(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

“Why go to Israel?”  Perhaps you’ve asked yourself that question before or someone else has asked it of you.  If you have been to Israel (or live there now) then you can probably think of several reasons why someone should go.  But for someone who has never been, this is a valid question.  After all, for most people in the world, it is a serious investment of time and money (and a certain amount of risk) to travel to the Holy Land.  Why go through all the trouble?

My favorite way to answer that question is to tell people that the Bible comes alive and somehow becomes more real when you go to Israel or any of the other lands of the Bible.  From our armchairs in what the Bible refers to as the “ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8), it is all too easy to fall into the trap of reading the Bible like you would read a fictional book.  Even if you believe every word is true, those times and places are so far removed from your everyday life that it is difficult to remember that the heroes in the Bible were real people who faced real challenges and who had to exercise real faith. 

However, traveling to biblical lands removes much of distance between you and the people in the Bible.  You see the biblical places with your own eyes and you become aware that you are standing in the same spot as David or Ruth or whomever.  Suddenly it hits you … “This is where it happened!” … and a biblical story will jump off the page into real life.

In my experience, such moments happen in different places for different people when they visit Israel.  Our picture of the week is of one of the places where it happened to me.  It comes from Volume 1 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands which focuses on Galilee.  It is a photograph of the High Place at Dan.  In the foreground is a reconstruction of a horned altar that once stood at that spot, and behind it are steps leading up to an elevated platform where one of Jeroboam’s golden calves once stood.

I was familiar with the story of Jeroboam’s idolatry when I first visited the site and could even point out for you on a map where Dan and Bethel were, the two places where Jeroboam erected golden calves for the Israelites to worship.  But it wasn’t until I was standing there, close to the spot where this picture was taken, that I ever stopped to think that there was an actual place on the globe where a golden calf had stood and where sacrifices were offered to it.  The absolute certainty of the place drove home to me the reality of 1 Kings 12:26-30.

Jeroboam said in his heart, “Now the kingdom will return to the house of David.  If this people go up to offer sacrifieces in the house of the LORD at Jerualem, then the heart of this people will return to their lord, even to Rehoboam king of Judah; and they will kill me and return to Rehoboam king of Judah.”  So the king consulted, and made two golden calves, and he said to them, “It is too much for your to go up to Jerusalem; behold your gods, O Israel, that brought you up from the land of Egypt.”  He set one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan.  Now this thing became a sin, for the people went to worship before the one as far as Dan. (NASV)

So why go to Israel?  Well, for one thing, the Bible will come alive for you in ways you don’t expect.

This photograph and over 1,100 others are available in Volume 1 of the Pictorial Libary of Bible Lands which is available here for $39 (with free shipping).  Additional photographs of Tel Dan and links to more information about the site can be found on the BiblePlaces website here.

(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Last week, a link was provided on this blog to some fascinating 360-degree panoramas of the remains at Laodicea.  So our “picture of the week” comes from Volume 10 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands which focuses on Western Turkey.  The image captures the remains of the main street in Laodicea.

It is worth noting the biblical significance of this site, which is mentioned six times in the New Testament.  Paul refers to the city four times in his letter to the Colossians (Col. 2:1; 4:13; 4:15-16), and Jesus addresses the city in his Revelation to John:

14 “And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write: ‘The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation.
15 “‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! 16 So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. 17 For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. 18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see. 19 Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent. 20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me. 21 The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’” (Rev. 3:14-22, ESV.)

The cultural background of this passage is discussed in the PowerPoint notes included in the PLBL collection.  (As a side note, in my humble opinion, these notes are one of the most valuable features of the Pictorial Library.  They are a handy, concise source of reliable information about biblical sites.)  The notes in the Laodicea PowerPoint file state this:

Laodicea in Revelation

1. The church in Laodicea was the last and southeasternmost of the Asian churches addressed by John in Revelation (3:14-22). It was the only one of the seven letters written to churches of Asia Minor bearing no commendation …

2. This letter to the Laodiceans is filled with local allusions which would have brought his message to life for the people of the city.

   a. The church is said to be “poor,” contrasting with Laodicea’s role as the banking center of the province of Asia. Laodicea was famous for its wealth, changing money and minting its own coins since before the 1st century AD. Even when an earthquake destroyed their city in 60, the Laodiceans refused aid offered by Rome and rebuilt the city at their own expense.

   b. John also says that they are “blind”; Laodicea was the chief medical center of Phrygia. Nearby a temple and great medical center/school was dedicated to the Roman god Men Karou (identified with the Greek god Zeus), famous for its production of eye-salve from “Phrygian powder,” said to cure weak eyes. The irony is that these people, who took great pride in their medical skill, were unaware of their own spiritual blindness.

   c. The church is also said to be “naked,” a local allusion which relates to the major industry of the entire region: the manufacture and preparation of textiles. Laodicea’s glossy, black wool earned her a grand reputation, and her citizens wore black garments with pride, contrasting John’s advice to the Christians of the city to buy “white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed.”

So, like so many of the prophets in the Bible, Jesus uses the cultural environment of the hearers to drive home spiritual truths.  Understanding that cultural background leads us to a deeper understanding of the text.

This photo and over 900 others are available in Volume 10 of the Pictorial Library of the Bible Lands and is available here for $34 (with free shipping).  Additional images of Laodicea and links to other pages that discuss the site are available on the BiblePlaces website here.  Images and information about textile industries are available on the LifeInTheHolyLand website here.

(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Perhaps one of the largest obstacles to understanding what life was like in Bible times is the difference between a modern city and an ancient city.  A modern city spans hundreds of square miles, but an ancient city was typically only a few acres.  A modern city has no protection around it, but an ancient city was protected by a massive wall.  A modern city has dozens of roads leading in and out of it, but an ancient city had (at most) a handful of gates leading in and out, and often had only one.  So when a modern reader opens the Bible and reads about Boaz doing business transactions at the city gate (Ruth 4) or gossipers sitting in the gate (Psalm 69:12) or Amos calling for justice in the gate (Amos 5:15), the full significance of those passages may be lost.

Our picture of the week comes from Volume 5 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands, and shows the remains of the Iron Age gate at Beersheba.  Actually it shows only one chamber within that gate.  During this time period, it was common for gates to have rooms on either side of the passageway.  For example, a double chambered gate had two rooms on one side of the passage and two on the other side.  It was shaped like an E and a 3 facing each other: E3.  These chambers sometimes were lined with benches, such as in the picture below.  This would provide a place for people to sit while carrying out the various types of business that happened in the city gate … and there was a wide variety of action here. 

Since there was always a small number of gates in an ancient city, all the foot traffic coming in and out of the city was funneled though this one place.  Consequently it became an ideal place for people to sit and do business transactions, talk about current events, or sell their wares.  It also was a convenient place for the elders and rulers to decide legal matters or prophets to  proclaim a message from the Lord.  In times of battle, these rooms provided the soldiers of the city with space to fight an enemy that had managed to break through the door.

Oded Borowski, in his book Daily Life in Biblical Times, describes the city gate this way:

When discussing the gate, one should realize that this was more than just a door; it was a gate system. Many cities, such as Hazor, Megiddo, Gezer, Lachish, and Dan, had a series of gates, outer and inner, through which traffic found its way in and out of the city.  … The main gate was a formidable structure that had two or more stories to provide space for the activities undertaken by the civic and military administrations and by the citizenry. … The street-level floor had one to three chambers on each side …. The gate area, including the chambers and the open space around it, was used in peacetime for judicial, commercial, and social activities.  The city elders, as well as the king or the regional governor, met in the gate to hold court. At Tell Dan, the remains of a low podium for an elaborate seat and canopy were found by the gate adjacent to the open area.  The chambers in the gate at Gezer contained low benches along the walls to provide seating, possibly for the elders or for merchants.  The gate was also where certain cultic activities took place (2 Kgs 23:8), as illustrated by the standing stones discovered at Dan and other sites.

In the age of computers, automobiles, and sprawling cities, there really is no good modern equivalent of the city gate.  It was the mall, the courthouse, the army base, the television, and Facebook all rolled into one.  In many ways, it was the center of daily life in the city.

Excerpt from Oded Borowski, Daily Life in Biblical Times, Society of Biblical Literature: Archaeology and Biblical Studies, No. 5 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003), pp. 47-48.

This photo and over 700 others are available in Volume 5 of the Pictorial Library of Bible Lands, and is available here for $34 with free shipping.  Additional pictures of ancient gates can be seen here, here, and here on the BiblePlaces website.

(Post by Seth M. Rodriquez)

Someone who has been to the Western Wall today and has seen the big, beautiful plaza that spreads out before the wall may be surprised to learn that for much of the past few centuries, the Jews worshiped at the wall in a much smaller space.  What’s more, for about 20 years in the middle of the last century, they couldn’t worship there at all.

Our picture of the week comes from a collection called Photographs of Charles Lee Feinberg, which is available for purchase at LifeintheHolyLand.com.  Dr. Feinberg was a Bible professor who took several trips to the Middle East between 1959 to 1968.  His collection is a rare jewel of color photographs from a period when the region was less densely populated and developed.

Pictures from the 1800s and photographs like the one below from the mid-1900s show that the old “Western Wall Plaza” wasn’t much of a plaza.  It was more like a hallway … or maybe just a closet. 

However, it was still revered by the Jewish people because it was the closest they could come to the place where the temple once stood, and the wall itself was part of the temple complex during the first century A.D.  (It was and still is part of a retaining wall that holds up part of the Temple Mount.)

During Israel’s War of Independence in 1948, the Jews lost control of the Old City of Jerusalem and with it lost access to their most revered place of worship: the Wailing Wall … or as they call it these days, the Western Wall. (When I was in college, one of my Jewish-born professors said that they didn’t call it the Wailing Wall anymore because they had done enough wailing.) So from 1948 until the Six Day War in 1967, the Jews were not allowed to worship at their most holy site.

All that changed in 1967 when Israeli soldiers defeated the Jordanian forces and captured the Old City. In his book, The Battle for Jerusalem, Lt. Gen. Mordechai Gur captures the emotions of that fateful day as he and his men visited the Western Wall for the first time in over 20 years:

We came to the narrow little gate, known as the Mograbi, and lowered our heads to duck through it to the top of the gloomy, crooked, steep, narrow stairs.  We heard the sounds of praying as we went down the steps.  The space in front of the wall was packed with people.  Soldiers were praying, some swaying devoutly as if in synagogue, although they were still wearing their stained battle dress.

To our right and above us was the wall: huge blocks, gray, bare, silent.  Only shrubs of hyssop in the cracks, like eyes, gave the stones life.  We saw that somebody had set up an Ark, brought from a military synagogue, and that in front of it stood Rabbi Goren praying in a hoarse voice.  he had been praying non-stop now for two hours. 

The site, the prayers, the great victory, the thoughts of the fallen seemed to release the paratroopers from their armor of iron and many of them wept unashamedly, like children. …

I drew near the crowd of soldiers praying, and when they noticed me they indicated I should go to the front.  I thanked them but stayed at the back. 

Despite the great congregation, I had to undergo my own private experience.  I did not listen to the prayers, but raised my eyes to the stones and looked at the paratroopers praying, some with helmets on their heads and some with skullcaps.  I scanned the buildings closing in on us from three directions, which gave the square a very intimate character.

I remembered our family visits at the wall.  Twenty-five years ago, as a child, I had walked through the narrow alleys and markets.  The impression made on me by the praying at the wall never left me.  My memories blended in with the pictures that I had seen at a later age of Jews, with long white beards, wearing frock coats and black hats.  They and the wall were one.

Shortly after this, the modern, spacious Western Wall plaza was created.

Excerpt from Mordechai Gur, The Battle for Jerusalem, trans. by Philip Gillon (New York: Popular Library, 1978), pp. 376, 378.

This picture and over 400 others are included in a collection called Photographs of Charles Lee Feinberg, and can be purchased here for $20 (with free shipping).  Additional images of the Western Wall throughout the last two centuries can be found here, here, and here.