Some of you may have read my entry about the Jewish "ghetto" (that's the actual word, it originated there, I'm not being crude) in Venice. There were Jewish quarters like this all over Europe. The Jews were segregated, lived by curfews and many other laws. One of the Jewish quarters was in Prague, where I recently visited with Brian and my mom. We saw some of the synagogues, the Jewish museum, and learned a lot about their history. The old Jewish cemetery was something that I was not quite expecting. Most modern cemeteries bury the dead in neat rows, sometimes stacked a few deep, but this was unlike anything I had seen before. The Jews were only allowed so much land in their quarter for the Jewish Burial Society to, well, bury the deceased. This meant that people were stacked, tombstomes were crowded and it's more like a hill. I know that the people who died and were buried are no longer in this place, but for some reason the cemetery saddened me. Perhaps it was because you could almost get a glimpse of some of the suffering by looking at the physical reminders (headstones) of the lives that were there. Let history be a reminder of how we are to treat others: with love and kindness, mercy and graciousness.
Some of you may have read my entry about the Jewish "ghetto" (that's the actual word, it originated there, I'm not being crude) in Venice. There were Jewish quarters like this all over Europe. The Jews were segregated, lived by curfews and many other laws. One of the Jewish quarters was in Prague, where I recently visited with Brian and my mom. We saw some of the synagogues, the Jewish museum, and learned a lot about their history. The old Jewish cemetery was something that I was not quite expecting. Most modern cemeteries bury the dead in neat rows, sometimes stacked a few deep, but this was unlike anything I had seen before. The Jews were only allowed so much land in their quarter for the Jewish Burial Society to, well, bury the deceased. This meant that people were stacked, tombstomes were crowded and it's more like a hill. I know that the people who died and were buried are no longer in this place, but for some reason the cemetery saddened me. Perhaps it was because you could almost get a glimpse of some of the suffering by looking at the physical reminders (headstones) of the lives that were there. Let history be a reminder of how we are to treat others: with love and kindness, mercy and graciousness.
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