The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #93294 Message #1795731
Posted By: Charlie Baum
28-Jul-06 - 05:40 PM
Thread Name: BS: Facing East to Mecca
Subject: RE: BS: Facing East to Mecca
For certain prayers, Jews face Jerusalem the same way Muslims face Mecca. And within Jerusalem, once you've gotten close enough that the scale matters, Jews face the Temple Mount. (Within the temple in olden days, one then faced the Holy-of-Holies, but that's all theoretical now, given the lack of a Temple.)
Most Jews I know face due East, or think Mercator-ly as though the Earth were a flat map; I'm the weird one who faces Jerusalem via the Great Circle, because I wouldn't want to fall off the edge of the earth.