Some last thoughts after Bethlehem

Some notes about nativity: wooden mangers were not used in the time of Christ, wood was not used as a building material, it’s too rare and valuable here. Instead, stone mangers were used. (Imagine a small square stone with a dip in it.) Also, in this time, they didn’t grow hay for animals; they just let them graze, so there wasn’t any hay either in the manger: it was just used for water. Also in case you didn’t know they didn’t keep animals in wooden barns either, they would have used caves. The manger was also probably only used for donkeys or sheep. If it belonged to Joseph which our teacher believes it may have it would have just had a donkey. Also, If you’re wondering about wood and how Jesus was a carpenter if wood was rare, the answer is he wasn’t a carpenter. The Greek says he was a tekton, or a builder. And what was furniture and houses made of back then? Stone. So Jesus and Joseph were stone-masons. One more thing that may bust your bubble: have you ever seen a manger scene with a palm tree in it? Palm trees don’t grow in Bethlehem it’s a hill country, nor do they grow in Jerusalem. You see, most olive wood mangers are built by Muslim Palestinians. The Koran says Mary went out into the wilderness and gave birth to Jesus under a palm tree, hence the palm tree included in many manger scenes. Well now you know.

Another day of the week a few of us went out through Orson Hyde Garden to a Russian Orthodox church, as well as one or two other churches. Other than that we took a final, which I did very well on, and I’ve been studying for classes and writing another final paper for another class. I’m doing my best to balance being in Jerusalem, being social and doing homework. I decided at the beginning of this semester that I was going to do all my homework, which has made it hard to do the other two. Oh well, I guess I can’t expect everything to be perfect. Hey also the 8^th this Friday we did celebrate the 4^th a July with a BBQ. Maybe I haven’t had American food for a while but it was super good! Steaks, Kabobs, Chicken, Hot dogs, pecan pie. YUM!!!

I taught Elder’s quorum today; that’s always fun. There was a rumor Glen Beck was going to show up at church, cause he was in Israel, but he didn’t, something about security concerns. Also tonight at a fireside we had our Relief Society President, a convert to the Church because of a Palestinian scholarship brought her to do her masters at BYU. She lives in Bethlehem but can come to Jerusalem for church because she works for the United Nations now. But for years she didn’t. She grew up in the West Banks and went to Bethlehem University. She was there in 87 when the intifada broke out. One of her fellow students was shot trying to raise a Palestinian flag on top on the university. He laid there shot in the head in the University for two hours until they let a ambulance in. Anyway, she hated Israeli’s. However, she said after her conversion she returned to the West Banks expecting to be filled with that same hate. Surprisingly to her she wasn’t. She said she’d had a change brought upon her. After church a few of us went down to the “Garden of Gethsemane.” I use quotations because that phrase is not found in the New Testament. In the Gospels it says the disciples went to a place called Gethsemane (Olive Press), and he left his apostles there and went father to pray, taking Peter, James, and John with him. In the Book of John it says he went to a garden to pray. Anyway, my teacher thought it was important that there was a garden (olive orchard) near the olive press but that is wasn’t called by that name. ANYWAY, there was a place our teacher pointed out where there is actually a chapel built where there was found an ancient olive press just at the site in the Kidron valley where Gethsemane was! (Olive presses were underground, to protect the oil from the sun, so they weren’t just anywhere). So that was neat. They also had a “Tomb of Mary” nearby so that was cool too. Then we sweated our way back up the hill to the Jerusalem Center to eat dinner.

That’s about it for now. This week we’ll be heading up to north Israel to the Galilee and be spending nearly two weeks there. This is really the reason I came here, because of the New Testament. We’re 2/3 through and have 5 weeks left. I’m starting to feel worn out from all the learning, and we just finished the Old Testament (which P.S. is important to understand this land and all LDS scripture.) I hope to make the most of it. 

At Russian Orthodox church.

A panoramic view of an underground church that used to be an olive press where Gethsemane is.