Perhaps one of the things that impressed me most about today was the water. For having seen so little thus far in Israel, it feels like everywhere we went today was flowing with water. Everywhere I look I see green fields and things growing. Even if I've been seeing it for three days, it still impresses me every time I see it. It is so different than Jerusalem and so different than the Negev.
This morning at Hazor, I very much enjoyed seeing the old ruins. I still have a fascination with all things old, and places like Hazor just kind of wow me. I was also really interested when we moved the rock armies of the King of Hazor and recreated the possible Joshua conquest on the map. For so many of these stories I have never really had a visual context before, and I love seeing it play out. At Hazor, I think I was most impressed by the Late Bronze Age (pre-Israelite) mudbrick still standing, and perhaps equally by the idea of a fire that could crack basalt foundations. If you think about the fact they are lava rock, it must take an incredibly hot fire to break them. It kind of lends a pretty decent picture as to why the Bible bothers to point out that Joshua burned Hazor. It must have been quite a day there.
Moving on to Dan, I was massively impresssed the amount of water pouring through. The rapids and strength of the water was pretty amazing. Beyond just the water, I also was kind of in awe of the gate with the mudbrick arch from the 18th century B.C. It is pretty cool to me to think that Abraham could have passed through there. Additionally, I studied the Tel Dan inscription in hermeneutics this past semester as part of a project on Israelite minimalism. It's always neat to see places that I have an academic connection to. I also found it really interesting when we were able to see into Lebanon. My great-grandparents emigrated from there, so I've kind of always wanted to go. While I can't at the moment, it was cool to think I was looking into Lebanon.
When we went to Banias following Dan, I was equally impressed by the water there. The temple to Pan was also very interesting. As we discussed Jesus and his ministry and the choices he made in regards to when and where he said things, it just continued my thoughts from yesterday about his origins. I never realized that he chose his farthest point from Jerusalem for Peter's confession. Then he started his journey to Jerusalem. It gets me to think about his motives and his plan and why he might have chosen the places he did. On a way less theological note, the massive waterfall was pretty much the highlight of my day. I kind of have a bit of an obsession with water, especially waterfalls, so I very much enjoyed that.
Stopping in the Golan Heights was cool just because I've heard that area talked about so much in regards to relatively current political situations. Being able to look across into Syria was also pretty neat. I love having visual context for things, so placing biblical stories always interests me. In this case, thinking about Paul on his way to Damascus somewhere down in front of where I was standing was a pretty awesome contextualization. And I certainly felt the cold and had to give a hearty respect to anyone who calls the Golan Heights home!
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