Sarajevo, Bosnia

  I recently had the chance to be in Sarajevo, Bosnia for about 3 days. A friend invited me along on a trip he was taking, and I was free to go. I read some of the history of the 1990s' war to learn some; we talked to several people from a variety of backgrounds, and went to museums and memorials. It's a lovely city, but it has a remembered history that will make your soul sad, though it will also leave space for hope. The Ottoman welcoming of the exiled Jews who had to flee Spain after 1492, the spot where the Archduke Ferdinand was shot which precipitated World War I, Serbian (and others') nationalism, the Balkan holocaust in the 1940s (and a wall detailing 'the righteous among the nations'), the Non-Aligned Movement (as part of Yugoslavia) trying not avoid the worst of the Cold War, and the massacres of the war during the 1990s.  

 There was a lot to see and experience, but I haven't had time to write about it in detail, so I think I'll just leave these pictures and comments here. I really enjoyed my visit, but I don't remember ever visiting another place that left me with such a heavy sense of humanity even among the good and lovely. Much of it seemed relevant to today's troubles of exiles, alliances, and ignoring violence and the oppressed. The stories of hope and resilience and courage and grace were also there then as they are also happening now. Horror and Hope.

 

Sarajevo

 

Cylinders inscribed with the names of the children killed during the war from 1992-1995.

 

The Latin Bridge

 

The streets of Sarajevo and the surrounding hills

 

The lower pistol is the one that killed Archduke Ferdiand and his wife Sophie. It was the second attempted assassination of him during that parade! 

 

A covered bazaar, from the Ottoman period

 

items in the Jewish museum, notice the candelabra on the far right

 

A sign in the Jewish museum

 

ceremonial circumcision  stuff

 

The Sarajevo Haggadah from the 14th century (replica)  

Passover materials

 

A very large old synagogue

a snowy street, the last day I was there

"The diplomats were useful because they realized that domestic politics was only one of the busted pistons of American policy. "It's not just the elections," Kenney explained over dinner. "If the situation was reversed in Bosnia, and a fanatical Muslim regime in Belgrade was slaughtering thousands of innocent Christians in Sarajevo, then America would have reacted by now. We would not watch Christians get killed by Muslims in Europe. Period. But we can watch Muslims get killed by Christians." The problem for Bosnia was larger than the fact that George Bush was getting clobbered by Bill Clinton in the polls. Bosnia was Islam." 

(Maas, Love Thy Neighbor: A Story of War, pg 66, emphasis mine) 

 

[Unfortunately for all his sympathy with the Muslims here in the book, the author, a few pages later, seems rather inconsistent when he explains how these Muslims are not like those Muslims. Their humanity itself didn't seem to be enough, which was saddening in an otherwise helpful book.]

Rutledge's "The Crucifixion" - quotations

  I've been reading Fleming Rutledge's The Crucifixion for a while now, and I continue to benefit. Her earlier section on the irreligious and godless nature of the crucifixion as seen in its original cultural context was really helpful. Following that, her insights on forgiveness and the fact that real forgiveness cannot be easy or automatic is really valuable. Now, her discussion on Anselm has been insightful. I hadn't realized how controversial Anselm is though it makes sense as I read about it. She shows how in many ways Anselm is not understood well across the centuries, for reasons both understandable and not. So I'm including a series of quotations below. They are in three groupings, on three tracks. Each a peak into her thought. I highly recommend the book!

"'Honor' in Anselm's thought stands not for some imagined hypersensitivity by the Creator to his own dignity, but is a metaphor for the deep logic of reality, in which the balance of a universe is disrupted by the fact of death and by human alienation from others and from God, a situation which could only be rectifies by divine action."  ~ Eamon Duffy, as cited in Rutledge

~~~~~

In an important sense, the Bible is art rather than science or philosophy, and theology is a sort of art too, since it is largely based upon the narrative form of the Scriptures. (pp. 146-147).  

~~~~~

The wrath of God falls upon God himself, by God’s own choice, out of God’s own love. The “justice connection” may not be clear to those who are accustomed to privilege, but to oppressed and suffering Christians in the troubled places of the earth, there is no need to spell it out. God in Christ on the cross has become one with those who are despised and outcast in the world. (p. 143).

God’s righteousness leads him to all lengths to oppose what will destroy what he loves, and that means declaring enmity against everything that resists his redemptive purpose. This is the aggressive principle in God’s justice.  (p. 136).

The pervasive and monstrous nature of injustice around the world forces us to acknowledge that forgiveness alone does not give a true picture of God’s purpose. (p. 142).

If, when we see an injustice, our blood does not boil at some point, we have not yet understood the depths of God. It depends, though, on what outrages us. To be outraged on behalf of oneself or one’s own group alone is to be human, but it is not to participate in Christ. To be outraged and to take action on behalf of the voiceless and oppressed, however, is to do the work of God. (p. 143).

  From the standpoint of the gospel, however, every single one of us, rich or poor, is a complex mixture; we are all capable of injustice and we are all living on the edge of neediness at any time. (p. 150).

It is in the very nature of God, “the Holy One in your midst,” to step down from the bench and pour himself out in unquenchable compassion. (p. 136).