Mysteries of Ark’s Journey Revealed

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The Shocking True Story behind Spielberg’s Next Film
With Papal consent, Edgardo Mortara, a Jewish child, was ripped from his family and raised as a Catholic in 19th century Italy.
by Dr. Yvette Alt Miller
Steven Spielberg’s next film focuses on a little-known tragedy that ripped apart a Jewish family in Italy.
Based on The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, a 1997 book by David Kertzer, it is the shocking story of a Jewish boy taken from his family in pre-unification Italy, with the blessing of Pope Pius IX.
Even though it seems like something from Medieval times, this happened in modern times; Edgardo lived until 1940.

In the 1850s, Bologna was the second city of the Papal States, an area of central Italy ruled by the Pope. Although many Italians were pressing for change, the city remained under sway of Church leaders. Bologna’s small Jewish community of 200 faced intense anti-Semitism and kept a low profile. In order not to draw attention to themselves, they had neither a community rabbi nor a synagogue.
Momolo and Marianna Mortara lived in the center of the city and employed a series of local teenagers to help look after apartment and children. In 1853, the Mortaras’ housekeeper was 14 year old Anna Morisi. She’d moved into their home a few months after their son Edgardo was born. Morisi took a liking to the little Jewish baby: when Edgardo became ill at the age of one, the teenager told the local grocer that he was a handsome baby and she’d be sad to see him die. The grocer suggested that she baptize the child – maybe that would help cure him.

“Your son Edgardo has been baptized,” the chief Papal policeman declared, “and I have been ordered to take him with me.”
The young babysitter didn’t know how to baptize anyone, but she improvised, throwing a glass of water on him and saying some words that she soon forgot. “I figured that it wasn’t of any importance since I had done it without really knowing what I was doing,” she later recalled.
But years later, the babysitter casually mentioned to a friend what she’d done to a Jewish boy she’d once looked after. Word soon travelled to Church authorities, and the girl found herself summoned to the official Inquisitor and interrogated.
Edgardo Mortara (right) with his mother and brother, c. 1880

The reaction of the Church was swift. The night of Wednesday, June 23, 1858, Papal Police descended on the Mortaras’ apartment and demanded to see all their children. Terrified, the Mortaras woke up their sleeping kids. Soon, seven exhausted children were assembled before the police: twin 11-year-old girls Ernesta and Erminia, 10-year-old August, nine-year-old Arnoldo, six-year-old Edgardo, four-year-old Ercole, and baby Imelda.

“Your son Edgardo has been baptized,” the chief Papal policeman declared, “and I have been ordered to take him with me.”
Weeping, both of Edgardo’s parents fell to their knees before the officer, begging for his mercy. A Jewish neighbor rushed to see what the commotion was about. “I saw a distraught mother, bathed in tears, and a father who was tearing out his hair, while the children were down on their knees begging the policemen for mercy. It was a scene so moving I can’t begin to describe it.”

As the family’s screams echoed through the neighborhood, local Jewish residents and some members of the Papal guard went to the local Inquisitor to see if he would change his mind. After 24 grueling hours, the answer came: having been baptized, Edgardo Mortara was now a Christian, and as such could not possibly be left to be raised by Jews. The next day, June 24, 1858, the little boy was torn from his mother’s arms forever.
Edgardo was brought to Rome. His kidnapping was attracting much attention. Eager to deflect criticism, Church officials put out an official version of

Edgardo’s journey: immediately after being removed from his parents, they declared, Edgardo became a devout Catholic, asking to stop in towns along the way so he could see their churches. In reality, Edgardo later recalled sobbing for his parents. (He was falsely told they’d be waiting for him in Rome.) When he asked for the mezuzah he normally wore on a chain around his neck, he was given a crucifix to wear instead.

Despite mounting international pressure against the kidnapping, the Pope regarded himself as Edgardo’s “new” father and refused to return the child.
In Rome, Edgardo was raised in the House of Catechumens, a home for new converts to Catholicism, including some Jews brought there against their will. In the mid-1800s, it was illegal for Jews to approach the building or communicate with those inside. One Jew was arrested for merely looking through a window. Edgardo’s parents journeyed to Rome and after many months of pleading they were able to see their son briefly. Edgardo told his mother that he continued to say the Shema prayer every night.

Pope Pius IX himself took a personal interest in Edgardo Mortara. Despite mounting international pressure against the kidnapping, the Pope regarded himself as Edgardo’s “new” father and refused to return the child, nor even have any contact again with his parents. By the time he was 13, after seven years of intense Catholic education, Edgardo took an additional name Pio, in honor of the Pope. When he came of age, turning 21 in 1873, Edgardo was ordained a Catholic priest.
Moritz Daniel Oppenheim’s ‘The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara,’ 1862

In 1878, Edgardo’s mother Marianna visited him, reestablishing contact after years of being forbidden to see her son. Marianna found Edgardo changed. He now ardently wished to convert Jews, especially his family, to Catholicism. When Marianna died in 1890, Italian newspapers ran sensational accounts of her supposed conversion to Catholicism at the insistence of her illustrious priest son. Rather than bask in these reports, Edgardo took pains to let the world know the truth: “I have always ardently desired that my mother embrace the Catholic faith, and I tried many times to get her to do so. However, that never happened, and although I stood beside her during her last illness, along with my brothers and sisters, she never showed any sign of converting.”

The family stayed in touch. Edgardo’s great nephew Gustavo Latis told The Times of Israel in 2014 that for over a century, a picture of Edgardo stood in his family home with the dedication under it: “My blessed, beloved mother! May God keep you happy to the affection of your beloved son Pio-Edgardo, who loves you very much. Venice 15/XI/81”.
Gustavo Latis holds a framed portrait of Edgardo (Rossella Tercatin/The Times of Israel)
Latis recalls Edgardo visiting his home, hanging his big black priest’s hat in their hall. His grandmother Imelda, Edgardo’s youngest sister, was “very attached to Judaism,” he recalls. “She always made sure that we would fast on Yom Kippur and celebrate Pesach, and she loved cooking Jewish dishes….” Despite her strong commitment to her Jewish faith, Imelda continued to stay in touch with her brother. But she was careful around her brother. Her grandson recalls, “Although the fraternal affection between them never ceased, my grandmother was very cautious around him. She feared his preaching, especially for us children.”
Many of Edgardo’s Jewish relatives died in the Holocaust. Living in Belgium during World War II, Edgardo himself would have found his conversion to Catholicism insufficient to save him and might have been deported, had he not died in 1940, months before Germany’s invasion of Belgium, at the age of 88.
Steven Spielberg is currently casting the movie around the world and thousands of parents are excited about the prospect of having their child selected. Learning about this horrific story can help us appreciate that this was a real person and perhaps reminds us not to take our children’s Jewish upbringing for granted.

Mysteries of Ark’s Journey Revealed as Excavation Begins at Site of Ark of Covenant
By Abra Forman February 12, 2017 , 10:30 am
“And it came to pass, from the day that the ark abode in Kiryat Yearim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years; and all the house of Israel yearned after Hashem.” I Samuel 7:2 (The Israel Bible™)

image: https://www.breakingisraelnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/ark-david.jpg
King David escorts the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. (Italo-Flämische Schule um 1600, Öl auf Holztafel/Wikimedia Commons)
This summer, archaeologists will begin the first-ever excavation of the major Biblical site where the Ark of the Covenant was kept for two decades before King David conveyed it to Jerusalem.

The site, known in Hebrew as Kiryat Ye’arim and often transliterated at Kiriath Jearim, is mentioned over a dozen times in the Bible as a Judean town near Jerusalem during the period of Biblical history associated with the judges and King David. Today, it remains one of the last such Biblical landmarks unstudied.

The Book of Samuel tells of the moving of the Ark from Beit Shemesh to Kiryat Ye’arim after it was returned to the Israelites by the Philistines, who were stricken with disease in punishment for having stolen the sacred Ark in battle. There, the Ark resided for twenty years as the people of Israel began to turn from idol worship back to God.

And the men of Kiryat Yearim came, and fetched up the ark of Hashem, and brought it into the house of Avinadav in the hill, and sanctified Elazar his son to keep the ark of Hashem. And it came to pass, from the day that the ark abode in Kiryat Yearim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years; and all the house of Israel yearned after Hashem. I Samuel 7:1-2

At the end of that period, King David brought the Ark to Jerusalem. After the First Temple was built by David’s son Solomon, the Ark was placed there and remained until the Temple was destroyed by the Babylonians, after which all traces of it completely disappeared.

Uncover the Truth Behind the A.R.K.
The Ark of the Covenant, one of the most mysterious and sought-after Biblical treasures in history, is described in the Book of Exodus as a gold-plated wooden box which holds within it the two tablets given by God to Moses on Mount Sinai.

And they shall make an ark of acacia-wood: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof. And thou shalt overlay it with pure gold, within and without shalt thou overlay it, and shalt make upon it a crown of gold round about. Exodus 25:10-11

After the destruction of the Temple, it vanished from all record, though different legends have sprung up around it. While the archaeologists running the Kiryat Ye’arim dig will not be primarily looking for clues to its current location, the chance remains that uncovering some of the mysteries of the Ark’s journey could yield surprising results.

image: https://www.breakingisraelnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/kiryat-yaarim.png
The Biblical tel of Kiryat Ya’arim. (Screenshot)
“It’s a large, central site in the Jerusalem hills that hasn’t been studied until now. It may be the only key site in Judah that hasn’t undergone a systematic archaeological excavation,” Israel Finkelstein, one of three archaeologists heading the project, told the Times of Israel.

As of now, the archaeologists believe there may be a smaller ancient temple at the site where the Ark once stood, but as Biblical accounts often connect the city with the pagan deity Ba’al, a shrine found there could be a site of idol worship.

“To follow the story, the place where they took the Ark of the Covenant wasn’t, of course, just some field or under a tree, they refer to an important cult place,” Finkelstein explained.

He hopes that the dig’s findings could reveal significant information about the history of the site and improve scholars’ overall picture of the period of King David’s rule.
Read more at https://www.breakingisraelnews.com/83503/mysteries-arks-journey-revealed-excavation-begins-site-ark-covenant/#shOv5iOiP1RkIs99.99