THURSDAY, OCTOBER 11

Welcome to Israel. Today's destination is the Dead Sea.


0:00 - 1:00
On this flight we cross the coast at Tel Aviv, taking a look southward along the coast from above the Yarkon River and a flyby of Joppa, the port where both Solomon and Ezra received rafts of cedar logs for the temple from the king of Tyre, Jonah set sail for Tarshish to escape God's call to go to Nineveh and God gave Peter the vision of unclean animals suspended from heaven in a sheet as a sign that the gospel was for the gentiles too.


1:00 - 1:24
The Ben Gurion Airport is located between Biblical Ono and Lod, a place Nehemiah identifies as the Valley of the Craftsmen, perhaps referencing the time hundreds of years before his time when the dominant Philistines forbade the Israelites to have blacksmiths in order to prevent the manufacture of weapons. Farmers in the hill country had to journey down here to the coastal plain to have their plows and other farm tools sharpened.


1:24 - 1:42
Old Testament Lod is New Testament Lydda, the site of Peter's praying for healing of the paralytic man. We are currently in what was originally the territory of the tribe of Dan when Israel first came into the land under Joshua. They eventually left here and went to far Northern Israel because they could not hold it -- this has always been a major zone of movement for the conquering armies that passed through the land.


1:43 - 2:00
As we swing around Lod, we look south toward Gezer, an important city for control of the plain and, when Israel held it, for defense of approaches to the hill country. In 1 Kings, pharoah conquers Gezer, probably from the Philistines, burns it, and gives it to his daughter as a wedding present for her marriage to Solomon. Solomon built up the city again along with Hazor and Megiddo. All three have the same distinctive gate complex attributed to Solomon. Beyond Gezer to the west is the Philistine Plain and in the distance the Negev.


2:00 - 2:22
We continue along Hwy 1 toward Jerusalem with a slight detour to the Valley of Aijalon. In antiquity, this was the gateway to the hill country around Jerusalem and along the Beth-horon road. It was at Gibeon where the Beth-horon road reaches the top of the ascent that Joshua, in battle with the five Canaanite kings, called for the sun to stand still over Aijalon and the moon over Gibeon. He subsequently pursued the Canaanites down the Beth-horon road, across the Valley of Aijalon and southward through the Shephelah or western lowland.


2:22 - 3:02
Where Hwy 1 turns into the hills we see the Shephelah, a series of low hills separating the Philistine Plain from the hill country of Judah. Where the latter two meet, there is a north-south valley that extends to the area near Beersheba. The Shephelah is the site of David killing Goliath, the stories of Samson and others that show its strategic importance to Judah's defenses.

At this point we also see one of the possible sites for Emmaus where Jesus revealed himself to two disciples after the resurrection. Neighboring Latrun was the site of fierce fighting in the 1948 war in the effort to keep the very road we're traveling open to resupply Jerusalem.


3:02 - 3:23
Hwy 1 ascends toward Jerusalem through a forest on a fairly steep grade. Near the top is Kiriath-jearim, the place where the Ark of the Covenant was kept after it had been taken in battle by the Philistines and then returned.


3:24 - 3:40
We're in West Jerusalem -- the tribal territory of Judah. To the south -- off to the left as we're flying -- is the territory of Benjamin. That area is flatter and lower than Judah and the territory of Ephraim further south, making Benjamin a kind of "saddle" that provided the best east-west passage across the central range between Aijalon and Jericho, the Jordan Valley and Transjordan beyond.


3:41 - 4:22
We'll take a little spin over the southern portion of Benjamin and the city of Jerusalem before continuing to the Dead Sea. In Benjamin, we see Nebi Samwil ("Prohet Samuel"), a traditional site where Samuel's body is said to be buried, although the Bible indicates he was buried a bit further east in Ramah. Nebi Samwil is as close to Jerusalem as crusader Richard the Lionhearted got in 1192.

We also see Gibeah of Saul, where Israel's first king lived, before spinning over to the City of David -- the Jebusite city captured by David and made his capital.


4:22 - 4:43
We leave Jerusalem and drop into the Judean wilderness at Nob, site of the tabernacle when David fled from Saul and asked the priests for the shewbread and Goliath's sword. Nob is on a ridge that continues southward to become the Mount of Olives.


4:43 - 5:04
We're about to rapidly drop from an elevation of about 2,700 feet at the Mount of Olives to 1,400 feet below sea level at the Dead Sea. The rain shadow effect means this eastern slope of the hill country gets little rain.


5:05 - 5:39
We get a good view of the well-watered site of Jericho, thanks to springs. Directly across the Jordan River is what the Bible called the Cities of the Plain and the Plain of Moab. The lush Cities of the Plain are what enticed Lot to choose to move there, ultimately ending up in Sodom. The Plain of Moab is where the children of Israel encamped on the eve of crossing the Jordan under Joshua into the Promised Land. The Book of Deuteronomy was written there by Moses. The place where Israel crossed the Jordan was likely where the ancient ford was -- at the New Testament's Bethany Beyond Jordan, the site where Jesus was baptised by John the Baptist.


5:40 - 5:19
As we head south, we're leaving the Jordan Valley and going into the Arabah.


6:01 - 6:19
Qumran is next. Here in about 1947, the first of the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in caves where a Jewish community -- usually considered the Essenes -- hid them during the A.D. 66-73 war with Rome.


6:20 - 6:39
We cross the stream of the Kidron -- the stream that has its beginning in the Kidron Valley between the Mount of Olives and the Temple Mount. The Prophet Ezekiel in chapter 47 pictures God's restoration by a stream that begins at the Temple and flows here, making the salt water fresh and lined with trees, their leaves for healing. It's a good chance to stop and read the chapter and visualize what the ancient prophet saw when he put pen to parchment.


6:40 - 7:19
Continuing south beneath the escarpment, you should notice signs that the level of the sea has dropped. This has resulted in dangerous sinkholes forming. The fresh groundwater, such as it is, seeping down through the rock and soil formerly met the salty water close to the edge of the escarpment. The Dead Sea -- 10 times saltier that ocean water -- quickly turned the fresh water salty. But now, with the water level lower, the fresh water is filtered through the now exposed shore area before reaching the salt water and in the process leaches out salts. The changed soil structure results in sinkholes. Watch your step.


7:20 - 7:39
The Spring of the Goats -- En Gedi -- is next. Here David hid from Saul. The waterfall is quite refershing on a hot day.


7:40 - 7:59
We'll take a jump to the top of the escarpment at En Gedi and get a better view of the Dead Sea. The sea is divided into two sections. The northern is 1,400 feet deep at its deepest and the sediment in the bottom goes even deeper. This is the lowest spot on the surface of the earth. The southern section is quite shallow. There's evidence it was crossable in antiquity. The southern bay, today, is divided into evaporation pans where the intense sunlight concentrates the salts even further for extraction by industries at the extreme southern end of the sea.


8:01 - 9:00
Masada is one of the several palace/forts built by Herod the Great to protect himself from the Jews who might rebel. With a system of large cisterns that captured water from the rare flash flood, there was a supply of fresh water in this desert land sufficient for decades. He had extensive storehouses of food. It was here, in A.D. 73, the last Jewish holdouts resisted the army of Rome. The Romans built a seige ramp using palm fronds brought from En Gedi and the soft Senonian chalk soils that allowed them to breach the defenses of the resisters who took their own lives and they lives of their families rather than surrender. Believe it or not, those 1,948-year-old palm fronds can be seen sticking out of the ramp's soil to this day, so dry is the climate there.


9:00 - 9:37
Not much further to Israel's resort area on the Dead Sea. Nice hotels, good food. Don't ignore the bright red glow of the setting sun on the cliffs of Moab across the Dead Sea. The sunrise is impressive as well.