Thursday, December 8, 2011


The Way of the Lord
Tom Wright


I have just recently run across the book The Way of the Lord. This is a must read for anyone who has an interest in the Holy Land. Written by one of my favorite Authors N.T. Wright. Nicholas Thomas "Tom" Wright is a leading New Testament scholar and former Bishop of Durham in the Church of England. His academic work has usually been published under the name N. T. Wright but works such as What St Paul Really Said and The Way of the Lord, which are aimed at a more popular readership, are published under the less formal name of Tom Wright. Among modern New Testament scholars, Wright is an important representative of more conservative Christian views. In this book Wright Vividly evokes the sights, sounds, and smells of the Holy Land. He explores the nature of pilgramage and explains not only what is to be seen but also the context of faith that makes these sites and the events associated with them profound. I am including an excerpt to give you a taste. 


"In all our pilgrimage, we begin by going back to our roots. When Christians go to the Holy Land today, we do not go because God is present there in a way in which he not in New York or Nottingham, Lichfield or London, in Melborne or Manchester. We go because the Holy Land is our place of roots, of beginnings; because the Lord whom we serve walked and talked in those places, laughed and wept and suffered in those places, and they carry a memory of him still, hard to describe or even to rationalize theologically, but yet of enormous power, Some have described the Land as in that sense a fifth Gospel, one which can bring the others into three-dimensional reality for us, so that we can both imagine Jesus by the lake, in the garden and on the cross, and also can sense his presence in new ways…not more or less valid then other ways, but for many a new dimension of their discipleship."

MASADA

Some of the 2011 Holy Land
group on top of Masada

Masada ("fortress" in Hebrew) is the name for a site of ancient palaces and fortifications on top of an isolated rock plateau, on the eastern edge of the Judean Desert, overlooking the Dead Sea. The cliffs on the east edge of Masada are about 1,300 feet high, making it easily defensible. The top of the plateau is flat and about 1,800 feet by 900 feet. There are remains of  a casemate wall around the top of the plateau with many towers. The fortress included storehouses, barracks, an armory, the palace, and cisterns that were refilled by rainwater. Herod the Great fortified Masada between 37 and 31 BC as a refuge for himself in the event of a revolt. In 66 AD, at the beginning of the First Jewish-Roman War, a group of Jewish extremists, called the Sicarii, overcame the Roman garrison of Masada. After the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD, additional members of the Sicarii and numerous Jewish families fled Jerusalem and settled on the mountaintop, using it as a base for harassing the Romans. In 72 AD, the notorious Roman Legion X Fretensis laid siege to Masada. The Roman's surrounded Masada and built a siege embankment against the western face of the plateau, moving thousands of tons of stones and beaten earth to do so. The rampart was complete in the spring of 73 AD, after probably two to three months of siege, allowing the Romans to finally breach the wall of the fortress with a battering ram on April 16. When Roman troops entered the fortress, they discovered that its 960 inhabitants had set all the buildings but the food storerooms ablaze and committed a mass suicide.
Date Palm grown from 2000 year
old seed found in Masada
While a hike up the Snake Path on the eastern side of the mountain is considered part of the "Masada experience," a cable car operates at the site for those who wish to avoid the physical exertion. Many of the ancient buildings have been restored from their remains, as have the wall-paintings of Herod's two main palaces, and the Roman-style bathhouses that he built. The synagogue, storehouses, and houses of the Jewish rebels have also been identified and restored. Water cisterns two-thirds of the way up the cliff drain the nearby wadis by an elaborate system of channels, which explains how the rebels managed to have enough water for such a long time In the area in front of the northern palace, eleven small ostraca (broken pieces of pottery with inscriptions) were recovered, each bearing a single name. One reads "ben Yair", the commander of the Jewish rebels. It has been suggested that the other ten names are those of the men chosen by lot to kill the others and then themselves.The remnants of a Byzantine church dating from the 5th and 6th centuries, have also been excavated on the top of Masada.The Chief of Staff of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), Moshe Dayan, initiated the practice of holding the swearing-in ceremony of soldiers who have completed their Tironut (IDF basic training) on top of Masada. The ceremony ends with the declaration: "Masada shall not fall again." The soldiers climb the Snake Path at night and are sworn in with torches lighting the background. A 2,000-year-old seed discovered during archaeological excavations in the early 1960s has been successfully germinated to become a date plant, the oldest known such germination.

 
Map of Masada:
1. snake path gate. 2. rebel dwellings. 3. Byzantine monastic cave. 4. eastern water  cistern. 5. rebel dwellings. 6. mikvah. 7. southern gate. 8. rebel dwellings. 9. southern water cistern.10.southern fort. 11. swimming pool. 12. small palace. 13. round columbarium tower. 14. mosaic workshop. 15. small palace. 16. small palace. 17. public immersion pool.
18-21. Western Palace: 18. service area. 19. residential area. 20. storerooms. 21. administrative area. 22. tanners' tower. 23. western Byzantine gate. 24. columbarium towers. 25. synagogue. 26. Byzantine church. 27. barracks.
28-39. Northern Palace: 28. grand residence. 29. quarry. 30. commandant’s headquarters. 31. tower. 32. administration building. 33. gate. 34. storerooms. 35. bathhouse. 36. water gate.
37-39. Herod's Palace: 37. upper terrace. 38. middle terrace. 39. lower terrace. A. ostraca cache found in casemate. B. Herod's throne room. C. colorful mosaic. D. Roman breaching point. E. coin cache found. F. ostraca cache found. G. three skeletons found.







Monday, December 5, 2011

The Tombs of the Kings

2nd in a series…Jerusalem underground

The Tomb of the Kings. Photo by Ferrell Jenkins.
It is likely that we will be staying at the Olive Tree hotel In East Jerusalem…The tomb complex is just a couple of blocks from this hotel.
The Tombs of the Kings are a collection of rock cut

Map of the Tomb of the Kings
tombs in East Jerusalem, 820 meters north of the Old City in Al-Shaykh Jarrah suburb of East Jerusalem
The grandeur of the site lead to the mistaken belief that the tombs had once been the burial place of the kings of Judah, hence the name Tombs of the Kings, but the tombs are now known to be the tomb of Queen Helena of Adiabene.  Queen Helena chose the site to bury her son Isates and others of her dynasty. In 1847 the Ottoman governor of Jerusalem started excavation at the site. The excavation was then followed in 1863 by French archaeologists The tombs are located underneath a piece of land that has a small stone house on top of it. The house was built by and inhabited by a Muslim family called up until mid 1990s, when they have been prevented from going back to Jerusalem due to the occupation. The tomb was described by the Greek geographer Pausanias as the second most beautiful tomb in the world (after the tomb of Mausolus, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world). there is a 30 foot wide staircase (23 steps) that was originally paved and leads to a forecourt. The rain water is collected in baths, which are carved in the steps, and carried via a channel system to the water wells. At the bottom of the stairs there is a gate that leads to a courtyard that is roughly 75 feet square
The entrance to the tombs is in this courtyard. The tombs are entered  through a rock-cut arch (facade) in the western side. 75 foot facade was crowned with three pyramids, which no longer exist, and decorated with reliefs of grapes, plexus leaves, acorns and fruit, reflecting the Greek architectural style. The tombs are arranged on two levels around a central chamber, with four rooms upstairs and three rooms downstairs. The central chamber itself is entered from the courtyard via an antechamber that goes down into a dimly lit maze of chambers. The access from the antechamber to the exterior courtyard could be sealed closed by rolling a round stone across it, and the stone still remains at the site. Two of the eight burial chambers have arcosolia, resting places made of a bench with an arch over it. Some of the arcosolia have triangular niches where oil lamps were placed to give light during the burial process.

File:Helena of Adiabene Sarcophagus 1.JPG
The Sarcophagus of Helena of Adiabene
The two most common types of tombs in the first century BC are found in this tomb complex. Shaft tombs were long narrow shafts in which the deceased were placed and closed with a stone slab which probably had the name of the occupant inscribed on it. The tombs are now empty, but previously housed a number of sarcophagus; they were excavated by a French archaeological mission headed by Louis Felicien de Saulcy, who took them back to France, where they are exhibited at the Louvre. The Sarcophagus of Helena of Adiabene rests at the Israeli museum.

Thursday, December 1, 2011

Jerusalem Bagels
A common sight, especialy in the Old City. Best enjoyed still warm and dipped in olive oil and za'atar.
  • 1 cup  water
  • 1 cup whole milk
  • 4 Tablespoons butter
  • 1/4 cup honey
  • 2 teaspoons salt
  • 6-7 cups bread flour
  • 1 tablespoon SAF yeast
  • 1 egg white mixed with 1 Tablespoon water 
  • sesame seeds
  • za'atar  and olive oil for dipping.
  1. preheat oven to 350. Place an empty heavy cookie sheet in the bottom of the oven so you can create steam when you bake your bagels.
  2. mix water, milk, butter, salt and honey together and bring just to a simmer. remove from heat and let cool to room temperature.
  3. Add 5 sups of flour  and yeast and kneed with a dough hook or by hand, adding flour until you have a smooth , elastic dough. (about 8 minutes)
  4. place dough ball on the counter and cover with a damp cloth. Allow the dough to rise until double in size.
  5. Gently deflate dough and divide it up into six. Roll each portion into a ball and let rest, covered with a damp towel for 10 minutes.  
  6. To make each bagel, push your finger through the center of the ball and gently start to pull and roll  until you have a ring about 9 inches across.
  7. Place the finished bagels, two to a pan, on a parchment-lined cookie sheet, stretching them into an oval shape.
  8. Brush each bagel with the egg white water wash and then sprinkle on sesame seeds. Cover with a damp towel and allow to rise until doubled in size.   
  9. place pan in oven and pour a 1/2 cup of water into empty pan. Close oven door immedietly and bake at 350 for about 25 minutes until they are a golden brown color