God. Real. Right.

Monday was a departure from the Dead Sea and ascent to Jerusalem. We started at Masada, the isolated Dead Sea mountain where Herod had built a fortified palace for himself, but which ended up being a refuge for about a thousand zealots and survivors from the “Great Rebellion” of the Jews against Rome in 66 AD, which resulted in the complete destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. They lived at Masada for three years until the Romans finally came for them, seiged them, and built a ramp to take the city. The rest is too much to tell here, but makes clear what is meant by the Masada mentality, a both scary and encouraging descriptor of the Israelis’ level of commitment to their nation. From Masada we visited En-Geddi (the oasis where David cut off Saul’s skirt) and Qumran (where the Dead Sea scrolls were found) on the way to Jerusalem. Best moment: seeing the caves where David hid with his “mighty men” while being pursued by Saul. Worst moment (and maybe best): contemplating Masada.

Tuesday started early with a jostling visit to the Temple Mount and ended with the Holocaust Museum. We entered Old Jerusalem through the Dung Gate, entered the Temple Mount, took in the mosques and comparative options for the intended location of the Holy Place of the Jewish Temple, and finally visited the western wall, or Wailing Wall. It is the remaining visible retaining wall from Herod’s Temple Mount. Much more of that retaining wall is now accessible underground. In the afternoon we went to Yad Vashem (The Holocaust Museum). Best moment: seeing the very stones on which New Testament characters were standing when the biblical narrative’s events took place. Worst moment: knowing that the psychological distress I suffer everytime I am again confronted with the truth of the Holocaust is not suffering at all.

We spent Wednesday getting a perspective of the greater Jerusalem area. We started by taking in a 1:50 scale model of Herod’s Jerusalem just before Titus’ destruction of it in 70 A.D. We also saw the Aleppo Codex there as well as various Qumran artefacts. From there we looked at Jerusalem from several prominent overlooks, stood where the shepherds were when angels announced the birth of Jesus to them, then traveled to the Valley of Elah. Best moment: either standing where David killed Goliath or where the shepherds received the announcement. Worst moment: seeing the sharp division between the Jewish and Arab sectors of Jerusalem and knowing how far this city is from the meaning of its name (“the city of peace”).

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I arrived in Israel yesterday with a few other faculty, and will be here for one more week. (Yup, we’ll be flying back—from Israel—on September 11th.) I thought I’d share a few pictures from our first two days. If the player doesn’t work for you on this web page, you should be able to click it and get the pictures directly on my Picasa site.

The first day was spent traveling from Tel Aviv (where we landed) to Tiberius (where we are staying for the first few days). The captions of the pictures should give a sense of the places we stopped along the way. The best: being in the place where Elijah saw one of Israel’s two greatest miracles in the OT was certainly my favorite. The worst: knowing that since capitalism conforms the merchant to the customer to a certain extent, I had the privilege(?) of seeing the caricature of real Christianity with which many non-Christians believe they must deal.

Our second day was spent traveling around the Sea of Galilee. Again, the captions of the pictures should give a sense of the places we covered. The best: seeing what is very likely the very mountain from which the Gadarene demoniac would have emerged to meet Jesus was impressive. The worst: a vodka and juice special for those who chose so to celebrate after being “baptized” in the Jordan was ironic, to say the least.

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(Click here if you’d like to see the pictures but the shockwave slideshow doesn’t display or link to the photo album for you.)
In 2008 a Mallard drake and hen started hanging around our house. In April 2008 and 2009 the hen roosted under an Azalea by a brick planter in front of our door. My family quickly named her Louellen. In 2008 we kept up with her incubation and hatching, but missed the most amazing moment, the exit from the nest and one-time journey to water. But not this year. Having heard the ducklings the night before, and knowing their hen would most likely lead them on their precarious journey at dawn, we rose at 5:30 AM and took turns watching through our front window until she emerged.
The small lake we knew she would lead them to is less than a half mile from our house, as the crow flies. But she is not a crow. And with eleven ducklings in tow, she would not fly. So instead she waddled, walked, waded, paused, ate, rested, and reversed track for three hours around houses, over yards, across streets, under vehicles and signs, through puddles (where the ducklings took their proto-swims), up curbs, into a diversionary koi pond, but finally to the lake itself, where her journey’s work was not completed until she had warned off a too-interested drake.
So let’s say ducks have no consciousness and no worth beyond their utility for humanity. That’s no reason for those of us who do have consciousness and moral value not to be amazed at the beauty of creation and at the protection and guidance one little hen provides her otherwise helpless clutch of followers. Hmm. Helpless followers.
Click on a picture to see it, or the entire album or a slideshow, full-size in Picasa. All photos courtesy of my exhausted and freezing but still beautiful wife.

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