The Old City of Jerusalem has
proved to be the stumbling block for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
However, original discoveries of the Academy of Jerusalem over the last few
years can now delineate a new vision, re-cognizing the whole Old City of
Jerusalem as “the City of God” and as a multiple temple for peace and
interfaith reconciliation. These discoveries could have important repercussions
for peace making.
Proposed here are: (1) To
translate the vision into a viable Middle-East peace-making initiative and an
interfaith reconciliation project, supported by (2) building two virtual
models: (a) of the Old City of Jerusalem and (b) of the Heavenly/New Jerusalem,
which will function together as a virtual temple of Reconciliation, and allow
worldwide participation – "cyber pilgrimage" – and community building
via the Internet.
These means would serve to
form an international and interfaith constituency of the Lovers of Jerusalem,
ready to volunteer for the welfare of Jerusalem. Success in building this
constituency will indicate the feasibility of lifting the Old City of Jerusalem
out of the entanglement of Middle-East conflict, and passing custodianship over
the Old City to an appropriate interfaith constituency.
Building this model will
follow the dictum of Psalm 122:2 "Jerusalem built as a city that was
joined together" - understood by the commentators to mean the union of
both the Heavenly and Earthly Jerusalem. The design will thus amalgamate both the
ideal diagrams of the New Jerusalem and the prophesied Third Temple together
with photos and pictures of the actual Old City of Jerusalem as it is.
To begin with, two Old
City key foci will be reproduced in cyberspace (see below). Eventually the
entire Old City of Jerusalem would be accessible as a universal Temple of peace
and reconciliation. This virtual facility will train and instruct members in
building a Culture of Conversation and Peace in Jerusalem, extending worldwide.
(See example of conducting the operation via an Internet game in Appendix H).
Joined with this, an extensive
virtual model of the Heavenly Jerusalem, linking the relevant revelations of
all the world's religions, will serve as a means for "soul-travel"
and "heavenly ascents" for inter-personal, interfaith and divine
communion.
Go to Summary of the Proposed Pilot
Project
Go to Index
of The Project Proposal, including 12 Appendices
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