Jerusalem : the Holy City?

Donald Trump as US President decided to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel has led to protest. This recognition makes people around the world wonder why he must recognize it. Is it because his religion background or political movement? Is it important city? Is it Holy City? Jerusalem was capital of Israel long time ago as we can find it in bible was granted special status as under the 1947 UN Partition Plan to divide historical Palestine between Jewish and Arab States. Jerusalem, the holy city of three faiths, has been the focus of competing historical, religious, and political narratives from biblical chronicles to today’s headlines. With an aura that transcends the boundaries of time and place, the city itself embodies different levels of reality—indeed, different realities altogether—for both observers and inhabitants. There is the real Jerusalem, a place of ancient streets and monuments, temples and coffeehouses, religious discourse and political argument. But there is also the imaginary and utopian city that exists in the minds of believers and political strategists.

Why is Jerusalem a holy city? Does Jerusalem make itself to be holy? Or people with their religion that make Jerusalem to be a holy city?

The answer, obviously, is that Jerusalem is not just a city but a holy city,and a city holy to three faiths. And not to any three, but those aforementioned communities whose ideologies are both absolutist and supremist: we, and we alone, are God’s Chosen, each asserts. And how does the holy city of Jerusalem enter into the equation? To understand that we must first address the question of what exactly is a holy city. The very notion is an odd one. Sanctity and cities do not seem to go together, and traditionally the first thing that most saints do in their quest for self-sanctification is to clear out of the city and head for remote pastures, or better, deserts.

What, then, is a holy city? Some cities are holy because they possess a shrine, like Lourdes or Fatima in Portugal or Karbala in Iraq. But manycities possess shrines, perhaps many shrines, without being regarded as holy. New York City, for example, which has been called many things but never holy, possesses shrines to everyone from John Lennon in Central Park to Babe Ruth in Yankee Stadium, and it changes its street names almost daily to keep up with the current saints. No, holy places do not a city holy make.

            Jerusalem, where people of the Abrahamic Faith recognise the city as part of their religion. As we see in history, the followers of all three monotheistic religions made strenuous efforts to conquer the city by any means and at any cost. Jerusalem as one of oldest cities in the world has been destroyed, conquered and rebuilt time and again. Jerusalem has been for the religious imagination and the artistic expressions of people of the Abrahamic religions, it has also been a real place, an earthly place, where people live their daily lives, confronting economic problems and engaging in political struggles. The city’s history was shaped primarily by both its religious attributes and foreign domination. Jerusalem is unique city that Christian, Jewish and Muslim have quarter. Christian has Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jewsh has western Wall and Muslim has al-Aqsa Mosque the third holiest site in Islam. It makes Jerusalem is very unique that embodies itself to be holy. Jewish believes that Jerusalem is part of their religion that God has choose it as holy city. Christian looks Jerusalem as holy city where Jesus’s death, crucifixion and resurection is in there. Muslims believes that Mohammad travelled Jerusalem from mecca and ascendec to heaven.(DD)