Israel Day 3
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Phil's Journal
|
We boarded
our coach the third morning outside the western shores of the Sea of
Galilee and traveled south on route 90 through the old city of Tiberius.
Not stopping, we continued south to our first stop at the place called Gesher. Gesher means bridge in Hebrew and we soon found
out why. We entered Gesher which originally in the mid 20th century
began as a kibbutz. It resides on the banks of the Jordan River. The
obviously was a perfect place for a bridge because the Romans, Turks and
Jews all built bridges there. During the 1930's a Russian Jewish
architect (Pinchas Rutenberg) designed and helped build a hydroelectric
power plant on the east (Jordan) side of the Jordan River at Gesher.
After Israel declared its independence in 1948 and the war with the
Arabs began, Gesher was bombed and the bridges and power plant were all
destroyed. Gesher kibbutz survived (slightly inland now). We also saw
the electric fence border that divides Jordan from Israel here. From here we traveled south to the city now known as Bet She'an. Here, a huge archeological dig has uncovered the magnificent remains of the Roman City know as Scythopolis. At this strategic location, a large Roman city was uncovered during a 20 year dig that showed a huge bath house, hot and cold running water and a central sewage system that flowed under the city. Earthquakes early in the first millennium destroyed this city until the Turks and then the Crusaders rebuilt it. Each layer of dirt has been carefully removed to show the grandeur of the city. At the east end of the city, high on a hillside was a tribute to Zeus and also part of the 1973 filming of Jesus Christ Superstar. We left the ruins for a lunch in Bet She'an of the best falafel in Israel. Incredibly we experienced an 80% solar eclipse during this lunch that we all marveled at. |
We then
drove to the top of
Mount
Gilboa where our guide described to us the struggle that King Saul
had fighting the Philistines. We also got to see the very rare mountain
Iris growing amongst the wild flowers. From our perch, we could see
into Palestinian occupied lands including the city of Jenin where many
suicidal terrorists came from. We reboarded our bus and incredibly
entered the real West Bank zone for a drive south to the Dead Sea. All
along our way, we could see the security fence built to keep out the
terrorists. But the amazing thing was that we were on the inside of the
fence!! Fencing in the Palestinians is more complicated that you
understand from the States. You see, even though the Palestinians
control this land politically, Israel never gave up control of the roads
in this Palestinian controlled land! Confused, we traveled south to
the Dead Sea. Here we passed the city of Jericho where Joshua was
given the leadership of the Jews from Moses. We learned how he won the
battle and control of the city. Our last stop for the day was the ancient city of Qumran, the home of the famous Dead Sea Scrolls. The land here suddenly changed from prairie to that resembling the Bad Lands in South Dakota. The area is just west of the northern Dead Sea and consists of caves in the wind blown dessert area. Here, a sect of Jews broke away to become the Essenes. The Essenes lived here without women and carefully copied the Old Testament on scrolls. In 1947, a group of Bedouins discovered the first scrolls. Since then thousands of scrolls have been discovered in these cliffs. The bible had been passed down for 2000 years to what we have today. These scrolls however were shown to be identical to the script we use today. This amazing find, both reinforces our acceptance of the Bible as accurate and provides some evidence to Christians that Jesus may have been one of these Essenes who then continued on with his ministry. |
