It's almost 8PM here and I just got back to the hotel. It's been a long but good day. We ended up getting to church around 8:40 thinking that it started at 9, but it turns out that it didn't start until 10 AM so we went on a self guided tour of the grounds and just sat and took in the amazing view overlooking the old city including the Mount of Olives, and the Dome of the Rock. The church and BYU have done an amazing job with that center; it's really an amazing place with a great spirit. Apparently the church leases the land and it was very difficult for them to gain permission to have a presence over here (lots of opposition).
The students were in Egypt so the group was pretty small; mostly tourists and a group of LDS students studying at the Hebrew University which is just down the street from BYU. The service was nice. The best part is the amazing view. Behind the pulpit there is big 20 foot glass windows that look out through two sets of arches and over the city. We decided to leave after sacrament meeting. There is no way I could have stayed awake through 2 more meetings.
We decided to try to find the top of the Mount of Olives (which is really more like a hill) and the place where Orson Hyde dedicated the land of Israel for the gathering of the Jews. After walking around for more than an hour we gave up and asked a taxi driver to take us there. He didn't know where the Orson Hyde monument was but he took us to an overlook point on the Mount of Olives. Maybe tomorrow we'll try again to find it.
We went back to the hotel and took about an hour long nap. I was just wasted tired. I set my alarm for 1 hour so I wouldn’t sleet too long during the day here; which I easily could. When I woke up I changed into more comfortable clothes for walking around...and walk we did. We started by going through the Jaffa Gate into the "Old City"; which is what they call the part of the city that is inside the old city walls. There are still about 30,000 people that live inside of the city and it's really an amazing place. It's divided into 4 parts; the Jewish Quarter, the Muslim Quarter, the Christian Quarter, and the Armenian Quarter. I got a much better sense for why this area has been plagued by holy wars for the past 4,000+ years. The city has holy significance for 3 major religious groups: Christians, Muslims, and Jews and all 3 groups would be willing to fight and die for it. I'm amazed that it's as peaceful as it is.
I really liked the Jewish Quarter- it's really an amazing place with little walkways and arch-ways everywhere- probably not too different than it was 2000 years ago-the merchants just sell different things. The Jewish people amaze me- they are so devoted to their religion. It's amazing that they can maintain their culture so strictly while being surrounded by the outside world. The Western wall is one of the most (if not the most) holy places in the world for Jews; it was pretty cool.
A lot of the Muslim Quarter was closed to us non Muslims because it was Shabbat (Hebrew for Sabbath) and what we did see I really didn’t get. On so many occasions I wish that I would have had a knowledgeable guide because I'm sure all the things we saw would have been more significant had I know the history and background and prophecies about these places.
The Christian Quarter was interesting but significantly different from the time of Christ. I was amazed to discover that the Catholics believe that Christ followed a different path with his cross, was crucified, and was buried in different places than we believe in...I wish I understood why. We went to the place where Pilot supposedly condemned Jesus and where he was scourged. Beautiful architecture but not really on my list of favorites. Then we went out of the Lion's gate and across the Kidron Valley which sits between the Old City and the Mount of Olives. The Kidron valley is pretty significant…Christians believe that Jesus Christ will return to earth on the Mount of Olives, cross over the Kidron Valley, and reenter the City of Jerusalem as King of Kings. Jews believe that the Messiah will come from the East, pass over the Mount of Olives and through the Kidron Valley before arriving on the Temple Mount (part of the Old City). Muslims have their own account where the prophet Jesus will return in a similar way. These views of the 2nd coming have caused all three religious groups to build huge cemeteries throughout the Kidron Valley, hoping that they will be the first to be resurrected as the Savior moves West. I’ll show you pictures when I get home. The Kidron Valley is really small by our terms. It’s really more like the bottom of where two hills meet. About 5 minutes after leaving the Old City we were at the bottom of the Kidron Valley and 2 minutes later we were at the foot of the Mount of Olives at Gethsemane. This spot is owned by some other church and it’s surrounded by streets on 2 sides, one of which is pretty busy. There are only about 8 original olive trees left in the garden buy they are ancient and some say that they are old enough to have witnessed the Angel comforting Christ as he took upon him the sins of the world. As I tried to tune out all the noise it was pretty easy to feel something special about that place. I could have stayed there a lot longer than we did, but we wanted to make sure that we could get into visit the Garden Tomb. It’s a good thing we hurried, because we found out when we got there that it will be closed tomorrow because the church that owns it observes the Sabbath on Sunday. This is also a pretty special place that is very nicely kept. It was one of the few places that was not overrun with street vendors. There were a lot less people than I expected (partially because all the Catholics believe in a different spot), and I even got to spend a few minutes inside the tomb all by myself.
While we were walking around the grounds we ran into a group of 6 Sisters that we had seen at the LDS branch at BYU. They were all over there attending the Hebrew University. They were seated on some benches between the tomb and Golgotha (which are less that 200 yards away from each other). They were singing “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today” when we walked up and we recognized at once. We went and sat down behind them and just enjoyed the moment. After the song we chatted a minute and they invited us to sing along with them. We nicely declined because we would have detracted from the good thing they had going. Two of them played the violin and so them played together the song “He Is Risen” while the other 4 sang in parts. I told them it was the highlight of my trip so far…it was very cool.
Then we went back to the hotel and I started writing this. After the first paragraph we went to eat dinner but just ended up getting a waffle with ice cream on it. We had a big lunch and I didn’t really feel like having another big meal. It was warm today so I mainly been drinking a lot.
A couple funny things that I noticed during the Shabbat:
-Taxi drivers wouldn’t use their taximeters until the sun went down today.
- The buttons in the elevators in the hotel didn’t work; it would just stop on every floor
- The revolving door to enter the hotel wasn’t functioning until after sun-down today
-There was a metal detector at the entrance of the Western Wall had a big sign in front of it saying that it was “Shabbat Safe”, certified by some institute
I could go on, but you get the picture…it’s another world. Thanks for reading this far!! There are more details but It’ll have to wait till I get back. I’m going to bed. YEA!
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