Even today we Jews call Jerusalem...Yerushalyaim.....Jerusalem is its anglicized name........Snooker **************************
The name of Jerusalem in the Hebrew Bible is not Yerushalayim but Yerushalem which is not a dual but a unitary form.
In fact, "shalem" means just that - "whole". Shalem is also the first name by which Jerusalem is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, in connection with Abraham and his welcome to the place by King Malchitzedek ("king of Justice"), the priest of the Heavenly God. Thus, from the first mention, Jerusalem is associated with wholeness, justice, priest of Heaven - and all these were promised to Abraham and his children.
The next mention of this place in the Bible is then in connection with Isaac, Abraham's son, as the site for Isaac's Akeda (binding). The story of the Akeda ends by naming the site as "Yir'e", or "Yera'e in the Mountain of the Lord". the root YREH denotes both demonstration and awe. The demonstration is apparently to (and by) Abraham, to whom God said that He will show him the place (Yar'eh) and who told his son that God will show them the sacrificial lamb. The awe and fear are, in the first instance, Isaac's. The name Yeru has generally turned to point to the Mountain of Moriah. This related name denotes both the demonstration - as in the word Moreh (a teacher) - and awe - Morah. It is possible that in ancient times there were actually two cities in that locality, one called Shalem and one called Yeru or Yoru, and the two became united by King David. Psalm 122, attributed to David, thus speaks about "Jerusalem built as a city that was joined together".
There is yet a more important, a symbolic, sense to this "joining" of Yeru and Shalem which follows from their Biblical mentions. As father and son are two aspects of a unity that overcomes time, Yeru- Shalem gives us an intimation of a unitary meaning of demonstration with awe as a whole (shalem). In the Jewish symbolic tradition (the Kabbalah), Abraham represents the qualities of Hesed and Ahava, whereas Isaac represents the qualities of Din (judgement) and of Yir'a (awe). Hesed and Din are divine measures whereas Ahava and Yir'a are the human modes of approaching God. Thus the very name "YeruShalem" makes a compact formula that reiterates the essential Kabbalistic teachings about the unification (Yikhud) of the divine attributes that is at the basis of all that is to endure, and which was secured to Israel through the trials of the Fathers.
****************************************************** Jerusalem Means More to Jews Than to Muslims by Daniel Pipes Los Angeles Times July 21, 2000
With final-status talks between Israel and the Palestinians underway, Jerusalem is finally in play. At base, the argument here consists of an argument between Jews and Moslems over who has the older, better documented, and deeper ties to the Holy City.
A cursory review of the facts shows that there is not much of a contest.
Jerusalem has a unique importance to Jews. It has a unique place in Jewish law and a pervasive presence in the Jewish religion. Jews pray toward Jerusalem, mourn the destruction of their Temple there, and wishfully repeat the phrase "Next year in Jerusalem." It is the only capital of the Jewish state, ancient or modern.
In contrast, Jerusalem has a distinctly secondary place for Moslems. It is not once mentioned in the Koran or in the liturgy. The Prophet Mohammed never went to the city, nor did he have ties to it. Jerusalem never has served as the capital of any polity, and has never been an Islamic cultural center.
Rather, Mecca is the "Jerusalem" of Islam. That is where Moslems believe that Abraham nearly sacrificed Ishmael; where Mohammed lived most of his life; and where the key events of Islam took place. Moslems pray in its direction five times each day and it is where non-Moslems are forbidden to set foot.
Jerusalem being of minor importance to Islam, why do Moslems nowadays insist that the city is more important to them than to Jews? The answer has to do with politics. Moslems take religious interest in Jerusalem when it serves practical interests. When those concerns lapse, so does the standing of Jerusalem. This pattern has recurred at least five times over 14 centuries.
The Prophet. When Mohammed sought to convert the Jews in the 620s C.E., he adopted several Jewish-style practices - a Yom Kippur-like fast, a synagogue-like place of worship, kosher-style food restrictions - and also tachanun-like prayers while facing Jerusalem. But when most Jews rejected Mohammed's overtures, the Koran changed the prayer direction to Mecca and Jerusalem lost importance for Moslems.
The Umayyad Dynasty. Jerusalem regained stature a few decades later when rulers of the Umayyad dynasty sought ways to enhance the importance of their territories. One way was by building two monumental religious structures in Jerusalem, the Dome of the Rock in 691 and Al-Aqsa Mosque in 715.
Then the Umayyads did something tricky: The Koran states that God took Mohammed "by night from the sacred mosque in Mecca to the furthest (al-aqsa) place of worship." When this passage was revealed (about 621), "furthest place of worship" was a turn of phrase, not a specific place. Decades later, the Umayyads built a mosque in Jerusalem and called it Al-Aqsa. Moslems since then understand the passage about the "furthest place of worship" as referring to Jerusalem.
But when the Umayyads fell in 750, Jerusalem lapsed into near obscurity.
The Crusades. The Crusader conquest of Jerusalem in 1099 evinced little Moslem reaction at first. Then, as a Moslem counter-crusade developed, so did a whole literature extolling the virtues of Jerusalem. As a result, at about this time Jerusalem came to be seen as Islam's third most holy city.
Then, safely back in Moslem hands in 1187, the city lapsed into its usual obscurity. The population declined, even the defensive walls fell.
The British conquest. Only when British troops reached Jerusalem in 1917, did Moslems reawaken to the city's importance. Palestinian leaders made Jerusalem a centerpiece of their campaign against Zionism.
When the Jordanians won the old city in 1948, Moslems predictably lost interest again in Jerusalem. It reverted to a provincial backwater, deliberately degraded by the Jordanians in favor of Amman, their capital.
Taking out a bank loan, subscribing to telephone service, or registering a postal package required a trip to Amman. Jordanian radio transmitted the Friday sermon not from Al-Aqsa but from a minor mosque in Amman. Jerusalem also fell off the Arab diplomatic map: the PLO covenant of 1964 did not mention it. No Arab leader (other than King Hussein, and he rarely) visited there.
The Israeli conquest. When Israel captured the city in June 1967, Moslem interest in Jerusalem again surged. The 1968 PLO covenant mentioned Jerusalem by name. Revolutionary Iran created a Jerusalem Day and placed the city on bank notes. Money flooded into the city to build it up.
Thus have politics, more than religious sentiments, driven Moslem interest in Jerusalem through history.
