Log on to send your prayers . . .
QUESTION
Is it true that you can fax messages to a number in Israel to have them put in the Western Wall?
The Western Wall ( HaKotel HaMa’aravi) is the remnant of the retaining wall that once enclosed herod’s Second Temple. It has also been called the Wailing Wall as Jews have gathered there for centuries to mourn the loss of the temple. Due to the rabbinic ban on praying on the Mount, the Wall is the holiest place where Jews are permitted to pray.
The wall is made up of huge limestone blocks, each weighing between one and eight tons, crafted to fit together without mortar. Some of the j oints, however, have eroded, and Orthodox Jews fill chinks in the lower blocks with written prayers.
In 1993, Israel’s main telecommunications company, Bezeq, established a fax service whereby an employee would insert your prayers into the wall.
The number was +972 2 561 2222 and dubbed ‘ God’s fax number’. In 2004, the company added an email address kotel@onemail. bezeq.com. These have since been discontinued in favour of a much simpler service: you simply go to the Kotel website english.thekotel. org/today/ and select ‘Send a note to the Kotel’.
With messages being sent from all over the world, the fissures in the wall fill up. Before Passover, workers at the higher rabbinate have a clear-out, filling up to 150 boxes. These workers have to clean themselves f i rst i n the Jewish ritual bath — the mikvah. This is because as they will dig deep into crevices in the wall they might possibly touch the inside of the Temple Mount.
The rescued pieces of paper are buried on the Mount of Olives. Under Jewish tradition, no book or piece of writing that contains a mention of the name of God can be burned or thrown away.
G. Heller, Birmingham.
QUESTION
What became of boy soprano Ernest Lough after his voice broke?
FUrTher to the earlier answer, in about 1951, I was a 24-year-old police officer patrolling near Pall Mall, London.
A boy in s c hool uniform approached me and said: ‘I bet you wouldn’t tell me off if you knew who my father was.’ I thought: ‘Is this a schoolboy dare?’ he then said his father had been ‘the boy who recorded O For The Wings Of A Dove’, to which I replied: ‘You must be young Lough then.’
he seemed pleased a bobby on the beat knew of his father’s achievement. This boy must have been his son robin, who must be in his late 70s now. I wonder if he remembers our meeting.
Thomas Proudfoot, Alresford, Hants.