MY FAMILY
THE BETA ISRAEL CURRICULUM

HOPES & DREAMS

 Here, teachers should remind students of Unit 3: Hopes & Prayers, in which they learned about the centrality of hope in the Beta Israel’s faith as Jews and their constant prayer to return home to the Land of Israel. Teachers should also recount the lesson that the Beta Israel may have been the first community to undertake what has become common practice in Judaism: facing Jerusalem in prayer.

 In that vein, students should learn that throughout history, members of the Beta Israel customarily said: “Our fathers arrived from the west, and the day will come, when we will set out westward.”73

 Teachers should now explain:

Despite thousands of years of hopes and prayers, no member of the Beta Israel traveled to Jerusalem from the time of their arrival in Ethiopia until the middle of the nineteenth century.

As such, the biblical exodus from Egypt to the Land of Israel remained at the core of the Beta Israel’s historical and foundational memory; the dream of repeating this journey uplifted and inspired them for millennia. In 1855, the community’s hope became an attainable dream when an Ethiopian Jew named Daniel ben Hananiah, and his son Moshe, successfully journeyed toward Jerusalem. They were the first members of the Beta Israel to return to the Land of Israel and among the first to have left Ethiopia in centuries.

Students should now be asked to search the internet for images or descriptions of Jerusalem in the mid-nineteenth century (teachers can direct them toward artists such as David Roberts). Then, students should draw their own pictures of Jerusalem as it might have appeared through the eyes of Daniel ben Hananiah and his son Moshe in 1855. Once the students have had a chance to share their drawings, teachers should explain:

 When Daniel ben Hananiah and his son Moshe reached Jerusalem, they met with leading rabbis there, and described the plight of Ethiopian Jewry. The Jerusalem rabbis decided to send the Beta Israel an empathetic letter of solidarity, which Daniel ben Hananiah and Moshe brought back to the community in Ethiopia. The letter invigorated the hopes and dreams of the Beta Israel even further. This journey was profoundly significant as it paved the way for other members of the Beta Israel to attempt their own journey to Israel. Of all those who inspired the Beta Israel to believe that such a journey was possible, none was more impactful than the nineteenth century religious leader Abba Mahari.

 

 

73 Micha Feldman, On Wings of Eagles: The Secret Operation of the Ethiopian Exodus, (Gefen, 2012), p. xi.