Chapter Sixteen: Memories From Generations

I have had numerous chances to visit Israel throughout my lifetime. For one reason or another, I changed plans at the last minute and never made the voyage, not because Israel was unattractive but because other aspects of my life were beckoning me. In my twenties, for example, I was more interested in graduating college and getting my career underway than traveling around the world. The travel bug did hit me later and I have been all over the states as a public speaker/debater, but Israel remained a distant goal.

I always believed I would enjoy a trip to the Holy Land and of course I knew it would fascinate me. I have been studying Israel and teaching about Israel and writing about Israel for the longest time now (since the year 1973). But even as the thought of such a visit seemed intriguing, I was never in a hurry. Anti-Semitism is at an all time high around the world today. Even within America (Israel’s greatest ally) there are many die-hard, honest to goodness Nazi like anti-Semites. Many of them teach on our college campuses and with each springtime graduation, new crops of brainwashed disciples spread seed that will inevitably lead to a ripe,ugly harvest. No Jew, (even one who has converted to Christianity) can fail to notice such a trend. Therefore, it had occurred to me that one day I might just have to pack up and move to Israel whether I liked it or not. For quite a while, I have known that there may indeed be a new kind of holocaust on the horizon, making Israel the only safe place for a Jew. In the wake of such a tsunami that would inevitably spit me on the shores of Israel, I thought to myself, “You’ll get there someday. Meanwhile, just continue to enjoy being an American. Why the hurry?”

As it turns out, there was another kind of hurry, a more personal hurry. It came from my aging mother who now lives in Israel. Sometimes God’s individual plan for our lives is uncertain. On other occasions it slaps us up and down the side of the face. I did not need prophet, prayer or meditation to understand that if my mother lived in Israel, I too must start visiting Israel or I would never see my mother again. Does God want one to spend time with his mother? It’s a no brainier.

When people tried to warn me not to go, fearful, because of events that drive the news (Iran’s nuclear program, Hamas’ addictive habit of firing missiles into Israel every day from Gaza) I still knew that I needed to go. There were times when such a trip would have been safer but that is an irrelevant fact. The time to visit Israel is the time when God tells me. This same God who called me was going to take care of me. I never doubted it for a second and never believed I would fall into any harm.

What awaited me was unimaginable. As I have tried to describe with previous diary entries, there is now a connection between myself and the land that words can never fully explain. I have taken many journeys these last twenty years. I have seen the most beautiful places; including the home I loved flying back to, San Diego. Still, there is a tie to the land of the patriarchs that jumps light-years beyond my academic/spiritual interest in the Bible. It surpasses the obvious explanations, flirting with the metaphysical, the romantic, and other loaded words, which are still (at the end of the day) only words. They can never fully illustrate the feeling.

Who can interpret an emotional connection to the ancient? Only a fool would try…. which is why I will now try and I’ll do so, by detouring for a moment, with a story:

Masada was the name of a mountaintop fortress, constructed shortly before the time of Christ by King Herod the Great. Herod was an unpopular king, a puppet ruler, placed in power by Israel’s “peaceful” occupiers, the Romans. It occurred to Herod that a getaway sanctuary might just come in handy, should the populace ever revolt against him. As it happened, Herod died long before Masada’s walls were desperately needed for a different crisis. A Jewish uprising, dedicated to throwing the Romans out of Israel, resulted in a fatal war against Israel. A heroic last stand at Masada kept the Romans at bay for quite some time. But eventually, they built the kind of ramparts that enabled them to scale the mountain and make an example of any who would dare defy the masters of the world.

When the Romans finally broke through, not one Jewish soldier was found alive. These heroic rebels (along with their families) had chosen suicide. I believe that as a general rule, God wants us to hold on to life, even in the face of torture, slavery or death at the hands of an enemy, all of which awaited the ancient Jewish warriors if they were captured by Rome. But some of these men who might have continued fighting to the death were concerned about their wives and daughters being raped or their sons and babies being enslaved. They chose an honorable death rather than anti-life.

“God give me the grace to make the right decisions when confronted by horrible alternatives. I do not know if these people did the right thing or not. But I do not judge them. How can one imagine the painful, melancholy emotions that possess a man while watching the Romans approach from below?”

I took a tour of Masada. Its remains are vast and match well with the description of the ancient Jewish historian, Josephus. I made a new friend that day, an American who now lives in Israel. He was with me at the ruins of Masada but I am not going to mention his name. I actually don’t think he would mind, but he shared an unusual, personal story as we stood between past and present and it should be up to him if he wants his name on my blog.

At first, he talked about Masada as one who knew a lot about ancient history. Actually, he does know a good deal of history. He could spar with any scholar and give them a run for their money. But as our conversation unfolded, I realized he was talking about Masada as if he had truly been there in the past as an actual soldier in the first century battle!

“The Romans didn’t find everyone inside a high fort,” he said to me. ” Some of them jumped. I know, because I was there and I jumped. I’m not happy with that past life and in this life I am still dealing with it.”

Before I continue, I should say that I have a great respect for this fellow. Although he was describing the supernatural notion of reincarnation, the guy was no nutcase. He was knowledgeable, brilliant, educated and even street smart. He’s a courageous man with a multiplicity of skills. His profession is one of the most respected and difficult in the world, a medical doctor. What I’m saying is that this was nothing like Shirley McClain on the David Letterman show talking about her previous lives. The sojourner I got acquainted with that day was not prone to delusion, or wishful thinking. Neither was he a liar. That he conveyed a genuine intuition/experience was abundantly clear to me.

Not wanting to be rude or start an argument, and knowing how sincere he was, I asked questions about the experience but offered no commentary. I sensed what he seemed to be sensing as well, that we would indeed discuss it and bounce it around someday but this was not the day. Unfortunately, (in the silence of my thoughts) I was forced to reject his conclusions of the experience because the Bible tells us that people live only as one person. After death, we are resurrected, judged and placed into the afterlife, either with God in heaven, or without God in hell, but in either case, we are the same being with the same name.

“Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.” (Daniel 12:2)

Ancient rabbis understood this to mean a continuation in heaven or hell, not a recycled soul in a newborn baby that lives one life after another. The New Testament (which I also accept even though my friend would not) is much more specific than Daniel and COMPLETELY rules out reincarnation:

“Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment,”

(Hebrews 9:27)

I cannot and will not change the theology of the Bible because of experience, whether the experience is mine or someone else’s. And yet, although I have talked with many who accept reincarnation, it was different this time. I wondered if I was hearing an accurate testimony, mistakenly viewed as reincarnation.

This brings me back to my own feelings of familiarity with a land I had never visited before. No, I had not been there in the past, but my ancestors had. The Bible talks about generational curses and generational blessings. In another article I’ll discuss curses in more detail but for now, just know that they involve evil, spiritual beings called demons, described in ancient Hebrew literature as intelligent entities obsessed with humans, intertwining with their very thoughts and minds so as to maintain a hold on the body itself. Possibly such symbiotic beings can impart the thoughts of previous “hosts” to their descendants. I do not pass any kind of judgment here. We all wrestle with demons, every one of us, whether we believe in them or not.

But I mention this only to be comprehensive. I don’t wish to get bogged down here. The good news is that curses can be broken, and the pain of our ancestors need not be ours. Demons can be exposed, cast out and sent away. Even better news: Just as there are generational curses, there are generational blessings: My Jewish heritage may be a history of battle and trials, but it is also a history of miraculous protection and redemption. Abraham was blessed. God promised that through him, his descendants would also be blessed. God even took it to another level with a guarantee that through Abraham’s children, all the people of the world would be offered a road to God. Maybe my newfound friend was describing something that he sincerely interpreted as reincarnation. Maybe instead, it was an experience similar (but more detailed) to what I myself felt in Israel, a connection with my forefathers, for better or for worse.

I’m not claiming to have figured anything out here. I’m merely pondering a mystery. Someday, when we meet God in heaven, the full truth will be more wonderful than we could have possibly imagined.

In the meantime, it is life changing to explore the fantastic and incomprehensible. Who knows? We understand so little about the soul and its integration with the physical brain. For that matter, we understand so little about the brain itself. Who’s to say that a memory or two, from some relative in generations gone by, might not find its way into our mind? This could be part of the generational blessing. That does not make me more than one person. It makes me a person who is not alone in this world. We are connected. We are important. We are the result of the breath of God, a breath across time, a breath shared by family and community.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE

New International Version NIV

Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House.