Flashback: "I'm Not Christo", Summer 2006

We headed down to breakfast without having made our final plans for the day. Because the Guest House dining room is rather small, we sat down at the table that seemed to have the most room. After exchanging pleasantries, the couple we shared the table with mentioned that they were heading to St. George’s monastery and wondered if that was in our plan and if we wanted to share a cab. The offer sounded great, so we quickly cleaned our plates and ran back upstairs to grab our stuff.

In the cab ride over, we found out that our traveling companions were Eric and Sylvi, a Jewish couple who were in their early 60’s. Eric was from New York, a practicing psychiatrist and this was his first trip to Israel. Sylvi was from Paris, an author and professor at SUNY, making her second trip. The ride proved to be a great experience as we discussed our lives, our studies and talked about current Old Testament studies from the perspective of a modern-day Jewish person. Eric proved to be rather knowledgeable in speaking Hebrew and expressed his preferred translations of the Old Testament were the RSV and JPS. He dismissed the others as too Christological in their approach.

When we got to the site, we took the long descent down to the monastery itself. The scenery was beautiful and the monastery itself was incredible, hewn into the side of the face of a cliff. Also of note on the descent were the carved aqueducts which still held several inches of flowing water. After knocking on the front door of the monastery repeatedly, it was opened and we were welcomed inside. They provided us with water and juice. After a short time they invited us into side rooms to see their treasured possessions. Chief among these were the bones of St. George and St. John, the founders of the monastery, and the skulls of 14 other martyrs who died in defending it.

Leaving these rooms, we found an interesting scene. There was a monk there dealing with two senior Orthodox women. Both women in turn seized his hand and pressed it to their heads and their lips. They squeezed his hand and murmured unintelligible prayers. The monk, obviously taken aback, repeated over and over, “I’m not Christo. I’m not a Priest. I’m just a monk. I’m just a monk.” It was a touching scene that greatly enhanced my opinion of the monks from this order. Later we would have another interesting encounter with one of the monks who was wearing Nike sneakers. As we were leaving, asked us young Americans what the word Nike meant, and be overjoyed to find out that it came from a Greek word meaning “Victory.”

We went to the upper level of the monastery where we found the cave where Elijah supposedly received comfort while in the desert. The cave was filled with Orthodox icons; pictures hung from every wall, candles burned in all corners, there was nary a section of the wall that was not covered. It was an interesting sight. As we left the cave, we discussed the difference in worship style with Eric and Sylvi. Sylvi stated, “Protestants have it the worst. No walls to kiss or scrolls to revere. No pope. It’s just you and God.”

I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Flashback: The Church of the Holy Sepulcher, Summer 2006

Almost as a matter of chance we found ourselves at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. We went inside, saw the place of the Crucifixion and reached in and touched the rock in which the cross was placed. When we made it over to the tomb, we discovered that this was one place where the “No Shorts” rule was enforced. So, we decided to go to dinner and come back later. We figured there would be less people around then anyway. When we came back, we found the door to the church’s courtyard was closed and locked. A monk who was waiting at the door told us it would be opening in 5 minutes. We waited with two other people to be let inside. Once inside we rather quickly made our way over to the shrine covering the tomb and sat down to wait for the priests to do their required things before we got in line.

As we sat there, watching the priests go in and out, a Ukrainian Orthodox monk stopped to say hello in the few english words he knew. After finding out that he disliked our current administration’s policies in the middle east through a series of hand gestures, he began to ask about my religious background. “Orthodoxa?” No. “Catholique?” No. “Armeeenian?” No, Protestant. “Ah, Proteestant - vich? ” None, Neutral. “Neutraday?” Yes. “Oh.” Then he looked straight at me andpointed to his eyes, then he pointed to his ears and finally pointed up. He seemed to want to tell me to begin to look to and listen to God. (Apparently he thought that “Neutral” meant that I didn’t have a religious background.) I smiled and nodded my head, wishing I was better at charades. I wanted to tell him that I do see and hear God, and that I love Him and follow him as well. Instead I settled for smiling, nodding and receiving an old Ukrainian hand tussling my hair.

In the several minutes that we chatted with the Ukrainian, the line at the tomb became rather unruly. We explored the basement of the church to pass some time. After seeing the shrines and relics, we returned to the tomb to find the line even longer than it had been. We decided we should get in line now before things got worse. We got behind a couple of nuns which soon became several. Then some of their priests joined them and a few congregants. Not wanting to be a problem in this holy place, we held our tongues. The line behind us continued to get longer as well. Those in charge of keeping people out of the tomb lost a little control when the nuns continued to flock forward in large groups. As we got closer to the two small steps up to the tomb entrance we noticed that we had been positioning ourselves to block those behind us from moving in front of us. Here we were, at the very place where Jesus made himself last, trying to secure our place in line. We were annoyed with the nuns for slowing down the line and frustrated that any priest could walk in without waiting. As our turn finally arrived, we walked beneath the hanging lights and incense and ducked into the tiny two-room structure. Inside was a lone priest still praying. The monk outside said something to him (presumably asking him to leave), to which the kneeling priest virtually shouted back in response. He continued his prayers at a much higher volume and remained for the duration of the time we were there. I knelt beside him and said a short prayer as I looked around the tiny room. As I got up to leave, a man and his son were squeezing into the inner room with us, creating quite the pressing situation in getting out.

The experience was interesting, but not as spiritual as I would have hoped. The short, cynical prayer, “Lord, please save us from your followers” could not be ignored. We wondered what Jesus would do if confronted with what his tomb has become. Our own tired, cynical answer was, “Well, for starters he would have gone to the back of the line.”