Wednesday in the Jordan Valley and Galilee

  Tiberias, Israel
Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Today we were up and out; luggage loaded by 8:00 am.  We had a bus-driver change today. Yesterday our driver was an Israeli named Shimon, today we had, and will have for the rest of our tour this week, a Palestinian driver named Usama. One reason for that is that we were to visit Jericho, now under administrative control of the Palestinian Authority. Doreen told us that as an Israeli, she couldn't go in with us to Jericho. We didn't know if that meant an absolute prohibition or if there would just be so many delays and hassles that it wasn't worth it.
 
In any event, we drove north once again along the Dead Sea to the northern tip of the northern lake to the Dead Sea sect site of Qumran.  It was here that the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in 1947 by a Bedouin shepherd boy looking for a lost goat.

Qumran, the caves were in mountains behind

Later during our stay in Israel we plan to visit the Shrine of the Book in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem where the scrolls are displayed, but now we learned about the people how copied them out, by looking at the ruins of their community buildings.

Visiting Qumran

There were store houses, copy rooms for the copying of sacred texts, cisterns, and ritual baths, called micvahs.  They believed the end of the world was near, and that the last great confrontation would be between forces of light and forces of darkness. They had a rather communal way of life, which frequent ritual bathing to maintain spiritual cleanliness. Because of their ascetic way of life and their emphasis on ritual washing, some have tried to make a connection between the Essenes (apparently now the term of choice is no longer Essenes but "Dead Sea Sect") and John the Baptist. Doreen explained that there's not really any Biblical reason to connect them, but some modern scholars are intrigued by the possible link. It was already very hot by mid-morning. In the heat and humidity of the Dead Sea basin it never seems to cool off much, even at night.
 
We again drove north, 30 minutes or so to the checkpoints marking the line between the Isreali controlled side and the Palestinian controlled side of the line near Jericho. Jericho has been one of the most trustworthy areas of the Palestinian West Bank, where relations have been best, so it was the first area to receive some autonomy from the Israelis. We dropped Doreen at a gas station rest stop and would come back to pick her up again three hours later. Then we drove on to where fully armed Israeli troops at a check point, asked us our nationalities. They didn't ask for passports, just had a cursory look at the bus. A few hundred meters later we came to the Palestinian checkpoint, where similarly armed Palestinian Authority soldiers asked if there were any Israelis on board. When Usama said there were just Americans, we were waved through with a smile. At the site of Jericho we picked up our Palestinian tour guide named Hassan. He was an affable fellow always smiling and frequently laughing.  He first took us for a quick drive through new Jericho, a typical village in from this part of the world, full of old buildings, cafés, falafel shops and markets. David Baker asked about Herod's palace on the outskirts of town. It took a bit of finding and a few wrong roads but we were finally able to see the ruins of what had been one of Herod's palaces, later used by the Caliph Hisham Ibn Abd al-Malik in the 700s AD.
 
We took a few snapshots and then drove back to the ruins of old Jericho. The site was in pretty sad shape compared to when we had come here eight years ago.

Looking down toward the famous tower in Jericho

Little or no maintenance has been done, the marked pathways have all disappeared; the explanatory signs have been defaced and destroyed. It was very hard to know what anything was, outside the famous tower, that some claim is 10000 years old (chronology has always been a challenge at Jericho).

The tower, to the right

Dave and I explained what we were seeing as best we could from memory and our guidebook. Hassan was very friendly, but was obviously a very new tour guide. He didn't know anything at all about the tel or the excavations.

Excavation trenches in Jericho

Even so it is always exciting to actually walk through a site mentioned in the Bible, and this was no exception.
 
We next took the aerial cable car up the mountain to the east of Jericho. We had a brief but interesting view of the dig site from the air as we flew over the top of it on the way up to the Mount of Temptation, the traditional "high mountain" from which Satan showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, in his temptation of Jesus in Matthew 4. You can't really see all the kingdoms of the world from there, so it seems certain there was a supernatural vision involved, therefore it may well not have been this mountain. Still the views of Jericho and the Jordan valley made the trip worthwhile.
 
Back down in the town we headed for a local tourist center where we had a lunch of falafel or schawarma according to choice. Prices are high in Israel, we are learning, about twice as high as they would be for similar things in the US.
 
Finally we said goodbye to Hassan and gave him a tip (trying to keep up good relations), then drove back to pick up Doreen who was very happy to regain the air conditioned bus (and our tour group!).
 
We drove north again along the Jordan until we neared the Sea of Galilee. Our next stop was Beth Shean, the capital city of the Decapolis region, and the only such city on the West side of the Jordan. It is mentioned several times in the Bible, for example Saul's and Jonathan's bodies were nailed to the walls by the Philistines after Israel's defeat at nearby Mt Gilboa. Jesus taught in the Decapolis cities too, so He may have walked these streets during His ministry. The ruins we saw were from a Roman period, when Beth Shean was a remarkable border town between the Roman Empire and the Parthians to the East.
 
It is easy to see by the ruins today, how impressive a city it would have been. We walked the Cardo (the main street) and saw shops, baths, the theater event he public toilets which have survived in surprisingly good shape. 

On the Cardo at Beth Shean

They had water running underneath them to flush away the waste, and were apparently unisex. These are fascinating glimpses into everyday life in the ancient world.
 
Then we drove north again along the banks of the Sea of Galilee, reaching the resort town of Tiberius on the western shore. We settled into our hotel for the night, enjoying glimpses of the lake from our rooms, and a copious buffet dinner. We have to make sure we get our rest now. The days are full, though not too full. As long as we get our sleep, we should be able to maintain our tour schedule. It would be a shame to miss any of these facinating sites.