Understanding more (and less)

MAY 19—One of my primary goals for this trip is to cultivate a better understanding of the social, cultural and political circumstances of the Middle East. That certainly is happening. But the key word is “better.” Real understanding requires a lot more than a trip can provide; a lot more than a whole lifetime, for that matter.

Certain phrases are often repeated because they express a particular truth. Some of these overused statements are forever arising in my mind these days. “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing,” for example. Or, “the more you know, the more you realize that you don’t yet know.” True, so true, so frustratingly true.

I’ve heard a few new ones that also describe the Holy Lands today. Today I was told, “If you’re not confused, you don’t understand the situation.” Our guide then shared another: “Stay a week, write a book. Stay a month, write an article. Stay a year, write nothing.”

Well, I’m in the area for a little less than three weeks and halfway through my visit I’ve already produced an avalanche of words. What’s written on this blog is accurate as far as it goes. But it does a very poor job of communicating the stupendous complexity that various races, religions, branches of religions, historical understandings, landscapes, nationalisms, ethnicities and a host of other factors contribute to life in and around Jerusalem.

And I haven’t even begun to talk about politics. I won’t start that conversation in this place just yet, but the political situation here is beyond understanding.

So, what are we coming to understand? We understand better than we did the grip that this land has on the people who inhabit it or simply use it. It’s somehow special. We have a better idea of how power is used by those who currently wield it. This happens at the micro-level in the conduct of priests at shrines and churches; at the large-scale level in the way the West Bank is being settled.

We have more knowledge than we used to about certain Bible characters and the land they lived on. Today we saw the village of Tekoa, once home to a shepherd named Amos, a prophet, whose oracles we read in the Old Testament. Today there is an Arab village of Tekoa, and nearby some new Jewish settlements that bear the same name.

At Shepherds’ Field in Beit Sahour (just west of Bethlehem) I gained a richer understanding of the social status of those who announced the birth of Jesus (despised, impure, illiterate). And it helped to see the lay of the land, to learn how they kept sheep in caves and to survey the hill they had to climb in order to see the baby born in Bethlehem. They’re steep.

Yes, our understanding is improving in myriad miniscule ways like this. But I’m fairly convinced there are no real experts on the Middle East. These lands have baffled the best of minds since the very foundation of the world.