What's In a Stone?

A while ago my family celebrated a Bar Mitzva for my nephew, in a family-only, low-key event.

It was a chilly day and the ceremony took place in an unusual site for such occasions: the ancient synagogue in Chorazin (Greek) or Korazim (Hebrew), on a hill above the Sea of Galilee, near Capernaum. The synagogue was built in the late 3rd century, destroyed in the 4th century, and rebuilt in the 6th century.

As the ceremony ended, the site manager asked if he could say a few words. We were happy to say yes, and what he said was: "I want to thank you for coming here and performing this ceremony. Without people coming here, interacting, engaging, celebrating, this place has no meaning, it's just a pile of old stones. You gave it meaning and I thank you for it".

I was touched by these words because indeed, stones themselves, ancient as they may be, don't carry any meaning. We give them meaning.

These days I can't help looking around me at the fierce battles over stones – sacred, ancient, holy, new, old. These stones are what we make of them, and now we are making them an excuse for our conflict.

All those sacred sites, we are robbing them of their holiness as places of worship, and turning them into a cause for a fight.

The site manager was right: when we want them to be a place of worship and of love, they become that. And when we want them to be a cause to fight over, they become that.

I know what I want any holy site to mean, and I'm doing my best to act and communicate it in my conflicted and hurting environment. And I miss the feeling of love and happiness I felt when I stood there at Korazim and the ancient stones became a place to celebrate in.