Earthquakes and King Solomon’s Mines in the Jordan Valley

The Jordan Valley Photo: Tango7174

The Jordan Rift valley - Earthquakes Galore!

Here in Israel we’ve just experienced five mild but noticeable earthquakes in six days.  People are wondering whether there’s a big one on the way.  We have a lot of earthquakes here.  It’s not at all surprising.  We live right at the edge of the Jordan Rift Valley where the African and Arabian Plates meet.  These are so-called tectonic plates.  They are huge slabs of the Earth’s crust that float on the surface of the molten rock below.  Very, very slowly they move with respect to each other.  At these junctions, the movement of the plates gives rise to volcanoes and earthquakes.  The Golan Heights were created by volcanic activity.    Earthquakes have occurred along and around the Jordan Valley throughout recorded history. 

Mt of Olives Earthquake Damage 1927
Photo: Matson Collection 

On July 11th 1927 an earthquake measuring 6.3 on the Richter scale damaged buildings in Jericho, Tiberias, Ramle, Nablus and Jerusalem (including the domes of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the al-Aqsa Mosque) and killed at least 500 people.  On January 1st 1837 an earthquake in the Jordan Vally east of Safed was felt up to 500 kilometres away but the main damage was in Safed, Tiberias and in Galilee villages.  Thousands of people died in Safed where the whole Jewish Quarter was destroyed. 


The Great Earthquake of 749

Fallen Columns at Sussita
Photo: Akos Nagy


Major earthquakes were recorded during every era in the history of the Holy Land but the most famous of all was in the shemitta year 749.  Whole cities were laid waste.   In Jerusalem the al-Aqsa Mosque and four Muslim palaces around the south-western corner of the Temple Mount were destroyed.  Take a trip to Beit Shean at the junction of the Jordan and Jezreel Valleys or to Sussita (Hippos) on the Golan Heights and you will see the results of this devastating earthquake.  Buildings and columns lie where they fell.  If you look carefully you will see that in Beit Shean the columns fell pointing north and in Sussita they fell pointing south.  Why should this be?  It is visible evidence that the Arabian plate on which Sussita and the Golan Heights sit is moving north with respect to the African plate which includes Beit Shean and the Land of Israel.

Timna and Feinan – Two Halves of a Crater 100 km Apart

Way down south in the Arava Valley, about 26 km north of Eilat, at Timna are the northernmost deposits of copper to be found in Israel.  There are ancient copper mines here.  Timna sits in the western half of a machtesh – a crater caused by erosion.  To find the eastern half of the crater and the copper deposits it contains you must travel 100 km north to Feinan on the Jordanian side of the Arava.  This is biblical Punon where the Children of Israel stopped on their way from Egypt.  Some 30 million years ago movement between the tectonic plates in the Jordan Rift Valley separated the two halves of the crater.

King  Solomon’s Mines?

King Solomon's Pillars Timna
Photo: Chmee2

Timna also hit the news this week.  Tel Aviv University archaeologist Erez Ben-Yosef used carbon dating to examine organic remains from the ancient copper mines here.  He concluded that the mines were from the Iron Age – the time of King Solomon.  Are the legends of King Solomon’s Mines true after all?

Already 6,000 years ago prehistoric man began to extract the copper deposits that could be found at Timna and to produce pure copper by smelting the ore at high temperatures.  At first copper deposits above the ground were exploited.  Over time the miners began to dig open pits then shallow “burrows” and eventually deeper mine shafts to reach the valuable metal ore.  For a time it was thought that these were the legendary King Solomon’s Mines.  Three large sandstone columns formed by erosion became known as King Solomon’s Pillars. 




Egyptian Rock Painting, Timna
Photo: Shlomo Chetrit

The first archaeological exploration of the copper mines at Timna began in 1959.  The archaeologist Beno Rothenberg discovered an Egyptian temple to the goddess Hathor.   Hathor is the goddess of fertility and also the goddess of mining.  This, together with a huge rock painting showing Pharaoh Rameses III paying homage to Hathor seemed to confirm his theory that the major mining enterprise here was Egyptian and dated to the 12th and 13th centuries BCE.  Later, after the Egyptians left Timna, Midianites took over the mining and altered the temple to fit with their rituals and beliefs.

The recent carbon dating evidence gives a strong indication that the mines are not Egyptian but from the Iron Age period.  Ben-Yosef believes that the mines were operated by the Edomites a people that lived along the Jordan Valley.  They abandoned the mines in the 10th century BCE perhaps because of an Egyptian invasion or perhaps due to competition from copper produced in Cyprus.  Are these King Solomon’s Mines?  We can’t say that.  But who knows – they may have supplied his building projects with precious copper.

Beit Shean and Timna Park are fascinating and extensive sites well worth visiting.  Follow the links for more information.

Sussita isn’t really accessible for unaccompanied tourists yet but here’s a link to the Hippos / Sussita excavation project.

The Riddle of the Sphinx

Greek sphinx.
Photo: Jeanhousen

In Greek mythology the sphinx was a malevolent creature with the face of a woman, the body of a lion, the wings of an eagle and the tail of a serpent.  It was said that a sphinx guarded the approach to the city of Thebes and asked each passer-by a riddle.  She strangled and devoured all those who did not know the answer.  There are different versions of the riddle of the sphinx.  Here is one.

“What is it that goes on four legs in the morning, on two legs at noon and on three legs in the evening?”

The answer is man who crawls on all fours as a baby, walks upright in his prime and uses a stick to walk in old age.

The Great Sphinx at Giza
Photo: Marek Kokjan

The sphinx did not originate in Greece but in Egypt.  There the sphinx had the body of a lion and the face of a man – no wings or tail.  In Egypt the sphinx was seen as benevolent – a guardian of temples and holy places.  The largest and most famous of all is the Great Sphinx of Giza which sits on the bank of the Nile by the Great Pyramids.  We don’t know exactly when this sphinx was built.  Its face is thought to represent Pharaoh Khafra who reigned in about 2,570 BCE.  He built the second largest pyramid in Giza.

 

Pharaoh Menkaure
Photo: Iry-Hor

 

Last week it was announced that a team from the Hebrew University’s Institute of Archaeology had discovered the front legs of a sphinx from ancient Egypt in Tel Hazor in Upper Galilee.  Between the feet was a hieroglyphic inscription bearing the name of Pharaoh Menkaure (in Greek: Mycerinus) a son of Khafra whom he succeeded to the throne in about 2,530 BCE.  Menkaure built the smallest of the three Great Pyramids of Giza.  This is the only sphinx of Menkaure discovered anywhere in the world and the only royal sphinx discovered in the eastern Mediterranean.

 

Now here is another riddle of the sphinx.  We know of no connection between Egypt and Canaan during the reign of Menkaure.  It would be another 800 years before Egypt ruled Canaan.  How did the statue get to Hazor? 

 

 

Photo: Prof. Amnon Ben Tor
and Dr. Sharon Zuckerman

There are some clues to help us solve this riddle.  The fragment of the statue was found at the entrance to the city palace in a destruction layer dated to 13th century BCE.  At that time Hazor was the largest and most important city in the region.  The text of the inscription describes Menkaure as “Beloved by the divine manifestation… that gave him eternal life”.  The inscription, say Professor Amnon Ben-Tor and Dr Sharon Zuckerman who lead the excavation at Hazor, suggests that the sphinx originated in ancient Heliopolis a few miles north of the modern city of Cairo.  It seems that centuries later it may have been a gift from a King of Egypt to the King of Hazor during the 15th to 13th centuries BCE when Canaan was under Egyptian rule.

 

By any standards this is a major archaeological discovery but perhaps this photo will explain why it especially interests me.  It shows my parents in 1950 standing in front of the Great Sphinx of Giza with the pyramid of Khufu, Menkaure's grandfather, in the background.  The little boy my father is holding is me.

What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?



The Romans Carry off the treasures of the Temple
Relief fromTitus Arch, Rome

The “Three Weeks”, a period of mourning for the loss of the Temple observed by the Jewish people, began this Monday night on the 17th day of the Hebrew month of Tammuz.  During that period we recall the awful climax of the Great Jewish Revolt against the Romans in the year 70 CE in which the Temple and the city of Jerusalem were destroyed.  Tradition holds that on 17th of Tammuz the walls of Jerusalem were breached by the Romans.

Amongst Jews there has always been a tension between admiration for the great achievements of the Romans and anger and resentment for the way in which they abused their power.  A story in the Babylonian Talmud (Shabbat 33 b) illustrates this well.



Roman Bathhouse - Hypercaust

Rabbi Yehuda, Rabbi Jose, and Rabbi Shimon were sitting together and Yehuda, the son of proselytes, sat before them.  Rabbi Yehuda opened the conversation, saying:  "How beautiful are the works of this nation (the Romans).  They have established markets.  They have built bridges.  They have opened bathing-houses." 

Rabbi Jose said nothing, but Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai said: "All these things they have instituted for their own sake. Their markets are gathering-places for harlots.  They have built baths for the purpose of indulging themselves in their comforts.  They have built bridges to collect tolls from those who cross them." 

This month two discoveries in Jerusalem were announced that illustrate both the technical achievements and the brutality of the Romans.

Roman Road Beit Hanina: Assaf Peretz
Courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority 

The Romans are famous for their roads.  A good transport system was vital for the military, financial and administrative maintenance of their empire.  Major roads were built to a high technical standard with inns and forts along the way.  The routes and sometimes the surfaces of major Roman roads have survived for thousands of years.  In the Beit Hanina neighbourhood of Jerusalem an archaeological excavation preceded the laying of a new drainage pipe.  The work revealed a beautifully preserved section of a major road from the Roman period linking the port of Jaffa to Jerusalem.  The surface is made of large flat stones that would have been comfortable to walk on.   It is well worn – a testament to the volume of traffic it carried. 

In Roman times, like today, there were two main routes from Jaffa to Jerusalem.  They followed a common path from the coast as far as Lod.  From there one road led through Sha’ar HaGai following today’s Route 1.  A second headed further north via Modi’in and Beit Horon along the line of our Route 443.  It is a section of this road that was discovered in Beit Hanina.  In some places a modern road had been laid only a few centimetres above the Roman road.  The Roman surface must have been visible until just a few decades ago.

In the year 70 CE the Romans laid siege to Jerusalem.  A terrible famine resulted that was made worse by the rebels who hunted for food in the homes of their fellow Jews.  The historian Josephus wrote: 

As the famine grew worse, the frenzy of the partisans increased with it….For, as corn was nowhere to be seen, men broke into the houses and ransacked them.  If they found any, they maltreated the occupants for saying there was none.  If they did not, they suspected them of having hidden it more carefully and tortured them. ...

Many secretly exchanged their possessions for one measure of corn - wheat if they happened to be rich, barley if they were poor.  Then they shut themselves up in the darkest corners of their houses where some through extreme hunger ate their grain as it was.  Others made bread, necessity and fear being their only guides.  Nowhere was a table laid… (Jewish War, V, 428).

The Finds: Photo Vladimir Naykhin
Courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority

Three whole cooking pots and an oil lamp were discovered in the cistern of a house that had stood near the Western Wall in the area of Robinson’s Arch.   The residents of the house had gone down into the cistern to eat their remaining food in secret.  The archaeologist directing the excavation, Eli Shukron, said that these are the first finds that connects us directly with the famine during the siege of Jerusalem.



And finally here is a clip from the Monty Python film The Life of Brian on the same theme.  John Cleese who plays Reg tries to arouse his fellow members of the “People’s Front of Judea” to rebel against the Romans but encounters some difficulty.



Kaiser Wilhelm II, Vincent van Gogh and Herod the Great: Exhibitions of Genius and Madness

For 2,000 years it has been thought that there is a connection between genius and mental illness.  Seneca, the 1st century Roman philosopher, wrote “There is no great genius without some touch of madness”.   Does the evidence support the idea?  The jury is still out but, even if geniuses are more prone to mental illness than the rest of us, to have psychological problems is no guarantee of genius.

There are three outstanding exhibitions showing in Israel at the moment - two in Jerusalem and one in Tel Aviv.  Each focuses on an individual who was important and influential in his own way despite psychological problems and episodes of mental illness.  Two achieved greatness.  One led his country and the world to disaster.

The Kaiser is Coming!

Kaiser Wilhelm II in 1905

Kaiser Wilhelm II was the last German Emperor.  Wilhelm was undoubtedly intelligent but he was also insecure, bombastic, autocratic and prone to bouts of depression and hysteria.  He was quite unfit to be a ruler.  In 1898 he visited Jerusalem.  His aim was to cement relationships between the German and Ottoman empires. 
 
The Turks were as determined to honour their imperial guest as he was to strengthen his relationship with them.  He was welcomed with great pomp and ceremony.  Three great decorated arches were set up along his route to the Old City.  The section of the city wall between the Jaffa Gate and the Citadel was torn down and the moat filled in to allow his entourage, complete with horses and carriages, to pass through.  Beggars and stray dogs were banished from the city lest they give a bad impression. 

Wilhelm's Entourage by the Sultan's Arch

Wilhelm saw himself as the patron of the Protestant church and wanted to leave a religious and architectural legacy of his visit to the Holy City.  During his visit he dedicated the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in the Old City, acquired the land for the Augusta Victoria Hospice on the Mount of Olives and, in a gesture to German Catholics, laid the cornerstone of the Dormition Abbey on Mount Zion. 



Wilhelm's Tent Camp Jerusalem

On November 2nd Wilhelm formally received Theodore Herzl in the elaborate tent camp that had been set up for him in Jerusalem.  Herzl had timed his visit to coincide with that of the Kaiser and hoped to enlist his support for the Zionist cause.  The brief encounter left Herzl deeply disappointed.

Wilhelm’s erratic and reckless foreign policy led to the carnage of the First World War and the downfall of his empire.  He died in exile in the Netherlands in 1941.

There was huge press interest in the Kaiser's visit.  An exhibition in Jerusalem's Tower of David cleverly combines 21st century technology and contemporary reports and photographs to bring this encounter between European and Levantine empires to life and to explore its impact on the city.

“The Kaiser is Coming!” is at the Tower of David in Jerusalem until April 6th 2013.
 

Van Gogh Alive

Van Gogh - The Potato Eaters

In his own lifetime Vincent van Gogh’s work was not fully appreciated.  Today however he is considered one of the greatest artists in history.  He was born in the Netherlands in 1853 into a family in which art and religion were formative influences.  He began to draw as a child but worked as an art dealer, as a missionary in a poor coal mining district in Belgium and, briefly, as a teacher in London before applying himself more seriously to his art from 1885.  That year he produced his first major work The Potato Eaters.  It reflected the poverty of peasant life and was executed in dark, sombre colours.  His work changed radically when he moved to Paris in 1886.  Here he became interested in Japanese wood block prints and was exposed to the work of the Impressionists and the company of Post-Impressionist artists, notably Toulouse Lautrec, Seurat and Paul Gauguin whom he befriended.  He experimented with their brush techniques and adopted a palette of brighter, primary colours.

Van Gogh - Self Portrait With Straw Hat

In 1888 van Gogh moved to Arles in the south of France.  For a time he worked there together with Gauguin but their relationship became increasingly tense.  Van Gogh threatened Gauguin with a razor blade, but fled and used the razor to cut off his own earlobe.  He descended into delusions and hallucinations and was admitted to an asylum in nearby Saint-Remy where he remained for a year.  In May 1890 he moved to Auvers-sur-Oise, a suburb of Paris.  On 27th July 1890, at the age of 37 he shot himself with a revolver and died the next day as a result of his wounds.

Van Gogh left a vast artistic legacy.  He worked quickly producing over 2,000 works of art in ten years and averaging a painting a day during his last two months.  He used bold, dramatic brush strokes that gave a sense of movement and emotion and often applied paint directly from the tube.  Uniquely he used colour to express mood rather than realistically.

Van Gogh Alive is not a regular art exhibition.  It is a dramatic multi-sensory experience.  Large scale projections of over 2,000 of van Gogh’s works are synchronised with classical music.  It takes you on a spellbinding journey through his life, his work, his thoughts and his state of mind.

“Van Gogh Alive” is at the Maxidome, Israeli Trade Fairs and Conventions Centre, Tel Aviv until April 30th 2013

Herod the Great: The King’s Final Journey

Herod the Great

Herod the Great was King of Judea from 37 – 4 BCE.  He was one of the most ambitious builders of the classical world combining the most modern building techniques with a determination to defy nature.  In Jericho he diverted a river through the middle of his winter palace.  At Masada, in the middle of a desert with scarcely any water, he built a swimming pool.  In Caesarea Maritima he used hydraulic cement that hardened underwater to create a port where no natural harbour existed.  In Jerusalem he rebuilt the Temple of which the rabbis of the Talmud wrote "Whoever has not seen Herod's Temple has not seen a beautiful building in his life". 

Model of Herod's Temple Israel Museum

Herod was far more than a builder.  He was a skilful and effective ruler - the most successful client king of the Roman Empire.  He was also a difficult and dangerous man, famously paranoid.  Descended on his father’s side from Idumean converts to Judaism and on his mother’s side from Nabatean Arabs he married Mariamne, a princess of the royal Hasmonean line, to strengthen the legitimacy of his kingship.  She and two of Herod’s sons were put to death for Herod suspected even his closest family of plotting against him.  Caesar Augustus commented that it was “better to be Herod’s pig than his son”. 

Josephus the Jewish historian of the Great Revolt describes in graphic detail Herod’s death in Jericho and the procession that accompanied him to his last resting place in Herodium. 

 “There was a solid gold bier, adorned with precious stones and draped with the richest purple.  On it lay the body wrapped in crimson, with a diadem resting on the head and above that a golden crown, and the sceptre by the right hand.  The bier was escorted by Herod's sons and the whole body of his kinsmen, followed by his Spearmen, the Thracian Company, and his Germans and Gauls, all in full battle order.  The rest of his army led the way, fully armed and in perfect order, headed by their commanders and all the officers, and followed by five hundred of the house slaves and freed-men carrying spices.  The body was borne twenty-four miles to Herodium, where by the late king’s command it was buried.” Josephus, Wars, I, 33, 9.

Herodium from above

For over 40 years Ehud Netzer, architect and archaeologist, excavated sites that had been built 2,000 years before by Herod.  Herod’s tomb however remained elusive.  It wasn’t until April 2007 that Netzer and his team discovered the remains of a magnificent mausoleum and three sarcophagi on the slope of the hilltop palace fortress of Herodium facing Jerusalem.  Together with staff from the Israel Museum Netzer began to plan an exhibition of these recent discoveries.  Sadly whilst working on this plan at Herodium in October 2010 he fell to his death.

This world class exhibition represents Herod’s final journey from Jericho where he died, through the Judean Desert to Herodium where he was laid to rest.  The richly decorated throne room of Herod’s Winter Palace in Jericho and the royal box of his theatre at Herodium have been reconstructed together with his sarcophagus and elaborate mausoleum.  These and many other original artefacts are on display for the first time. 

“Herod the Great: The King’s Final Journey” is at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem until October 5th 2013

And the Egyptians ill-treated us...

One of the ways we describe the festival of Passover is “z’man heruteinu”.  It is the festival of our redemption, of our freedom from slavery in Egypt.  As a child this always puzzled me because my father ע"ה was born in Egypt, actually on the first day of Passover, and grew up there.  How did he sit with his family around the seder table celebrating having been taken out of Egypt when he was still living there?  It is a mystery to me!

The Bible tells us that the Egyptians enslaved the Children of Israel in Egypt.  The archaeologists and historians add that they ruled over the land of Canaan during the Late Bronze Age, from 1550 BCE to 1200 BCE.  In Biblical terms this was the time of Joseph in Egypt through the Exodus to the time when the Israelites approached the Land of Israel.  So where in Israel can we see evidence of those 350 years of Egyptian domination?

Megiddo

Megiddo City Gate Photo: Golf Bravo

Megiddo is a huge and impressive archaeological site.  It’s not surprising.  It was one of the mightiest city states in Canaan.  For thousands of years it dominated the ancient trade route between Egypt to the south and the empires to the north and east.  It has been the site of some critical battles.  The last of these was the British General Allenby’s defeat of the Turkish army in 1917.

Thutmose III attacks his enemies

from the temple at Karnak

In 1482 BCE the King of Mitanni was stirring up revolt in Canaan against Egypt.  Pharaoh Thutmose III marched north with his army to put down the rebellion.  The Canaanite forces gathered for battle near Megiddo.  Thutmose took the Canaanites by surprise by choosing the most dangerous but most direct route from the coastal road through the valleys to Megiddo.  The next day the two armies met on the battlefield.  When the Egyptian infantry charged the Canaanites fled and sought refuge in Megiddo.  Instead of pressing their advantage the Egyptian troops took time out to loot the Canaanite camp.  They lost the element of surprise.  It took a seven month siege before Megiddo fell to Thutmose.  Egypt continued to rule Caanaan for the next 300 years and established garrisons in Megiddo and around the country in Gaza, Beit Shean and Afeq.   In an inscription at the Temple of Karnak in Upper Egypt Thutmose recorded that 119 cities in Canaan had bowed down before him. 

Jerusalem

A letter from Tel el-Amarna

In 1887 a peasant woman was digging in the ruins of el-Amarna in Upper Egypt when she came across a pile of palm-sized clay tablets inscribed in cuneiform script in Accadian, the diplomatic language of the Late Bronze Age.  What she had discovered was Egypt’s Foreign Office archive from the time of Pharaoh Akhenaten.  These were mainly letters between the Egyptian administration and their representatives and client kings in Canaan and Amurru (modern Lebanon).  Six of the letters are from Abdi-Heba, the king of Jerusalem, to Pharaoh.  He pleads with Pharaoh to help defend against attacks from neighbouring cities and from nomadic fighters called the Apiru.  One letter opens:

“Say to the king, my lord: Message of Abdi-Heba, your servant. I fall at the feet of my lord 7 times and 7 times.  Consider the entire affair.  Milkilu and Tagi brought troops into Qiltu against me... ...May the king know (that) all the lands are at peace (with one another), but I am at war.  May the king provide for his land. ...”

In 2009, while the archaeologist Eilat Mazar was excavating a gatehouse tower in the wall of First Temple Jerusalem, a small fragment of a clay tablet with fragments of nine lines of Akkadian cuneiform script.  We don’t know for sure but this seems to be a fragment of one of Abdi-Heba’s letters to Pharaoh – a copy perhaps stored in his archive.  You can see it on display in the Davidson Centre in Jerusalem.

Anthropoid coffin from Deir el-Balah:

Hecht Museum, Photo: Hanay

At the entrance to the Archaeology Wing of the Israel Museum there is a group of strange anthropoid coffins from the Late Bronze Age.  They were discovered at Deir el-Balah, a few kilometres south-west of Gaza.  They may have been made for Egyptians but they certainly reflect the influence of Egypt in Canaan at that time.  The Hecht Museum in Haifa also has an anthropoid coffin from this period.

Beit Shean



Inscribed tablet governor's house

Beit Shean. Photo: Yukatan

Mention Beit Shean and most people think of the magnificent remains of Scythopolis, a Roman Byzantine city destroyed by an earthquake in 749.  At the northern edge of the Roman city is Tell el-Husn, the mound of ancient and biblical Beit Shean - an Egyptian regional centre for 300 years.  An Egyptian basalt stele (standing stone) was found here celebrating the defeat by Pharaoh Seti I of a group of Canaanite cities that tried to capture the city in 1318 BCE.  The governor’s house from the time of a later Pharaoh Ramses III was built in Egyptian style from mud bricks.  A bust of the Pharaoh stands in one of the rooms.  Over the doorpost was a stone tablet bearing the name of the governor, Ramse-Weser Khepesh, and his titles.  The stone artefacts on display are copies.  The originals are in the Rockefeller Museum in Jerusalem.

Timna Valley

Solomon's Pillars Timna Valley

Photo: Chmee2

Copper has been mined in the Timna Valley,in the south west Aravah about 30 km north of Eilat, for over 6,000 years.   In the Late Bronze Age the Egyptians established a sophisticated copper mining and production centre here.  Their mine shafts can still be seen.  Three huge sandstone pillars, known as Solomon’s Pillars, stand near the copper mines.  At their base is a small temple to Hathor, the Egyptian goddess of mining.  The engraved stelae in the temple contain a lot of information about the groups of Egyptians who came to mine here.  Above the temple on the side of one of the sandstone pillars is a carving of Ramses III with Hathor.

A Final Word?

Merneptah Stele
Photo: Webscribe

Mernheptah, the son of Ramses II, reigned from 1213 – 1203 BCE.  He was the last Egyptian king to personally enter Canaan to put down a rebellion.  In 1896 A basalt stone known as the Merneptah Stele was found at the Pharaoh’s burial temple in Thebes in Egypt.  A part of the inscription refers to Mernheptah’s victories during a military campaign in Canaan.  It includes the earliest known reference to Israel.  It reads:

“Canaan is captive with all woe. Ashkelon is conquered, Gezer seized, Yanoam made nonexistent; Israel is wasted, its seed is no more.”

The scholars tell us that “Israel” here refers to a people, the Ancient Israelites, rather than to a state and that the “seed” refers to its supply of grain.  Even so this is one of many times when our conquerors have underestimated our resilience.  As the Passover Haggadah tells us:

“For not just one alone has risen against us to destroy us, but in every generation they rise against us to destroy us; and the Holy One, blessed be He, saves us from their hand!”

Chag sameach!

Of Stamps and Seals and Purity

Act 1:   Bringing the Mishna to life 

The announcement from the Israel Antiquities Authority came just before Chanukah.  The timing was a tour guide’s dream.  Every guide in Jerusalem would be talking about how over 2,000 years ago on that first Chanukah the Maccabees found just one flask of oil in the Temple with the seal of the High Priest certifying its purity.  Now we had a real seal from the Temple!

A small piece of fired clay the size of a button had been discovered in the soil under the Herodian street near the south west corner of the Temple Mount.  It was inscribed with two lines of Hebrew letters and dated to the late Second Temple period.  It was, said the announcement, “probably used as a voucher certifying the ritual purity of an object of food in the Temple”.  The inscription read “"דכא ל'ה.  The excavators, Ronny Reich and Eli Shukrun explained that this meant “Pure for G-d”.  This inscribed piece of clay was direct archaeological evidence of the workings of the Temple.  It may not actually have been the High Priest’s seal on a flask of oil but it was almost as good.

An inscribed piece of clay from the Second Temple.  Photo: Israel Antiquities Authority

Within a few days Professor Shlomo Naeh from Hebrew University had helped us keep our feet firmly on the ground.  The object could not have been used as a stamp to impress on a container – because the inscription was positive not negative.  It couldn’t have been used to seal a container and ensure the ritual purity of the contents - it had no way of being attached.  His careful reading of the Mishna (Shekalim, 5, 1-5) showed that this was a voucher or token used in the purchase of sacrifices in the Temple.

A person bringing a sacrifice would pay for it at the Temple “office” and receive a voucher inscribed in Aramaic.  He would then exchange the voucher for the appropriate sacrifice.  The inscription on the clay object, Professor Naeh explained, was exactly as described in the Mishna and the Jerusalem Talmud.  It specified the type of sacrifice (in this case a ram), the day of the week (Sunday) and the family of priests who were serving in the Temple that week (Yehoyariv).  These tokens never left the Temple precincts so it’s no wonder that they are rarely found now. 

This inscribed piece of clay is tiny, 2 centimetres in diameter, and yet it helps to bring the workings of the Temple and the pages of the Mishna to life.  Sometimes it’s the little things that count.

Here are links to the press releases from the Israel Antiquities Authority and the Hebrew University.

۞۞۞۞

Act 2:   Early Competition for the OU

In the 6^th century CE, when the land was under Roman Byzantine rule, Acco and its surrounding area was predominantly Christian.  A Jewish housewife living in that setting would have had to take extra care that the food she bought was kosher.  She could of course go directly to the source and see the food being prepared with her own eyes.  But if that wasn’t possible she might do what many of us do today and rely on a hechsher – a stamp or seal or label that told her that the food was prepared in accordance with Jewish law.  

Earlier this month the Israel Antiquities Authority announced the discovery of a tiny ceramic stamp during excavations at Horbat Uza east of Acco in the north of the country.  It was found during a rescue dig there prior to the building of a new railway line.  The stamp is about 1,500 years old and it was used to stamp a hechsher onto bread.

A 1,500 Year Old Bread Stamp.  Photo: Dr Danny Syon courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority

The potter had engraved the image of the Temple Menorah, the symbol of a Jewish bakery, on the face of the stamp before firing it in a kiln.  Afterwards the word “Launtius” had been scratched in Greek letters on its handle.  The excavators concluded that a batch of stamps was made each engraved with the menorah.  The baker then scratched his name, Launtius, on the handle of his own stamp.  Each loaf he baked would have been stamped with the image of the menorah and with his name.  This combination would assure the buyer that the bread was kosher.

Christian bread stamps inscribed with a cross were much more common in this period.  Bread stamps like this one with a menorah have come to light before but never in a controlled excavation.  This find testifies that there was a Jewish community in Uza in Byzantine times and suggests that the baker in Uza was producing baked goods for the nearby town of Acco.  It shows us that the hechsher has a history that goes back at least 1,500 years.  It’s another small discovery with a big story to tell.

Here’s a link to the Israel Antiquities Authority press release.

Welcome to the Tour With Jack Blog

Dear Friends,


Welcome to the Tour With Jack blog. The blog is a way for you to be more involved with the Tour With Jack experience. I'm hoping that you will let me know what you like about the tours we run, what else you would like to see and also share your thoughts and experiences about touring in Israel with us at Tour With Jack.

For my part, I want to share with you the fun of being a guide: the funny things that happen along the way, the ideas behind the tours, the excitement of new discoveries and interesting stories and ideas I come across from the world of tour-guiding in Israel.

Here's a story from one of my tours. Archaeologists Ronny Reich and Eli Shukrun have been exploring the water systems in Ir David. They have challenged cherished views about the dating of a couple of well known features of Jerusalem’s history. They published evidence to suggest that “Hezekiah’s Tunnel” was built well before the reign of King Hezekiah and maybe 100 years before the Assyrian Siege of Jerusalem. More recently, they have shown that while Herod may have started the building of the Western Wall it was not finished in his reign. Here’s the Israel Antiquities Authority press release with photos.

                                              

Reich and Shukrun came to this conclusion whilst preparing a path for visitors through a water channel that runs under the Second Temple Period street alongside the Temple Mount. Two thousand years ago Jews used it to try to escape from the Romans who were destroying the Temple and the city of Jerusalem.  Now tourists can walk through this channel all the way from Ir David to the corner of the Western Wall. They come out just by Robinson’s Arch where the paving stones were smashed by falling masonry when the Romans destroyed the Temple.

My story took place in June last year – before this water channel was open to the public and before most of us even really thought of such a possibility.  I was with my tourists by Robinson’s Arch explaining about the arch itself, the great staircase it supported and about the 4^th Century inscription on the wall there.  Suddenly, to our surprise, up popped two guys from a hole in the 2^nd Temple pavement and asked if they could borrow a pen!  It was a classic moment.

You never know what will happen next on a tour in Jerusalem. Every day, something new is discovered about the past. Come on a tour and learn more about the amazing history of Israel. Or, let me know what you want to see and we will try to make it happen!