Day 3: Archaeology and Final Day in Galilee

April 05, 2023

Shalom and As-salaam Alaikum!

At the moment I have just arrived in Bethlehem and have been in more of the Palestinian areas today, which is why I think it appropriate to greet you in both Hebrew and Arabic. But more on that later. I have a major Education Policies project brewing which has delayed my blogging and so I have two days worth of adventures to catch you all up on! Let me start with April 4th first in this post and reserve another for what I have been up to today.

To warn you though, yesterday our tour group stopped in five different areas so this could easily become a longer post. You are more than welcome to simply skip to the pictures.

Tel Hazor National Park

We stopped at a cool excavation site which has been found to contain over twenty ancient cities. Items of particular interest include Solomon's Gate and another water system shaft created by King Ahab in 9th century BC. How the workforce carved steps down into the rock without power tools amazes me. Sadly this was probably done using slave labour.

Tel Dan

This site was absolutely stunning! Much of our Biblical discussion had to do with Old Testament history. We also visited the Banyas Waterfalls which is fairly near there and equally beautiful.

The Temple of Pan

One of the sites we visited was known in Biblical times as Caesarea Philippi. It is home to shrines to various gods and contains what is now only the ruins of many temples. My personal favourite which I fully intend to do more research on was "The Temple of the Dancing Goats". Interestingly though there is a temple Set up for Zeus there as well. We spent some time reading Mark 8:27-38 which is where Jesus asks His disciples who they say He is. It is interesting that He chose this place, where so many other shrines, idols and temples would have been set up, to pose this question. I'm not sure I will ever cease to be surprised by how deliberately Jesus acts in all matters.

Yom Kippur War Memorial at Quineitra Viewpoint

This was a far more sombre visit to a lookout point from which the UN buildings and Syrian border can be seen. I know far too little about Israeli-Syrian history to be able to comment much on the memorial, but what I will say was that it was saddening. I continue to pray for peace there and especially so after the effects of the earthquake. Family-friends of ours who work as doctors will be headed across there soon and it was a sobering reminder of what they risk in doing so.

Lake Tiberias/The Sea of Galilee

Since it was our final day in Galilee, we thought it best to end with a swim. While there are signs around that warn you to stay out of the water, all the locals ignore them and so do the other tourists. It was a really magnificent way to end a busy day. For the Maties following the blog, the temperature of the water compares well to a 7am swim in the new dam, so fairly cool. Most of the water flows down from Mt Herman's snowy peak.

Here is the photo dump, thanks for tagging along!