Shabbat Shalom, Nabi Samwil, Negev, Jericho, etc.

Eres tov y'all. Another great week in Syria-Palestinia (Roman term). Stone throwing, Fiddler on the Roof dancing, and the oldest city in the world. I feel like I need to give another disclaimer that this is a fairly shotgun approach to my experience. My experience itself is fairly shotgun, one day we are looking at 10000 year old brick and the next day we are in the New Testement and the next day we are in 1948. 

Tomb is straight ahead. This was a bit of a sneaky shot.

Nabi Samwil: Our first day long field trip was a journey to the high places of Jerusalem so that we could get some sweet overlookage of the region. One of the critical northern mountains was Nabi Samwil which was a strategic point of defense which currently is a Jewish shrine but which was built by the Muslims and has significant Christian Crusader ruins remaining. The tomb is the traditional burial spot of the prophet Samuel. The shrine is a holy place to Jews and it was super interesting to go down into this tomb and hear the Jews pray and even blow the Shofar (ram horn).   

My roomate Brandon and I at the Wall. Closest we could get using electricity (forbidden on Sabbath).

Shabbat at the Western Wall: Loved welcoming in the Sabbath with the Jews at the Western Wall. Jews revere this site as the most sacred place in Judaism because it is adjacent to the Temple Mount and they do not want to go on the Temple Mount for fear of stepping on the spot where the Holy of Holies used to be. Also, the Muslims have built a mosque and shrine on the temple mount and have control of it. The atmosphere at the Western Wall as the sun was going down on Friday was electric. Many people were dancing and singing and we were able to join the circles and blabber our nonsense Hebrew attempts. I noticed the day after how scuffed my shoes were (its quite a crowded place) and it was a "I never want to shine these shoes again" moment.

Ancient cistern in Beersheva

Lower portion of Tel Arad

Negev: Negev means south and we ventured down there to visit a women bedouin wool making business. The bedouin are basically the Native Americans of the Arabian Peninsula. After we went to Tel Arad and Tel Beersheva. Tel means hill and essentially are these archealogical sites where digs of ancient cities occur. Typically civilizations just build on top of each other and so these sites just have layers and layers of different time periods and people. Tel Arad was a southern settlement controlled by Saul at one point and dating back to 3000 BCE. After we went to the home of Abraham, Tel Beersheva. There were some crazy cool wells and cisterns. These sites were all centered around water, water is a big deal I guess.

The teachers let us toss rocks down these 100 ft wells

Inside the huge Beersheva cisterns

 

This is my attempt at creating a shofar to blow and make the walls fall down at Jericho

Jericho: The oldest site we will visit, 10000 years old, located in the West Bank, pretty important place for Joshua to conquer.  

The Palestinians have made Jericho into a pretty cool oasis

This cathedral in Ein Karem commemorates all the great women of the Bible

Notice the aquaduct on left built by Herod the Great, still works

Overlook of Jerusalem from the Center at sunset

Lots of cool people have stayed here. Also the hotel which Zionist terrorists blew up in 1946. 

Shalom, Brief Israel Geography, Garden Tomb, a little bit of Temple Mount stuff

Shalom and marhaba from the Holy Land. I apoligize firstly to those who have been waiting what has felt like a lifetime for my blog posts to begin and secondly I apoligize to those who don't actually know I am horrible at everything pictures and so I don't have much as far as that goes. I know you don't have all day to read this blog so I am going to share some quick quips from my adventures and invite you to ask any follow-ups to my brief words. I will be making a weekly entry and will try to not be too extreme in politcal or spiritual things, but that just comes with the territory.  

BYU Jerusalem Center

The JC sits on Mount Scopus adjacent to the Mount of Olives. The JC is a state-of-the-art building with pristine gardens, a large glass auditorium with an impressive organ, nice housing luxuries, great security, and a ping-pong table. The tower in the upper right is the Augusta Victoria Hospital/ Lutheran Church of Ascension. Students make a 15 minute walk through East Jerusalem to get into the Old City where this picture was taken. One of the great things about studying in the Near East is seeing signs and hearing about random biblical geography. The Kidron Valley is at the bottom of the picture and continues running south into the Hinnom Valley. I love the Palestinian flag flying at the bottom right. Here is a quick breakdown of Palestinian-Israeli geography: The land of Israel was under Ottoman Empire rule until World War I when it was put under British Mandate. In 1948 todays boundaries excluding the West Bank (Jordan), Golan Heights (Syria), and the Gaza Strip (Eqypt) were given to the new Israeli State. In 1967 Israel attacked the surrounding countries and gained control of the three areas mentioned above. The JC is located in East Jerusalem on land that used to be under Jordanian/Palestinian control and thus it is inhabitated by Arab Israelis who don't enjoy full Israeli citizenship. The Old City in the middle of Jerusalsem is divided between Muslims, Jews, Armenians, and Christians. West Jerusalsem is completely Jewish land.   

Me at tomb entrance

Our first Sunday in Jerusalem we went to the Garden Tomb. The tomb was rediscovered in the 19th century and is ran by Protestant Christians. It is just North of the Old City and the Christians there do a great job of running the place. They are very clear in establishing that the place of Christs death, burial, and ressurection is less important than the fact that it happened. This is interesting to contrast with the other place in Jerusalem where Christians claim Christ suffered. That place is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre which is located inside the city and is controlled by Orthodox and Catholic churchs, which naturally gives it much more of an ancient/idolatrous feel. The four reasons many Christians think the Garden Tomb fits the bill includes: Location outside the city wall, location at teh crossroads of two major highways would have made exposure for the event desirable for Roman leadership, the spot was located on an ancient Jewish stoning ground and the Romans replaced the stoning practice with crucification, and lastly is the indentations in the rock wall adjacent to the tomb has the appearance of a skull (Golgotha=place of the skull). Within the tomb itself there were Christian symbols bored into the walls and the wine press also in the garden dates to the time of Christ.   

1st century wine press right by tomb

Inside Garden Tomb (smaller then I expected)

Golgotha (can't see well from this angle the lower indentation but "eyes" of skull are below what today is a Muslim cemetery)

One of the great things about our schedule (and me with my anti-do homework agenda particualry) is that we have time to go and explore the Old City. One of the days we spent at the Temple Mount. I enjoyed seeing soldiers praying at the Western Wall which is considered by Jews as the most effective palce to pray in the world. Jews wont go on the Temple Mount itself because they aren't sure where the Holy of Holies was and don't want to walk over that. Also the Temple Mount today is the third most holy place for Muslims as the 7th century Dome of the Rock and El-Asqa Mosgue are there.

Soldiers are everywhere out here

Dome of the Rock and a fountain for Muslims to wash before prayer

Dome of Rock upper left, Western Wall lower left, El-Asqa Mosque right

Some sheep being shepherded. Kinda cool.