Day with the Druze

Thursday July 25^th 

We woke up bright and early, cleaned out the apartment and got on the bus to head up North. Everyone was really excited for the trip but especially for Day 1 because it involved a Druze visit and authentic lunch and a couple of hours in Tzfat. Our bus ride to Beit Jann was 3 hours long and when we got there we were welcomed by our hosts for the day, an NGO called Horizons for the Future. The organization works to modernize Druze society by establishing youth leaders committed to equality and community involvement. As part of the organization they also learn English so it was really easy to communicate with the kids in the program who spent the day with us. It was nice to get to not only learn about the NGO and the village but having the added benefit of meeting and getting to know the kids involved made the experience 100 times better. It was also really cute because since they found out about our visit a couple of months ago the schedule for our trip has been on the wall and they had been anxiously waiting to show us around. 

We started our visit with a brief presentation about Druze culture and life. The first thing we were told is that Druze are loyal to their country. So if you live in Israel you support Israel and if you live in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Australia, West Africa, or the Americas you support your respective country. I wasn't expecting that to be the case. I was expecting to learn that Druze support other Druze over people of a different culture. In all these areas there are only 1.5 million Druze though so in a way I understand that it is easier to support a larger country than group of people. Because of this there is also a clear divide between religion and politics in Druze culture. There are 7 moral principles of the Druze religion: 

1. Truthfulness

2. Fellowship

3. Abandoning False Beliefs

4. Avoidance of Confusion

5. Acceptance of the Divinity of all G-ds acts

6. Submission in accordance to G-ds will

7. Acceptance of Divine Unity in Humanity

However, despite the principles and religious aspects we learned that only 10% of the Druze population actually practices the religion and is allowed access to holy books and knowledge. Everyone who is secular is called Juhhal or ignorant and has no access to the religion. This kind of begs the question of well then how can you consider yourself Druze? Druze is supposed to be a religion isn't it? But, then again Judaism is also supposed to be a religion but often it is unclear as to whether or not it is a religion or ethnicity so I guess the Druze community is in a similar situation. Unlike Judaism though the Druze will not let anyone enter their religion. You cannot decide you want to be Druze and convert, you can only exit the religion. According to Druze theory in the 1100s everyone in the world was given the chance to become a Druze and since then no one has been allowed to enter the religion. If you are a Druze male you are reincarnated into another Druze male and if you are female and female. To emphasize this concept one of our guides told us a story about a man who was dying and a women who was about to give birth in two nearby communities. The woman had been told she was having a girl and thus was expecting to have one. But that didn't happen. As she was in labor the old man in the nearby village was dying and his family was sad and worried and such. But he assured them that he would be okay. You see the Druze people believe the body is just a physical vehicle, what really counts is the soul and that is what is transferred during reincarnation. Right as he was fading out he told his family not to worry because he was being reborn to a good family with a loving mother and father in the next town over. When the mom gave birth she in fact had a son rather than a daughter and the baby wouldn't stop crying. Something was wrong, the soul was having separation anxiety from its previous family. About a week after the baby was born the two families got in contact with each other and the baby stopped crying because he knew his family was okay with his death. That boy is now 14 years old and the two families get together every once in a while so that both families can be involved in the life of their loved one. I am not sure as to whether or not I actually belief this because it seems really out there from my perspective but you never know, anything is possible and I recently read a book about a medium so in a way I understand but I think I still have some more processing of the idea to do.

As part of the info session, when the leaders were explaining why the created the NGO they told us about income and graduation rates in their village. The average income (per month) of the working people in Beit Jann is 5300 shekels (1432 dollars~ about 17000 a year). The national average though is 8800 shekels (2738 dollars~ about 33000). Whats interesting about this though is that the Beit Jann graduation rate is higher than the national average. This year, 100% of their senior class graduated. However, only about 2.8% of those graduates go off to college. 

It was a little foggy so this isn't the best picture

After the info session we went to visit the holy site of the town. Normally anyone, no matter what gender or religion, is allowed inside but it was a Druze holiday so we just sat outside and learned a little bit about it. The site itself was the Shrine of Bahhdi. On July 25th Druze from all over travel to Beit Jann just to see this site because a prophet is said to have stopped to pray there and spend a night thousands of years ago. From the shrine we walked to the prettiest view of the area where we could see all the way across Israel (From the Sea of Galilee to the Mediterranean). It was a pretty amazing view and complimented the fact that the village was much more modern architecture wise than one would expect. 

By this point it was already about 2pm and we were ready for our authentic Druze lunch. In my head I was envisioning the elaborate spread we had when we visited a Druze home for dinner on EIE but that isn't exactly what we got. We got a spread but it was of homemade bread either with a light tomato sauce,  zaatar spread, or stuffed with cheese. The bread, like most bread in the village was homemade and cooked right in front of us. It wasn't what I was expecting but it was definitely tasty. 

After lunch we went and toured the ancient home of Beit Jann. 10 generations have lived in the home, which underneath it has a sort of cave containing a well. The well itself is 7 meters deep but when we peered inside it definitely looked much deeper. In the process of being inside the cave though the youngest son showing us around let us taste the water. It had no taste. It was pure fresh water. When he dumped the water from the pail back into the well it sounded like a thunder storm and rapids all at once. I was taken by surprise at just how loud, and as weird as it sounds,  magnificent the sound was. The reason I wrote youngest son above is because in Druze society the youngest son must live with the parents to take care of them. The parents are never to be left alone and it is the responsibility of the youngest son, even if he is married to live at home and take care of them until they die. I think the members of our group, which is mostly female, were a little iffy as to why it had to be the youngest son. Thinking about it now though I assume it is because according to Druze tradition all girls are born religious. So I guess it just came about that a religious person should be studying rather than taking care of the parents. It was kind of nice to see the culture reverse though since we are so used to a society in which it is seen as a female role to take care of the old and sick. Oddly enough it actually seems like Druze women have more rights than general Israeli women. Legally speaking men and women are equals. A women is always entitled to a divorce and in fact most of the kids that go to college from Druze villages are female.

The last part of our day in Beit Jann was eating knafe (a fried cheese pastry thing, which I didn't eat but heard was good) and watching/participating in a cultural dance. The dance at first seemed kind of simple but quickly sped up and got more complicated so it was a tad challenging to follow. It was fun to watch though. After the dance we did a quick wrap up thanking them for their hospitality and warm welcoming and then got back on the bus to head for Tzfat. Unfortunately we left Beit Jann a tad late and ran into traffic so we didn't have a whole lot of time to explore Tzfat but to be honest I don't think there is a lot to explore. The city is primarily orthodox synagogues because it is a biblical town. What I enjoy about being there, other than the view, is the artist quarter. A lot of the stuff is expensive but there are so many fantastic galleries and jewelry makers.  I went off on my own though and knew exactly where I was headed, the candle store. This store in known to a lot of tourists (mostly American) for their unique candle designs and sculptures. Despite not having a lot of need for candles myself, I love getting to look at the sculptures (sorry forgot to take a picture).

 

 

One of the galleries

Our "Tent"

Before we left Tzfat we had to get dinner so I went typical Rachel and found a vegetarian restaurant that served stir-fried veggies with brown rice. It wasn't the tastiest meal in the world but one can only take so much pita, hummus, and falafel. We then drove to our campsite for the night. We had heard that we would be camping out so we all had sleeping bags and were ready to sleep outside. However, we have one of the best program organizers and we got to the campground to find we were sleeping a cabin with mattress pads and electricity and plugs. Right next to our "Tent" there were swings and hammocks sitting underneath fig trees and bushels of grapes which I thought was a neat Israeli experience because I would never see something like that in America. So I spent the rest of my night sitting on the swing finishing by 3rd book of the trip.