The Negev and then some...

To begin our longest trip yet we boarded the bus and took a little trip past Nebi Samwil (the place where Samuel is supposedly buried) and took our first stop at the national park where we walked down into the Sorek Valley. Along the way we s topped and read Judges 5, a passage about Deborah where it reads that the people were sticking to back roads which were much like the trail we were currently traveling on, rather than the main roads (see also Isaiah 62:10). We descended a bit further to see a “house” which really consisted of a cave in the rock, which would be an average Israelite dwelling. At our next sitting place we could see the western settlements of Jerusalem. We were just above the end of the Sorek Canyon. In this area is nice cenomanian rock with terra rosa soil, and the land here is kept within the family and the small spring found in the area is enough to support everyone living there. We red 1 kings 4:25 which describes the “good life” which is living under your own vines and eating, sleeping, and living in peace. Climbing down a bit farther we read Psalm 80 which uses vine imagery, which was very cool since we were stopped by a bunch of grape vines (see also Psalm 128; Isaiah 7; John 15). We also read Isaiah 5 which again speaks of grape vines (a vineyard). John 15 was interesting because it shows Jesus as becoming what Israel was supposed to be. They were often portrayed as a vine, but Christ is the True Vine! At our last stop I took a sweet picture of the “Good Land” being plowed.

We then began our ascent (I climbed up the face of the cliff in a poor decision and fought my way through many thorns and thistles and almost fell to my death a few times), boarded the bus, and traveled on to a spot on the Sorek Valley near Beth Shemesh.
From this spot we could see Zorah and Eshtaol, both of which play important roles in the story of Samson. But before we talked about Samson, Cyndi Parker (our professor of course) talked about the cycle that chapter two of Judges begins that is displayed throughout the book: 1) Israel worships the Baals around them 2) God is angry and allows persecution by the people around Israel 3) Israel cries out 4) God raises a Judge for Israel who delivers the people from their persecutors until the death of the Judge 5) Israel goes back to their evil ways. As the book goes the people rally less and less to the Judge until Judges 13 where a new cycle begins with Samson w here no Israelites remain that are willing to come together under the Judge. It is worth mentioning that Samson carried the city gates quite a ways. Look up the story and look at a map… he wasn’t just strong, he could walk a ways to!! The event of him taking the city gaates was not just a random event to show Samson can pick up gates… but when one took the “gates of the city” one is said to have conquered that city. Thus Samson was trying to rally the people around him by essentially saying “I took this city by myself, rally to me and we can defeat the Philistines!!” Needless to say, it didn’t work.
Our next stop was at Azekah, the place where the story of David and Goliath unfolded. From our spot we could see the upper Shephelah (Eocene rock). These hills are lower rolling hills than we are used to seeing. The Husan Ridge Route which is marked on our maps from Bethlehem to Socoh passes through this area. In 1 Samuel 17:2 the emmic is the valley mentioned, which is a flat valley with sloping sides. In verse 3 the Hebrew word for valley is gai which is describing a valley with v-shaped sides. Quite interesting the difference the two words could make realistically between two armies. The pictures that I have display the emmic, while the gai would be on the other side of the hills. It was definitely cool to see where the battle lines would have been, or even were drawn between Israel and the Philistines. The Husson ridge route would have been David’s path to his brothers from his home in Bethlehem.

Our next and second to last stop was Lachish (the toaster) (sorry that’s an analogy from class that few understand ;-)). This city is important for Israel and the Philistines because it holds the fertile valleys of the wadis and it is an opening past the hill country’s natural defenses into the heart of Israel (Hebron and Jerusalem). The picture following this paragraph displays the Assyrian siege ramp which captured the city (the Israelites tried to make a ramp on the other side of the wall to continue to reinforce and build up the wall, but to no avail). We sat near the inner gate where a room used to stand known as the “room of letters” because many letters where found there during excavation. We talked about Solomon fortifying the routes going from the valleys and the hill country. Jar handles found in fortified cities entitled “for the king” showed that Rahaboem was storing goods via taxes for the fortified cities encase of siege.

Our final stop (which I regret I have no pictures of because I was too busy swimming) was the Mediterranean Sea. Now I have saw in 2 of the 4 (at least) seas I will be swimming in while I am here (actually I get number 3 on this trip as well). It was clear and warm and awesome. There was a sand bar a little ways out and we rode waves like nobody’s business. Then we took our two hour drive to the youth hostel on the edge of the super bowl (which looked awesome at night) but I will talk about it my next section.
Here we start day two. Rather than explain what the “Super Bowl” looks like, I will show you.

This is only one of many pictures of the giant crater in the earth found in the Negev. We started our day here. Some of the rock we could see (and you can too!) is as old as the Jurassic period. Wow. If you ever want to travel there and see it for yourself, stay at the Youth Hostel in Mizpeh Ramon, it was super nice. Super nice, I sound like Ashley Greenwell ;-). We talked about how the Greater Negev represented Israel’s honeymoon stage with God, a place where they had nothing but lacked nothing. The prayer in the desert is not “God take me out of this place” rather it is “meet me here”. God places us into the desert to revive his relationship with us back to the necessity of the honeymoon stage, and we should not want to leave this place, as hard as it may be, without taking full advantage of that gift. Looking around this giant Maktesh (in Hebrew this huge bowl is called Makhtesh Ramon meaning great maktesh or great crater) we could truly understand the image of God as our Rock. The rock surrounding us was breathtaking. Do we see our God as so breathtaking? I could even see why God cannot be in the presence of sin. As I looked down I saw a lone plastic bag floating around the edge of the wall, and it made the majestic scene immediately less astounding. It took away from the glory of the maktesh, and God cannot allow the same to be done to him.
Our next stop was Avdat (which was formally known as Aboda). This was one of the few Nabatian cities. We watched a movie on the nomadic people known as the Nabatians. They have the finest type of pottery of anyone of their day, which was strange since they traveled all the time to and fro across the desert. No one but them knew their secret ways to traverse this landscape, and this made them very wealthy. Even when the Romans conquered the Nabatians, they could not glean their paths across the desert. The Byzentine remains here at this site allow us to assume that the Nabatians were assimilated into their ranks after the Romans took their toll. Check it out.
We even saw a sweet wine press here (which is crazy because it was in the desert, and I’ll tell you guys some stories about this site sometime but enough is enough for now).

From here we traveled to Beer Sheva, which is in biblical history was settled by the patriarchs. There is no archeological evidence of this (which is not surprising) because they were nomads dwelling in tents until when Israel comes in under Joshua making permanent settlements. What we do have are wells which could have been dug by Abraham and Isaac themselves. This is also where Hagar and Ishmael would have been in Genesis 21:14 (the wilderness of Beer Sheva) when they were cast out of Abrahams household. Another story which took place here was that of Samuel’s sons who were the religious rulers of the area but were untrustworthy and were the last straw before the people demanded a king. Also noteworthy is that Beer Sheva was a city of refuge (one of 6), a place where someone who murdered another accidentally could escape from an avenger of blood. This was the location of a four horned alter, which was a strange site since it was cut from stone, not simply made of uncut stones as the Israelites were supposed to make their alters. We looked at the gate of the city, built at the lowest point where the water of the city could drain, and we talked about (among many other things) the three large storehouses so that (perhaps) food could be stored for military pushes into the grater Negev.


After we finished here by walking through the water system of the city, the group was ferried over (by the bus) to Tel Arad. As we looked into the biblical Negev we could see the hills of the Transjordan and even into Moab. Arad anchors the land of Israel watching the lands of Edom and Moab and perhaps was even more of a stronghold than Beer Sheva. Arad had no natural springs but took advantage of the hills to catch a ll of the water draining. In Obadiah, a book which is essentially just written against the Edomites, we read verse 9 and onward from there objectifying Edom watching and aiding Babylon in defeating Israel so that they could take the land surrounding Arad from Israel when Babylon defeats them. One question that arises from Tel Arad is the remains of a lesser temple modeled after the temple in Jerusalem and probably built by Solomon. However at this temple there were two standing stones and two alters… some might argue that it had to do with the assimilation of the cultures around them and one was for God and one for his wife, or it was a temple for Solomon’s wives, the answer (as of yet) remains unclear. Thus ended day two of our Journey.
Day three was the most physically stimulating. We began by driving to an overlook of Masada too talk about the aquifer that Herod the Great created to bring water to his desert fortress. From here we drove to the base of the great fortress and had the immense pleasure of trying to run up the siege ramp. I think Trey did it in like 2:35 seconds or so, I managed it in 3:10. Dan does not like running stairs, or running in general. Anyway the fortress was amazing. We talked about three areas of Masada: Its excavation, Herod the Great, and Josephus.

The excavation was done by an Israeli general, who was the first to incorporate the people into the dig getting people to see it as an honor to dig and doing so at their own expense, and he was the first to start the idea of a reconstruction line showing what was standing before and what was rebuilt by archeologists. Herod the great had Masada as his greatest accomplishment. With two palaces (one for him and now for whoever he was entertaining) he was a master of fine design and a genius of beauty. He had various ways of making things look even better than they were (i.e. plastering the walls). Lastly we talked about the story of the zealots defending Masada from the Romans as told my Josephus. Crazy interesting story, and the siege ramp was super cool, especially how it only came to the base of the wall so the roman siege machines could come and do the rest… but the really interesting part is where the Romans finish the ramp, breach the wall, then wait until morning only to find the zealots all dead except a woman or two and some children who hid. Read the story, its sweet.

Our next stop was the dead sea. That was really cool. I never knew I would have the inability to sink in water, but now I know what it is like. And putting one’s tongue to one’s finger was the worst salty taste throughout your entire mouth ever. There was even Crystallized salt lying around. I felt almost greasy on your body in t he water and out of it. I didn’t take any pictures here but I am getting some off of Brandon’s Camera so I’ll put them up when I get them. Lunch here was awesome. Hotdogs and hummus. Delicious. Next we went to our second to last stop, En Geti Springs. En Geti was like a big park with a stream running through it with Ibex running around and pools we could swim in. It was beautiful. Again I’ll get pictures when I steal them from Trey.
After a bath in the freshwater springs, which nicely washed the salt from our bones, we spent our last stop at Qumran. This is the site of the finding of the Dead Sea scrolls. There are various interpretations of the settlement below the caves where the scrolls where found, but it may have been an Essene community that was writing the scrolls and hiding them in the caves. The truth is yet to be discovered, for not everything points to this as accurate. Lastly we climbed up on a rock and read some scripture and drew our trip to a close. Here is a picture to close out this super long entry.