When’s the right time for a rite of passage?
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Life, Religion, Travel, health
It’s generally accepted that the Israeli perspective on the bar/bat mitzvah ceremony is different from its counterpart in the US.
I remember when Susie and three of her closest friends decided to celebrate their bat mitzvahs together – they were all around 40-years-old at the time.
They had been studying Torah as a group in Jerusalem for a year and a half. It all started when Boston-born Susie, who had already been in Israel for more than 20 years, started to feel that while her Jewish identity was her primary identity, which is why she had moved here, it was time for her to confront her “awe of the Torah.”
Sally, Ruti and Janet had also been in Israel for a couple of decades and for various reasons, none of the four had had a bat mitzvah back in the States. In fact, the first bat mitzvah was held by American rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan, a major figure in Jewish thought and the founder of the Reconstructionist movement, for his daughter Judith in 1922.
So the culmination of 18 months of study and learning to read from the holy book was a ceremony at Jerusalem’s Kol Haneshama .
Now the idea didn’t resonate with everybody, but at that June ceremony 12 years ago no one could fail to be moved by the four women’s obvious quiet joy and pride in their achievements.
The bat mitzvahs of those forty-somethings inevitably came to mind when I received an e-mail recently, telling me about another group of delayed bar/bat mitzvah celebrants, en route to Israel.
Some of the participants at the upcoming celebration will be using walkers. Oxygen and wheelchairs will be available for emergencies. Five nurses will be traveling with the group. The average age of the participants in this particular version of the Jewish coming-of-age ceremony? Eighty-five.
Read more
Unmade in the shade of Masada
The snake path at Masada - no place for a human to be in August.
On one of their weekends, they’re going to stay at the youth hostel at the foot of Masada. And on Sunday morning, they’ll awaken bright and early to climb the snakepath up to the top, before ending the day at the nearby Dead Sea.
“Do you want to join us?” they asked recently in an e-mail.
Now, I love Masada and the Dead Sea as much as the next Zionist, but maybe I’ve just been here too long. Never mind that it’s the lowest place on earth – the idea of spending a Shabbat in August at what is likely the hottest place in Israel was not an offer I couldn’t refuse.
I’ll gladly go there in the cooler weather October, or even in January and chance the flash floods. But as far as seeing our Canadian friends while they’re here, I think we’ll stick to a barbecue in our backyard – where the temperature usually doesn’t rise above double digits.
And if it’s clear out, we might even be able to see the Dead Sea.
The Jurassic Park of seeds
Filed under: Environment, Food, General, Technology
Israeli agrotech experts like to break the bounds of science every now and then – well actually pretty frequently. So it should come as no surprise that a team of Israeli researchers has now resurrected a 2,000-year-old date tree by using a seed excavated from Masada.
What a fun project this must have been.
Apparently the seed was one of three discovered at the ancient Jewish fortress in the 1960s and was radiocarbon-dated to the 1st century BCE – AD73 to be exact – around the time the Romans laid siege to Masada.
Three years ago, a team from the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies bathed the seeds in fertilizer and enzyme-rich solutions and then planted them.
Lo and behold, about four weeks later one of the seeds sprouted, making it the oldest germinated seed in the world. Today’s it’s a four-foot tall Judean palm sapling called Methuselah –named by the scientists after the oldest person in the Hebrew bible.
The main researcher, Elaine Solowey – who was featured on ISRAEL21c some months ago and specializes in reviving extinct plants, said: “I really never thought we would get life out of this group of seeds because when we first acquired them, they looked so dry. Most of the seeds were dead and then suddenly, we saw that we could get life out of this one.”
According to the scientists this region was once covered in thick forests of Judean palms reaching up top 80 feet high, but they have all become extinct. Methuselah is the only living Judean date palm in the world.
The researchers hope that by reviving the plant they can study its medicinal uses. It’s also got quite a bit of history behind it – researchers believe the seeds were most likely the remnants of fruits stored or eaten by the Zealot Jewish community living in Masada at that time.
Perhaps I watch too much Sci-Fi. Although I think this is absolutely fascinating, there’s also part of me that finds it faintly scary.
A resurrected seed… what comes next?
Subscribe
Subscribe to Israelity via email:
Social Media
Categories
- A New Reality
- Art
- Blogging
- Business
- coexistence
- Crime
- design
- education
- Environment
- Food
- Foto Friday
- General
- health
- History and Culture
- Holidays
- Immigrant Moments
- Israeliness
- Life
- Medical Breakthroughs
- Movies
- Music
- Nostalgia Sunday
- Picture of the Week
- Politics
- Pop Culture
- Profiles
- Religion
- Social Justice
- Sports
- Technology
- Travel
- tv
- War
The Face of Israel Today
-
About Israelity
Free newsletter
Stories from ISRAEL21c.orgPopular Posts