Day 4: Tel Dan, Caesarea Philippi, Golan Heights, Bental & Katsrin (Qatzrin or Katzrin)

Day 4: 
We started today by wishing Abby a happy 15th birthday during our breakfast at the hotel. We surprised her with a card and gift from the whole group. It was a special moment for all of us.

Singing happy birthday to Abby.

Tel-Dan Nature Reserve
After breakfast, we traveled about an hour north to the Tel-Dan Nature Reserve. Our first experience here was of the Dan Springs, one of three springs that feed the Jordan River. We enjoyed the sound of the water rushing by us and were surprised by its clarity.

The water was as clear as Swiss glacier water.

The beauty of this place is inspiring. It was so very green,

Reed, Sam, Ellie, and Hannah

Taking a moment to hear the history of this site and soak up the cool, fresh air.

Rachael!

Kayla!

The Bema
When Solomon died, Israel became a divided kingdom with the south following Solomon's son Rehoboam and the north following Jeroboam as king. Jeroboam erected two altars in the northern kingdom to prevent the people from going to Jerusalem in the south. We visited the remains of the altar he built at Dan and read 1 Kings 12:26-33 which tells this story.

This is where the altar would have been. It would have had a golden calf with four horns. It was an altar to God, but looked more like a pagan altar.  In brief, it was to keep the people in Dan from making the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. This was not pleasing to God.

The ruins of Dan.

Fares teaching us more about the city of Dan.

6-Day War
At the top of the mountain, we came upon trenches that were used during the Six Day War in 1967. The land we could see was conquered by Israel during this time. Previously, it had belonged to Lebanon to the north west and Syria to the north east.

Below is Abram's Gate (also known as the Canaanite Gate and the Arched Gateway)

This gate was built in 4000 B.C. Notice the arch of the city gate. This is problematic since Romans are credited with perfecting the arch. Obviously the Canaanite's used it thousand's of years before the Romans.This is also an active archeological site and much more has been excavated since I was here in 2015. It is slow going because of funding.

A model of Abram's Gate

Below is Jeroboam's Gate. It is the second gate to the city of Dan. This area has been more excavated. It was a beautiful day for exploring this ancient cities ruins.

Ellie stands where the king or judge would sit at the gate. He would settle disputes between people and collect taxes among other things.

Jeff tries his hand at being king.

We met some Jewish men exploring the site as well.

Almost every street sign is written in Hebrew, Arabic and English. No wonder learning three languages is a bit easier here.

Caesarea Philippi
Leaving Dan, we traveled to Caesarea Philippi where Peter replied to Jesus, "You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God." This is located in the Golan Heights region of Israel.

Fares teaching us about Caesarea Philippi.

Lisa Cole read to us from Matthew Matthew 16:13-20 where Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ. It is significant that Jesus brought his disciples here because this was a place of pagan worship. Originally it was built to the Greek god, Pan. Later temples to many different gods were added. The facades of the temples have crumbled over time but a few niches remain. There would have been statues of a pagan god in each one.

Rachael and Christian by one of the niches with Greek carvings saying it was for the goddess of retribution, Nemesis.

The high places at Caesarea Philippi

The Hermon River Springs is another one of the three sources of the Jordan River.

An excellent view of the niches and cave of Pan.

The site is expansive. The artists renderings help you imagine what it must have looked like when Jesus and his disciples visited here. 

The spring water is so clean and also cold from the mountain snow run off.

The guys were checking out just how cold the water actually was!

Mr. Davenport has been looking forward to our visit here. So glad he got to spend some quiet time with the Lord and sing his praises.

The crusader fortress at Nimrod. This place was an imposing structure on our way to lunch at one of the four Druze villages in the Golan Heights area. We also got to see the snow topped peaks of the Hermon Mountains.

Nimrod Fortress

Lunch in a Druze Village

The Israeli flag flying over this area that was part of Syria before the war of 1967.

This is probably my favorite lunch so far. The skewers of lamb and chicken were excellent. The kebabs and falafels were amazing as well.

The snow on the top of the Hermon Mountains.

Mount Bental
Continuing our journey in the Golan Heights brought us to Mount Bental. From here, we could look into Syria. We also viewed the snow capped Mount Hermon.

The United Nations building.

This is looking down from the Golan Heights at Bental into Syria. Damascus was only 45 miles from where we were. The land looks was peaceful. It's is so sad to think of the brokenness of Syria and its many refugees.

The left over bunkers from the war.

United Nation Peacekeepers who watch the border.

Katzrin
We ended our journey in the Golan Heights with a visit to Katzrin. Remains of a 4th century AD Jewish village have been reconstructed and turned into a typical Talmudic village. We walked through the narrow streets, saw a synagogue, and entered a house in this village that would have been similar to those where Jesus lived and ministered. We all dressed in robes typical of the time, and some of our students volunteered to make olive oil using the ancient equipment.

Our guide was Karen, she was from Canada originally, she loved teaching Jewish history and had an obvious love of people. Thus she helped us understand the importance of Jewish communities.

In a community, everyone works together. Sarah carried our laundry.

We got to dress up for our tour. It added so much ambiance to the site.

Mrs. Starnes getting into character.

The ancient synagogue site was impressive.

Synagogue ruins. About four inches of this gate into the synagogue poked out of the ground. That is how they uncovered this site. They had no idea the entire village was under ten feet of earth. They continue to excavate and reconstruct the village.

What a fun crew of people we have on this trip!

Jill Carroll, Lisa Cate, and Lisa Cole

We got to go through houses that were reconstructed to look like they did in the 4th century. We learned so much.

We had an excellent lesson on how the roofs were constructed. We now understand how the paralyzed man was lowered through the roof to Jesus.

This tool was used every year to compress the mud for the house's new roof

Sam and Cindy

Looking down on the homes and well of the village.

Wheat. We were reminded of the Jewish customs of not cutting the corners of a field, and not going back for wheat that you missed on the first cutting. These were left for the poor. The poor still had to cut and thrash their wheat. So even though provision was given to them, they still had to work to have food. This allowed them to have dignity and be apart of the community.

Next we moved on to olive pressing.

This is the oldest working olive press in Israel.

Sam and Ellie demonstrated how the olives were crushed.

Chance and Hannah loaded the crushed olives into the wheel to be pressed. Every part of the olive was used. The dregs of the oil could even be used to kill weeds.

After leaving the 4th century village, we headed back for our last night in Tiberias. We had dinner at 6:30 in the hotel with a little surprise planned for Miss Abby.

We had a special birthday cake for Abby tonight. She also got to open her cards from her family. It has been a very special day indeed!

After a bit of shopping or hanging out in the lobby, the students gathered to debrief our stay in the Galilee region. Tomorrow morning we check out at 7:30 and move to Jerusalem. Do you want to hear what we have planned?????

We go to Masada first; then we go to Ein Gedi (where David fled from Saul), Qumran (where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found), float in the Dead Sea and end the day with a visit to Jericho. Whew....I suspect I will have some good stories for the blog tomorrow night.

For now, goodnight from the Sea of Galilee. Thank you for providing this trip for your loved ones. I believe the impact will last a life time.