For our Land and the Bible class, we have to write a report after each one of our field trips. For the sake of time, I’m gonna use these also as blog posts to describe our outings. Never fear, I will continue to blog about non-cirricular stuff as well.
If I had to pick two words to describe my first visit to the Old City of Jerusalem, they would be “intense” and “surreal”. Intense in that there is a vibrant fervor to the Old City that slaps you in the face when you get there, and surreal in that for a student of the Bible, it’s initially hard to believe that you are actually standing where so many biblical events unfolded. While the entire day was filled with new experiences and discoveries, I will only highlight a few in this report.
To run the risk of sounding a tad melodramatic, entering through the Jaffa gate was somewhat akin to stepping back through time. I have never before seen a city with stone walls and giant wooden doors. We walked through the gate, which is on the Old City’s western wall (not to be confused with the Western Wall of the Temple Mount, which lies within the boundaries of the Old City), and turned immediately at a 90 degree angle. I thought this was odd until Bill, our Prof, explained that the turn in the entrance would serve to slow invading hordes, because a city’s gates are its weakest points. He went on to describe how the gate, along with most of the wall, was constructed in 1536 by the Turks, who at the time held sway over Jerusalem.
We then proceeded to the Citadel of David, which is one of the most ancient structures to be found in the city. When the Romans destroyed the city in 70 AD under the direction of General Titus, son of Vespasian, they left this tower standing as a reminder of the former grandeur of Jerusalem, to stand in stark contrast to the utter ruin they made of everything else so as to warn of the retribution that would befall any others who dared revolt against Rome. When the Crusaders arrived circa 1299, they found this tower, built upon it, and christened it “The Citadel of David.” This is a misnomer, however, because the tower has nothing to do with David, as it dates to Herodian times. From the top of the tower, we could see the entire city and beyond, to the New city in the west, the Mt. of Olives in the east, and the area where Moab once was to the south-east. Standing up there, hearing Bill point out such-and-such an area and saying “…and this happened there…” was one of those experiences I would describe as surreal.
After lunch and a walk through David Street to Christian Quarter Road, where we met Shaaban, we proceeded to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, which stands on the most probable location of Christ’s death and burial. The church is fought over by six different “Christian” denominations, to the point that physical fist fights are not unheard of. The inter-denominational tension surrounding ownership of this place is so bad that a Muslim family has to hold the key to it, and everything inside must stay status quo, essentially meaning that nothing must be moved, for if someone moves something, they are presumably exercising ownership over it. As we entered the church, I was filled with a mixture of awe and shock. Awe because I was standing at the place where many scholars believe Jesus actually paid for the sins of the entire world, including my sins. Shock because there are so many candles, icons, statues, incenses, and religious devotees milling around, the sanctity of what should be place of commemoration is more of a sideshow. Leaving the church, I saw a few people kneeling and kissing a white stone near the entrance. I asked Abner what they were doing, and he informed me that many believe that stone marks the place where Jesus fell carrying his cross. I left feeling a twinge of sadness for those people who obviously fail to understand that God doesn’t desire external acts of obeisance, but a heart of mercy.
We then exited out the Damascus Gate, which lies on the northern side of the Old City, and began to proceed around the outside toward the East. After a stop in St. Anne’s Church (where allegedly Mary, the mother of Jesus, was born) and the Pools of Bethesda (where Christ healed a blind man in John 5:1-17), which both lie within St. Stephen’s Gate, a.k.a. the Lion’s Gate (but I was encouraging those around me that we should just call it “Steve’s Gate”), we walked along the outer wall of the Old City on the East. This was by far my favorite part of the trip. As we walked, partly through Muslim graveyards, we discussed the Mt. of Olives and its significance. The Mt. of Olives lies opposite Jerusalem, separated by the Kidron valley. We saw where the Garden of Gethsemane lies on the southern portion of the Mt. We viewed the Church of the Ascension (a Russian Orthodox Church), as well as the Augusta Victoria (a German hospital), Hebrew University, and interestingly enough, an extension campus of BYU. But more importantly, as Bill was talking, I couldn’t help but stare at the Mt. of Olives and think, “this is where the Olivet Discourse happened, this is where Jesus prayed for strength in the garden, this is where he ascended to rejoin His Father in heaven, and this is where He will come back and usher in the Millennium.” Of all the places we visited, it was viewing the Mt. of Olives that gave me the biggest rush, for lack of a better term.
We then stopped for a little while to discuss the geography of the original City of David, which only occupied the Eastern Hill of Jerusalem (the Old City today sits on both the Eastern Hill and the Western Hill, which are divided by the now semi-filled Central Valley) and then proceeded to enter back into the City. We viewed the Temple Mount from afar and then made our way back to the bus. All in all, it was a day that I will not soon forget.
***Pictures coming soon, when I’m not exhausted***
