#WallWillFall
Reflection
on World Week of Prayer for Peace in Palestine Israel 2015
The theme for this year’s World Week of Prayer for
Peace in Palestine Israel (WWPPPI) 2015 has been “God has broken down the
dividing walls.” When religious tourists travel in the so called ‘holy land’,
the wall between Israel and West Bank cannot go unnoticed. But the Zionist tour
guides inform the tourists, that the walls are built for security reasons, for
those living on the other side of the wall are all terrorists and therefore to
protect the land and people of Israel these walls are built. The wall runs
around for about 400 miles long and about 25 feet height, and has concrete
walls, fences, barbed wires, barriers etc. It is a separation wall; it is a
wall of apartheid; separating people and communities, for the walls are built
right in to the communities, only to divide and distance the communities. Walls
are the ‘unholy sights’ in the so called land of the ‘holy sites’. #WallWillFall
is a prayer of hope and a cry of justice that soon the dividing wall will be
broken down.
Walls between Land without People and People
without Land:
Journeying
into the streets of Palestine would lead any one to anger, distress,
disappointment and frustration, for visualising the segregations and
separations made by the state of Israel by their cruel occupations,
confiscating the Palestine lands, by building walls, fences and gates and
thereby dividing and dispersing towns and villages of Palestinians, which is
beyond one’s imagination in this so called ‘holy land.’ It is a paradox to see one
hand the foreign ‘settlers’ on mountain tops guarded by the security forces living
in comfortable zones with all amenities and on the other hand the native
inhabitants of the land of Palestine living in the most deprived conditions. “The
land without people and people without a land” is the greatest paradox that one
encounters here. There are lots of ‘check-posts’ to cross across for the people
of the land, the Palestinians, for these walls is a huge wall of separation and
division. The humiliations,
discriminations and the human right violations done against Palestinians knew
no bounds.
Come, let us not build the walls: A
Hermeneutical Recovery of Biblical Texts
In
such a context, what do these walls mean to us as Christian faith communities?
How many times have we triumphantly quoted, used, misused and abused texts from
the book of Nehemiah, ‘come let us build the walls’, not realising what that
would mean to our Palestinian friends living in the context of Israeli
occupation? The occupiers have appropriated such Biblical texts to their
advantage in building the walls, and have taken them as divine sanctions in
raising the walls. They have
also taken for granted that the biblical Israel is today’s political Israel and
therefore there is a divine sanction for them in occupying land in Palestine.
However, WWPPPI provides us an opportunity to recover such Biblical texts from
the occupiers’ territory and to redeem it from the occupiers perspective by
re-appropriating it to the given context of the occupied Palestinians, who are
today’s biblical Israel, forced into slavery and occupation by the state of
Israel. This also gives us an opportunity to confess for being Christian
Zionists in many ways confusing today’s political Israel as equivalent with
Biblical Israel. Time is ripe now to rediscover the narrative God’s revelation
amidst the growing signs of our times today.
#WallWillFall with Christ and
in Christ:
In light of this, the text of Paul written to the Church
in Ephesus as recorded in Ephesians 2: 11-22, finds great relevance, for in
verse 14, it is written, “For Christ is our peace; in his flesh he
has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is
the hostility between us.” The context at the Church at Ephesus was the
division between circumcised Christians and the uncircumcised Christians, and
therefore Paul exhorts the Church that Christ Jesus is our peace who has broken
down all the dividing walls of hostility, ethnicity, and ritual, for he has
brought reconciliation and love among all people in the Church. This statement
of faith made by Paul is a statement of hope & trust, for God who in Christ
Jesus has broken those dividing walls will also bring down these walls of separation
and division in today’s Palestine Israel. Allow me to reflect on this verse in
three sub-sections for more clarity and commitment.
1. Breaking
down the Dividing Walls is a Christological Necessity:
Christ Jesus is the reconciling point, where peace is
made between the two dividing groups, where all of them gather in the name of
God. It was mentioned that it is in his flesh that the two groups are made as
one common humanity. Where flesh here
refers to the ground realities, in its brokenness, and in its weakness, peace
is made between the rival groups. Peace is made in Christ’s fragility of flesh.
Being in Christ does not allow us to affirm in raising dividing walls, and
therefore breaking down the wall of apartheid is a Christological necessity for
us today. Out of our fragile contexts, we called in Christ and by Christ to
praying for the breaking down the wall of separation.
2. Breaking
down the Dividing Walls is a Missiological Necessity:
Breaking down the dividing walls today is a
missiological necessity, for those of us engaged in mission cannot but partake
in continuing Christ’s activity in our contexts today. If we believe in Christ,
there is unity of all humanity, and in Christ all divisions and hostilities are
broken down, then following such a Christ Jesus compels us to advocate in
breaking down all dividing walls of hostility, particularly in the context of
Palestine Israel. Breaking down the walls would yield liberation and freedom to
Palestinians, for their self and their lands would be free from confiscation
and occupation. Breaking down the dividing walls should be on the mission
agenda of all Churches, for such a mission is part and parcel of God’s mission.
3. Breaking
down the Dividing Walls is a Contextual Necessity:
The dividing walls in Palestine and Israel are against
the UN International Border agreements, and therefore advocating for the
breaking down of the walls is a cry of all responsible citizens from across the
world. Garth Hewitt observes the Eucharist celebrated at Cremisan Monastery, at
Beit- Jala near Bethlehem, where a huge separation wall is being built to cut
across the community as an act of protest. ‘Eucharist as an act of Protest’ is
a challenge to the Christians globally to strive for the breaking down of the
dividing walls of hostility and separation in Palestine Israel. If this
dividing wall is broken down, communities will be united, liberation will be
realised and unity among people will be established. Breaking down the dividing
walls in Palestine Israel is a 21st Century’s contextual necessity.
Let us as communities of faith, pledge that we shall
strive and advocate for the breaking down of these dividing walls in Palestine
Israel, and to ensure that justice and peace will be restored in this land. Let
us be prophetic in our faith, address the human rights violations done to the
people in occupations, speak to the principalities and powers of occupation by
joining in movements like Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) etc. to
express our dissent with occupation. Those going on pilgrimages to this land,
want to spend their time at Wailing Wall piercing their prayer requests to be
answered. May pilgrims recognise the walls of separation and understand the
political moorings of such walls, and pray for the breaking down of these
dividing walls, for only in those breaking of those walls can one find the
living God in Christ. Today we don’t need walls, but we need bridges, for
Christ has come to become bridge of reconciliation, and so does God call us to
become bridges of reconciliations.
With God, the walls at Biblical Jericho fell down; in
Christ the dividing walls of hostility broke down, and Inshallah in God, by God and with God the walls of separation in
Palestine Israel will fall down. #WallWillFall. Amen
I thought young Joseph would be there
welcoming
but it was young men with guns at
checkpoints incoming
I thought young Mary would be there
welcoming
But it was young women with guns at
checkpoints incoming
I thought then it would be the manger
that’s welcoming
but shockingly, it was the huge
concrete wall of separation.
a wall of division
a wall of segregation
a wall of occupation
a wall of humiliation
a wall of discrimination
Making the birth of Jesus’ place
invisible.
O Jesus, come now to be born again
here
to break these walls of domination
to tear down these walls of
demonization
to break open the cruel hearts of
oppressions
to restore liberation and peace on
this earth
and to bring glad tiding of joy to all
these people
Come Jesus, and come now!
In hope I leave, only to return to see
Joseph, Mary and
baby Jesus - in all freedom - in this
land.
02.09.2015
