Day 3: Sites along the North Western Shores of the Sea of Galilee

Today was spent travelling up and down the coast of the Sea of Galilee where much of Christ's ministry took place.  Seeing the places where Jesus may have taught, worked, and lived was as interesting as seeing the variety of ways in which Christians have honored or preserved these sites.

Mount of Beatitudes

 This eight sided church built by Barluzzi is high up on a hill at the top of a natural amphitheater.  Hearing the Beatitudes ( Matthew 5:1-12) spoken in such a lovely setting, seeing their beautiful stained glass representations in the church, and reflecting on the first part of Jesus' message I remember learning from my parents set a good tone for the rest of the day.

Rob sets the scene for the Sermon on the Mount

An acoustical study showed that a speaker could be heard and seen here by 7000 people.

The Sea of Galilee is off to the left and our Hotel at a Kibbutz (Jewish Commune) in Genosaur is somewhere at the back of the picture in the valley.

Tabgha

We heard the story of the feeding of the five thousand (John 6:1-14) told from the perspective of the little boy who gave his lunch to Jesus.  Our pilgrimage involves telling the story of each location at that location.  In this case, the story we heard at the traditional site of the the miracle and the 5th century mosaics we saw representing the miracle in the church at Tabgha gave two very different interpretations.  It's nice that for everyone there is a different way of representing the story that will mean something special to that individual.

This mosaic is possibly one of the most famous we've seen so far.  The rock just behind it, under the altar table, is the rock on which some believe Jesus performed the miracle of the Loaves and Fishes.

Mensa Christi

"Table of Christ"

A.K.A. "Breakfast on the Beach" for those familiar with the N.R.T. (New Robert Translation)

 Christ appeared to his disciples a few times after his resurrection.  One of these times involved him telling them where to catch fish after a long evening of fruitless fishing and then cooking them breakfast. (John 21:1-14)

The rock you see here, behind the monk but in front of the altar, is believed to be the rock on which Jesus served his meal of fish and bread.  The monk was preaching to his own tour group.  We won't bore you with the video but know that Rob recorded his sermon (supposedly to get a better view of the rock) and was super excited when he ended with "So the point is, all we can do is love God and love others."

We took a number of great photos of this statue depicting Peter responding to Jesus' questioning.  "Simon Peter, do you love me?  Feed my sheep." (John 21:15-19)

Capernaum

This town is believed to be Jesus' base of operations during his ministry in the Galilee.

It's mentioned a lot in the New Testament.

I am finding it fascinating how many pieces of Jesus' parables we're seeing.  In Capernaum we saw a number of millstones, used for grinding wheat into flour.  The video explains why there are an abnormally large amount.  This one's for the youth leaders...remember that terrifying passage warning you against leading a little child astray? (Matthew 18:1-6).  Well, these are the millstones.  Eek!

This is the 4th Century Synagogue in Capernaum built on the foundations of the 2nd Century Synagogue built on the foundations of the 1st Century Synagogue that Jesus may have studied in.  Synagogues in the 1st Century were more like glorified Sunday School.  Worship happened at the temple in Jerusalem but local synagogues provided the study necessary to read and understand the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible.

Okay, this is cool.  This picture shows the foundations of the synagogue.  The round, black basalt (volcanic rock) stones at the bottom are from the 1st Century.  The more regular black basalt stones just above them are from the 2nd Century and the Limestone at the top is from the 4th Century.  Through the door you can see the church built above Peter's Mother-In-Law's house where Jesus may have lived.

The town of Capernaum in Jesus' time would've been built of the black basalt rock you see here.  These foundations are just like the one's of Peter's mother-in-law's house.  You would see these foundations if they hadn't built a 4th century church over it, and then put the church structure you see here on top of that.

One of our leaders insisted we have our picture taken under these lovely purple flowers at the entrance of the town of Capernaum.  It was a good call.

Sea of Galilee

This Crusader church in the town of Tiberias was right next to the docks our boat launched from and the restaurant at which we ate "St. Peter's Fish" a.k.a. Tilapia.

Leona's had a coin in its mouth (Matthew 17:24-27)

Robert is demonstrating the wind that can kick up on the Sea of Galilee.  Apparently the cold air from the Golan Heights near Syria and the warm air rising off the Sea of Galilee can create some interesting weather conditions (Mark 4:35-41 & John 6:16-21 & Matthew 14:22-33)

And then we danced!  On a boat!

Mount Tabor


Mount Tabor is the site of many biblical stories in both the old and new testament.  The Judge Deborah sent her Army Captain, Barak out to conquer the Canaanites from this mountain.  Remember Jael?  Yup, that's that story (Judges 4 & 5)

This is the view from the top of Mount Tabor looking out over the Jezreel Valley where Armageddon will happen.  Megiddo, mentioned yesterday, is off to the right in the mist, Gilboa from the book of Joshua is the large mountain in the center, and Mount Mehor (don't remember where that's mentioned in the O.T.) is to the left of Gilboa.  Further to the left, outside the frame of this picture is Gilead, also from Joshua.  Naim (see below) is in front of Gilboa currently being lit by the rays of the sun.

Mount Tabor is also the presumed site of the Transfiguration (Mark 9:2-8) where Jesus and his disciples are joined by visions of Elijah (above) and Moses.  This painting is on the walls of the Elijah chapel inside the Church of the Transfiguration.  It depicts the "fire building contest" (N.R.T.) between Elijah and the prophets of Baal (1 Kings 18).

The Transfiguration (Mark 9:2-8) is depicted here in gold mosaic.  You can see Christ int he center flanked by Moses & Elijah and then Jesus' disciples on either side being confused as usual.

Naim

Our last site of the day was Naim, located on Mount Hamor.  It is one of the few towns to have retained the exact same name for over 2000 years.  So if it says Naim in the Bible, it's here.  Most other towns we're just making (hopefully very educated) guesses.

This Franciscan church (on the right) stands on the site of the medieval church that commemorated another of Christ's Miracles when he raised a widowed mother's child from the dead.  The church is not currently being used for anything religious, tourist, or otherwise.  Although, VERY recently, the folks who run Mount Tabor have committed to it's upkeep, until now the folks at the mosque have been preventing it from falling down.  So far the only two religious interactions we've seen have been 1) this stewardship of an abandoned Christian Church by it's neighborhood mosque and 2) the Muslim taxi driver who took us up Mount Tabor.  The taxi driver's conclusions: No more religious fanatics; we're all sons of Adam so we should stop fighting and all get along.

I don't really have any better conclusion than that.

-Leona