What would Jerusalem be like if its air were not punctuated with the cry of the muezzin summoning faithful Muslims to prayer? Or the sound of Jews davening before the Western, formerly Wailing, Wall? Or that of Christians following the cross along the Via Dolorosa, singing as they go?
--------------
Down the Via Dolorosa
in Jerusalem that day
The soldiers tried to clear
the narrow street
But the crowd pressed in to see
A Man condemned to die on Calvary
He was bleeding
from a beating, there were stripes
upon His back
And He wore a crown of thorns
upon His head
And He bore with every step
The scorn of those who cried out
for His death
Down the Via Dolorosa called
the way of suffering
Like a lamb came the Messiah,
Christ the King,
But He chose to walk that road
out of His love
For you and me.
Down the Via Dolorosa,
all the way to Calvary.
Por la Via Dolorosa,
triste dia en Jerusalem
Los saldados le abrian paso a Jesus
Mas la gente se acercaba
Para ver al que llevaba aquella cruz . . .
--------------
Instead of all these languages, some known only to God as Pentecostals speak in tongues, there would be a consuming silence. Which might please those Israelis tempted to hit the snooze button and roll over for a few more minutes of shut-eye. But such an anti-noise ordinance would also rob Jerusalem, the City Upon a Hill, of its essential character as a sacred place for all peoples where all tongues are spoken.
Now a move is afoot in the Old City to mute the cry of the muezzin. While such a city ordinance might sound neutral, everybody knows its target is Muslims--and all the other believers who dare pray out loud to the God of their choice. Zvi Barel, a columnist for the liberal newspaper Haaretz, writes that he would gladly support efforts to limit the role of religion in a secular state, but he would do so only if it weren't discriminatory--as this law would be.
"Israeli liberals," he wrote the other day, "whether Jewish or Arab, can't support this excellent bill because it is intended to harm Muslims." Americans should know how this routine works, or rather doesn't work: Separate but equal has a way of turning out separate, all right, but scarcely equal.
Such tricks of the legal trade can have a lot of unintended consequences. Those who design them, for example, may discover they're about as effective as a boomerang, turning and twisting in mid-air to strike the very people clever enough to design and pass them. And it serves 'em right. Israeli legislators noted that it could silence not just muezzins but the sirens that are sounded to announce the beginning of the Jewish Sabbath and holidays in many observant communities.
"I think the whole law is unnecessary," announced Yaakov Litzman in an interview with Israeli Army Radio--except that "unnecessary" ain't the half of it. It's also provocative, counter-productive, prejudicial and a pitiful attempt to hide its true purposes. Which ain't pretty.
Turns out that what goes around comes around. Till it bites the very people who proposed it in the first place. For there is still justice in this world, and it will not be denied. All the while poetic justice awaits in poetry, prose and even popular song lyrics:
--------------
Down the Via Dolorosa called
the way of suffering
Like a lamb came the Messiah,
Christ the King,
But He chose to walk that road
out of His love
For you and me.
Down the Via Dolorosa,
all the way to Calvary.
Editorial on 11/28/2016