Day 14

Our first stop of the day was the Israeli museum. Here they have this incredible model of the old city of Jerusalem as it may have looked in the time of Christ. It was fascinating. We found out that the reason our itinerary for the tour had changed was because of some scheduled protests. The real Old City of Jerusalem was closed today for security. Once in the distance, we heard some protest shouts. But never came close to any action. So we spent most of the day out of the area.

The model of Herod's temple.

This is what the steps to the Temple Mount by the Huldah gates would
have looked like in the time of Christ.

Our next stop was a tel called Beth Shemesh. It covers the ruins of the town where Sampson was born. One of the treats here was being able to watch this Bedouin shepherd with his herd. In the picture above, you can see one of our bus drivers visiting with the shepherd. This bus driver was a Bedouin himself.

Watching this shepherd was very instructive. He did not have a passive job. He was constantly on the move watching over his flock. He carried a switch that he used gently to keep the sheep from eating things that weren't good for them. The sheep tended to follow him rather than he driving them. However, they were still sheep and sometimes didn't pay attention and he'd have to go fetch them back to the flock. He also had goats in with his sheep and he took as much care of them as he did of his sheep. It was a very impressive sight and full of symbolism.

This is the Valley of Elah where David fought Goliath. The hill in the background is where the Israelite army was. In the Bible, it tells how David came down the hill and stopped at the stream that runs at the foot of the hill, just in front of the light section of rock. There he gathered 5 stones, about the size of his fist. Then he went into the valley where he fought Goliath.

The valley was filled with beautiful fields of wheat. It is a far different variety than we grow here. It is much taller (about chest high) and has larger leaves. It was here that I gathered stones to share with the grandsons.

This stop was a place called "Bet Lehi" (pronounced bet lay-hee). It is an active archeological dig. However, it is on a military reservation so they can only dig when the military isn't active - two months a year during holidays. Archeologists don't like getting shot at. The city is mostly underground and dates to about 600 AD to about 1400 AD.

We were surprised at how many cars we passed getting to the dig. It's literally in the middle of nowhere. We found out that locals really like coming out there.

Above is the mosaic floor of an old Byzantine Church. It is very attractive. We also saw an underground stable. The lighting was poor so the pictures didn't turn out well. It was also very crowded. We kept wondering how they convinced the animals to go in there. At one time, a house was built above ground over it.

In one of the dugout caves, was the colombaria (spelling probably isn't right). It is what we would call a dovecote. It held a couple thousand birds. The triangular hole were where the birds would nest. This town was on the route to Jerusalem. It is believed that people would buy birds for sacrificing at the temple here. They were also used for food and the droppings for fertilizer. To get birds, all they did was drop in some food and the birds would arrive. Instant business.

These are some of the wildflowers of the area. The red poppies, if you remember, are what Christ was referring when he spoke of the Lilies of the Field. We were there at the height of the wildflowers bloom season.

This is our guide standing at the bottom of the oil press room. You can see some of the weights used in the olive press by his feet. He was a doctorate student and very passionate about the work there. He was a lot of fun and his enthusiasm was infectious.

The big openings at the top are were there were oil presses. The slot is where a large wooden beam went. Where it stuck out of the wall, the workers hung heavy stones. The other end was connected so that the beam pressed on a cover over mashed up olives. The oil would be squeezed out and run out of the slot into a collection area. Next to this room was a ceremonial bath. It was expected that workers would be physically and spiritually clean before they pressed oil.

This was the entrance to an room that had oil presses.