(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Our “Picture of the Week” focuses on the small, but significant, Kishon River. It is not a place that you would visit on a typical trip to Israel. In fact, I’ve been to Israel four times (two of which were extended stays) and I have never stopped there. Perhaps that is because the river does not look very impressive. Nevertheless, a couple of significant biblical events took place along this watercourse, and the geography surrounding and forming the river have played a crucial role throughout history.

The Kishon River drains much of the water from the Jezreel Valley and Lower Galilee. The Bible mentions this river by name a total of five times (Judg 4:7, 13; 5:21; 1 Kgs 18:40; Ps 83:9). It was here that Deborah and Barak defeated the 900 chariots of Sisera after gathering their forces at Mount Tabor, and it was here that Elijah had the prophets of Baal slain after the showdown on Mount Carmel.

In Judges 5:21, the Kishon is referred to as a “torrent,” but a visit to the site reveals that most of the time it is a rather timid river. In his book, The Geography of the Bible, Denis Baly describes the Kishon by saying:

Dry in its upper courses in summer, and only a trickle when it passes Harosheth [near its end], this famous stream is often a sad disappointment to visitors …

Yet on that fateful day in history, the river swelled with rainwater and swept away Sisera’s retreating army of chariots (Judg. 5:21).

The image above was a sketch of the river as it looked in the 1870s. At this location, the Kishon leaves the Jezreel Valley and enters the Plain of Asher through a narrow pass where the hills of Lower Galilee almost touch Mount Carmel. This choke-point is one of the reasons why the Jezreel Valley contains such rich soil. As the soil erodes into the valley from the surrounding hills, the river is not able to carry it out to sea. Instead, the river is blocked: first by a low ridge of volcanic rock that cuts across the valley in a northeast line starting near Megiddo, and then again by the foothills of Western Lower Galilee. Baly describes the outcome of these geographical features in this way:

The Kishon, small though it is, has to carry away the entire drainage from the surrounding hills, but it is twice hindered in this formidable task, once by the volcanic causeway and then again by the narrow defile through which it finds its way to the Bay of Acco. In consequence the two basins thus formed are only too easily flooded in winter, sometimes for prolonged periods, and W. M. Thomson, who knew the country well a century and a half ago, speaks of having “no little trouble with its bottomless mire and tangled grass.” In February, 1905, Gertrude Bell wrote even more feelingly of riding from Haifa to Jenin: “The road lay all across the Plain of Esdraelon … and the mud was incredible. We waded sometimes for an hour at a time knee deep in clinging mud, the mules fell down, the donkeys almost disappeared … and the horses grew wearier and wearier.” … Yet it was always “the rich valley,” for once dried out, the bottomless mud bears notable harvests.

So the Kishon River is not much to look at most of the time and until the rise of modern transportation it caused all sorts of difficulties for travelers during the rainy season when it flooded the valley. Yet for all this, it has played a key role in making the Jezreel Valley into a region of rich farmland. The fertile soil in this valley combined with the valley’s strategic location along the international trade route made the control of this area a coveted prize for many nations throughout history.

This image and 150 others (along with the entire text of Picturesque Palestine, Sinai and Egypt, Vol. 3) are available in Picturesque Palestine III: Phoenicia, Philistia, and the South. This digital volume can be purchased here for $20, or you can purchase all four volumes of the work for $55. Additional images of the Jezreel Valley can be seen here on the BiblePlaces website. Excerpts were taken from Denis Baly, The Geography of the Bible, new and revised ed. (New York: Harper & Row, 1974), pp. 144, 146-147.

(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

I still remember the first time I studied the descriptions of the Tabernacle in detail. I was a college student at the time and was taking an Old Testament Survey course. I combed through the descriptions of the Tabernacle in Exodus 25-30 and did the best I could (with the limited knowledge that I had) to picture what the various items looked like and how they fit together.

A case in point is the description of the lampstand in the tabernacle, or as it is commonly called: the menorah. The Bible describes the lampstand in the follow way:

You shall make a lampstand of pure gold. The lampstand shall be made of hammered work: its base, its stem, its cups, its calyxes, and its flowers shall be of one piece with it. And there shall be six branches going out of its sides, three branches of the lampstand out of one side of it and three branches of the lampstand out of the other side of it; three cups made like almond blossoms, each with calyx and flower, on one branch, and three cups made like almond blossoms, each with calyx and flower, on the other branch—so for the six branches going out of the lampstand. And on the lampstand itself there shall be four cups made like almond blossoms, with their calyxes and flowers, and a calyx of one piece with it under each pair of the six branches going out from the lampstand. Their calyxes and their branches shall be of one piece with it, the whole of it a single piece of hammered work of pure gold. You shall make seven lamps for it. And the lamps shall be set up so as to give light on the space in front of it. Its tongs and their trays shall be of pure gold. It shall be made, with all these utensils, out of a talent of pure gold. And see that you make them after the pattern for them, which is being shown you on the mountain. (Exod. 25:31-40, ESV)

Now some of the Hebrew terms in this passage are difficult to accurately interpret (for example, the word translated “calyx” in the ESV is translated as “bulb” in the NASB), but it is clear that the menorah in the Tabernacle incorporated elements of almond blossoms. So to get an idea of what the menorah looked like, you need to know something about the shape of almond blossoms. Unfortunately, as a college student from the suburbs of Southern California, I had no clue what an almond blossom looked like.

So to remedy that situation (for myself and for the sake of others like me) our picture of the week comes from Volume 16 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands. This is an entirely new volume that was added when the collection was revised and expanded last year and it focuses on “Trees, Plants, and Flowers of the Holy Land.”  (For another sample from this collection, see my post here.)  The photograph below shows a branch of almond blossoms on a tree near Aijalon in Israel.  You can click on the photo to enlarge it.

Almond blossoms are white or pink in color and appear on the tree in early spring, before any of the leaves are produced. The petals of the blossom form a cup and, as you can see, several flowers grow next to each other on a single branch.  In the upper left section of the photograph you can see some new buds forming with the calyx covering. (A “calyx” is the leafy covering around a bud or flower.)

Given an image like this, it is not difficult to imagine what the branches of the Tabernacle’s lampstand may have looked like. Each of the six outer branches of the menorah incorporated three almond blossoms and the center branch somehow incorporated four blossoms. Although we may not be able to reconstruct the exact details of the lampstand with certainty, a picture like this goes a long way in enlightening our reading of the text.

This photograph and over 1,500 others are available in Volume 16 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands, and is available here for $34 (with free shipping).  Additional photographs from that collection can be seen here, here, and here on the BiblePlaces website. For one reconstruction of the Tabernacle’s lampstand, see images of the Tabernacle replica here and here.

(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Where can you see the American seal in Jerusalem? In honor of Independence Day in the United States, this week’s “Picture of the Week” will show you.

The photo above was taken in the Church of All Nations (also known as the Basilica of the Agony) on the Mount of Olives. The church is built over the traditional location of the place where Jesus prayed the night he was arrested. The modern church was completed in 1924, but it sits on the location of two earlier churches: one from the fourth century and another from the twelfth century.

The photograph shows the interior of one of the church’s twelve cupolas. The American seal can be seen at the bottom of the photo (click the picture to enlarge it). The ceiling of this church actually contains the seals or coats-of-arms of several countries, all of whom donated money to help construct the building. Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, England, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Spain, and the U.S. are all represented.

In his book, The Holy Land, Jerome Murphy-O’Connor provides the following information about the church:

This church … built in 1924, is located on the traditional site of the garden in which Jesus collapsed. No one can be sure of the exact spot at which he prayed, but this limited area was certainly close to the natural route leading from the Temple to the summit of the Mount of Olives and the ridge leading to Bethany.

The present edifice … is the latest in a series of three churches. It covers ‘the elegant church’ (Egeria) built between AD 379 and 384 … on the site where the pre-Constantinian Jerusalem community commemorated the prayer of Christ. Willibald, in 724-5, is the last pilgrim to mention this church; it was destroyed by an earthquake some twenty years later. The Crusaders first built an oratory in the ruins which they later (c.1170) replaced by a church …. The fate of this building is unknown; still functioning in 1323, it was abandoned in 1345.

Additional information about the modern church (as well as additional pictures) can be found on the Franciscan Cyberspot here. A 360-degree image of the inside of the church is available here.

This photo and over 1,500 others are available in Volume 3 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands, which can be purchased here for $39 (with free shipping). Additional photos and information about the Mount of Olives is available here on the BiblePlaces website. This page on LifeintheHolyLand.com includes a photograph of the area taken in the 1890s before the Church of All Nations was built.

Excerpt was taken from Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, The Holy Land: An Oxford Archaeological Guide from Earliest Times to 1700, 4th ed. (Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 128-129. The fifth edition of this book is available here.