Confusion over a Jewish man practicing an ancient religious tradition brought a South Shore train to a halt early Thursday.Before the misunderstanding was resolved, Metra police and a bomb-sniffing dog were called to a Chicago train stop to investigate.Robert Byrd, chief of transit police for the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District, said passengers on Train No. 108 out of East Chicago told the ticket collector they believed a man on the 6:46 a.m. train was dressed strangely and acting suspiciously.
The man was described as wearing a head piece with a box on the front of it. Passengers said the box had wires sticking out of it. Other wires led down his arm, they reported.
When the man did not respond to repeated inquiries by the South Shore ticket collector and conductor, crews called Metra police as they approached the Illinois passenger train company’s tracks in Chicago.
The South Shore crew stopped the train at the 57th Street station in Chicago, where they were met by Metra police and a bomb-sniffing dog.
The man explained that he was Jewish and was in the middle of reciting his daily morning prayers when the South Shore crew tried to question him.
The box on his head did not contain wires, he said, but rather, leather straps which bind the box to his head. More leather straps bind another box to his arm.
In Hebrew, the items are called tefillin, two black leather boxes containing religious verses hand-written on scrolls. The verses comprise the prayer “Shema Yisrael,” which begins with the phrase, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.”
The boxes are bound by the leather straps to the left bicep and the center of the forehead and are worn by observant men over the age of 13 during daily morning prayer, except on the Sabbath and scriptural holy days.
I wonder why the man in question could not have said his prayers in his home, prior to getting on the train? There is nothing wrong with praying on a train, but the bible speaks against form and fashion. In fact, the scriptures advise us to go into our “private” prayer closet to pray. In other words, don’t put on a show. Some of these old customs are more legalistic than anything else.
NOTE: The pictures presented serve only to show you what the teffillin tradition looks like and are not images of the man who was on the train.
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