August 19, 2022

This week, Jim went on another organ “crawl” by himself (he didn’t think Deanne or the Barkers would enjoy it so much).  He started at the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer, where he met up with Michael-Peter Seifried, the German organist of that church as well as the Lutheran Church of the Ascension right near us, with the wonderful Sauer organ.  He was very friendly, demonstrated the Schuke tracker organ, and he heard him play a very stylish Bach Prelude in F major (from the 8 Little) for prelude, and then the opening hymn with many stop changes that illustrated the hymn text.  He’s a pro!  

 Saint Savior Church 

                                      Lutheran Church of the Redeemer

 Michael-Peter Seifried

Since Jim was right by the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, he went in and was surprised to see how few people there were.  We've never been able to go into the traditional tomb because there is always a long line.  But no line today.  You have to stoop to go in, and only two people can be in there at the same time.  It pays to go in the morning!  

 

Unction stone in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher

Jim went on a wonderful walking tour all over the Old City, exploring alleys and corridors to his heart’s content. He found the Arch of St. Mary, the Church of St. John the Baptist, found the entrance to the Hurva Synagogue (will go in another time), walked through the excavated Cardo, which was the main thoroughfare of Byzantine Jerusalem.  You can look down in places and see how much lower the ground was 2000 years ago. We never tire of walking through the markets in the Muslim quarter, crowded as they are.  

 Arch of St. Mary

 Cardo

 Jewish students

Later that same day, Jim drove to Yuval Rabin’s house.  He is the most prominent Israeli organist and such a friendly guy.  In his home he has a piano, harpsichord, clavichord, and a small German tracker organ.  He has four nice kids, and his wife works at the Einstein Archives at Hebrew University. 

 Yuval Rabin

We had our weekly field trip with the Earnshaws and Barkers.  We went to Abu-Gosh, an old town in the Judean hills about 12 km west of Jerusalem, famous for centuries as a caravanserai on the way from the coast to Jerusalem.  First we visited the Church of Notre Dame de l’Arche de l’Alliance (Our Lady of the Ark of the Covenant), where the Ark of the Covenant is said to have rested for 20 years (1 Samuel 7:1-2) until David took it to Jerusalem. 

 

Church of Notre Dame de l’Arche de l’Alliance

Then to a wonderful Crusader church, the St. Mary of the Resurrection Abbey. It was begun in Roman times, and in 1143 Crusaders identified the site with the village of Emmaus and built the crypt and church.  The grounds are a beautiful oasis.  Jim was particularly interested in the little one-manual pipe organ (of course) with its wildly painted case.  It was built in 1986.  He asked if he could play it, so he played a few pieces and improvisations on Gregorian chants.  Sounded right in that very old church.  

 

St. Mary of the Resurrection Abbey

Next we visited the Ahmad Grand Mosque in Abu-Gosh, our first visit to a mosque since we arrived.  It is the second largest mosque in Israel.  Completed in 2014, it is named after Ahmad Kadyrov, the Chechnian president who was assassinated in 2004.  The women had to wear head-coverings.  Seeing an electronic sign-board with the prayer times seemed a little anachronistic, but why not?  

Ahmad Grand  Mosque

We ended our trip with lunch at the Abu-Gosh Restaurant, which holds a Guinness World Record for serving the largest dish of hummus in 2010, 9016 lbs. of hummus.  We didn’t eat quite that much, but it was a wonderful lunch with all the varied Palestinian salads, sides, fries, and meats on skewers.

We took a long walk with Barkers to Hebrew University, fun to see that again. We found the student center which had a wonderful bookstore and office supply store.

We met with Eran Hayat (the director at the Jerusalem Center) and his staff to talk about reopening the tours on September 7! Great news for us. Admittedly, it is too quiet here without the students! They bring such energy. The next group arrives August 31. The new faculty is coming this week and we look forward to working with them. 

Another morning walk with Barkers took us to the Russian Orthodox Church of the Ascension. It is very close to the Center. In the ornate church is a stone on which Mary is said to have stood at Christ’s ascension. They also have a small chapel with a mosaic indentation in the floor where the head of John the Baptist was supposedly found :/ We continue to discover so much here!

  

             Russian Orthodox Church of the Ascension

And we are grateful for the fast work done by the maintenance staff here when we discovered black mold on the entire wall behind the cabinet in our bathroom hallway. Evidently an A/C pipe had been damaged and was leaking through the wall. Luckily, they bleached and repainted the wall very quickly. (We'll spare you a picture of the mold!)

Both of us ventured out for our first haircuts since arriving. Let's say Jim had a less pampering experience than Deanne did. He didn't get worried until the barber asked if he wanted "knife" (razor) or "machine" to trim around his ears...