Watch 3,000 Jews and Muslims sing together, just five years ago—the music, and their spirit, reassuring us that we (who want to live in peace) SHALL overcome
An antidote to the despair induced by the combined ferocity of Zionism ("Christian," "Jewish") and Judaeophobia
At this nightmarish moment of pandemic hate, we badly need to be reminded of the possibility that we can come together, and thereby defeat the forces dedicated to dividing us, by keeping both sides in a genocidal rage—which, if it doesn’t kill you outright, will only make you that much easier to kill, through other means.
To put it differently, we can and must resist the atavistic call to join the sort of “holy war” that drenched the Middle East, and so much of Europe, and Byzantium, in blood throughout the centuries of the Crusades, with oceans more spilled during the Reformation, then the Counter-Reformation. We need, in short, to rediscover the great prior time of Convivencia, in Spain, when Muslims, Jews and Christians lived in harmony, and flourished culturally, for some three centuries of the (so-called) “Dark Ages.”
The glory of that possibility resounds from this exhilarating mass performance of “One Day,” sung in English, Arabic and Hebrew, in Haifa, just five years ago.
Please watch and listen, and then share it if you like, because its spirit is enough to help us overcome the hate that has now been so deftly engineered to have at us at each other’s throats, so that we fail to see what’s coming down on all of us, and has been for some four years.
From M. Hall:
"Matthew Paul Miller - known by his Hebrew name Matisyahu is a Jewish reggae singer.
In 2018 he asked 3,000 Muslims and Jews in Haifa (none of whom had ever met before) to come together and learn the song "One Day" with him in less than an hour. Not only that, they also learned to sing and harmonize the song in three different languages. The concert that resulted from this brings the spirit of the new era into the world.
There is an incomprehensible power inherent in the spirit of UNITY, LOVE and CONNECTION.
Carrying this power TOGETHER into the world is the new WE ❤️ "
On the possibility of Convivencia—a possibility that was once realized in the “Dark Ages,” which evidently were less “dark” than the later centuries of Christian (or “Christian”) primacy.
For those who want to dig more deeply into it, I strongly recommend Constantine’s Sword: The Church and the Jews, by James Carroll:
all the israeli musicians i know love arabic music
all the arab musicians i know play with jews
left to our own devices, there would be arguments over arrangements for sure, and band breakups no doubt, but probably no wars
just as several other people in other substacks assured us - it is NOT the people. They live together, work together and get along just fine. One wrote how his taxi driver pointed a t the 3 language street names. It is the govt and some sickeningly rich people that provoke and set the people up against each other. I remember reading from former Yugoslavia how all had intermarried - then all of asudden, brothers are killing brothers-in-law, sisters, children.... I also read Novak Djokovic's book. He does not spill a word about not getting along with neighbors - no, governments (nato) decided to bomb... the man in the street is the one who suffers, while these 'behind the scenes' eat lobster and drink champagne. Let them fight it out that want war, in a desert somewhere, and leave the people alone!