My trip to Israel in 1971. My trip to the Temple Mount was no problem, didn’t know it was a problem. Learned several years later that Jews’ visiting the Temple Mount, Judaism’s holiest site, are limited in time, and space, as well as the number of visitors allowed access at any given time. While Jews’ rights to worship at the site have improved in recent years, much remains wanting, and the full freedom of worship has yet to be granted by the State of Israel to Jews visiting the Temple Mount.

Triple exposure

An interesting picture. I bought the camera new just for this trip, then discovered after I arrived in Israel that at times the film wouldn't fully advance. I knew this when I was using the camera, and took lots of pictures. After I developed them, I wasn't angry, I thought they were very interesting.

THE SEED OF PROMISE

The history of the Jewish people begins with Abraham, and the story of Abraham begins when G-d tells him to leave his homeland, promising Abraham and his descendants a new home in the land of Canaan. (Gen. 12). This is the land now known as Israel, named after Abraham's grandson, whose descendants are the Jewish people. The land is often referred to as the Promised Land because of G-d's repeated promise (Gen. 12:7, Gen. 13:15, Gen. 15:18, Gen. 17:8) to give the land to the descendants of Abraham.

Bereshit - Genesis - Chapter 12

1  And the Lord said to Abram, "Go forth from your land and from your birthplace and from your father's house, to the land that I will show you.

2  And I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will aggrandize your name, and [you shall] be a blessing.

3  And I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse, and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you."

4  And Abram went, as the Lord had spoken to him, and Lot went with him, and Abram was seventy five years old when he left Haran.

5  And Abram took Sarai his wife and Lot his brother's son, and all their possessions that they had acquired, and the souls they had acquired in Haran, and they went to go to the land of Canaan, and they came to the land of Canaan.

6  And Abram passed through the land, until the place of Shechem, until the plain of Moreh, and the Canaanites were then in the land.

7  And the Lord appeared to Abram, and He said, "To your seed I will give this land," and there he built an altar to the Lord, Who had appeared to him.

8  And he moved from there to the mountain, east of Beth el, and he pitched his tent; Beth el was to the west and Ai was to the east, and there he built an altar to the Lord, and he called in the name of the Lord.

9  And Abram traveled, continually traveling southward.

10  And there was a famine in the land, and Abram descended to Egypt to sojourn there because the famine was severe in the land.

Bereshit - Genesis - Chapter 13 

14  And the Lord said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, "Please raise your eyes and see, from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward.

15  For all the land that you see I will give to you and to your seed to eternity.

16  And I will make your seed like the dust of the earth, so that if a man will be able to count the dust of the earth, so will your seed be counted.

17  Rise, walk in the land, to its length and to its breadth, for I will give it to

you."

Bereshit - Genesis - Chapter 15

5 And He took him outside, and He said, "Please look heavenward and count the stars, if you are able to count them." And He said to him, "So will be your seed."

6  And he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him as righteousness.

7  And He said to him, "I am the Lord, Who brought you forth from Ur of the Chaldees, to give you this land to inherit it."

8  And he said, "O Lord God, how will I know that I will inherit it?"

9  And He said to him, "Take for Me three heifers and three goats and three rams, and a turtle dove and a young bird."

10 And he took for Him all these, and he divided them in the middle, and he placed each part opposite its mate, but he did not divide the birds.

11 And the birds of prey descended upon the carcasses, and Abram drove them away.

12 Now the sun was ready to set, and a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and behold, a fright, a great darkness was falling upon him.

13 And He said to Abram, "You shall surely know that your seed will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and they will enslave them and oppress them, for four hundred years.

14 And also the nation that they will serve will I judge, and afterwards they will go forth with great possessions.

15 But you will come to your forefathers in peace; you will be buried in a good old age.

16 And the fourth generation will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites will not be complete until then."

17 Now it came to pass that the sun had set, and it was dark, and behold, a smoking furnace and a fire brand, which passed between these parts.

18 On that day, the Lord formed a covenant with Abram, saying, "To your seed I have given this land, from the river of Egypt until the great river, the Euphrates river.

Bereshit - Genesis - Chapter 17

1 And Abram was ninety-nine years old, and God appeared to Abram, and He said to him, "I am the Almighty God; walk before Me and be perfect.

2 And I will place My covenant between Me and between you, and I will multiply you very greatly."

3 And Abram fell upon his face, and God spoke with him, saying,

4 "As for Me, behold My covenant is with you, and you shall become the father of a multitude of nations.

5 And your name shall no longer be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.

6 And I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings will emerge from you.

7 And I will establish My covenant between Me and between you and between your seed after you throughout their generations as an everlasting covenant, to be to you for a God and to your seed after you.

8 And I will give you and your seed after you the land of your sojournings, the entire land of Canaan for an everlasting possession, and I will be to them for a God."

9 And God said to Abraham, "And you shall keep My covenant, you and your seed after you throughout their generations.

10 This is My covenant, which you shall observe between Me and between you and between your seed after you, that every male among you be circumcised.

The land is described repeatedly in the Torah as a good land and "a land flowing with milk and honey" (e.g., Ex. 3:8). 

Shemot - Exodus - Chapter 3

1  Moses was pasturing the flocks of Jethro, his father in law, the chief of Midian, and he led the flocks after the free pastureland, and he came to the mountain of God, to Horeb.

2  An angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from within the thorn bush, and behold, the thorn bush was burning with fire, but the thorn bush was not being consumed.

3  So Moses said, "Let me turn now and see this great spectacle why does the thorn bush not burn up?"

4  The Lord saw that he had turned to see, and God called to him from within the thorn bush, and He said, "Moses, Moses!" And he said, "Here I am!"

5  And He said, "Do not draw near here. Take your shoes off your feet, because the place upon which you stand is holy soil."

6  And He said, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look toward God.

7  And the Lord said, "I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their cry because of their slave drivers, for I know their pains.

8  I have descended to rescue them from the hand[s] of the Egyptians and to bring them up from that land, to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivvites, and the Jebusites.

This description may not seem to fit well with the desert images we see on the nightly news, but let's keep in mind that the land was repeatedly abused by conquerors who were determined to make the land uninhabitable for the Jews. In the few decades since the Jewish people regained control of the land, we have seen a tremendous improvement in its agriculture. Israeli agriculture today has a very high yield.

Jews have lived in this land continuously from the time of its original conquest by Joshua more than 3200 years ago until the present day, though Jews were not always in political control of the land, and Jews were not always the majority of the land's population and were at times a small minority.

The land of Israel is central to Judaism. A substantial portion of Jewish law is tied to the land of Israel, and can only be performed there. Some rabbis have declared that it is a mitzvah (commandment) to take possession of Israel and to live in it (relying on Num. 33:53). The Talmud indicates that the land itself is so holy that merely walking in it can gain you a place in the World to Come. Prayers for a return to Israel and Jerusalem are included in daily prayers as well as many holiday observances and special events.

Living outside of Israel is viewed as an unnatural state for a Jew. The world outside of Israel is often referred to as "galut," which is usually translated as "diaspora" (dispersion), but a more literal translation would be "exile" or "captivity." When we live outside of Israel, we are living in exile from our land.

Jews were exiled from the land of Israel by the Romans in 135 C.E., after they defeated the Jews in a three-year war, and Jews did not have any control over the land again until 1948 C.E.

The Journey to the Land of Israel 

This song reflects the experiences of many Ethiopian Jews on their journey from Ethiopia back to the Land of Israel. It speaks to the hope, love, resilience, and challenges that characterized that journey.

I remember a story I heard while I was working in Egypt.

Ethiopian Jews would make a dash across the Sinai into Israel, the Egyptian Border guards would shoot at them, causing the IDF to shoot back. The IDF would then pick up the ones that came across the border and take them to a refugee camp.

Zionism and the Formation of the State of Israel

Theodor Herzl was the founder of the Modern Zionist movement. In his 1896 pamphlet Der Judenstaat, he envisioned the founding of a future independent Jewish state during the 20th century.

Zionism (Hebrew: צִיּוֹנוּת Tsiyyonut [tsijoˈnut] after Zion) is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in Jewish tradition as the Land of Israel, which corresponds in other terms to the region of Canaan, or the Holy Land, on the basis of a long Jewish connection and attachment to that land.

Modern Zionism emerged in the late 19th century in Central and Eastern Europe as a national revival movement, both in reaction to newer waves of antisemitism and as a response to Haskalah, or Jewish Enlightenment. Soon after this, most leaders of the movement associated the main goal with creating the desired homeland in Palestine, then an area controlled by the Ottoman Empire.

From 1897 to 1948, the primary goal of the Zionist Movement was to establish the basis for a Jewish homeland in Palestine, and thereafter to consolidate it. In a unique variation of the principle of self-determination, the Zionist Movement viewed this process as an 'ingathering of exiles' (kibbutz galuyot) whereby Jews everywhere would have the right to emigrate to historical Palestine, as a haven from persecution, an area which Moses in the Bible stated was the land of their forefathers. Zionist ideology also included negation of Jewish life in the Diaspora. The Lovers of Zion united in 1884 and in 1897 the first Zionist congress was organized.

The First Aliyah (Hebrew: העלייה הראשונה, HaAliyah HaRishona), also known as the agriculture Aliyah, was a major wave of Jewish immigration (aliyah) to Ottoman Syria between 1881 and 1903. Jews who migrated in this wave came mostly from Eastern Europe and from Yemen. An estimated 25,000 Jews immigrated. Many of the European Jewish immigrants during the late 19th-early 20th century period gave up after a few months and went back to their country of origin, often suffering from hunger and disease.

Because there had been a wave of immigration to Palestine starting in the mid-19th century (between 1840 and 1880, the Jewish population rose from 9,000 to 23,000), use of the term "First Aliyah" is controversial. Nearly all of the Jews from Eastern Europe before that time came from traditional Jewish families who were not inspired by modern Zionist ideology, but rather by traditional ideas of the holiness of the land combined with practical / economic considerations.

Shema Israel - Sarit Hadad