A banner for Ramadan

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I came just at the right moment today to witness four Jewish students putting up a banner that says in Arabic 
HAVE A GENEROUS RAMADAN, ACCEPTABLE FASTING, AND A DELICIOUS IFTAR
And the Hebrew parts says
tsom kal -- HAVE AN EASY FAST.  RAMADAN KAREEM

At the Student Union building, Beit HaStudent, at Beer Sheva's Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. 

The month of Ramadan begins today.
Unfortunately for the Muslims this whole next week Israel will be suffering a heat wave.  
Imagine not being able to drink anything from sunrise to sunset when it is is 41 degrees C.  
Kol hakavod, respect, to those who fast. 
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(Linking to Weekend Reflections and signs, signs.)
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Unter den Linden

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What a relief -- no more raking leaves in the courtyard.
(Can you tell it's R day at ABC Wednesday?)

The leaves have all fallen and now is the time for community members here in Austria to clean the gutters and sweep the roof.

The one tree in the courtyard kept me busy raking the grass this past month.
The linden tree is about 110 years old!

Austrian apples

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I got to help the Franziskusgemeinschaft men pick apples! 

Well, actually I was picking UP apples, the ones that came down while the brave men were 8 meters up on the ladders.

One apple fell hard on my back as I was bending over.
A sign of the times: my first reaction was "OMG I've been stabbed!"
I may be in Austria right now but my heart is in and with Israel as she bleeds.
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(Linking to Our World Tuesday.)
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The Ladder of Divine Ascent

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An Orthodox priest filling the oil lamps above the tomb at the Holy Sepulchre.

 A brave Benedictine nun positioned a ladder on the stairs leading down to the crypt and climbed up to extinguish the candle at one of the stations of the cross.
 At the Abbey of St. Mary of the Resurrection, Abu Ghosh.

A brave nun friend on chapel-cleaning day.
Chapel at the tomb of St. Elisabeth.
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Why am I posting pictures of monastics on tall ladders?
Because  today is the Sunday of  John of the Ladder!
St. John Climacus wrote the guide for his fellow monks, The Ladder of Divine Ascent.
He lived not far from here, at Santa Katarina monastery in Sinai and in desert caves in the 7th century.

I have been learning about him at Sr. Dr. Vassa's short video.
In it Sr. Vassa also talks about how you don't have to be a monastic to get into the habit of doing a little bit of spiritual reading, lectio divina, every day,  just for a few minutes.

The 12th C icon for The Ladder of Divine Ascent, this one from St. Catherine's Monastery.

You can sample some sections of the book here.
Or an outline of the steps of the ladder.
More about St. John Climacus.
An easy walk-through of the icon is at this nice icons blog.
Also at Wikipedia. 
But the most fun way is to see the Coffee with Sr. Vassa episode. Only ten minutes.
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Ascension

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The incense was ready for today's Feast of the Ascension.

These are my pictures from 2012  but it is the same ritual every year at the Chapel of the Ascension on the Mount of Olives.
Click a few times on the photos to enjoy the details.

For more about the holy site and about the holy day, please see previous posts.
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The Franciscans now have a nice article about last Wednesday/Thursday's celebrations:
http://www.terrasanctablog.org/2014/05/30/feast-of-the-ascension-together-disciples-of-christ/

UPDATE:  See a little video of this year's celebration: http://www.terrasanctablog.org/2014/06/03/ecumenical-ascension-in-jerusalem/
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Pulvinate shadows

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The pulvinate elements above the door of the Holy Sepulchre gave crisp shadows for Shadow Shot Sunday 2.
Such "cushions" or boofim or poofim are typical of Crusader architecture.

Oh, and there is the immovable ladder.
Someone put it there sometime before 1852, when the status quo defined both the doors and the window ledges as common ground.
Under the status quo, no part of what is designated as common territory may be so much as rearranged without consent from all the communities that have rights inside the church.
So no one dares to remove the old ladder.

Please enlarge the photos to enjoy the stonework.
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Careful up there!

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Oi! Would you trust your co-worker enough to steady your ladder here?
The ladder rests on the slippery slope of Greek Catholic Patriarchate Street, which is just inside Jaffa Gate, in Jerusalem's Old City.
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Hmm . . . this could be for Monday Doorways.
And if you enlarge the photo and look in the mirror on the Franciscan Book Shop door, you also see a reflection of the photographer, for Weekend Reflections.
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Did you say woodpeckers?!

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Every winter, with the first rain, my little old house in the hills gets Internet connectivity problems and my phone often dies for days or weeks.
Whether this may have played a hand in Google's lock-down on my blog for a week I don't know.
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But I know I was over-joyed to find this telephone infrastructure man out on the street a few days ago!

Bless his heart, Yossi was patient with all my questions and picture-taking.
He worked for hours out in the cold.
The Bezeq man replaced the old cables on the two wooden poles nearest my house.

Yossi showed me how the cables were full of holes.
Can you believe?! He said woodpeckers made the holes, thinking the cables were the commonly used black drip irrigation tubes!
The birds were hoping to get a drink of water!
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Well, it made good fodder for the blog, this story, but I am still waiting for my telephone to work properly.
Thank you Yossi, you tried, and I appreciate your dedication.
Now it's time to wait for another Bezeq technician, but from a different department.
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(This is not a grand tour but it has been very much "my world" these past weeks, so I will add it to Our World Tuesday meme.)

Something NEW over the Holy Sepulchre??

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Sometime this year a big roof awning went up over (what looks like) part of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

I can't believe that this got past the old Status Quo agreements about the church.
You see the ladder under the window on the left, for instance?
It was placed on a ledge over the entrance sometime in the 19th century has remained there ever since because of a dispute over who has the authority to take it down.

Does anyone know who put up the awning and why?
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UPDATE: I think I found a lead. See Sept. 10 post.
UPDATE 2: Someone here told me the roof-thing is not quite over the Holy Sepulchre, which makes sense, considering the strength of the status quo.
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BEST UPDATE!: The answer to the mystery is from Tom Powers!
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Sure is crowded downtown

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This week, after 150 years as Jerusalem's main artery, Jaffa Street is now closed to traffic.
Between Tsahal Square and Machaneh Yehuda market the street will be a pedestrian mall, open only to people and the new light rail.
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Enlarge this photo for a rear view (and a smile).

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Trial runs of the trams are supposed to start this week in this section, so workmen were busy trying to finish the job.

These three were caulking the roof of the Machaneh Yehuda station.

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Across the street, this technician or engineer (judging from his nice clean jeans) was fiddling with the more high tech stuff inside.

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A hundred men were hired to stand on Jaffa Street and explain to confused shoppers where to find their bus.

They also tried to speed up the bus traffic by helping the old folks with their many bags full of fruit and vegetables onto the buses, even through the rear door.

Some handed out pamphlets explaining the new light rail and how great it will be.

This help (from a private firm) will cost 100,000 shekels per day for the 100 "traffic assistants" and for the materials to explain the changes.
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The trams were supposed to be in service starting in April, but now they are saying more like August.

Some 2,000 buses go through downtown Jerusalem along parallel Nevi'im, Agrippas, and Jaffa Streets every day. Now, with Jaffa St. closed down, the congestion is even worse.

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More about the situation in the Jerusalem Post.
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But still, it is exciting to see our Jerusalem lion on the shiny new trams!

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That's the current situation for That's My World Tuesday.

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Sacristan duties on a ladder

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A brave Benedictine nun positioned a ladder on the stairs leading down to the crypt and climbed up to extinguish the candle at one of the stations of the cross.
This was after the Epiphany Mass last Thursday.
I think you have to be surefooted as a mountain goat to take care of the tall 12th C. Crusader church.
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The church and the Abbey of St. Mary of the Resurrection are behind the tall trees.
I imagine the nuns and monks hear quite well the muezzin's call to prayer five times a day, as the minaret is just to the left of their compound.
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Abu Ghosh is a Muslim Israeli Arab town west of Jerusalem.
Its restaurants are always full of Israeli Jews who appreciate their Middle Eastern food.
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Leaning on ladders

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Do you like ladders?
Come have a laugh with these pictures in honor of ABC Wednesday L-Day.
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Living in the Hills, we like our ladders long.
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Part I: LADIES ON LADDERS
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A brave friend on chapel-cleaning day.

A brave Russian Orthodox picking olives at Gorni Convent.

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Our Tiberias excavation director about to photograph our square.

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Hard-hatted me about to descend into a Canaanite shaft tomb in Jerusalem.

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Part II: BOYS AND THEIR LADDERS

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Before sun-up, the dig photographer at work at Tel Yarmouth.

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The neighbor boy building a new roof.

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"Plastering" over the straw bales in the neighbors' new straw bale house.

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Part III: LEFT LADDERS

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Under the window in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the famous ladder that none of the churchmen dares to move since the 19th century because of the Status Quo.
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Night falls and the tired olive pickers leave their ladders.

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Leaving little room between ladder and ceiling.

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Silence and solitude, even for ladders!

View from the cemetery of the Sisters of Zion in Ein Kerem.

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And to see the angels on the ladder of Jacob, please go back to an ABC post of two years ago.

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Ladder of the Lord

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Almost a hundred bloggers contribute surprising posts to ABC Wednesday every week.
Our letter today is L.

The L word that came to my mind is LADDER.
This fantastically long ladder is in the Jenolan Caves of Australia.

But the ladder I love most is Jacob's ladder.

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Genesis 28 tells the story, so full of promise:

Jacob left Beersheva and went toward Haran. He came to the place and stayed there that night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place to sleep.

And he dreamed that there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven; and behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it!

And behold, the Lord stood above it [or "beside him"] and said, "I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your descendants; and your descendants shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and by you and your descendants shall all the families of the earth bless themselves.

Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done that of which I have spoken to you."

Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, "Surely the Lord is in this place; and I did not know it." טז וַיִּיקַץ יַעֲקֹב, מִשְּׁנָתוֹ, וַיֹּאמֶר, אָכֵן יֵשׁ יְהוָה בַּמָּקוֹם הַזֶּה; וְאָנֹכִי, לֹא יָדָעְתִּי.

And he was afraid, and said, "This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." וַיִּירָא, וַיֹּאמַר, מַה-נּוֹרָא, הַמָּקוֹם הַזֶּה: אֵין זֶה, כִּי אִם-בֵּית אֱלֹהִים, וְזֶה, שַׁעַר הַשָּׁמָיִם

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