If you’re on holiday in Rhodes and you don’t mind swimming a bit, you can get your diving practice from this concrete platform.
Paul briefly visited Rhodes as he traveled back to Jerusalem on his third missionary journey.
Acts 21:1 — After we had torn ourselves away from them, we put out to sea and sailed straight to Cos. The next day we went to Rhodes and from there to Patara.
I don’t pay much attention to statistics for this blog or its related website, given limited time and a sense that it doesn’t matter much anyway. But I noticed that Feedburner provides a list of most popular blog posts and I was surprised at what received the most views in the last 18 months (when we began using the Feedburner service). Here are the top sixteen, with the most popular at the top:
New Discoveries Related to Temple Mount
Best of 2009: Books, Software, Photo CDs
Weekend Roundup (from Feb 2010)
The Dragnet on the Sea of Galilee
I am having trouble accounting for why some of these were so popular. I notice that none of these are less than a year old, so perhaps the results are skewed by the length of time they’ve been available to those searching for specific terms. Perhaps I’ll check back in a year and see how the list compares.
If you’re thinking of a trip to biblical lands, you might want to choose a country other than Greece this year. From the Guardian:
The greatest repository of ancient Greek art – the National Archaeological Museum of Athens – has become the latest victim of the economic crisis engulfing Greece, with visitors getting only a peek at its renowned collections.
As the long-awaited tourist season begins, the debt-choked country’s top attraction is in the news for all the wrong reasons: closed exhibition halls, neglect and exasperated holidaymakers.
“This is our first time to Greece and of course we’re disappointed,” said Shareen Young, from Orange Country, California, who on Friday found herself locked out of the venerable institution because of a staff shortage. “I had really wanted to see the golden Mask of Agamemnon and other treasures of Troy.”
Barbara Vimercati, an Italian tourist, was also left standing outside the museum’s monumental bronze doors. “It says it’s open until 4pm but it’s not, and there isn’t even a note explaining why,” she said, making do with a glimpse of cellophane-wrapped statues in an adjacent corridor. “It’s unbelievable. We don’t understand.”
Most Greeks, including the museum’s keepers, are similarly at a loss. “We have 11,000 exhibits, five permanent collections and galleries over more than 8,000 square metres of space,” said Alexandra Christopoulou, a museum representative. “The season begins in April. I really don’t know why it has taken so long for the culture ministry to send extra personnel.”
With just 30 guards to supervise displays that require at least 130 on a daily basis, only eight of the museum’s 64 exhibition halls were open to the public last Sunday, according to the Kathimerini newspaper. Visitors have reportedly almost come to blows with staff when they discover that their €7 (£6.25) ticket gives them access to only a fraction of the displays.
The story continues here.
HT: Jack Sasson
From WorldNetDaily:
One of the most prominent Israeli archaeologists declared today that remains from the First and Second Jewish Temple period – including the Second Temple itself – lie underneath the Temple Mount surface, just waiting to be excavated. Dr. Eilat Mazar of Hebrew University accused the site’s Islamic custodians of destroying Jewish artifacts while attempting to turn the Temple Mount into a "giant mosque." "I think we will find all the remains starting from the First Temple period and remains of the Temple itself," said Mazar, a third-generation archeologist. "I mean, no one took it out, it’s there." Mazar said she is "absolutely sure" remains from the First and Second Temple periods, including "the Second Temple itself," as well as later remains from the Byzentine [sic] and early Islamic periods, are just under the surface of the Temple Mount. Continued Mazar: "I am absolutely sure, in light of my very rich experience excavating Jerusalem for 30 years now, all these remains are waiting to be revealed. And if it can’t be done nowadays because of all kinds of sensitivities, at least we should take care that it won’t be ruined for future excavations when time comes." Mazar was speaking in an interview with "Aaron Klein Investigative Radio" on New York’s WABC Radio.
The continuation of the story and the audio of the 14-minute interview with Mazar can be found here.
With the most recent “roundup” here on Wednesday, there are not enough items of interest to warrant another edition this weekend. Instead, I have recently learned about (a new?) feature at the BAS website. You can check the same link each week for new content. From BAS:
Here’s a quick list of what’s brand new and most popular this week on the award-winning Web site of the Biblical Archaeology Society, publishers of Biblical Archaeology Review magazine.
BRAND NEW
Roman Ships Transported Live Fish June 03, 2011
Large Underground Water Source Found in Jerusalem June 02, 2011
Hawass Says Report of New Pyramids is Inaccurate June 01, 2011
Jerusalem Tunnels Reveal City’s Ancient Past May 31, 2011
Researchers Create Replicas of Cuneiform Tablets May 27, 2011
MOST POPULAR
A Case Against the Repatriation of Archaeological Artifacts
The Pharaoh, the Bible and Liberation (Square)
The Birth and Death of Biblical Minimalism
Scholar’s Study
2011 Archaeological Digs Seeking Volunteers
Three items struck me in the list’s one-sentence introduction:
1. What is the difference between “brand new” and “new”? Is it necessary or helpful to include the word “brand”?
2. Is there some value in informing your readers that your website is “award-winning”? Does it matter what kind of award it is?
3. In the 1990s we spoke of the World Wide Web, but it seems that in the last ten years or so, the Web has become the web and we don’t have Web sites, but websites.
None of these items are all that significant, but they stood out to me.
With regard to the links themselves, I recommend “A Case Against the Repatriation of Archaeological Artifacts,” by Rachel Hallotte.
Apparently one fisherman grew tired of wading from his boat to land each day and built himself a little dock. This rickety walkway does nothing to remind the visitor of the glory of the ancient city of Troas and its important harbor, long reclaimed by the ocean.
The apostle Paul passed through the port several times, beginning with his first trip to Europe and the city of Philippi (Acts 16:8-10). Luke joined Paul at this time, based on the first occurrence of the first person plural in the narrative.
On his third missionary journey, Paul returned this way to visit friends as he traveled to Jerusalem.
His lengthy oratory put Eutychus to sleep, an event which might have gone unnoticed had not Eutychus been sitting in a window on the third floor (Acts 20:9). As the NET Bible puts it, “Fast asleep, he fell down from the third story and was picked up dead.”
Some have suggested that following his release from prison in Rome, Paul was later arrested in Troas. This would explain why Paul left his cloak and scrolls there, and why he requested that Timothy bring them to him quickly (2 Tim 4:13).
Strabo called Troas “one of the most famous cities of the world,” but by the sixth century, its harbors were apparently silted up and the city was no longer a significant crossroads in the Byzantine empire.
