiritually unwell. My relationships here are very difficult and I often feel as though those relationships are making it difficult for me to fully experience this place.

First, the physical. I don't do well in dry places. My sinuses clog quickly making it difficult for me to sleep. I get ear aches and head aches and spend most of my time wanting to sleep. Enough about that.

The Old City is so beautiful. I feel blessed everyday to
be able to walk through it. Everything from the stone
walls to the doors and windows is touched with beauty.
I look forward to exploring it more in the next two
months.

Second, emotional: this part of the world is very emotional. The post-Holocaust victim-hood complex is still strong, at the very least in this part of Jerusalem, though I have seen a little of it in other parts of the country. The relationship between Israel and Palestine is invisible in the everyday world; in my experience so far, Israelis spend far more energy thinking about Syria and Saudi Arabia then they do about Palestine. I've even heard off-handed comments dismissing the very existence of Palestine. The Orthodox world that I have been learning in is very quick to take up the sword against whoever they feel is a threat. I have heard "wise" teachers call the Jewish people the leaders of the world in the same breath that they insist that we are to destroy our enemies. "Love your neighbor as yourself" comes along with "Saudi Arabia is the new Amalekites [i]."

This cat was a wonderful model. There are so many stray
cats in this country. The were introduced to Jerusalem to
take care of a rat and mouse problem, and I think they
did a very good job, but the city is now infested by cats.

This bleeds very easily into my third feeling of unwell-ness, spiritual. I feel a disassociation with my Jewish heritage. The events that I would normally enjoy have become tainted by Dogma. Last month, at Tu B’ishvat, I talked some about the environmental contradiction in the Orthodox community. As time passes here, I feel that more and more. I see it every time I go to an Orthodox Shabbat when we eat three meals in honor of the closeness of our relationship with God, with full table settings, off of plastic disposable dishes. I hear it whenever discussions of holiness and the spirit turn to ravings about anti-Semitism and oppression. I feel it in my soul when I am in an Orthodox synagogue and I am told that, as a woman, I am not allowed to sing.

Today is the beginning of the week of Purim; a holiday that crosses Halloween with Mardi Gras in Israel. Last weekend was the beginning of the month of Adar; the month of joy. Both this holiday, and the month containing it, are a time in which we are meant to find the joy hiding in plain sight and to, in a way, emulate “God who "disguised" his presence behind the natural events described in the Purim story, and has remained concealed (yet ever-present) in Jewish history since the times of the destruction of the first Temple.[i]”

This has always been one of my favorite holidays, from an academic standpoint, as it is the only story in the Torah that does not mention God. Not even once. I also feel an affinity towards it since my first name is Esther. Even more so now that I know it’s associations with joy.

I spent this past weekend in Ashkelon, one of the best beaches in the world, apparently. It was absolutely beautiful. I got to
go swimming in this amazing surf. The sun was delightful. It's not all bad. Not by a long shot.

Watching the ultra-lites at Ashkalon beach. Thinking of my father.

But I am concerned. I have seen the ways that things can get turned around here, and I have experienced the dogmatic coating on what I have before seen as beautiful and holy, and I am afraid that I will see it again. I find myself morbidly dreading and wanting to hear a stranger speak my language, I both want the familiarity of English and afraid of what they will say.

I am in a state of contemplation and conflict right now. I see how blessed I am to be in this beautiful place, gaining experience on my resume, having the questions I have been asking answered, but I am also experiencing an intense removal from all things Jewish and Israeli. I am seeing the beauty in the ancient traditions of the Israelites but an ugliness in the reality of modern Israel. I am feeling a desire to strengthen my connection to what Judaism has meant in my past, and to better understand it, but to distance myself in every way from the Orthodox dogma.

Thank you for reading. If you would like to support me in my journey, please visit: gofund.me/joystar

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[i] The Amalekites were a people mentioned a number of times in the book of Genesis, and considered to be Amalek's descendants. In the chant of Balaam at Numbers, 24:20, Amalek was called the 'first of the nations', attesting to high antiquity. The Amalekites were nomads who attacked the Hebrews at Rephidim (Exodus 17:8-10) in the desert of Sinai during their exodus from Egypt: "smiting the hindmost, all that were feeble behind," (Deuteronomy 25:18). The Amalekites were thereafter the hereditary enemy of Israel. According to the Jewish Encyclopedia, "David waged a sacred war of extermination against the Amalekites,"[10] who may have subsequently disappeared from history. Long after, in the time of Hezekiah, five hundred Simeonites annihilated the remnant "of the Amalekites that had escaped" on Mount Seir, and settled in their place (1 Chr. 4:42–43). It is believed by most Jews that the last of the Amalekites were destroyed during the time of Queen Esther in Pursia.

[ii] Thank you Wiki “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purim”