אדריכלות ישראלית - גיליון 123

what will be the end What will be the end is one of the most popular questions any worried Yentl asks himself and, lately 90% of worried Israeli citizens, who wear a mask on the chin when no-one is looking. This question reminds me of the endless arguments I had with my brother Udi when rowing the flat boat towards the horizon – the only non-existent place that has no end. The argument was about the "simple" question of where the universe ends – if it does, what lies beyond it, and if not – how can a physical essence have no end. Udi recruited evolution, and I – recruited God. He repeatedly claimed that everything is Darwinist, and I’d adhere to the default definition of God as something "beyond human comprehension". But the fact that no-one has ever provided a reasonable explanation for the question re-confirms Man’s relative futility before God or Evolution, whatever these may be. And therefore, we human beings should stop patronising other creatures who even with their nano-brains, still manage to teach us from where Corona pees. Although I by no means suffer from a large brain I still have an imagination or I wouldn’t be the editor of an architectural magazine who spends his days sweating like a woman in labor. And according to the fact that there is no finite physical entity, the only logical answer is that the universe is nothing but an abstract entity, like mathematics or ideas that can be developed again and again. An abstract void that contains physical components like stars, suns and worlds. This mathematical notion I learned auto- didactically, escaping once from class to listen to the neighbours’ radio bellowing Uri Zohar and ChaimTopol’s sketch, "Contra re Contra" into the street. The two took a bet on who could imagine the larger number and each time one of them said a number, the other would add three hundred and seventy-four, and win. According to Conspiracy Theory, God doesn’t really create things but merely throws abstract ideas into the air and things make themselves, such as - loneliness that is supposed to teach us the importance of togetherness; fire that highlights the importance of water, and death which comes to show us the value of life. From the incomparable Amir Dadon, I learned that infinity exists… but the rain that surprised us washed everything away… remember how we met, broken on some shore, trying not to drown, we only tried to breathe a little….we wanted just to touch, we wanted just to be… how we struggled to hold on, not fall, see how we vanished when dreams disappeared… And contrary to what we believe when having a barbecue, God doesn’t really distinguish between all living things, each of which experiences the world from his own perspective, each has its own end. The best example of this is the story of theman who heard a knock at the door, opened it and to his disappointment saw a tiny snail. Annoyed at being disturbed, he kicked it down the steps. Two days later, another knock. The man opens the door and to his surprise finds the same snail who looks directly at him and asks in a hurt voice: tell me, why did you have to do that to me…? What will be the end asked Leah Goldberg, will heaven stand still? Which seed will the winds carry? Which flower will bloom on our graves? I pray it will be a white anemone edged in blue, and that two boys will sing in the street rather than shout out slogans, and we will no longer have to be worried about our end. Architect, Dr. Ami Ran editorial Editorial Aesthetic and functional aspects of natural light and artificial lighting in architecture