Do
I lack madmen…?
(1
Samuel, 21,15)
Every year approximately one hundred tourists suffering from a strange syndrome are hospitalized at the Kfar Shaul Psychiatric facility in Jerusalem. Most of them are American Protestants believing themselves to be Mary Magdalene, John the Baptist or even Jesus Christ himself, who have been found preaching and prophesying around the old city. Professor Bar-el, who has been studying and treating this phenomenon for years, believes that these people suffer from the "Jerusalem Syndrome", a condition brought on by a mystical-religious experience peculiar to the city.
The cause for this sudden madness, according to Bar-el, is the disappointment people feel when they see the biblical places in the modern-day setting.
Their desire to ascend to a more spiritual state in the wake of this disappointment
eventually leads to unusual and bizarre behaviour.
The symptoms
often appear on the second day in town, when they don white cloaks in
order to resemble the biblical figures with whom they identify.
This syndrome rarely leads to behaviour which endangers the peace or the
public, but some temporary psychiatric intervention is often necessary.
Bar-el found some resemblance to the "Stendhal Syndrome" of Florence,
a similar condition brought on by reactions to works of art and the beauty
of the city itself.