So much has happened since my last post! We’ve crammed so much into such a short period of time we hardly remember where we’ve gone on a specific day.
I’ll pick up where I left off in my last post on our big day in Jerusalem, which was Friday, the Muslim holy day. After lunch we got off our bus at the northeast corner of the city walls. We walked through a Muslim cemetery on our way to Lion's Gate. Since it was just after 1 o’clock, we were like fish swimming against the tide as Muslim worshipers were leaving the city after their time at the mosque in the Temple Mount. Vendors sold vegetables, ice cream, and live chicks(!) along the way.
We went through Lion’s Gate, and not too much further, entered the noticeably quiet sanctuary of the compound with St. Anne’s Church and the remains of the Bethesda Pools. The church is named for Jesus’ grandmother, Mary’s mother Anne. It’s not ornate inside like some of the others and has marvelous acoustics. Concerts are held here regularly. We were able to sing some hymns, Redeemer of Israel and The Old, Old Path. Our small number of voices sounded like a large choir.
Outside in the grounds are the remains of the pool with five porches by the former sheep market where Jesus healed the man who had had “an infirmity thirty and eight years” (John 5:1-9). Crusader remains covered the pool, and only recently has this place been identified as Bethesda, the pool with five porches.
Returning to the street, we began walking the “Via Dolorosa,” something almost all Christian visitors to Jerusalem will do. It begins with the place of judgment or trial of Christ and the different “stations” along the way after he began to carry the cross.
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| Golgotha where Christ was crucified. |
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| Rubbing possessions over the slab where Jesus was prepared for burial. |
By the time we had reached the end of the Via Dolorosa, we had walked miles and gone up and down stairs so much we could hardly put one foot in front of the other. But Yossi still had more to show us!
We continued to the area in the old city that has Roman remains from the time of Christ, much of it about 20 to 30 feet below the current street level. Upscale shops are in that part of the city. Then Abad, our great bus driver, picked us up at the Jaffa Gate and returned us to the hotel.
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| The Cardo: Roman main street through Jerusalem. |
We're now in Tiberias, but I'm behind two days!! I couldn't get on the Internet when we first arrived here...... We'll be here tonight and tomorrow, and then we'll be traveling through the country and later to the airport to return home on Wednesday. Inshallah, God willing, I hope to get at least one more post up before leaving.
