Tomorrow, The Copts of Egypt are to celebrate “Palm Sunday”. Palm means “Sh’aneen” which is derived from the Aramic word “ōshaʿnā” and the Greek word, “hōsanná”. As for the word, “ōshaʿnā”, it is divided to two syllables, “ōshaʿ” that means to save or rescue and “nā” that expresses an urgent need, thus its semantic meaning is “Save us now”.”Hōsanná” is a call that was repeated many times when Jesus was entering” Jerusalem” “Al Qods” riding on a donkey after His disciples has put their clothes on it till he entered the city. As for the crowds, some of them put their clothes on the road and other cut the branches of trees and put them before Him as if they are celebrating the entrance of a king and a display of their love and respect. All people were shouting, Hosanna to the Son of David!‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’ Hosanna in the highest!” as the major of the people were suffering the burden of the Roman Colonization one way and led a hard life and severe poverty. They thought Jesus came to save them from all this while His mission was not like this. He came as a spiritual Savior as He declared, “My kingdom is not of this world””.He is leading humans toward heaven and eternal life. He offered them His words and his deeds to teach them life of righteousness and goodness with which man should live. Thus, Jesus never cared to enter Jerusalem as one of the greatest men in the world, a king or a hero who enters a city in haughtiness riding a horse, but He entered it meekly and modestly riding a donkey introducing meekness as a way to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, while the world would consider it a sort of degradation not fit with his greatest men.
But if we look thoroughly at the life of great men we will find greatness comes hand in hand with humanity; as by soothing the pain of others, support and serve them, they become more humane. The more humane they are, the greater and more appreciated by God and people. I saw a picture of a lady that for the first time made me think she is a homeless poor woman, then I discovered it was a picture of the past president of Finland, Tarja Halonen, (2000-2012) that made her country one of the best country one of the best countries of the world: in education, health, infrastructure not to mention that she made her companies like Nokia and many others get the first international ranks. That picture was propaganda to the president in the aim of alleviating the suffering of the poor and needy. She wore old clothes and sat with no shelter for to experience the feeling of the needy and homeless people offering one of the greatest sceneries of humanity. How great those who realize the secret of life and reach the depth of humanity.
