The early morning light caresses the New Jerusalem stone. The old man sits by The Wall, at the entrance to the men’s section. He is unaware of the camera’s presence. He would have been offended if he knew the camera would be stealing a piece of his soul. Now, in his shabby clothes, that have clung to Rebbes for hundred’s of years, he appears like the beggar Elijah, when he returns to earth, dressed as a poor man, to right some wrong.
His red plastic shopping basket accompanies him and serves as a prop that brings him into the present. It is filled with a few scraps of personal, practical possessions and holy remnants from centuries long ago. In his mind, he haltingly speaks of his travels, how he has journeyed through time. He has witnessed the burning flames from the Inquisition, has lived next door to Rembrandt in the poor Jewish quarter in Amsterdam, 1625. He has known the brutal cold and grinding poverty of Krakow that drove him out of Poland. His Hasidic roots and yearning have delivered him into Eretz Israel, the Home of his People. In his mind echo the languages, the sounds from his own voice, Dutch, Polish, Russian, Yiddish. Private images wander across his inner landscape. He longs for the whisper that can weave his story. But soon, he stops, leaving his last thought to dangle, hang, inside the air.
His solid bearing anchors him to the earth and stone. His concentration pulls him into himself, as he counts his meager coins. Like Elijah before him, he is a Messenger from God, confirmed by God’s Protective Hand, shaped into a rectangle patch of light that appears directly behind his left, stooped shoulder.
The Rebbe has come to spread God’s Word. There is no one who wants to listen to His important message. He remains silent. Patient. He has nowhere else to go.