On the occasion of Passover, the Western Wall Heritage Foundation held this morning (Sunday) the removal of the prayer notes buried between the layers of the Western Wall for the past six months. The evacuation was done according to the halachic guidelines and by using gloves and disposable wooden utensils, with the goal being to make room for new notes of the tourists and visitors who are expected to arrive in Jerusalem in the coming months.
The notes were collected in sacks and will be buried together with worn holy books which are transferred to a designated genizah. The rabbi of the Western Wall and the Holy Places – Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitch of Israel, personally accompanied the evacuation as every year and offered a prayer for the unity of Israel and for the thousands of visitors who buried their prayers.
How can you send a note to be buried at the Kotel and when did the custom even begin?
The custom of burying the notes at the Western Wall was already documented about three hundred years ago by the Holy Light of Life. The prayer notes are buried along the entire length of the Western Wall and can also be found between the courses of stones that were exposed in the tunnels of the Western Wall.
Every month, an average of about 3,000 notes are sent through the website of the Western Wall Heritage Foundation. This is in addition to the hundreds of thousands of notes personally entrusted by the visitors, in the last year about one hundred thousand notes were sent through the website alone, an increase of 30% compared to this time last year, from countries around the world, including: the USA, Slovakia, Brazil, South America, Colombia, Germany, Holland, Canada, England, Russia, Venezuela, Ukraine, India, Mexico, Argentina, Taiwan. With the ten countries from which the highest number of notes were sent: USA, Brazil, Colombia, Russia, Canada, Slovakia, South Africa, Ukraine, England.
Thousands of notes are sent to the Western Wall during the year, each note and the story behind it. Groups and organizations from many countries send notes to the Western Wall. In the last month, notes were sent to the Western Wall to be buried among the stones of the Wall, sent by participants in a tourism conference in Madrid – Spain, as well as in Taiwan, during which a virtual wall was shown and the participants were invited to write whatever was on their hearts on the notes, and they arrived via Ministry of Tourism for the Western Wall.
We will also remind you that the traditional blessing of the priests will take place on Sunday, the third of Chul HaMoed – 18th of Nisan 2017, 9/4/2.
The times of the class that will be held on Sunday 04.09.23, 18 Nissan 2018:
• Morning prayer: 8:45
• First priestly blessing of the morning: 9:15
• Additional prayer: 10:15
• Second priestly blessing of Mosef: 10:30
