For the first time in ancient history, the Jewish people split into different areas of existence in Babylon and the Land of Israel. This fragmentation raises deep questions of identity as a central group of the people detaches from its land. For how long and to what extent did Babylonian Jews continue to feelRelated to Eretz Yisrael as the "property of their ancestors"? Did the removal of Judaism from the land and establishment of a religion without sovereignty fundamentally change their definition, even in their own eyes?
Shibat Zion sets out on a journey following the Jews who left their home in Jerusalem before the destruction of the First Temple, through the prophecies of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, and looks at the exile through the eyes of the psalmists and prophets of the time. He follows the ascent of Zerubbabel and the captives of Zion to the land together with Haggai and Zechariah, dives into the complexities of assimilation into Babylon in the Book of Esther, accompanies the ascent of Ezra and his challenges and reaches the days of Nehemiah during the reign of King Artaxerxes.
In these hundred and fifty years the story of a nation between two centers took shape for the first time. These were years of upheaval, of searching for a way, of longing, of integrating into the new spaces of life, of an invitation to row back, of imaginings of a home waiting for its children and of a reality that suppresses these imaginings.
True to his method, Rabbi Binyamin Lau seeks to bring the stories of the past closer to our story, and thus as it becomes clearer, the picture of the journey of the ancient return to Zion raises questions that remain open regarding the next stations in the course of the people establishing themselves in their land in our generation.
