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| Awake Zion | |
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| Directed by | Monica Haim |
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Running time | 60 min. |
| Languages | English, Hebrew and Iyaric |
Awake Zion is a 2005 documentary by Monica Haim that explores the connection between Jews and Rastafarians.
In Awake Zion, Haim travels from Manhattan to Jamaica and Israel, interviewing Rastafarians and rabbis to highlight similarities between their worldviews. Haim, a young Jewish woman, says she first perceived a connection between Jews and Rastafarians at a reggae concert.
Haim interviews Super Dane, an African American DJ in the Brooklyn reggae scene, who is shocked by Matisyahu, a Hasidic reggae artist from White Plains, New York. The film also features Jamaican-born Israeli rapper Yehoshua Sofer. [1]
Most reviews of Awake Zion emphasize the documentary's social conscience in trying to bridge a gap between two seemingly different cultures. Rather than being scholarly, Haim's tone is described as "gently irreverent".
Rastafari, sometimes called Rastafarianism, is an Abrahamic religion that developed in Jamaica during the 1930s. It is classified as both a new religious movement and a social movement by scholars of religion. There is no central authority in control of the movement and much diversity exists among practitioners, who are known as Rastafari, Rastafarians, or Rastas.
Religious music is a type of music that is performed or composed for religious use or through religious influence. It may overlap with ritual music, which is music, sacred or not, performed or composed for or as ritual. Religious songs have been described as a source of strength, as well as a means of easing pain, improving one's mood, and assisting in the discovery of meaning in one's suffering. While style and genre vary broadly across traditions, religious groups still share a variety of musical practices and techniques.
Roots reggae is a subgenre of reggae that deals with the everyday lives and aspirations of Africans and those in the African Diaspora, including the spiritual side of Rastafari, black liberation, revolution and the honouring of God, called Jah by Rastafarians. It is identified with the life of the ghetto sufferer, and the rural poor. Lyrical themes include spirituality and religion, struggles by artists, poverty, black pride, social issues, resistance to fascism, capitalism, corrupt government and racial oppression. A spiritual repatriation to Africa is a common theme in roots reggae.
This is a partial timeline of Zionism since the start of the 16th century.
Zion is a placename in the Hebrew Bible, often used as a synonym for Jerusalem as well as for the Land of Israel as a whole.
Jah Shaka, also known as the Zulu Warrior, was a Jamaican reggae/dub sound system operator who operated a South East London-based, roots reggae Jamaican sound system since the early 1970s. His name is an amalgamation of the Rastafarian term for God and that of the Zulu king Shaka Zulu.
Christafari is a Christian reggae band formed in 1989. It is centered on Christ Jesus and follows the personality of ordained minister Mark Mohr, an American, and born-again Christian. Until the age of 17, Mohr was a Rastafarian.
Hélène Lee is a French journalist who specialises in Jamaican and West African music.
"Rivers of Babylon" is a Rastafari song written and recorded by Brent Dowe and Trevor McNaughton of the Jamaican reggae group The Melodians in 1970. The lyrics are adapted from the texts of Psalms 19 and 137 in the Hebrew Bible. The Melodians' original version of the song appeared on the soundtrack album for the 1972 movie The Harder They Come, which made it internationally known.
Jepther McClymont OD, better known as Luciano, is a Jamaican second-generation roots reggae singer.
Yehoshua Sofer is an Israeli-Jamaican hip hop and rap artist, and a martial artist. As a martial artist, he is the founder of Abir Warrior Arts Association of Israel, teaching his own style of “Abir-Qesheth Hebrew Warrior Arts” in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, claiming it to be a tradition of his family dating to Israelite antiquity preserved by an underground school of "Bani Abir" in Habban, Yemen. Sofer perceives this style of martial arts training to be a continuation of the practices of the Jewish people prior to the Second Temple period. The style takes inspiration from the Hebrew alphabet, basing moves and stances on Hebrew letters.
Matthew Paul Miller, known by his stage name Matisyahu, is an American reggae singer, rapper, beatboxer, and musician.
Kiddus I is a reggae singer and musician, best known for his appearance in the film Rockers.
Wentworth Arthur Matthew, a West Indian immigrant to New York City, was the founder in 1919 of the Commandment Keepers of the Living God, a Black Hebrew congregation. It was influenced by the pan-Africanism and black nationalism of Marcus Garvey from Jamaica. Matthew developed his congregation along Jewish lines of observance and the theory that they were returning to Judaism as the true Hebrews. He incorporated in 1930 and moved the congregation to Brooklyn. There he founded the Israelite Rabbinical Academy, teaching and ordaining African-American rabbis. His theory of Black Hebrews is not accepted by Jews.
The Forgotten Refugees is a 2005 documentary film directed by Michael Grynszpan and produced by The David Project and IsraTV with Ralph Avi Goldwasser as executive producer, that recounts the history of Jewish communities of the Middle East and North Africa and their demise in the face of persecutions following the creation of the modern State of Israel in 1948.
Baruch Ben Haim was a Sephardi Hakham who served as Chief Rabbi of the Syrian Jewish community in Brooklyn, New York for 55 years. He taught at Magen David Yeshiva and established the Shaare Zion Torah Center at Congregation Shaare Zion. He was a protege of Rabbi Ezra Attiya, rosh yeshiva of Porat Yosef Yeshiva, who trained and dispatched students to leadership positions in Sephardi communities around the world.
Nyabinghi, also Nyahbinghi, Niyabinghi, Niyahbinghi, is the gathering of Rastafari people to celebrate and commemorate key dates significant to Rastafari throughout the year. It is essentially an opportunity for the Rastafari to congregate and engage in praise and worship. For example, on July 23 of each year, a Nyabinghi is held to celebrate the birth of Emperor Haille Selassie I. During a Nyabinghi celebration men and women have different roles and expectations. Men are expected to remove any hair coverings, whilst women must keep their hair covered. A group of men typically organise themselves in a line or semi-circle and are assigned to beat the drums throughout. The remaining congregation continue to sing well known songs or 'chants', some of which are Hebraic scriptural verses that evidence the divinity of Haile Sellassie. For example, 'I have a little light in I and I'm going to make it shine, Rastafariiii, shine' and 'Holy Mount Zion is a holy place and no sinners can enter there, so let the words of my mouth and the mediation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, of Rastafari'. Nyabinghi is a Rastafari tradition that promotes Rastafari unity, strengthens the Rastafari spirit with fellowship and raises the consciousness and presence of Rastafafari in the heart of those in attendance. At some points passages of the bible are read. Rastafari recognise the significance of Jesus Christ, due to Haile Sellassie I fulfilling the teachings and prophecy of scripture. Nyah Bingi came before Rastafari Nyah is the Highest
The recorded history of the Jews in Angola stretches from the Middle Ages to modern times. A very small community of Jews lives in Angola mostly in the capital city of Luanda with a handful scattered elsewhere of mixed origins and backgrounds. There are also a number of transitory Israeli businesspeople living in Angola.
The Rastafari movement developed out of the legacy of the Atlantic slave trade, in which over ten million Africans were enslaved and transported to the Americas between the 16th and 19th centuries. Once there, they were sold to European planters and forced to work on the plantations. Around a third of these transported Africans were relocated in the Caribbean, with under 700,000 being settled in Jamaica. In 1834, slavery in Jamaica was abolished after the British government passed the Slavery Abolition Act 1833. Racial prejudice nevertheless remained prevalent across Jamaican society. The overwhelming majority of Jamaica's legislative council was white throughout the 19th century, and those of African descent were treated as second-class citizens.