We are living in passionate and confusing times. On the one hand, everything that we once held to be constant and true seems to be shaken to its core. Ideals and vision seem to have been replaced by many in this world with the passions of the "now" and the tangible. Yet, even in the midst of this morass

An old man came over to me, took my hand and poured three gold shavings into my palm.

of self-serving focus, one can sense the current and flow of something fresh and quickening.


There is a very deep sense that the final text of the bible of human history is being inscribed and written in our very days. The Divine text that began with the words B'reisheet ("In the beginning") seems to be careening in a hurried pace to some new climax and drama. The Heavenly scroll seems to have been opened and the quill is in Hand and we have all been given the opportunity, the choice and the right to be the very words and ink used to write these dramatic climactic chapters. At times, this text is being written in dramatic flourishes of passion and glory, and at times, the subtle and simple story carries the flow of history to its end.


Our shop in the Old City of Jerusalem has become a venue for daily discussions with groups of all faiths and political views. It was in the midst of one of these discussions that another small piece of the puzzle fell into place. I was giving a lecture through an interpreter to a group of people from Papua New Guinea. Papua New Guinea occupies the eastern half of the rugged tropical island of New Guinea, as well as numerous smaller islands and atolls in the Pacific. The country is so very far from Israel and, one would assume, spiritually very far from Jerusalem. Yet, the opposite seems to be the case.


At the end of the discussion, an old man came over to me, took my hand and turned it over. He then unscrewed a small jar and poured three gold shavings into my palm.
Through his interpreter, he explained that he works in a gold mine in his land and that he had asked permission to bring these gold shavings to Israel. He wanted to fulfill the verse in Isaiah that says, "Then thou shalt see and be radiant, and thy heart shall throb and be enlarged; because the abundance of the sea shall be turned unto thee, the wealth of the nations shall come unto thee...." (Isaiah 60:5-6)


I was much moved and told the group that I would take his gift to the Temple Institute, to people who were busy preparing the possible implements of the Third Temple.


At that moment, three women jumped up. On of them took off a thin gold necklace, another, her earrings, and the third, a gold broach in the shape of the national bird of her country, and placed the jewelry in my hands. They, too, wanted to be a fulfillment of words spoken over three thousand years ago. The next morning, I dutifully brought the precious gifts into the institute in the Old City of Jerusalem - and another page was written in the Divine narrative.


The Jewish people have been watching - with a wariness born out of years of persecution - the beginning of a delicate relationship developing between themselves and segments of the nations of the world. This new relationship is fragile and d

The story is also being propelled forward by the small acts of individual people.

elicate, and it must overcome and heal thousands of years of pain and suspicion. Yet, like a tender shoot, it is beginning to flower and take root as history continues to unfold.


In general, the Jewish people seem to have been destined to be the measuring stick and compass of this flow of human history, and have been a witness and a participant in all the turmoil and dramas that have swept over mankind.
The Biblical text spoke of the long and painful voyage through exile. The actual unfolding of that voyage has created countless physical and spiritual casualties. Yet, this people has come through the "valley of the shadow of death" and has been re-birthed into a land that had been lying desolate and waiting for them for thousands of years. They have witnessed their eternal city, which had been divided and conquered over countless generations, become "a city united together" (Psalms 122) in the midst of the miraculous six days of the 1967 war. These are all parts of the bigger picture, but the components of the little picture remain critical to the process. The story is also being propelled forward by the small acts of individual people.


These small acts include a simple gift being brought to Jerusalem by an elderly man from a small mining village in Papua New Guinea.