Masada and the Dead Sea

T.V. mini-series became popular in my late teens and early 20s, and I remember loving them and waiting for the weekly installments:  Roots,  Rich Man/Poor Man, The Thorn Birds, and last but not least, Masada.  The dramatic story of the band of Jewish rebels who resisted Roman invasion from 66-72 CE  on a huge rock in the middle of the desert was very appealing to me, so I decided to take a day trip to visit the site.  Since pretty much everything I knew about this landmark was gleaned from the Peter Strauss and Peter O'Toole's portrayals, I had a lot to learn.  First of all, I didn't know that Masada had been built on this naturally fortified plateau by Herod the Great between 37 and 31 BCE.  Herod was rather a paranoid person, and built lots of palaces that he could escape to in case of invasion from Egypt.  Herod filled  huge storerooms with food and built an elaborate water system including  several water cisterns filled to the brim just in case he needed to hold out there for a long period of time.  He didn't end up needing these, but they served the Zealots well, as these stored provisions were how they survived as long as they did on Masada.

It was a long ride out to Masada!!
(well, I didn't really ride the camel ALL the way!)

Masada

Remains of buildings on Masada

Herod's storage rooms that were filled with food

The people of  Masada kept doves here as a source of fertilizer and meat.

 Of course, if you've seen the movie, you know that when it became evident that the Romans would breach the wall and take the fortress, the Jewish rebels decided that it was better to die than to be taken as slaves, so almost 1000 people committed mass suicide here.  Only 2 women and 5 children survived, hiding in a cistern, and from these people Josephus learned of the story and wrote the history.

View from Masada:  you can see the ramp the Romans built
to take siege of the rebels here.

The accounts of the historian, Josephus, say that the men of
Masada had their names written of pieces of pottery and they
 drew lots to see who would kill the others and at last, kill themselves.
Finding these pottery shards with names written on them here at
Masada was an incredible discovery, confirming the story.

" A victory? What have we won? We've won a rock in the middle of a wasteland, on the shores of a poisoned sea."

Well, after a rather sobering morning on Masada, it was time to beat the heat and take a trip to that poisoned sea, the beautiful, but lifeless, Dead Sea.  

The proper process here is to smear yourself with
mud from the sea........

......then go for a float.  You really don't have to try to float at all,
just tip back and enjoy. You can even float standing
straight up, with your arms above your head, which I did.  To move about,
I just kind of pedaled my legs as if I were riding a unicycle.
A fun way to end the day!

Bethlehem, Hebron and Walls

This is what it might look like if Jesus were born today,
a wall separating the shepherds from the manger.

On my third day in the Holy Land I took a Green Olive Tour which is an alternative tour group that works with the  Palestinian Lutheran Church.  We took a bus through the checkpoints to Bethlehem where our first stop was the wall that divides Palestine from Israel.  We walked along the wall and looked at the images (some by the famed graffiti artist, Banksy) and tried to understand how complicated these walls make life in this region.  We were told that when outsiders come for a day, they feel they can write a book about the situation, after a week, they can write an article, after a month, they can maybe write a sentence, and after longer than that they realize there is really no way to explain it.  Walls, checkpoints, armed guards, that's what the Little Town of Bethlehem has to deal with today.

I'm no Banksy, but I left my mark on the Wall

                                                                 

This is in a  Palestinian Refugee Camp where
a second generation of children are
growing up as refugees in their own country.

We continued from the wall to Manger Square and the Church of the Nativity. This church was originally commissioned  in 327 AD by Constantine and his mother, Helena and built over the birthplace of Jesus.  

Inside the Church of the Nativity

The Door of Humility is the Main Entrance
to the Church of the Nativity

This is believed to be over the place the manger was located.

Icon of Mary and Jesus

I got to touch the place under the altar that is believed
 to be over the spot Jesus was born.  

Another view of the inside the Church of the Nativity

We went down into the Grotto of the Nativity to the  location of Jesus' birth and the location of the manger where he was laid.    Entering into the cave and placing my hands on these holy sites was very moving experience.  I've always known these were real places, but it still seemed like stepping into a beloved storybook, but in this case the book was the Bible.











Our next stop was the city of Hebron.  Hebron is especially confusing, as there are Israeli settlements around and even above the Palestinian city.  Our guide was a Christian Palestinian, and he wasn't allowed to walk down many of the streets we could walk down as tourists.   The Palestinian areas are pretty depressing.   There was one area where the wall cut 3 families off from the rest of the town.  There is almost no way for these families to make money, but one thing they can do is cook for tourists.  We had a very nice lunch in one of the homes there while talking to family members about their experiences living inside the wall.  They told us how their children had been attacked on the way to school and how there is little hope for the future as things are now.  They are cut off from their relatives and their family farms and ancestral homes.  I asked one young man if Israelis and Palestinians ever married one another and he said he had been in love with an Israeli girl, but her father was a rabbi who would not allow her to marry him.  They explained to us how they are prisoners in their own homes and told us that there are more soldiers than settlers that the soldiers are guarding.  It was interesting to get this side of the story--so interesting that I forgot to take photos, unfortunately.

There is an Israeli settlement above this Palestinian street,
so nets are strung across the top of the  road to prevent the
settlers from throwing things into the street. 

Guards at Checkpoint

All in all, this was such a day of contradictions--visiting the birthplace of the Prince of Peace in an area that hasn't known peace in such a long time.  Or perhaps it's not a contradiction at all, as Jesus and His family left Bethlehem as refugees too when they heard from the Wise Men that King Herod wanted to find the newborn king.   

 ♪ ♪ Oh little town of Bethlehem,
How still we see thee lie,
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep,
The silent stars go by.
Yet in thy dark streets shineth,
The everlasting Light,
The hopes and fears of all the years,
Are met in thee tonight.  ♪  ♪

Easter in Jerusalem

My first morning in Jerusalem was Easter Sunday.  I saw a notice on the door of the kitchen at the Lutheran World Federation Guesthouse advertising an Easter Sunrise Service at 5:30 a.m. on the Mount of Olives, just a few minute's walk from the Guesthouse, so I decided to go.  I got up early and walked toward the spot described on the notice, but on my way  I met a group of worshippers coming out of the church next-door carrying lanterns and walking in silence through the darkness.  It was just so beautiful,  I couldn't help but join in the procession, not knowing where I was headed. They circled around the mount to the backside of the Augusta Victoria campus and entered another church, while I continued on to find a path lined with luminaries leading to the location of the Sunrise Service which had just begun.  The service was led by husband and wife pastors from America, and in some ways seemed so familiar, as we repeated the refrains "He is Risen/He is Risen Indeed" and sang the Easter hymns.  But as the sun began to rise, it became more and more evident that I was not at my home church in Roseville, California, where I have enjoyed greeting Easter morning the past 20 years, but in a hilltop olive grove overlooking Jerusalem.  Awe-some!

Sunrise Service on the Mount of Olives

Seeing the sun come up while we worshipped.

This is the group I celebrated Easter dawn with, but you can see a little
further on there is another group.  Little groups were all over the Mount of Olives
worshipping in different styles and languages.

Me on the Mount of Olives Easter Morning

Another view from the Mount of Olives

After service, I made my way down the mount to the Old City of Jerusalem, which is within the city walls and entered by one of several gates.  My goal for the day was to walk to along the Via Dolorosa.  I stopped at each station of the cross, including the Rock of Calvary where Jesus was crucified and the tomb in which he was buried, being contained within the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

Damascus Gate

Easter parade through the Old City of Jerusalem

The fifth station of the cross, where Jesus leaned against this wall
and Simon of Cyrene was enlisted to help him carry the cross.

At the Ninth Station of the Cross where
Jesus fell for the 3rd time.  

Stone of Golgotha, site of the Crucifixion and
12th Station of the Cross.  I was able to kneel under this altar
and reach down into the hole in which the cross of
Jesus was placed.  

At the stone where Jesus' body was anointed for burial

The Holy Sepulchre, the tomb of Jesus, 14th Station of the Cross
Take note. it's empty!  So special to be here on Easter!

I attended a Greek Orthodox Service in the
Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

The Western Wall where many Jewish people pray
as they are not allowed any closer to the Temple
Mound where you can see the Dome of the Rock
in the background.

Exploring the Old City of Jerusalem and actually standing in these holy sites was really rather surreal. This was definitely an Easter I will always remember!

Israel, the First 24 Hours

Windsurfers at Sunset on the Mediterranean Sea

All my life I've read about the Holy Land, so traveling to Israel was a dream come true.  After landing at Ben Gurion airport, I headed to the Mediterranean Sea where I walked along the beach watching the windsurfers at sunset.  I found my hostel in Tel Aviv and set my alarm to catch an early bus to the childhood home of Jesus, Nazareth.   There I went to the Basilica of the Annunciation, which was built over the spot where the angel Gabriel told Mary that she would be the mother of the Son of God.   My friend, Kim, recently asked me if I have had any Mary sightings, and I had to laugh, as this place is "Mary Central".  All around the courtyard and the upper church are mosaics of Mary. Each one was made in a different country in a style characteristic of that nation.  Below the church is the grotto on the spot of  the angelic announcement.  Not far from the Basilica is  St. Joseph's Church, which was built at the site of Joseph's carpentry shop.  

Grotto of the Annunciation

Mary's jacket  is made of real pearls in
this mosaic from Japan

This could be the site of Joseph's Carpentry Shop

Statues of the Holy Family in Nazareth

 From Nazareth I continued on to the shores of the Sea of Galilee where Jesus multiplied the 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish to feed 5000 people.  There is a church there with a mosaic depicting the loaves and fish in the floor in front of the altar, which dates from the 5th century.   Of course, I stopped to eat fish at a restaurant on the Galilean shore.

Sea of Galilee

Fish right out of the Sea of Galilee!

These little critters were all over Galilee

Ruins of Capernaum, the home of  Peter, Andrew,
James, John and Matthew

Next stop, the Jordan River, where many people were being baptised.  I couldn't resist a little wade in the water.

Wading in the Jordan River

From the Jordan River, my bus took me to Jerusalem where I made my way up the Mount of Olives to the Lutheran World Federation Guesthouse where I would be spending the next 5 nights.  My first 24 hours in Israel were fabulous!  Not a bad way to start my spring break!