Galilee

Yesterday felt like a week ago! Sorry if this one is a little long…

Our intrepid group was blessed today. SUNSHINE. We took breakfast in the dining room of our hotel, which happens to have glass walls and overlook the Sea of Galilee. We were in high spirits. And today, we would walk in the footsteps of giants.

The first trip was a long bus ride up into cold country. The views were marvelous as we wound our way up the rolling hills on hairpin turns.

We finally arrived at Hazor. Now, there are several biblical scholars on this trip, both professional and amateur. I’m not really one of them. I had no idea that Hazor existed before this. One of those names from the Bible that never stuck with me, I guess, but the reality of it is pretty crazy. Megiddo, that powerful city that we saw yesterday, covered 15 acres. Hazor covered 200. It’s a big place. Even what’s left of it is absolutely majestic.

our own Indiana Jones: Uri

The narrow gates stand thick with stones. The palace itself is in impressive shape, given that the mud-brick walls are 5,000 years old. During the time of Joshua, a Canaanite king sat on its throne. The king led his forces against the Israelite leader, but Joshua prevailed, and burned Hazor to the ground. Walking through that palace, we could visualize the ground that Joshua walked before he ultimately razed the city. Joshua: the protégé of Moses, who had seen the Red Sea parted, who had followed the pillar of fire through the desert and had seen the walls of Jericho crumble before him.

But we weren’t done with Hazor. We found its water system, and it was a lot more exciting than that sounded. A cavernous pit dug deep into the earth, now ridged with metal walkways and spiral stairs. Uri warned us not to go all the way down, as it was slippery. I couldn’t resist. Down, down, down…the steps were slick with mud as I descended into the darkness. A handful of others soon followed. At the very bottom of the shaft, 150 feet into the earth, we found ourselves on a platform…overlooking a giant puddle of watery mud. If we had been in a horror movie, something ancient and monstrous would have jumped out of that mud, but instead, we just turned around and hiked back up the whole leg-burning staircase. It was a great way to warm up for the icy blasts of wind above.

Our next excursion was the region of Dan. It’s northern Israel. So northern that some places look like the African jungle, and others look like the mountains of Vermont. When we arrived at a nature preserve, Uri read a couple verses from Psalms. With the sound of water trickling in the background and the snow-covered mass of Mt. Hermon rising in the background, David’s words seemed to come from this very spot. We set off into the dense forest, trekked through Neverending Story-levels of mud, and even managed to get everyone together for a photo!

Deep in the heart of this jungle of eucalyptus trees and rushing rivers, we found a massive altar. You could literally fit an entire bull on that thing. It was built by Jeroboam as a northern alternative for making sacrifices, so Israelites wouldn’t travel all the way to Jerusalem. Unfortunately, he also set up a golden calf as an idol, and appointed priests from outside the tribe of Levi. No bueno.

We kept on through the woods, spotting Nimrod Fortress, the ancient assassins’ castle, high up on a snowy peak. This is the castle of the original assassins – the ones that originated the word from the nickname “hashashin”, which was given to them because of all the hashish that they smoked. It looks like quite a hike to get to, but that was super cool.

We turned the next corner, and came upon a sight that stunned. The gate of the city of Dan rose up before us, an imposing wall. The arched opening itself had been blocked up by its inhabitants thousands of years ago. As we approached it, Uri recalled the passage of Abraham on his mission to rescue his nephew Lot. Abraham could have come through this kind of gate on his way to Damascus, just over the mountains to the north. A silence fell on our group as we realized where we stood.

Nearby was another massive excavation: the outskirts of an unnamed city, built with HUGE stones and featuring both a pagan altar outside and a king’s throne inside. And yeah, I had to sit on the throne podium.

the Horns, sitting on the benches beside the throne...like subjects

(Lunch was an incredible chicken shawarma and the best chai latte ever in a little café playing the all-American pop song Hey Mickey. All of that was good.)

The end of our day came at the shore of the Sea of Galilee. To clarify, the Sea of Galilee is not a sea. It’s a lake, and not even a very big one at that. In the museum nearby, we saw a recovered fishing boat from the time of Jesus - the kind that his disciples would have made their living with.

We had some free time to wander, so I walked down to the lake. Standing on its banks in the quiet of twilight, I was overcome. I put my hand in the water and let it lap over my shoes.

Standing in the Sea of Galilee. It would have been worth the entire trip for this moment alone.

There was one more moment off-book. David, our seasoned Israeli leader, took us aside for a moment of demonstration. Holding a long thorny acacia branch, he began to strip its leaves.

A solemn revulsion took hold in us as we realized how vicious this little branch was becoming…it became a horrified reverence as he bent and twisted it into a crown.

The crown of a King.