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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Article
Journey From a “Small Place” to a “Big Place”: Mediated and Divided Sanctity in a Pilgrimage Holiday
Author(s)
Rachel Sharaby
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DOI:10.17265/2328-2177/2020.01.007
Affiliation(s)
Ashkelon Academic College, Ashkelon, Israel
ABSTRACT
Sacred
spaces have usually been presented dichotomously in pilgrimage studies: small
or big, near or far, at the “center of the world” or at the margins. This
article discusses a unique combined pilgrimage during the Seged holiday of the
Jews of Ethiopia, which is still celebrated today. Based on testimonies, I
conclude that they made a physical and symbolic journey from the “small place”
to the “big place”. The “big place”, similarly to the sacredness itself, was
also divided into two memory places. The liturgy of the Seged mediated between
the “small place” and the “big place”. It also created a connection between the
“small time” which includes the small everyday actions, and the “big time”
which includes large leaps toward a mythological past.
KEYWORDS
Seged, Ethiopia, sacred space, liturgy, ritual
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