Israel pilgrimage, eighth in series

Hello, everyone.

Apologies for the break in posting, it was a busy week. Today's post begins the third day of visiting in the Holy Land.  We got out early as it was our day to change hotels as well as visit places. Our bus toted all of our luggage around in the hold all day as we went around.

Qumran region, Dead Sea in background

It was a desert day this day. We headed out onto the highway and went to Qumran and then over to a place with a camel ride (five minutes for those who wished) and then on to the Jordan River. Qumran is in a desolate place--a good trick for a region as small as the Holy Land. It isn't Texas, friends. It isn't even Wyoming. Think more like one of the East Coast states...Rhode Island? New Hampshire might be larger than the Holy Land. But in this highly populated area there are desolate, empty zones.


Qumran is famous because it is the site where the first of the Dead Sea Scrolls was discovered. The Israeli government maintains the place as an archeological site and has a small museum.






















They have what I think I remember as a reproduction of a scroll unrolled in the case for visitors to appreciate. The actual scrolls, being extremely old and written on animal skins for the most part, are kept in climate-controlled conditions I think. They were apparently the main project of a secluded religious community that lived on a hill overlooking the Dead Sea. The scrolls date back to the time of Jesus, give or take a few decades, and after the wars of the late first century AD the community was gone and later completely forgotten. Their stored scrolls were in caves around the area. Every so often a new collection of ancient scrolls gets discovered.

The first scroll cave (extra entrances added by archeologists)

The first scroll cave had only one entrance when its nature as a store room was discovered. A local shepherd was looking for a lost critter (goat? sheep?) and as the hold was deep and dark, he tossed a rock down to see if his creature was down there. I guess the logic is, if it's down there it will say something when the rock comes rolling down. Instead of a bleat, however, he heard the sound of breaking pottery. "Hmm," he said, crawled down to have a look, and the rest is history.







The ruins of the community there have been excavated, at least in part, and various features of the facility are labeled for visitors' information. There is a paved path as well.

They had a really big cistern to store the winter rain water. It might not have seemed so big toward the end of summer when the water would have been running low.

After visiting Qumran, and a short stop at the place with a couple of riding camels--and a shop--we rode over to the Jordan River.

Going to the Jordan meant driving through military areas. We saw people walking around in their uniforms, possibly training, and saw signs requesting that photos not be taken.

There is an Israeli government operated visitors center at the Jordan River at the traditional place St. John did his baptizing. The bathrooms were nice, there were assorted sitting areas, and while we didn't wander in there was a shop.

View of shrine on Jordanian side of the river

 Signs helpfully informed the visitor that immersion gowns were available for $9 each in the shop. Being Catholics, we didn't have interest in that. (The sacrament of Baptism is a "once and done" thing with us.) The folks at the water's edge did, however, have a bowl and shell for our pastor to pour water onto our heads in memory of our baptisms and in honor of St. John.

View of the baptizing area.

The water may be very edifying but I don't think I'd want my head to go under the surface with all that mud in it.

As y'all can see, the Jordan River is not, pace the song, "deep and wide" and it may not even be deep. The shed on the other side of the water is in Jordanian territory. The banks are steep enough that quite a crowd could have stood around listening to the prophet preach and call the repentant to come forward and wash off their old sinful ways.

There is a gentleman that offers to take pictures of the group. He brought the group prints to the hotel a couple of days later. The price was reasonable--about $10 for the group photo print.

The Baptism Site seems like a good stopping point for this post. More of the third day later!