My commute to "work" and slichot

While it is very challenging, it is hard to call ulpan "work", yet that is my full time job at this time. I am in class from 8:30 to 1-ish, and it is true that one should really budget 1 hour for every hour in class....

So about my commute. I, like many others that live here, travel to Jerusalem essentially every day. The route we take is around the arab neighborhoods of the city, through a tunnel, and one pops out not far from the Hebrew University. For those that are in the know, from Mt. Scopus, one has an incredible view of Har HaBayit, a.k.a. the Temple Mount (hence the name "Scopus", I believe).

Every day on the bus, in both directions, I get to gaze at the area of what once was, and what will be, the Temple (with a huge capital "T"). Only one problem - it is not there. Nope. Big Problem.

You see, the space where the Temple was and will be is currently Occupied by the Dome of the Rock.

Suffice it to say, I have very conflicting emotions on my daily commute, looking out my bus window. On the one hand, I get to look at, in the physical sense, is the Capitol of Judaism. No "3rd" or 17th" or "35th" holiest site we are talk about - this is IT. Numero uno, the first, the last, G-d's physical, huge "kaveyachol"/as it were, home amongst humanity.

But...........there is something so painful about looking at it. To me, the sense of unfinished business it overwhelming. One of greatest and most comforting things about our Torah is that not only do we know how it all begain, "B'reishit" as it were - but we also know how it all ends. The only mystery (and it is a big one) is how we will get there. What the exact process will be.

So I gaze at Har HaBayit and get smacked in the face by the knowledge that as happy and tranquil as things "seem to be", what we are living, the every day experience that we call "normal life", is simply a blip on the screen towards something much different. I am concerned by the thought of what events may transpire between our status quo and the end game. We are always afraid more of the "unknown" danger (the mystery of the process) than we are by the familiar danger of what we live every day. Just plain old human nature to feel this way.

............so we now have slichot, the period of introspection leading up to our yomim noraim, "terrible days" as it would be incorrectly translated. How does this connect to my daily commute?

The freedom, if not the obligation, to "do tshuva", to better oneself, is there for the taking every day of our lives. These days, we have an extra special opportunity to look at ourselves in the mirror and try to make those adjustments, realignments, that are required. This model works very well - for individuals. But what of "tshuva" for a People? A Nation even?

I am reminded that (I think) it was a piece from Rabbi Tzvi Hirsch Weinreb that worked on this thought - slichot, tshuva, realignment, is of course an individual "thing" - but that is not to the exclusion of the tshuva that is required for People. As above, we know where we are going - just not sure how we will get there. I think that I know (not by any means do I take credit for doing this correctly as a person, it should be noted) what an individual is to do. But how will we, as a People, every one of us as a collective, upright ourselves?

Someday, I know the commute will be a very different experience. Just wish I knew what it will take, from myself and family, and perhaps more perplexing, from all of us.