I got up early today, to take a few photos of the Sea of Galilee before our departure. It had just rained, and the sun was shining through the rain clouds.
Across the lake I could see the modern town of Tiberias, and further north, the mountains of Galilee.
We set out for our journey back to Jerusalem - passing the site of Magdala along the way (where Mary Magdalene came from), as well as Mount Gilboa, where Saul and three of his sons died in battle with the Philistines (1 Samuel 31). The countryside, of course, is just full of sites of significance to biblical history. We were actually heading for Bet She'an (a city with a history as far back as the fifth millenium BC, due to its strategic site at the junction of the Jordan River Valley and the Jezreel Valley). The high point above the city had a wonderful view right out to the hills of Jordan. In Hellenistic times a city called Scythopolis was built on this site. In Jesus' time, Scythopolis was the capital of the group of cities known as the Decapolis, and the most important city in northern Israel. Like the other cities in the Galilee area, it was of mixed Jewish and Gentile population.
Bet She'an/Scythopolis was an extensive site, but I spent most of my time in the bath house (so to speak).
Bet She'an/Scythopolis was an extensive site, but I spent most of my time in the bath house (so to speak).
This is the hypocaust. The little brick pillars supported a floor under which hot air was circulated, to create a sauna effect in the room above. There were a whole series of panels explaining what happened in the bath house - which I won't bore you with here! But it certainly absorbed my attention and so I didn't go exploring more widely on this site.
The next place on our itinerary was Jericho. The guide books make the claim that this is the oldest continually inhabited city on earth, with remains going back to the proto-Neolithic period (10,000-8,500 BC). The Jericho tell, known as Tell es-Sultan has 17 identifiable layers in it – before 1,500 BC! Many of the finer archaeological details escaped me, but I was interested by a talk that the Dean gave about archaeology in the Holy Land.
He said that archaeology only really developed as a discipline in the middle of the 19th century, and that the earliest archaeologists were said to come to the Holy Land with a Bible in one hand and a spade in the other. They had expectations of what they would find, which were formed by the biblical text. Quite often their work showed that the biblical text was based on accurate historical memory. At times, however, the result was that they found what they were looking for because they interpreted their evidence to support their presuppositions. An example of this is the work of John Garstang in the 20th century, who found in the Jericho tell a second millennium BC wall that had been destroyed and he argued that it was the one destroyed by Joshua and the invading Israelites in the 14th century BC. A later archaeologist, Kathleen Kenyon, focused on the same evidence and argued that this destruction came at a time a few centuries earlier than the Israelites’ entry into Canaan. This latter view still holds the greater weight in the archeological world. The Dean made the point that archaeology is far from an exact science, as it involves not only discovery but also interpretation.
The contentious ‘wall’ is the brick layer in the picture below, a little below a stone layer.
Right next to Jericho is a mountain traditionally identified as the Mount of Temptation. You can get an idea of the kind of desert Jesus was in for 40 days and nights, up on that mountain.
The Greek Orthodox church have long had a monastery in this inhospitable place.
In contrast, modern Jericho, as seen from Tell es-Sultan, looked green and really quite beautiful.
After a nice lunch at a local restaurant, we headed back towards Jerusalem and stopped for a time of reflection at Wadi Qelt, an area just off the main highway, from which you could see bits of the old Roman road from Jericho to Jerusalem (the road that features in Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan). You could see how the Roman road construction followed the wadi, so that travellers could find water and also shade from the trees that grew by the water.
In the evening we had an interesting lecture from Naim Ateek, a Palestinian Anglican priest and director of the organisation Sabeel, which aims to promote peace through dialogue between the three main religions of the Holy Land (Jewish, Muslim and Christian). His lecture provoked quite a lot of discussion amongst our group. I found one thing he said particularly memorable. He said that the issue of a just peace and solution to the current situation between Israel and the Palestinians related to theological views about God, about others and about the land. Is God only the God of Israel, or is he equally the God of the Palestinians and as interested in justice for them as for the Jews? Is he concerned about how his people (Jewish, Muslim and Christian) treat each other? And has he given the land to only one group or to all peoples to live in? Although these perspectives don’t provide any easy answers to the difficult questions, they do provide a way of working towards some answers.
The next place on our itinerary was Jericho. The guide books make the claim that this is the oldest continually inhabited city on earth, with remains going back to the proto-Neolithic period (10,000-8,500 BC). The Jericho tell, known as Tell es-Sultan has 17 identifiable layers in it – before 1,500 BC! Many of the finer archaeological details escaped me, but I was interested by a talk that the Dean gave about archaeology in the Holy Land.
He said that archaeology only really developed as a discipline in the middle of the 19th century, and that the earliest archaeologists were said to come to the Holy Land with a Bible in one hand and a spade in the other. They had expectations of what they would find, which were formed by the biblical text. Quite often their work showed that the biblical text was based on accurate historical memory. At times, however, the result was that they found what they were looking for because they interpreted their evidence to support their presuppositions. An example of this is the work of John Garstang in the 20th century, who found in the Jericho tell a second millennium BC wall that had been destroyed and he argued that it was the one destroyed by Joshua and the invading Israelites in the 14th century BC. A later archaeologist, Kathleen Kenyon, focused on the same evidence and argued that this destruction came at a time a few centuries earlier than the Israelites’ entry into Canaan. This latter view still holds the greater weight in the archeological world. The Dean made the point that archaeology is far from an exact science, as it involves not only discovery but also interpretation.
The contentious ‘wall’ is the brick layer in the picture below, a little below a stone layer.
Right next to Jericho is a mountain traditionally identified as the Mount of Temptation. You can get an idea of the kind of desert Jesus was in for 40 days and nights, up on that mountain.
The Greek Orthodox church have long had a monastery in this inhospitable place.
In contrast, modern Jericho, as seen from Tell es-Sultan, looked green and really quite beautiful.
After a nice lunch at a local restaurant, we headed back towards Jerusalem and stopped for a time of reflection at Wadi Qelt, an area just off the main highway, from which you could see bits of the old Roman road from Jericho to Jerusalem (the road that features in Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan). You could see how the Roman road construction followed the wadi, so that travellers could find water and also shade from the trees that grew by the water.
In the evening we had an interesting lecture from Naim Ateek, a Palestinian Anglican priest and director of the organisation Sabeel, which aims to promote peace through dialogue between the three main religions of the Holy Land (Jewish, Muslim and Christian). His lecture provoked quite a lot of discussion amongst our group. I found one thing he said particularly memorable. He said that the issue of a just peace and solution to the current situation between Israel and the Palestinians related to theological views about God, about others and about the land. Is God only the God of Israel, or is he equally the God of the Palestinians and as interested in justice for them as for the Jews? Is he concerned about how his people (Jewish, Muslim and Christian) treat each other? And has he given the land to only one group or to all peoples to live in? Although these perspectives don’t provide any easy answers to the difficult questions, they do provide a way of working towards some answers.
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