That's funny and a clever idea!
JERUSALEM - Jews too lazy or busy to visit Jerusalem's Western Wall are sending their prayers by mobile phone text message to a rabbi who places a printed copy in the holy site's stone crevasses.
"Not everyone has the means or time to get there," said Gal Wagner on Wednesday, an official from the company that began offering the service two weeks ago for about $1.20.
The service is a high-tech alternative for Jews who traditionally put prayers or wishes in the Old City's Western Wall in the hope they will come true.
As a retaining wall of one of the biblical Jewish temples, the Western Wall is one of Judaism's holiest sites.
So far 30,000 text messages have been received. Israeli cellular phone users send the text message with their prayers to the number "1818," numbers which in Jewish tradition symbolize life. At the moment the service is not available to people living abroad.
The messages are received on a computer, collated and then faxed to a rabbi at the Western Wall who is paid by Wagner's company to tear off each message and insert it between the stones of the ancient wall.
"We promise to put the message in the Western Wall within 24 hours of it being sent," Wagner said.
He added his was the first company to offer a text messaging service for the Western Wall. An Israeli company offers to put faxed messages from Jews living abroad in the wall.