Galilee Field Study

Lake Galilee

Hello Again!
I have returned from the Galilee.  I'm back on campus in Jerusalem.  We had another wonderful field study, the longest one of the semester.  We stayed at the En Gev Resort!  A nice place located on the shore of Lake Galilee and we stayed there every night, which was much nicer than having to pack up every night and move somewhere else.  Our first day we went from sea to shinning sea, starting at Caesarea and ending at En Gev.  But through the entire four days we went up, down, and across the Galilee, we even climbed 3200ft up onto a volcanic cone and looked into Syria and Lebanon - we were as far north as possible.  Most of our field studies have been Old Testament focused, including parts of this one, but obviously there is a great amount of very interesting things happening in the Galilee during the New Testament...like the ministry of Jesus!  That made this trip unique and very special to me.  We traced the movement of Jesus and his ministry finding realities that could only be found in historical geography and how that plays into culture and society.  So, that is a basic overall look at our trip.  I'll go into some details about my favorite parts and show some pictures.

Our first stop was at the New Testament site of Caeserea.  Its an awesome Herod the Great city built up by him to impress Rome and to satisfy his ego.  He built crazy palaces there, temples, and theaters. So here it is, the west at its best on the shore of the holy land, Hellenism moving in.  We sat in what could have been a prison cell, perhaps Paul's cell, and read some stories out of Acts.  Another awesome find at Caeserea was this stone with an inscription on it and with Pontius Pilate's name on it! Until that stone was found scholars weren't sure of the reality of Pontius Pilate and his role.  So thats a pretty cool stone.  I meant to take a picture of it, and never did.  But the stone at Caesarea is just a replica, the real one is at the museum here in Jerusalem. so i need to go there.
Here are some pictures of Caesarea

Herod's Aqueduct

Caesarea

The Palace. Small rooms here, like prison cells

Theater

 

Ok. I'm gonna "publish" this post and keep editing it as I have time. So there will be more coming, either in addition to this post, or new posts. so keep yourself updated!