The Thin Place of Jerusalem’s Western Wall
The Thin Place of Jerusalem’s Western Wall.
“ The thin place is where the veil between this world and the next is so sheer that it is easy to step through.” (Barbara Brown Taylor, Home By Another Way).
This term from an ancient Celtic tradition has stood the test of time. The idea of a thin place between heaven and earth has captured our imaginations, and yet is not just a metaphor. Thin places are literal as well.
The traditional thin place as the Irish understood it has been described in many ways: where the veil between heaven and earth is so thin as to be porous, permeable, practically transparent; where the space between the diviner and the human has narrowed; where eternity and time intersect; where the boundary between heaven and earth has collapsed; where the wall between heaven and earth have become indistinguishable; where the doors between heaven and earth have cracked open enough to walk through, if only temporarily; the place where eternity and time seem to join together.
Those descriptions of thin places have recently been expanded to include… wherever God has chosen to reveal Himself and make Himself known with unusual intimacy; wherever the sacred interaction with God’s presence is more pronounced and accessible; wherever the Holy Spirit is released in a particularly powerful way; a physical space where one can more directly and intensely experience God’s presence. I like to think of a thin place as when the Spirit of God opens the skylight of the earth’s roof and helps us climb through it into the cellar of heaven.
The Western Wall in Jerusalem: The ancient limestone wall, also referred to as “Kotel” in Jewish tradition, is an invaluable sacred site in Judaism and an historic holy place of prayer and pilgrimage. The Western Wall is the remaining physical remnant of the Holy Temple that was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD, is 187’ long, 60’ high, and is buried at least 40’ beneath the ground. The ancient stones comprising the Wall vary in size, the largest being gigantic: 44’ long, 11’ high, and weighing in at 570 tons. The Western Wall is visited by millions of people of all faiths every year, and is never called the “Wailing Wall” by Israelis. That term was popularized long ago after European Christian tourists witnessed so many pious Jews at the Wall, weeping, praying, mournfully recalling the destruction of the Temple and the overall suffering of the Jewish people. A brief history of the Western Wall… The First Temple in Jerusalem was built by Solomon, but destroyed by the Babylonians in 587-586 BC. It was rebuilt after the Babylonian captivity in the era of Nehemiah and Ezra, and then was doubled in size by King Herod in 20 BC. Herod had four retaining walls built around the Temple Mount at that time of expansion, and the Western Wall was one of those retaining walls. The Western Wall was the wall closest to the Holy of Holies, and so continues to be considered the most sacred site outside the Temple Mount on which the Second Temple was built. The Wall has had a contentious history through the centuries between the Muslims and the Jews, enduring numerous conflicts and battles as to who owns it and who can have access to it. For centuries the Muslim clerics wouldn’t allow access to the Jewish Temple Mount site, so the Jews would pray instead at the Western Wall, which was the next best thing. Surprisingly, in 1949 the Jews were not granted access to the Western Wall, and that status remained for the next 19 years. Finally, in 1967, Israel gained control of the Western Wall, and proceeded to build an enlarged plaza at the Wall site to allow for more public use. To this day, the Orthodox Jews consider the Western Wall to be where the Presence of God placed Himself after the Temple was destroyed. They believe that the Divine Presence has never departed from the Western Wall. One can understand then why so many faithfully visit the Wall in Jerusalem, to offer prayers by touching the Wall with their hands, or leaning their foreheads against the Wall, or placing a personal prayer written on slips of paper into the cracks between the Wall’s limestone rocks. Those written prayers placed in the Wall have the status of holy prayers to God, and so are collected by selected rabbis twice a year and buried in the Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives. The Western Wall is managed by Israeli authorities, and is not considered private property, so people of any faith can respectfully and prayerfully visit the site and experience a true contemporary thin place on earth.
Rabbi Jonathon Wittenberg has beautifully reflected on his experience at the Western Wall, and gives us a profound picture of what it means to believers… “It is late at night in Jerusalem and the crowds have gone home. The birds cry in the dark from high above the Western Wall and from the tenacious bushes rooted between the stones. Here by this wall the Divine Spirit is said to dwell as, since the dedication of the Temple by King Solomon, it always has. The Divine Spirit has never departed from this wall. Here the Spirit has remained through the many centuries when Jerusalem was all but forsaken. That is why Jews have gathered here for millennia, to pour out our souls, to find comfort and to commune with God. Throughout the ages Jews have come with love and longing in their hearts. And so here at night, the crowds have gone. The stones glow in the darkness, layer above layer, immense. No other stones have evoked a deeper longing or elicited a greater love. The papers which choke the cracks between them contain the distillations of the prayers of a thousand souls, all hoping to tuck themselves into God’s garment. This place seems to be inhabited at this hour by those who know the pathways to the presence of God.” (Rabbi Jonathon Wittenberg, The Sacred Journey).
Massive group sings Ani Maamin (I believe) at the Kotel in Jerusalem – YouTube
Matisyahu – Jerusalem (with lyrics) (youtube.com)