State and Homeland
By Meir Shalev
I have visited Jordan several times since the signing of the peace agreement with Israel. The journey to a neighboring country, which to every European is something very normal, causes me new joy each time. The Jordanian border official stamps my Israeli passport, I cross the border and travel in a country that was once an enemy.
Jordan interests me very much. It is part of my historical homeland. This is where Elijah the Prophet was born and Moses was buried. This is where Jacob struggled with the angel. Ruth the Moabite came from here and gave birth to the grandfather of King David. I visit all those places and read the relevant passages from the Hebrew bible. But after that I cross the border again, show my passport and return to my home, to my state, to Israel.
There are Israelis who feel otherwise. According to them, all the places in which Jacob and Elijah lived and died still belong to us today. And now, when the issues of disengagement and convergence and the return of territories are coming up for discussion, they are not willing to give up their proximity to the tomb of Rachel or the valley through which David walked on his way to meet Goliath.
Our foremother Rachel is dear to my heart, but I don’t need national sovereignty over her tomb. I can visit it as I visit Jordan – by showing my Israeli passport at the border and traveling there. Because even if Rachel’s tomb is part of “the land of our forefathers,” of my spiritual homeland, it does not have to be part of my state.
The State of Israel and the “land of our forefathers” are
not the same thing, but the difference is not clear to many people. The state
is a tool of management; it has pragmatic considerations, legal borders and
policies. The homeland does not. Homeland is a historical and spiritual idea,
and those who love it are inclined to sentimentalism and extremism. In the
Middle East, however, there is another difference. The citizens of the state are living
beings. Citizens of the homeland, on the other hand, are dead. But their
influence is far greater.
And thus, to me and to the rest of Israel’s citizens it is difficult to compete with King David, Jesus, the Matriarch Rachel and Salah a-Din. It is difficult for our houses to compete with their tombs. That is why we must be resolute and strong. We must understand that the next generation, like every generation, will have the right to decide in which state and according to which borders they are willing and able to live. And so, after a 40-year struggle of belligerence and stupidity, Israel has finally understood that it must return the territories it conquered in the Six Day War. We are giving up part of our homeland in order to have a better and more normal state.
To all this there is an additional aspect: Most of our history took place without a state, but with a homeland. A very strong, virtual homeland. One of its symbols, the burial place of Rachel, has become a real place, an object of love and longing. Now, with our return to that place, it has become a fortified bunker, surrounded by guard posts, checkpoints, floodlights and soldiers. It is time to decide if that is the Rachel in whom we are interested. It is time to decide whether ownership of her tomb justifies the sacrifices we have made and will continue to make.
After the destruction of the First Temple and the dispersion to the Diaspora, Jeremiah the prophet wrote: "A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping; Rachel weeping for her children. ” Since then 2,500 years have passed, and there are still people amongst us who want Rachel to continue to weep. But this time she is weeping for the children who will die in order to keep her tomb fortified within the domain of Israel.
