After spending two days on the Mount of Beatitudes in recollection and enjoying the area of the Sea of Galilee, we went back on our normal touring routine with Fabritzio on Friday. Our first stop on Friday was the ruins of the city of Caesarea Philippi. It is mentioned both in Mt. 16:13 and Mk. 8:27 as the site where Christ gives Saint Peter a primacy of authority over the entire church. It is cited in the gospels as the following:
Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesare'a Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do men say that the Son of man is?"And they said, "Some say John the Baptist, others say Eli'jah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets."He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter replied, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."And Jesus answered him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven .And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ. (Mt. 16:13-20)
From the Gospel of Mark:
And Jesus went on with his disciples, to the villages of Caesare'a Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, "Who do men say that I am?" And he asked them, "But who do you say that I am?" Peter answered him, "You are the Christ." And he charged them to tell no one about him. (Mk. 8:27-30)
Christ also gives Saint Peter a primacy of love at Taghba off of the Sea of Galilee in Jn. 21 and we celebrated mass there as a group on Wednesday, August 3. In Caesaria Philippithe original crusader church that was built to commemorate this event was destroyed by the Muslims. It is now a national park of the state of Israel, where one can find one of the tributaries that feeds into the Jordan River and ruins of a pagan temple built by the Romans and Herod the Great to the gods Pan and Zeus. When we were there, we all renewed our baptismal vows and we toured the sites of the ruins of the pagan temples.
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| Traveling by the Golan Heights |
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| A Tributary of the Jordan River |
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| Group Shot after renewing our baptismal vows |
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| Ruins of a pagan temple |
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| Photographic recreation of the Temple area at Caesarea Philippi (Paneas) |
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| A Column left from the temple |
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| Exploring a water mill |
We then explored the ruins of Tel Dan, which was a major city and shrine site in the Northern Kingdom of Israel built by King Jeroboam after he split from the Southern Kingdom of Judah. It was meant to become a place to worship God and a rival to the Solomonic Temple of Jerusalem, although it was designed in a similar fashion to it. The Northern Kingdom of Israel and the 10 Northern Tribes (excluding Judah and Benjamin who were in the south) intermixed certain pagan elements into their religious practices such as worshipping the Canaanite fertility god Ba'al. God sought to call them back to Himself through the prophets such as Amos, Elijah, and Elisha. Eventually the Kingdom of Israel and the ten Northern tribes were destroyed and dispersed by the Assyrian Empire and became lost to history.
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| Fabritzio explaining the history behind the city of Dan |
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| Ryan Lerner walking the ruins of the temple |
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| Ruins of the altar of incense |
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| A depiction of King Jeroboam at the shrine site of Dan with the temple ruins and model of the altar of sacrifice in the background |
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| Ruins of the shrine site of Tel Dan |
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| 4,000 year old ruins of the Gate of Abraham in the City of Dan |
We also had the opportunity to take a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee in the afternoon. This experience gave us a glimpse of what life would have been like for Saints Peter, Andrew, James, and John as fisherman as well as what it was like in the Gospel when Jesus would preach to the crowds gathered at the shores of this sea sometimes from land other times from a boat.
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