JERUSALEM must be one of the most written-about cities in non-fiction. I expect that Rome takes the top prize for that. Numerous new books about Jerusalem are published every year. Most of them are stocked by Mahmoud, my local bookseller in Salah al-Din Street, in east Jerusalem. My question is always, what will this book about the Holy City add to the sum of knowledge or wisdom already available to us. Sadly, in relation to this book, I do not think that it adds much knowledge or wisdom.
Tim Dowley is a veteran author of books on a variety of Christian topics, a number of which will be on the bookshelves of clergy and religious educators. His new book is in a different genre and style from those previously written. It is a pot-pourri of Jerusalem miscellanea. Nine short chapters look at Jerusalem from a variety of perspectives: historical, religious, and archaeological. He incorporates Christian, Jewish, and Muslim viewpoints. The problem with this approach is that there is some repetition. For example, in several different chapters we are told that the Western Wall used to be called the “Wailing Wall”, as if the reader had not previously been informed of this. I also question whether there is value in dedicating an entire chapter to “Jerusalem Syndrome”, the medical condition that afflicts a small number of pilgrims or visitors with a type of religious mania.
Despite these reservations, there is some useful information that would not appear in tour guides and that the Jerusalem visitor would benefit from without time to read a more substantial book. The chapter “A (Very) Short History” manages to pack a great deal into a small space, and I could imagine commending this to our pilgrims. They would certainly gain some valuable information that would help them. It comes, however, with a warning: Dowley’s history inexplicably ends in 1967, and he makes the indefensible claim that “Israel united east and west Jerusalem” without conditioning this with the information that it was an illegal annexation and that, for the majority of Palestinian residents of the city, it remains divided.
This book serves as an object warning to readers that it is almost impossible to approach the past and present of the most contested city on earth without paying very close attention to the ways in which it is contested in the present and not only in the past. Despite this, Dowley shares some little gems with us, which may entice those who have never visited and send the better informed scurrying to discover more about a subject to which the author draws their attention.
The Very Revd Canon Richard Sewell is the Dean of St George’s College, Jerusalem.
I’m Talking About Jerusalem: Aspects of the Holy City
Tim Dowley
Cascade £18
(978-1-6667-6539-7)
Church Times Bookshop £16.20
