4/14/13
Today was the last day of our
Physical Settings field studies. It is
hard to believe that the semester is almost over. We started the day out at Karak Castle, a
crusader castle at the ancient site of Kir.
I am not the biggest fan of the crusades, so I tried to take in the site
for the sake of understanding. The
doorways inside seemed to be lowered so that one would have to awkwardly crouch
while entering a room. Ramy, the
Jordanian tour guide that was required by law to accompany us in Jordan, told
us it was a method of defense in the event that enemy troops would break into
the castle. The design of the arrow
slits on the outer edge of the castle wall caught my attention. They seemed too crowded to actually hold a
bow and shoot an arrow at oncoming attackers.
I was fairly certain that by the time of the Crusades crossbows had been
invented, which would have been preferable for such a tight space. I noticed a V-shaped slit on the floor which led up to the opening in the window looking down at the area in front of the
castle. I discussed its possible use
with several other students and we came up with two ideas for its use. It may have been used as a path to pour hot
liquid on climbing invaders, although the slit was rather dainty for such a
use, or it may have been used to prop up or slide some device into place. I had the wild idea that these long narrow
V-shaped slits may be used for some sort of sniper crossbow set up. To my surprise, when I walked further into
the castle there was a museum that confirmed my suspicion!
Afterwards,
we drove out to Dibon. A while back I
took a Hebrew Inscriptions class, in which we had to translate the Moabite
Stele (and even point the Hebrew text after changing it from the Paleo-Hebrew
to the later Biblical Hebrew that appears in the Aramaic script). Mesha, king of Moab, describes himself in
that text as a Dibonite. It was pretty
exciting to be wandering around the tel where such an important text was found,
and one I have read!
Our
next stop was at the Church of St. George.
This is where the mosaic Medaba map is preserved. The Medaba map dates to the 6th
Century A.D. and contains view of the sacred geography in the ancient
world. It also gives us a very
interesting look into the Old City of Jerusalem during that time. After studying the archaeology of Jerusalem
with Gabi Barkai and living in Jerusalem while studying the historical
geography of Israel, I have a greater appreciation of what something like this
means for biblical studies. It was quite
large compared to what I had in mind. It
is a shame that much of it was not preserved throughout time, but it is amazing
that so much of it was!
Our
last stop of our last field study was at Mt. Nebo. This is where Moses stood just before he
died, looking into the Promised Land. It
was a fitting place to end our field studies. As a class we were able to identify and
follow the shape and flow of the land and its important features, demonstrating
the massive amount of data we had absorbed during the semester. Dr. Wright gave a final lecture that
demonstrated his masterful ability to weave the data of historical geography
together with a pastoral message that stretched far beyond the scope of the
classroom. I don’t think there was a
student standing there on Mt. Nebo that didn’t have a pinch of melancholy
growing inside them at the sudden realization that an epic journey was coming
to an end. It was a mixture of finality
and nostalgia for something that hadn’t ended yet, with the wild card of
uncertainty thrown in for good measure. It
was a perfect ending.
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