Uncertain Passage, Certain Destination: The Peace of Jerusalem
This was published in the fall of 1994 in the Yale Standard.
I attended a wedding in Jerusalem this past July, an historic moment to be in Israel again. For the first time in forty-six years as a nation, Israel was promised peace with her closest neighbor: Jordan.
My friends among Colombian Jews who made “aliyah” (“going up” to Israel by immigration), and other Israelis, offered me a wide spectrum of reactions:
Ze’ev, who lives in the Jewish quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, took part in demonstrations against the Israeli government, demanding new elections to decide if, in fact, the majority of Israelis would consider giving up the territories of Samaria and Judea.
Lior and Liuba, who made “aliyah” four years ago, live just north of Jerusalem in a settlement in the territory of Samaria. They suddenly face the prospect of losing their land to Palestinians.
Reuben, an Israeli businessman who fought in the Six Day War in Jerusalem against the Jordanians, welcomes peace with Jordan. He believes it can lead to economic and industrial development for both countries, including joint exploitation of the mineral waters of the Dead Sea.
Yet, whether for or against negotiations, everyone expressed a troubling uncertainty. Would there really be peace? Would it really last? Now Yasser Arafat wants to negotiate Jerusalem. The Israelis say there is no negotiation of Jerusalem, the “eternal capital of Israel.” More uncertainty.
The Israelis say there is no negotiation of Jerusalem, the “eternal capital of Israel.” More uncertainty.
Standing near the Western Wall at the base of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on T’sh B’Av (the date on the Hebrew calendar when both Temples were destroyed), an older lady lamented: “The air is filled with change, but we don’t know what will happen.”
What about Messiah? And the rebuilding of the temple? “Maybe tomorrow, maybe in a hundred years,” a young lady, Shana, commented. She had made “aliyah” from Albany, New York, and found it exciting to live in the Old City.
Still, uncertainty dominated her view: “We don’t know. Things change so fast. Yesterday we had Jericho. Today we don’t. Yesterday we didn’t accept Arafat. Today we do. We don’t know what will happen tomorrow.”
True enough: we live in a world of uncertainty. Yet it is possible and important to perceive God’s hand at work.
At a youth village I know near Haifa, the director tells his Jewish students, who have immigrated from all over the world: “Did God bring us here just to let us disappear? No! We must see the thread of God’s purpose even in the dark times and believe He will bring us through.”
Indeed, from the perspective of centuries, Jerusalem as capital of a nation Israel stands as a sign and a wonder of Divine sovereignty. No city on earth is like it—center of a people scattered into nearly 2,000 years’ exile, and now again governing a nation of the exiles’ great-…-great-grandchildren.
Peace—Shalom—is written into Jerusalem’s very name, yet it was attacked, captured, destroyed time after time over the 3,000 years of history we know. In King Solomon’s day, it was the marvel of the civilized world, a shining city. In the depth of the Ottoman Empire’s oppressive rule, it was a beleaguered, famished, destitute shell.
Now it sits sovereign in the Beautiful Land (as Scripture calls it), yet uneasily aware of centuries of unreasoning hostility all around, and aware of its own fragility.
But, from a Biblical perspective, the city’s restoration, predicted by the Hebrew prophets of long ago, lies centrally in the stream of God’s sovereign purposes. In fact, according to the Scriptures, there is more to come.
Probably few people know the context in which the familiar “swords into plowshares” peace promise is conveyed:
“In the last days the mountain of the Lord’s temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it. Many peoples will come and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us His ways, so that we may walk in His paths.’ The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. Come, O house of Jacob, let us walk in the light of the Lord” (Isaiah 2:2-5).
No other city so sits astride the long purposes God outlined through the prophets in the Bible, including those touching the coming of Messiah.
Between now and then, Jerusalem faces other fulfillments of prophecy. Some of them speak of challenging times, even terrible times that would threaten anyone’s confidence in her future.
Whether we have visited or lived in Jerusalem, or only considered her from afar, we do well to step back from the political analysis, the tourist brochures, even the archeology that beckons the curious. If we step back to the perspective of history we see that only God has preserved and restored her through many trials, and we are foolish indeed to rely on human schemes and wits to preserve her and all Israel.
Let us look instead to Israel’s Maker. How wisely placed is that simple exhortation: “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem. They shall prosper who love thee” (Psalm 122, KJV).
Daniel Voll, Branford ’74
I was glad when they said to me,
“Let us go to the house of the Lord!”
Our feet have been standing
within your gates, O Jerusalem!
Jerusalem—built as a city
that is bound firmly together,
to which the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
as was decreed for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
There thrones for judgment were set,
the thrones of the house of David.
Pray for the peace of Jerusalem!
“May they be secure who love you!
Peace be within your walls
and security within your towers!”
For my brothers and companions’ sake
I will say, “Peace be within you!”
For the sake of the house of the Lord our God,
I will seek your good.
Psalm 122