Yeshua | Full Movie | Dr. Oswald Hoffman | Dan Mason | Ian Rosenberg | Leslie Luciani

[Music] you the Roman Empire 2,000 years ago the greatest contiguous land Empire the world had ever known completely surrounding the Mediterranean Sea starting at the Strait of Gibraltar which separates the continents of Europe and Africa it comprised what is now Spain Britain France Germany Austria Italy the Balkans Greece and across the Black Sea Turkey Lebanon Syria Egypt and the whole of North Africa back again to the Strait of Gibraltar a fantastic panorama in an historically free period of time tiny wrong set out its beaches to conquer what to them was the world [Music] here in Rome a Roman Emperor ruled his vast domain his troops and his governors controlled provinces from the icy north to the burning sands of the south his power was absolute and awesome [Music] the Roman Empire was a complex business well-engineered Roman roads ran in every direction carrying Commerce and the all-important legions which helped maintain the iron Roman rule [Music] all the great lands of antiquity were subject to Roman domination to the north Athens the center of world culture to the east Antioch in Syria center of commerce and also pleasure and vice and then to the south from the great Egyptian sea port of Alexandria there flowed grain which fed the Empire the be a Roman was truly to be a citizen of the world and here far from the splendor of the great cities of the Empire lay the small province of Palestine as the Romans called it as yet unimportant in the scales of empire and yet the crossroads between Europe and Asia and Africa it was vital it had always been vital [Music] here in this remote province Yeshua Jesus was born to understand the meaning of that birth we must understand this land which has been conquered and reconquered ever since the beginning of man himself [Music] the oldest city in this oldest land is Jericho a city famous for the walls which came tumbling down at the sound of Joshua's trumpets but in 1952 Kathleen Kenyon a British archaeologist discovered fire older walls dating several thousand years before the pyramids of Egypt making Jericho the oldest walled city to be found anywhere in the world as the most startling find at Jericho where these odd-looking human skulls covering eight scholars a layer of plaster carefully shaped to resemble the face of a living human being [Music] the dead were buried under the floor of the house but their skulls were kept with the family this ensured that the wisdom of the ancestors would be preserved for their descendants [Music] infants who had little wisdom to pass on were buried intact [Music] the earliest people of Jericho were not Israelites father Abraham would not be born for several thousand years but why build here eight hundred feet below sea level where summer temperatures reaches sizzling 130 degrees one answer may well lie with the Dead Sea only five miles away this is the saltiest body of water on the face of the earth [Music] the ancient man salt was more than worth its weight in gold without its staples of meat and fish would last only a few hours on a sweltering summer day [Music] for hundreds of miles around Jericho's merchants literally provided the salt of the earth then abruptly about 2300 BC the amorite swept out of the desert tumbling jericho sturdy walls [Music] from Jericho the amorite struck north and then far far to the east until they came upon the ultimate battle prize were of the counties the birthplace of Abraham Abraham was the first Israelite the father of the Jewish people ancestor of Jesus and the root of our story Abraham has often been considered a poor illiterate nomad economically backward and culturally deprived but nothing could be farther from the truth he was born in the splendor that was were once the richest most technologically advanced most powerful city in the world for thousands of years that splendor lay hidden under a mountain of sand in eastern Iraq and reminds something like this one which local Arabs long insisted concealed Abraham's war of the CAO deeds for a junction was no more than a lonely stop on the night train from Baghdad when archaeologist sir Leonard Woolley arrived in 1922 it took several years to free the mound from the rubble and sand that had buried it for millennia the Southwest face ultimately revealed an enormous structure of ancient mud brick but the northeast face unveiled a far more dramatic surprise it was a terrorist temple tower known to scholars as a ziggurat [Music] when Abraham witnessed the regular religious processions in front of this imposing structure it had been standing at least 1700 years the ziggurat featured a stairway by which man could ascend to meet the gods the cigarette of or honored the moon-god Nana no doubt this was once abraham's foremost god his shrine occupied the summit of the cigarette it's blue color matched the sky the moon God's natural abode [Music] this tall figure is I will the God of vegetation and the smaller statues are his human worshippers wraparound skirts with a border of sheepskin Tufts at the bottom were formal attire in Abraham's time [Music] [Applause] [Music] five years after the excavations began sir Leonard Woolley happened upon Wars royal cemetery here he found 10 musicians from Orr's royal court wearing finery of gold lapis lazuli imported from Persia and carnelian [Music] one of the court musicians lay across the ruins of a heart her fingers still touching its silent strings [Music] nearby was a ramp in front of a golden tree [Music] using technology millennia ahead of their time whereas craftsman fashioned the Rams body from silver its fleece from carved shells everywhere they priceless objects bearing nude testimony to civilization advanced beyond all others [Music] sir Leonard Woolley was awestruck in his published journals he proclaimed to the world that Abraham civilization possessed technical skills at least 2,000 years in advance of its time every generation of children has had its toys this may be the oldest of them all as a little boy Abraham probably played with a toy like this was drawn across the floor in this way and it is significant that it had wheels like the wheels of this toy chariot it's generally thought that these people invented the wheel and we're reminded by the trade on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers that it's not surprising they should also have invented the sail incredibly advanced as they were it's generally accepted that they also invented writing this is a letter from the time of Abraham it's a little clay tablet about the size of a modern postage stamp it's written on both sides and also on the ends and then hardened in the Sun and sent by messenger to its destination a little more sophisticated than that was this contract which was inserted into its envelope and then sealed by the witnesses to be recorded in the archives Abraham's civilization was among the first to develop mathematics as something more than just counting these people understood fractions square roots cube roots and even geometry and all of this was learned in school that was called the tablet house the teacher was called the father of the tablet house and the monitor was called the Big Brother with the stick the stick was frequently used in the learning process these children are counting in Akkadian the language used by Abraham himself and they've learned to write abraham's cuneiform script written in that ancient language is an old schoolboy essay of which we have many ancient copies it tells about the bad day and the life of a student in Abraham's time I got up too late for breakfast and I had to hurry away to school so I begged my mother for two rolls she gave me two rolls of bread and I hurried away to school when I got there the monitor said why are you late I stepped inside the school and stood with my heart pounding before the teacher I bowed low and he forgave me but a little later on when I left a tablet house without permission the big brother with a stick came to me several times later on for talking in school I was caned again but the worst came when the big brother with the stick said to me nobody can ever read your handwriting when I got home that night I talked to my father and complained about my bad marks he invited the father of the tablet house to dinner set him in a seat of Honor gave him a jar of oil I rolled some money and even a ring on his finger then the voice of the father of the tablet house began to change in tone and he said this son of the tablet house will ascend to the pinnacles of the art of writing the day will come when he will be first among his brothers since there are so many ancient copies of this essay it is obvious that Sumerian teachers loved it and gave it as an exercise to their pupils this was Abraham's land of war this was the civilization so far advanced above all others that the Emirates coveted it as a battle prize [Music] the army of who was ready in the royal cemetery sir Leonard Woolley had found a mosaic of war machine the characters are rendered in an almost comic style but wars army was not to be laughed at its war chariots still unknown in other civilizations were pulled along by auditors that literally ran down the enemy those who escaped face the charioteers with their drawn javelins for the mighty infantry brandishing battle axes and Spears had another ancient enemy not attacked from the east as the amorite attacked from the west wars great Sumerian Empire surely would have survived [Music] Abraham's or fell crushed under the heavy heel of the amorite their ziggurat was destroyed the gilded statue of the all-powerful moon guard was carried off in derision a poet of that period lamented woe my city woe my house the gods have departed there is no one left to hear the cry for help as the cry was heard not by or splendid gilded image but by the invisible unknown God who spoke in silence promising Abraham that from the ashes of or would come new nations and Abraham would be the father of those nations [Music] so Abraham following his God's direction took his family and a few followers and moved north and westward down the Great Plain between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and then south through the valley of the Jordan [Applause] the book of Genesis says Abraham was a very rich man with sheep goats and cattle as well as silver and gold the refugee from war was rich in everything but land even for a spot to pitch his tent he was dependent on the hospitality of the amorite who now controlled most of the land of Canaan in a vision the Lord spoke to Abraham and said look at the sky and try to count the Stars you will have as many descendants as that the whole land of Canaan will belong to your descendants forever and I will be their God as the vision continued the Lord said your descendants will be strangers in a foreign land they will be slaves there and will be treated cruelly for 400 years a [Music] little more than a hundred years later the vision began to come true the descendants God had promised Abraham went down to Egypt in search of food there they dwelt first as strangers then it slaves two three finally four hundred years past the hammerites were being driven out of the land of Canaan according to God's promise then the Egyptians striking from their rich ribbon of land along the Nile established an empire all along the coast of the Mediterranean as far north as Megiddo and HUD soy they set up their chariots city's fortresses from which they could launch their lightning strikes 4000 year old wooden soldiers depict Egypt's irresistible armored columns which swept like a flood tide up the entire length of the Crescent when the Israelites were captive in Egypt Egypt controlled the promised land the Egyptians had a lasting influence on the conquered peoples of Palestine scarabs symbols of Egyptian life after death were manufactured in many cities of Palestine including Jericho even in death the conquered peoples of Palestine copied their Egyptian masters these sarcophagi containing skeletons looked like a child's drawing of the beautiful and sophisticated mummy cases of the Egyptian dead they were found among the Canaanites the Philistines and the see people back in Egypt the Israelites drank the sweat of misery as slave laborers under a succession of Pharaohs they were born round out their lives and died beneath the whip [Music] you a [Music] pharaoh now rose known as Ramses the great and great he was the precocious boy king became a captain in the army and was given a harem at the unheard-of age of ten [Music] looking at his features in the monumental stone portrait at Abu Simbel we can see a subtle self-satisfied smile playing about his mouth clearly he was a pampered and pleasure-loving monarch Rameses marriages brought him 79 sons and 59 daughters whom he proudly depicted on the walls of his temples but ramses ii was known as Ramses the great for more than his virility not since the pyramid-building Pharaohs had a gypped seen a more ambitious construction program nearly half the temples in Egypt bear the marks of his handiwork he built to virtually new cities one he modestly named after himself the house of Rameses and his name appears everywhere [Music] Rameses construction like that of the Pharaohs before him was accomplished by forced labour Egyptian wall paintings show Foreman beating the slave the Bible identifies those slaves as Israelites [Music] the labor to erect Ramsey's colossal statue at the Ramesseum was enough to crush the stoutest spirit this monument was sculpted from a single piece of granite and then handed over to slaves to move by hand the Porcelli has immortalized this colossus now fallen I met a traveller from an antique land who said two vast and trunkless legs of stone stand in the desert near them on the sand half sunk a shattered visage lies whose frown and wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command tell that it's sculptor well those passions read which yet survive stamped on these lifeless things the hand that mocked them and the heart that fed and on the pedestal these words appear my name is Ozymandias king of kings look on my works ye mighty and despair nothing beside remains round the decay of that colossal wreck boundless and bare the lone and level sands stretch far away Ozymandias is greek for one of rameses royal names which he ordered carved within a loop of rope with the ends tied together it signified that he ruled over all the Sun and circles [Music] when Moses appeared before Pharaoh this was the proud man who refused to let God's people go [Music] it was not until God caused the death of the firstborn sons of Egypt including the Pharaoh's son the king called phimosis and said get out you and your Israelites [Music] at the famous Red Sea Pharaoh had a change of height sending six hundred chariots to recapture the fleeing slaves the king tried to match wits and muscle with the Lord God of Israel he lost ignominiously [Music] today Hebrew Cantor's still sing the great victory song of Moses I will sing to the Lord because he is one of glorious victory his throne the horses and their riders see while the body of ramses ii exists today only as a leathery mummy and he's thrown as long since crumbled the song of Moses concludes you Lord will be king forever [Music] if you move yellow team solo so with the parting of the Red Sea the escape of the Israelites the destruction of the Egyptians the people of God moved back to their promised land they fought for it every inch of the way and every minute of all the centuries and then a little more than half a century before Jesus was born a romans led by Pompey himself Rome's crack legions marched into Palestine and three brief months Jerusalem would fall in Israel would become a puppet state the Roman Empire [Music] fleeing the terror of war in Jerusalem a ten-year-old boy sought the safety of his grandfather's home in Arabia who would have guessed it in 25 years Caesar Augustus would ask the Roman Senate to crown this boy Herod King of the Jews here in Rome to receive the kingly wreaths Herod's eyes grew wide with one day though we see only ruins today he saw Rome in all its glory aqueducts to supply the ubiquitous Roman baths the Circus Maximus where quarter million spectators shouted themselves hoarse at the famous Roman games the forum with the house of the Vestals perpetual virgin priestesses [Music] everywhere were marble temples and everywhere were marble statues it is said that Augustus found wrong brick left admire [Music] you the coast of Palestine is virtually devoid of natural harbours in imitation of Caesar Herod newly crowned King of the Jews marked out an area's second in size only to the massive port of Alexandria then he lowered 30 ton blocks of stone into the sea building a gigantic mole to break the force of even the most treacherous waves Herod had performed a building feat worthy of Augustus himself now Israel had a harbor but a harbor needs a city and since the city cannot exist on salt water Herod taking a cue from Caesar build an aqueduct a Roman aqueduct nearby he built a Roman city with marble streets and marble statues with an amphitheater for entertainment in the Roman fashion he named his Roman City Caesarea after his mentor Caesar Augustus here one stood a temple to Caesar which Herod built in flagrant violation of the law of Moses this gigantic statue rivaling the Olympian Zeus one of the seven wonders of the world impressed Caesar but inflamed the Jews [Music] one day would come and record [Music] [Music] although it is known that Herod built several statues in honor of himself the modern world saw no trace of them until 1873 when an Arab donkey driver in moving stones from a wall being demolished on a site north of Jerusalem came upon an ancient bust this plaster cast of that bust shows the head of Herod the Great the back of the head is missing owing to mutilation in ancient times the tip of the nose is chipped this is Herod the Great and whose reign was born Jesus of Nazareth and circling the head is the laurel wreath he received in Rome on top of that the medallion with the Roman eagle at the center the symbol of Roman power which Herod wielded in Palestine on behalf of raagh however angry the Jews were with Herod for erecting statues of himself and temples to Caesar they would never forget the Magnificent temple he built to the God of Israel in Jerusalem this is a scale model of the temple very much as it appeared in Herod's day it covered 36 acres the equivalent of six city blocks the main public entrance was called the whole death gates from them ramps led inward and upward to the court of the Gentiles it was a place non-jews could worship God in an otherwise Jewish temple here Agrippa the right-hand man of Caesar Augustus offered 100 oxen to the God of Israel on behalf of Rome porches surrounded the court of the Gentiles were supported by a double row of columns 40 feet high cut from single blocks of whitest barb [Music] this is called the Royal porch because tradition held that here Solomon was anointed king behind these portals overlaid by Herod with gold and silver and called the beautiful gate was the court of the women called the court of the women because it represented the limit beyond which women could not go it covered the expanse of one and a half modern football fields during worship these 15 steps felt choirs of chanting Levites here Joseph and Mary would one day present the infant Jesus to the Lord in the inner court stood the famous altar of burnt-offering rising 22 feet high with four corners jutting out at the top like horns facade of the sanctuary was decorated by four half pillars pointing 150 feet up where they supported a row of gold covered spikes designed to prevent birds from purging on the temple power but rabbis said whoever has not seen Herod's temple has not seen a beautiful building [Music] - huge mosques now occupy only a fraction of the space that once was the temple part of Israel silver dome dellux and the golden dome of the rock in the past few years extensive excavations have been made on the southern wall the archaeologists have dug through the usual Turkish Arabic crusader Arabic and Byzantine layers of buildings they have exposed the base of the southern wall here it meets the western wall it is possible to get some idea of the size and excellence of Herod's engineering remember that the original wall was double the height of what is left mr. ben dolfe is the director of excavation for both the southern and the western walls of the temple area in Jerusalem we are sitting on the steps of the temple where Jesus stood and where one other man might have stood - an unusual man the man who built this temple that size the man who built the standard the steps and all this area was held the King held held a great how would you compare the quality and the Impressionist of this temple with other buildings in the Roman Empire at that time I think that speaking on temples that was the largest in that world and maybe the largest in the world at all as a temple did he have any problems with the people in Rome over the building of the temple not that he had problems but he was afraid it might be problems and he did not know whether to ask them or not to ask the Caesar in Rome to get license for building here a temple because it was kind of a fortification you know whether huge walls of 30 meters 90 feet high one of the people told him we have to start just before building the temple and at the meantime she send someone to want to ask automation they sent the man and he went one year to war because you know you can go straight to him but you can travel all over Europe till your coming there and he was waiting for one year there and then he came back in one year please that was the time that they finished to build the whole area here the answer of decision by the way was if they did not start not to start is there yes if they are in the middle to stop there if they finished what can you do and it's finished it's finished and that was the story seeing these huge stones these megaliths it seems incredible that even one of them could have been moved by hand much less the thousands it took to build this temple and then equally incredible that the entire superstructure could have been completed in only three years this megalith for example weighs over 200 tons the stones the Egyptians used to build the pyramids by comparison weighed only 15 tons how did Herod's work when raised a wall of such gigantic blocks to the height of 90 feet the Turks the Arabs and the Crusaders who rebuilt this wall long after Herod could not duplicate this tremendous accomplishment it's easy to distinguish their lightweight rubble from Herod's gigantic limestone blocks the latest explanation of how Herod moved these enormous stones comes from a little-known excavation north of the prayer area of the Temple Mount known as the Wailing Wall [Applause] [Music] fire in the background is a black door concealing a 600 foot tunnel which Jewish archaeologists have been quietly excavating since the six-day war opposite what may have been the holy place of the temple the granddaddy of long megaliths has been discovered it measures 46 feet long 10 feet high and 10 feet wide and weighs an astonishing 415 tons Engineers once theorized that Herod stones were pushed to the temple site on log rollers they now agree that a 415 tonne megalith would have crushed the stoutest logs to a public [Music] in the same tunnel the mystery stone was found one side is perfectly flat and the other side is smoothly curved why would Herod's nations have quarried a megalith with this contour a third stone located in one of Herod's quarries a half mile north of the Temple Mount may hold the key obviously it's round cylindrical apparently it was decided by Herod's masons because it cracked could it be that all the temple megaliths were quarried round then rolled down a specially constructed ramp into the temple area and maneuvered into position while the great slabs like the one found in the Rabbinical tunnel were chiseled off on all four sides in order to achieve the final rectangular shape the answer lies with Palestine's incredible builder Herod whose architectural genius earned him the title Herod the Great Herod's temple would have ingratiating him to Jewish hearts forever had he not first erected his pagan abominations here in the holy city this is a Hippodrome built to promote Herod's favorite pastime the Roman games some archeologists believe it stood in the very shadow of the Temple [Applause] gladion is fighting to the death while spectators chin deeply offended the religious jews [Applause] so the wild beast hunts with animals deliberately starved to a maddening frenzy [Music] likewise the horrifying sadism of throwing Jewish criminals to the Lions as a public sport both sections of the Jewish population rose in bitter protest an attempt was made to assassinate Herod on the very premises of his abominable games the spectacular jewel of a temple helped cool herds angry subjects Harrod is a builder deserved his title Herod the Great he was convinced that he had founded a kingdom that would endure forever to ensure succession he married many times had many children to make sure that there would always be a Herod king of the Jews for the first time since Solomon the boundaries of the Jewish Kingdom Herod's kingdom covered all the land which God had promised to Abraham descendants forever parrot considered himself the personification of that promise he was indeed the king of the Jews and so he was doubly startled when here in his palace at Jerusalem he received visitors astrologers from the eastern lands in search of a particular star they claimed heralded the birth of a great king where his astrologers asked the man who had spent his life building a secure throne is the one born King of the Jews [Music] you [Music] you [Applause] [Music] the Christmas gospel begins now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the King behold wise men from the east came to Jerusalem saying where is he who has been born King of the Jews for we have seen his star in the east and have come to worship Him Herod the Great was king of the Jews but there was a persistent expectation among his people that God would raise up a divine king a messiah whose birth would be heralded by a majestic star Saint Luke records the fulfillment of that messianic expectation at that time the Emperor Augustus ordered a census to be taken throughout the Roman Empire everyone went to register himself each to his own ancestral village so it was that Mary soon to be the mother of the promised Messiah traveled with Joseph her betrothed from Nazareth to Bethlehem for Joseph's ancestral village was Bethlehem the birthplace of his forefather David in the days of Joshua's conquest Bethlehem had another name Beit Lahm house of lahu lahul was the Canaanite God of War and Bethlehem was his sanctuary city it is one of the ironies of history that the Prince of Peace should be born in a city once devoted to the God of War [Music] this is the Church of the Nativity the traditional site of Jesus birth it's difficult to prove that it is the exact site but the church over this ruin dates from that period the church is Crusader built on Byzantine foundations there's only this single low entrance it was built that way for two reasons one spiritual and the other military everybody who entered here had to bow at the birthplace of the Lord the other reason was the Crusaders knew the Arabs of Islam that they rode horses and would be too proud to dismount and therefore could not enter at all Emperor Constantine's mother Queen Helena identified this site as the place where Jesus was born and erected a basilica here in honor of his nativity the remains of Helenus church lie beneath the present church down the steps in the grotto below the altar this silver star marks the place of Jesus birth and there down these marble steps is the place where they laid him in a manger even though it may not look like a manger today manger is in those days were made of stone like this one which dates to the time of Christ and stables in the region of Bethlehem were natural caves this is probably the way the place looked where Jesus was born before centuries of devotion covered the humble site with precious Margaux however lowly the circumstances of Christ's birth it wasn't historic event of the greatest magnitude an event that still today transcends paltry prose and sends human spirits soaring on wings of song [Music] [Music] to [Music] the song they knew their fal'cie [Music] we arrived and sliding [Music] wise [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the Magi the wise men we call them may have come from Persia Mageia is an ancient Persian word in the time of Christ they enjoyed a reputation very much like that of modern day scientists as advisors to Roman officials they earned high praise because of their research into the facts of nature cicero once remarked that no one could aspire to be king of persia until he had mastered the discipline of the magi the study of the stars was part of that discipline in the years preceding the birth of Christ we are told of heavenly phenomena in the evening skies that must have given pause to mage eye throughout the ancient world dr. Paul L Meyer professor of ancient history at Western Michigan University has done a lot of research on the events of the first Christmas having published a book by that title scientists and historians along with a lot of other people have been intrigued by the sty which is associated with the events of Christmas what a scientists say about all this dr. Hoffman there are three main explanations the first explanation is that they star of Bethlehem was a comet and of course comets are very very flashy Halley's Comet comes to mind of course but it couldn't have been Halley's Comet because this passed over Jerusalem about 12 BC at its nearest pass in those days and that would have been about five or six years too early for the Christmas story another explanation is that the Christmas star was a nova this is a new exploding star so bright that you can see them in the daytime even near the Sun the only problem there is that science has no real record of such a nova that exploded at the time of the first Christmas so I prefer this wonderful old explanation that Johannes Kepler first trotted out in the 1603 it was Kepler said that it must have been a triple conjunction between Jupiter and Saturn which almost impinged on each other three times in the year 7 BC do you have quite an astrological message loaded there not that I believe in astrology I know you don't but the major I did and according to the astrology the Jupiter planet is the ruling brightest light in the night sky therefore it is the planet of the king or the ruler and Saturn symbolizes the Planet of Israel as a matter of fact the Biblical Book of Amos refers to Saturn as the shield or the defender of Israel it's their day as you know Saturn day is the day of their worship we call it Saturday and so the message now is what happens when Jupiter almost touches Saturn three times Jupiter a king is coming to Saturn Palestine a king is coming to Palestine is message they read in the stars so this coincidence seems to go along with the conjunction but is it really a coincidence when it was 7 BC that this conjunction took place I know this may throw people off because they assume that Jesus was born in the year 0 there never was a year 0 by the way it goes from 1 BC to 1 ad and Jesus himself was actually born we estimate around 5 BC or five years before himself don't blame him for that there was a glitch in the recomputation of the calendar in the 6th century AD when a monk named Dionysius decided that we're not going to orient our ears anymore to the founding of the city of rome that had been the great date before that 753 BC and Dionysius said no Jesus was born 753 years after the founding of Rome when in fact it was only 748 years so 5 BC is perfect because herod instructed his soldiers to kill the babies in Bethlehem 2 years old and under according to the time of the star as reported by the wise man so 7 minus 2 is 5 BC it works out perfectly for the Christmas story led by the Christmas star to a stable in Bethlehem the Magi presented gifts to the infant who they believed was destined to become a great king gold frankincense a fragrant gum resin used as incense in most religions of antiquity and myrrh a liquid perfume which Persian kings often wore in their crowns [Music] having presented their gifts they returned to their country by another road since God had warned them in a dream not to go back to Herod the 40th day after his birth Mary and Joseph took the infant Yeshua on a seven-mile journey from Bethlehem to Jerusalem according to Jewish law this was the first day since birth that mother and child could appear in the temple of God [Music] today Jewish archaeologists are carefully excavating the temple that stood in Jesus day here in the middle of the southern wall they've uncovered the great staircase which ascended by tunnels into the court of the Gentiles many of these steps have the very ones Mary and Joseph would have used as they carried the baby Jesus up into the temple in all there were 30 steps on what was once a gigantic 215 foot wide stairway these bricked up gates once formed the main entrance the model of the temple is had actually looked in Jesus time shows the gates as they appeared then entering through them the Holy Family climbed the inner ramp leading into the court of the Gentiles they were greeted by the noisy shouts of merchants Hawking livestock needed for temple sacrifices [Music] here Mary and Joseph bought two turtledoves a poor woman's purification offering after the birth of a child then hurried through the beautiful gate into the court of the women standing on these 15 steps facing the giant bronze gate Mary would have waited for a priest to take the two turtledoves from her and perform the necessary sacrifice moments later the priesthood returned sprinkle her with the sacrificial blood and declare her cleanse [Music] she would have left the temple had it not been for an ancient man who suddenly lifted her baby out of her arms his name was Simeon a god-fearing man who had received a promise that he would not die before he had seen the Lord's Messiah [Music] Simeon said to Mary this child is chosen by God for the destruction and the salvation of many in Israel he will be a sign from God which many people will speak against and sorrow like a sharp sword will pierce your own heart [Music] this was no angel in a dream it was a flesh-and-blood man Mary and Joseph must have been proud and excited and also perplexed and a little bit frightened as they hurried back to Bethlehem when Herod in his palace at Jerusalem learned that the seers from the east had tricked him had gone back to their country without revealing the identity of the child King they were seeking he was furious he gave orders to kill all the male children in Bethlehem and vicinity who were two years of age and under this was in accordance with what he had learned from the visitors regarding the time when the star had appeared it seems almost incredible that a king could send his soldiers into a city only a few miles from his capital and their slaughter every male child under the age of two [Music] could a king actually do this yes if the king was Herod his favorite wife was Mary Omni granddaughter of Jewish royalty the marriage that began so happily would end tragically 2,000 years before the slaughter of the innocents Herod began to have doubts about his wife's faithfulness in a suspicious rage he ordered her instant execution the executioner's sword had barely done its grisly deed when wild remorse came over the king Lord Byron has described the shattering lament of Herod Oh Mariama me now for the the heart for which thou blessed is bleeding revenge is lost in agony and while remorse to rage succeeding I swept that flower from Judas stem whose leaves for me alone were blooming and minds the guilt and mine the hell this bosoms desolation to me I have earned those tortures well which unconsumed are still consuming so tormented with Herod that he began seeing her everywhere yeah [Applause] murderer she called him and that in truth he was the massacre Bethlehem's infant son's was not beyond the man who eventually ordered the execution of three of his own sons caesar augustus who knew jews were forbidden to slaughter pork said in riot humor I would rather be Herod's Pig than his son Herod did order the slaughter of the children in Bethlehem before the order could be executed Matthew says an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said Herod will be looking for the child in order to kill him so get up take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt and stay there until I tell you to leave so Joseph got up took the child and his mother and left for Egypt [Music] as the holy family journeyed into the land their forefathers had fled they would have seen its desert sands bloom transformed by the latest irrigation message practice throughout the Roman Empire the task of tending these waterwheels was given to children only half dozen years older than the infant Jesus himself [Applause] Egypt was no longer simply a land of ancient pyramids the Pharaohs who had built them for their eternal homes had gone to their father's nearly 3,000 years earlier [Music] rameses ii a great monument building Pharaoh before whom Moses had stood had been dead for at least 1200 years [Music] and yet according to popular belief the Pharaohs and other Egyptian notables still lived on within elaborately decorated mummy cases here they're carefully preserved body supposedly existed in a state of suspended animation awaiting the return of the body's lifeforce some corpses were encased in gilded coffins reflecting the hope that when the life force returned they would be transformed into being shining with light like the Sun to this land so pregnant with hope for life eternal came the child who would one day declare I am the resurrection and the life whoever believes in Me will never die [Music] scholars generally agree that if Mary and Joseph settled in any Egyptian city it was probably the seaport of Alexandria although the center of political influence had now shifted to Rome Alexandria was intellectually supreme the principal gateway to the best of world culture and scholarship [Music] 300 years earlier when Alexander the Great swept out of Macedonia to conquer the world for Greece he personally established the city bequeathing to it his own name [Music] today one of the largest Jewish synagogues in the middle east lies nearly abandoned in what was once the throbbing center of Alexandria's Jewish quarter it's synagogue then was far larger than any in Israel so lodge that when a rabbi addressed the congregation assistants would run halfway down the length of the building and repeat the message so that those in fact could hear [Music] dr. Mortimer chambers professor of ancient history at the University of California at Los Angeles has found Alexandria to be a fascinating city especially for Jewish people wasn't it at the time of Jesus very much so doctor often you know it was the largest Jewish city in the world far larger than anything like Jerusalem or any other city and the strict Jewish homeland so when Jesus and his family arrived there they were not going to some small suburban or provincial town but they were coming to the center of ancient civilization and especially ancient Jewish civilization it's thought that the Jews of Alexandria numbered about forty percent of the entire population of this already very large city the Jews living there many of them had forgotten their Hebrew language and they could no longer read the Hebrew Scriptures in the original so it became necessary about 130 before our era to make a translation of the Old Testament into Greek which ranks as the first translation of the Bible into any other language and it was a very good translation wasn't it it's respected today and there is a curious legend connected with it which is that seventy-two scholars worked on this translation each of them working separately isolated from the others and when it was all said and done they had produced seventy two identical translations word-for-word this may be what we could call an enhancement of the truth but at least that is the legend and we call this translation the Septuagint because in Latin Septuagint a' does mean 70 it was done on papyrus for the most part wasn't it yes we have here a replica of what one of these papyrus scrolls would have looked like you would roll it up and back and forth again as you read the text that was preserved there was a little more difficult to read than modern Greek text because the words ran right into one another yes this was done without punctuation and just in these columns without any paragraphing of any sort but they were used to that in those days well the name of Cleopatra of course has always been associated with Egypt and Alexandria and since the buildings aren't standing anymore we'll just have to take a look it's a model of a temple that Cleopatra built in honor of Mark Antony later taken over by Caesar Augustus yes Cleopatra the seventh the famous Cleopatra was the final queen of the Macedonian dynasty that govern Egypt until the Romans came along she killed herself in the year 30 about 25 years before Jesus and his family reached Alexandria now when Caesar Augustus took over the Roman world and found this temple available naturally he used it and converted it to a temple of romantic Gustus and so it was used in Alexandria it's interesting to remind ourselves that in front of this temple stood these two famous granite obelisks that we call Cleopatra's needles and these became prey for modern collectors one was taken off to London where it stands now on the embankment of the Thames River and the other is on our own Central Park in New York thus these two needles of Cleopatra are reminders of ancient Alexandria that have persisted right down into modern times here under the shadow of Caesar Jesus and Mary and Joseph may have lived until the man whom Caesar appointed King of the Jews would die [Music] Herod's death came slowly filled with extreme mental and physical agony intestinal cancer may have caused the excruciating physical pain while advanced syphilis contributed to his mental anguish terrifying hallucinations were disturbing Harrods nightly rest the murderer of Bethlehem's helpless sons envisioned his own sons murdering him [Music] when death finally came Herod's body was carried in a grand procession to this mountaintop mausoleum within sight of Bethlehem and it's slaughtered children Harrod had designed it himself providing entrance by way of 200 white marble steps that gleamed in the sunlight all the way to Jerusalem [Music] harrods architectural plan began with twin mountains deciding that neither one was majestic enough to house his royal remains he cut the top off the mountain on the left and piled it on top of the one on the right having created at room for himself taller than the pyramids of Egypt he proceeded to turn the interior into a monument truly befitting the King of the Jews calling it the Herodian in life it had served the monarch as a fortress Palace Herod's design included a massive guard tower housing enough provisions to outlast a five-year siege [Music] nearby archaeologists have uncovered ballista stones the first century equivalent of cannonballs [Music] Herod's soldiers would fire them down on the heads of an enemy was foolhardy enough to scale the heights of this mountain fortress [Music] one mystery still concealed at the Herodian is the whereabouts of Herod's tomb the structure was built as a mausoleum and yet no tomb has ever been found presently archaeologists are digging at the base of the mountain speculating that Herod may have arranged for a secret burial place outside the monument itself did Herod deliberately conceal his mortal remains fearing that his grave would be desecrated by his enemies the answer like so many associated with his incredible rule lies with Herod king of the Jews [Music] upon the death of Herod the Holy Family left Egypt and set out for the land of Israel [Music] avoiding Bethlehem with its disturbing memories they traveled instead the road to Nazareth where Jesus would grow up and this way the prophecy came true he will be called in Nazarene [Music] today grain grows undisturbed in the Jezreel claimed below Nazareth 2,000 years ago it was a frequent highway for war wondering with the chariots of invading armies pressing on toward the Judean Hartman Nazareth itself was high country to steeper climb and too insignificant a prize to tempt foreign troops [Music] safe on this Galilean hilltop crowned with thick oak forests the boy Jesus made his Holly the oaks were an abundant source of timber for the carpenters of the region such a carpenter was Joseph dr. Meyer is a student of the life and times of Jesus you certainly have given a lot of attention to Joseph and to his occupation which is described as that of a carpenter just what's meant by carpenter a Greek word in the New Testament for carpenter at that point is Erick got ace now this means not just a carpenter who would fashion beds and furniture and coffins and that sort of thing but it meant a general craftsman one who was skilled not only in making wooden implements of all kinds but also in servicing them later on and we do have a good idea of the specialty which Joseph and Jesus engaged in and their carpenter chef up in Nazareth we have a line from Justin Martyr who is an early church father he lived next door to Jesus in Samaria about a half-century later and he reports that Joseph and Jesus specialized in agricultural implements they made plowshares or yokes for oxen and Justin goes on to tell us that they were extremely well made and very serviceable as a matter of fact they were serving well into the middle of the second century AD I guess there are a lot of fanciful stories too about that flour making oh yes we had novelists nineteen hundred years ago as we have them today one of the charming stories and the apocryphal Gospels that is the false Gospels tell us about Joseph sometimes not measuring correctly and cutting big planks a little bit too short in which case he would simply whistle Jesus would come over and zap the board exactly out for the proper length but of course that didn't happen it was a real village with real people working real fields and using real plowshares tucked away in a side street of modern Israel an Arab carpenter practices Joseph's ancient craft in the same age old fashion a young apprentice works at his side very much as Jesus must have worked alongside Joseph little has changed in 2,000 years even the tools are a carbon copy of many used then this plow could easily have come from a first century time capsule it's identical to the type Justin Martyr says was the specialty of Joseph's carpenter's shop in Nazareth with a frame so strong and repairs so simple it's easy to see how the plows Jesus made could well have lasted into the second century Jesus grew up in a simple home like this first century house the courtyard was used in common by all the adjoining families families in those days generally lived in a single room it had certain conveniences by that period like a cistern from which water could be drawn by bucket and pulley and then put into a jar like this for regular use dr. ben dolfe the director of excavations on the southern wall of the temple area and jerusalem has unearthed many houses of this period everything came from the ground up did it not dr. ben dover what's this thing was it found in houses in those days that's a typical hand mill that was founded almost in every home of the period of the time and you can see how they used it they used to take some width and put into this hole at the center of the meal and then to turn it from grain and other products of the field came to food on the family table which was set on the floor like this dr. bender which meal of the day would this be that was a breakfast the typical breakfast of the staff that time and we can see they use the scheme as a table they just put it on the floor and then we can see that they used for breakfast eggs cheese olives and vegetables they used for sweets some almonds some dates and figs what would be in these battles and in the battles they used to put olive olive oil and vengeance how was that bread baked bread was baked by in an oven this is the oven you can see the opening they put food in today Albany and they hated it when it was hot enough they put a stone on the chimney and then they put the bird into the oven and D locked it after 20 minutes they had a failed plate what about soups and stews how did they make those for this they have a stove and we can see here take me to stove of those of those days and you can see two cooking pots on the top of the stove and the place of the fire we can see here an original only lamp if it was a doubt it was nice they used oil lamps the pious overlay of the centuries has covered the places associated with Jesus life in marble gold and precious stones but a house like this is the reality less than a day's journey from Nazareth stand the ruins of korazim if mute boulders are the last remaining witnesses to the laughter of children that once rang through its streets for the chanting of Hebrew boys that once emanated from its synagogue school [Applause] [Music] - yeah here the local Hassan a combination schoolteacher choir director and synagogue caretaker presided over the education of the young much as this yemenite rabbi is doing today education of course was religious there was no other kind the textbook was the Bible [Music] these children have printed Bibles of their own but it was not so in Jesus time [Music] boys did not simply recite the Bible they sang it the movement of the Hassan's hand indicated when the Katyn should rise and when it should fall [Music] listening and repeating until whole books of Scripture were committed to memory that's how boys learned in the first century that's also how Jesus learning to read what one had already memorized meant taking one's place in front of the sacred Scrolls in the beginning God says the first scroll of the Hebrew Scriptures in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth reading the Torah was an awesome privilege one never set one always stood for standing was the normal posture of prayer and prayer was the attitude in which one approached the king of the universe who spoke through the holy writings out of respect one covered his head before the word of God or indicated his attitude of Prayer by donning a prayer shawl [Music] doeseth was a god-fearing man and pranced fathers taught their children how to pray instruction from morning prayer involve teaching a ritual Jesus would probably repeat from the day of his bar mitzvah to the end of his life [Music] the right began with tefillin leather boxes containing a number of scripture passages [Music] before one prayed he literally bound himself with the Word of God first on the arm next to the heart then on the head the seat of thought signifying that God and His Word were to be loved with all one's heart and with all one's mind [Music] as the leather thong was wrapped around the middle finger the Lord's loving pledge to his people was recited I will be clothed thee unto me forever yea I will be trophy unto me in righteousness in loving kindness in mercy and faithfulness and thou shalt know the Lord [Music] Israeli soldiers stand guard at the Wailing Wall the ancient remains of a stone fence that encircled the Temple Mount at the time of Christ when the Romans put down the Jewish rebellion and destroyed Jerusalem's temple in 70 AD they left this one wall standing as an object lest a warning that wall is the most sacred spot in modern Israel the favorite place of prayer from modern Jews some sit because they've come to pray for hours on end a child places a prayer written for him between the stones of the sacred wall thirteen year old Jewish boys come here for their Bar Mitzvah the ceremony in which they enter fully into the religious heritage of their people this is the Torah they sing which God gave the people of Israel by the hand of Moses for the first time in his life the boy who has come of age will read the sacred scriptures in the presence of a congregation it is a proud moment for him as well as for his mother his aunts and his sisters from now on he is a man a man of Israel responsible to God for his spiritual life responsible for his own conduct [Music] the Bar Mitzvah ceremony as we see it today is comparatively modern we know little of the ritual as it was practiced in Jesus day if there was a ritual at all in that period we are told a boy reached the age of Bar Mitzvah not at 13 but at 12 [Music] when the Gospels tell us that the 12 year old Jesus went up to the temple in Jerusalem at Passover time with Joseph and Mary he had already reached the age of manhood [Music] [Music] apparently Jesus spent a good part of the Passover week within the temple courts where crowds of pilgrims congregated along the Magnificent colonnades listening to the theological discourses of popular preachers and Leonard scholars [Music] as a man of Israel Jesus would have been allowed to go beyond the court of the women through the great bronze door into the court of men here he would have seen the great altar of sacrifice built over the rock where Abraham once offered his son Isaac in the temple dedicated to the God of Abraham this new son of Abraham felt very much at home apparently far more so than Mary and Joseph realized the Gospel of Luke tells us when the festival was over they went back home but the boy Jesus stayed in Jerusalem his parents did not know this they thought he was with the group so they traveled for a whole day and then started looking for him among relatives and friends they did not find him and so they went back to Jerusalem looking for him on the third day they found him in the temple sitting with the Jewish teachers listening to them and asking questions all were amazed at his intelligent answers his parents were astonished when they saw him and his mother said to him son why have you done this to us didn't you know that your father and I were very worried looking for you and jesus answered why did you have to look for me didn't you know that I would be in my father's house but they didn't understand this answer leaving the Temple Mount Jesus returned to Nazareth where he grew both in body and in wisdom gaining favor with God and [Music] the ruins of the biblical city of korazim youthful Jewish dancers bring to mind King Solomon's famous proverb for everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven a time to weep and a time to laugh a time to mourn and a time to dance the childhood of every son of Israel was filled with times of dance wedding circumcisions religious festivals all were occasions for dancing the dance was so important in Jewish life that the Talmud speaks of angels dancing and says that at the end of days God Himself will arrange the dances of the righteous [Music] only in a wilderness like this isolated from normal society would a young Jewish boy have been deprived of the joys of the dance the Gospels tell of a boy who grew up in a wilderness such as this his name was John the Baptizer probably better known as John the Baptist the scripture says that at his conception he had been uniquely designated by God as the way preparer for the Messiah now some 2,000 years later this distant relative of Jesus is still something of a mystery to students of the Bible religious art has correctly portrayed John's father as a temple priest who belong to a priestly order known for its influence and wealth why didn't John become apprenticed to his father as the custom was in those days why did he exchange a life of comfort and maybe of luxury for the poverty of a desert hermit Saint Luke tells that the child John was in the desert there is a tradition that John was orphaned at an early age his parents were older when he was born how could an orphan child have survived the rigors of the Judean wilderness who would have fed it who would have educated him where would he have found shelter recent archaeological discoveries have suggested some interesting answers highly intriguing answers [Music] it all began in 1960 when four teams of archaeologists undertook a systematic exploration of the mountains overlooking the Judean wilderness Yoga Elia Dean his Rose most famous archaeologist was soon to make an incredible discovery seven stories above the desert floor yeah Dean and his associates prepared to explore an unusual cavern which he would later name the Cave of the letters a woven bag the kind in use at the time of John the Baptist had obviously been left behind by someone but who for some mysterious reason the people who once chose to live here hastily buried their valuables below the dirt floor leaving behind a treasure store of costly bronze vessels Roman Vespers [Music] in a Jewish cave this treasure could only be war booty captured from the Romans [Music] the identity of the mysterious cave dwellers was finally revealed when Hebrew letters were found written a hundred years after John the Baptist you sit eat and drink from the property of the house of Israel and care nothing for your brothers the letters complained they were addressed to two Jewish military commanders who apparently took their war booty and fled to the safety of the Cave of the letters during the final Jewish revolt against Rome the commanders obviously perished along with their buried treasure sifting through the dust of centuries Hadean had established that Joe Diaz mountain caves served as shelters for those who like John chose to distance themselves from society the cave of the letters provides no evidence that it was occupied at the time of John the Baptist scholars believe however that similar caves served as nightly shelters for a whole community of Hermits who were contemporaries of John many of them like John were descendants of priests convinced that Israel's society had become hopelessly corrupt and that the priesthood itself no longer represented the will of God they went out into the wilderness and established their own society a righteous Society here in the wilderness the hermit's believed God was disciplining them and preparing to raise up not one but two messiahs out of their own midst to usher in the day of divine judgment less than a mile from the Judean mountain caves stand the remains of Qumran the wilderness camp established by the Hermit society here John the Baptist may have grown up not a single dormitory or even a bedroom is to be found in the ruins below apparently the community preferred the nightly shelter of the nearby caves and built this area as a centre for work and meditation the Essenes as the sect was called constructed an elaborate conduit bringing spring water from the nearby Judean mountains to their desert home it emptied into eight cisterns some of them ritual baths here the child John would have seen the Hermit community baptized themselves every day just before noon in a right design to keep themselves ritually pure as an orphan John would have felt right at home for the Essenes made a practice of taking in orphans and raising them until manhood the largest room at Qumran was a 40-foot long scriptorium a centre for copying the scriptures it led to smaller areas probably designed as Bible reading rooms they read the Bible in shifts around the clock so that they might literally be found meditating on the sacred word day and night if the Essenes instilled anything in John beyond the passion for baptism it was a love for the scroll of Isaiah a voice cries in the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord a saying which John increasingly knew applied to him personally God had brought him to the wilderness as a child and provided him refuge food and clothing for a purpose this young hermit was to be the voice calling Israel out into the wilderness to prepare for the coming of the Lord [Music] you as for the meeting of Jesus and John Matthew describes it at that time Jesus arrived from Galilee and came to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him John tried to make him change his mind I ought to be baptized by you he said and yet you come to me jesus answered let it be so for now and in this way we will do all God requires John agreed matthew goes on to tell us that as soon as jesus was baptized and came out of the water a voice said from the heaven this is my own dear son i'm pleased with him the baptism of jesus was quickly over and now he was departing to go about his business john told the people been waiting for a deliverer only to have him disappear that's the Messiah he's the one that found Messiah unfortunately the sceen community did not 35 years later they were still searching the sacred Scrolls still waiting for the two messiahs they hoped would arise from their own midst then suddenly they deserted from run in the twinkling of an eye the great baptismal pools lay empty the Bible reading rooms were strangely silent not a single scroll was to be found not even a fragment was left behind in a rush to find a hiding place for their Scrolls the Essenes hid them in these nearby caves [Music] the unthinkable had happened Jerusalem had fallen to the Romans in the first Jewish revolt and now Roman legions were marching on Qumran [Music] ironically it was the eve of another Jewish war two millennia later that finally brought the hidden stoves to light it was late November 1947 and the United Nations was debating a resolution on Palestine calling for the establishment of the first Jewish state since the days when Qumran and all of Israel fell to the Romans [Music] harab leaders were warning that if the resolution should passed they would launch a vigorous attack on Jewish cities and villages at the height of the tension doctor sukenik professor of archaeology at Jerusalem's Hebrew University and the father of Yaga area Dean received an urgent message to get in touch with the Jerusalem dealer in antiquities the British security forces had recently divided the city into military zones no one could go from one zone to another without a special pass a pass which neither doctor sukenik nor the antiquities dealer had time to obtain [Music] as dr. sukenik stood on one side of the barrier and the antiquities dealer on the other the professor strained his eyes to peer at scraps of leather the dealer held in his hands they appeared to be fragments of incredibly ancient Hebrew Scrolls the dealer invited the professor to risk a trip through dense Arab territory to Bethlehem where another antiquities dealer was offering for sale the complete scrolls from which these fragments were taken they're in Bethlehem dr. sukenik heard an unusual tale a Bedouin Shepherd was idly tossing stones into a cave near Qumran when he heard the answering sound of stone hitting pottery it turned out to be an ancient earthenware jar with a bundle of leather inside in all the cave contained eight such dyes back in Jerusalem as the professor pored over three of the leather Scrolls found in the jars he discovered among them what scholars now recognize as the oldest biblical manuscript known to man outside dr. su kennix residence Jews were dancing in the streets [Music] [Applause] the UN resolution creating the Jewish state has just been passed war the Arabs had threatened now descended on the new Jewish state like a lightning bolt when the final shot was heard and peace settled over the land dr. su Kennex independence day discovery found its rightful place in Israel's archaeological archives the Dead Sea Scrolls as the discovery came to be known are now housed in a Jerusalem Museum here in the shrine of the book we meet Yaga Elia Dean son of the late dr. su Koenig Fantasia Dean you certainly come to the study of archaeology honestly thought you know the word honestly is the way you use it in the States which means that my father was an archaeologist yes he was and in fact he was the first scholar to discover the importance of the Dead Sea Scrolls and I remember very well in the end of 1947 I was at that time in the underground defense movement we had in The Hague and I was Chief of Operations and significantly or symbolically if you like on the 29th of November when the United Nations decided to create a Jewish state he came back to Jerusalem with three of the first Dead Sea Scrolls and tell us something about the value of these grows well they it's really very difficult to say in a very short time let's begin with the biblical aspect for example we have this desire oh it is the oldest biblical manuscript on earth it was copied not more than 500 years after the very words were uttered by Israel and they are before the mass erotic or the edited text of the Bible from which all the other translations were amazing so it opened a new Vista from the Bible but more important perhaps is that the scrolls were written by a special Jewish sect as we believe the Essenes whom I knew very little but few words with by Josephus Flavius the historian and now we understand for the first time not from the biblical Scrolls but from what we call sectarians flows what did the essence believe in and this is really very important the fascinating third aspect of the scroll is the relation between the essays and the straws are in Christianity my own view is that John the Baptist you in fact he was roaming and preaching in the very place where Qumran is he may have been even a member they may influence him he may influence them [Music] story of John ends where we began as a boy living near or among the Hermits of Qumran John may never have experienced the joys of the Dead it was precisely because of a dance that this forerunner of Yeshua would meet an untimely death [Music] the details have become vegging it was the birthday of Herod son of Herod the Great salomi his newly acquired stepdaughter danced to Herod's lecherous delight in front of his birthday guests he vowed to give her anything up to half of his kingdom it was an opportunity for Salome e's mother to silence john's public criticism of her recent divorce and marriage to Herod so the voice the voice of one crying in the wilderness was silenced the people who live in darkness will see a great light Isiah insisting on those who live in the dark land of death the light will shine the light of the world as Jesus called himself shone out into the surrounding darkness from this tiny Galilean village Capernaum for three years it was to be the center of Jesus ministry Capernaum was a fishing town on Israel's largest lake the lake of Galilee although it is a relatively small body of water the fishermen of the region held it in such awe that they never referred to it as a lake but as you see [Music] Matthew reports that as Jesus walked along the shore of the Sea of Galilee he saw two brothers who were fishermen Peter and his brother Andrew jesus said to them come with me and I will teach you to catch men at once they left their nets and went with him Jesus went on and saw two other brothers James and John in their boat getting the net ready he called them and at once they left the boat and went with him why fisherman why not important people we don't know but we can speculate that maybe the important people the rich and the powerful did not exactly fit into the plan for the kingdom of heaven he had in mind Jesus performed his first miracle at a wedding in Cana near his home today there's no sign of Cana only a tell somewhere beneath that tell are the ruins of a house where wedding feast was held to which Jesus and his friends were invited this is the way a wedding is conducted in Kiryat oh no today the ceremony is thought to be quite close to that used in Jesus time undoubtedly the wedding in Cana was very similar to this voice of mirth the voices gladness the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride the wedding party sings quoting the Prophet Jeremiah the chanting and the ceremony that preceded it traditionally took place under the hoopla a prayer shawl held aloft by friends of the groom the wedding took place under the open sky in hopes that the marriage would be blessed with as many children as stars in the heavens [Music] when the wine ran out his mother came to him and said they have no more wine jesus said to her you must not press me my time has not yet come but she said to the servants standing nearby whatever he tells you to do do it and she left and there he was with six large stone water jars used for ritual washing he told the servants to fill them up with water being good fellows the servants filled them up to the brim and then he said take some of that and give it to the master of ceremonies they brought it to him and he did not know that it was water which had been turned into wine when he tasted it he called the bridegroom and said you've turned everything around usually they served the good wine first and after people have drunk a lot they bring in the ordinary wine you have served the best wine last this is the first miracle Jesus did in Cana and showed forth his glory and his disciples believed in him [Music] following the wedding at Cana Saint John says Jesus and His disciples went back to Capernaum to the north of the village stood a synagogue built by a Roman centurion friendly to the Jews and later rebuilt with all its present grandeur in the second or third century [Music] it was gyrus the ruler of the synagogue whose 12 year old daughter Jesus raised from the day and it was the Roman centurion who built the synagogue of whom jesus said I tell you not even in Israel and I found such faith on one particular Sabbath st. Mark's Gospel tells us Jesus and His disciples including James and John left the synagogue and went straight to the home of Peter and Andrew Peters mother-in-law was sick in bed with a fever as soon as Jesus arrived they told him about her he went to her took her hand and helped her up the fever left her and she began to serve them the village of Capernaum was excavated in 1968 down to the very streets where Jesus walked and to the very homes which he entered the goal was to find the house of Peter and Andrew where Jesus had healed Peters mother-in-law Franciscan archaeologists believe that they had hit paydirt when they came upon this octagonal structure close to the lake they identified it as a church dating to the 5th century these yellow lines are the floorplan of that church the fact that the building had eight sides is highly significant 100 years earlier Emperor Constantine's mother Queen Helena had built a similar eight-sided Church in Bethlehem directly over the cave where she believed Jesus had been born during this period eight-sided churches marked places of special importance in early church history the Gospels infer that Jesus took up residence in Capernaum at the house of Peter and called it home during much of his Galilean ministry the fact that Jesus may have lived in this very house would obviously have made it a site of special importance was that the reason for building a church over it was that the reason for the special are tagging all design Diaries of early Christian pilgrims provided archaeologists with additional clues an Italian pilgrim recorded this note in his 6th century diary we came to Capernaum into the house of st. Peter which is a basilica no doubt Capernaum 5th century Church was the same Basilica that this pilgrim saw in the 6th century clearly the church was intended to mark the house of Peter the residence of Jesus one question still baffled archeologists we're in the present ruins where the remains of Peters house the mystery was not to be unraveled until archaeologists began sifting through rubble from the innermost octagon of the church father LaFrieda a Franciscan specializing in Biblical Archaeology had already come upon several oil lamps dating to the time of Christ his Arab assistant was concentrating on a corner of the ruins revealing remnants of a wall which had been planted and replastered many times this was highly unusual in ancient Capernaum was the only room with plastered walls found in any of the excavated buildings apparently it had been singled out for this special treatment in the middle years of the first century suddenly in the rubble of plastered fragment appeared it was the consistency and color of first century plaster father LaFrieda a veteran of numerous archaeological digs in the Middle East new at-a-glance that they were onto a discovery of the first magnitude scratched on the artifact where the Greek words Christ have mercy ultimately over a hundred graffiti were found scratched on the plaster walls the second piece revealed the words old Lord Jesus Christ help followed by two names apparently the graffiti indicated that this house might well have been a place of worship for early Christians a house church crowning the discovery was a piece of plaster which father LaFrieda traced the barely legible words Rome and Peter he believed he had the find of a lifetime the final piece of circumstantial evidence linking this octagon structure with the first century house of Peter and Andrew Jesus himself owned no home nor any material possessions other than his cloak and his staff possibly from this house of Peter and Andrew and certainly from these Capernaum streets the one born Yeshua would take his ministry and to all the surrounding country Jesus with a few disciples always on foot traveled all through Galilee preaching in the synagogue's teaching helping and curing people a man suffering from leprosy came to Jesus knelt down and begged him for help if you want to he said you can make me clean Jesus was filled with pity and reached out and touched him I do want to he said be clean don't tell anyone about this jesus said to him go straight to the priest and let him examine you then in order to prove to everyone that you are cured offer the sacrifice that was ordered by Moses we see Jesus constantly confronted by crowds of twisted unhappy people mentally and physically ill [Music] why would a relatively unpopulated region like Upper Galilee have had so many people suffering from so many diseases we now know that the afflicted were not only Galileans but Jews from every quarter of Israel Galilee was famous for its healing Springs near Tiberias only a few miles down the road from Capernaum stools still visible today allowed the ill to sit and soak hoping against hope for cures beyond the capacity of the steaming waters wherever Jesus found women made he stooped to help seeing a man who was born blind he said I must do the works of him who sent me it was the Jewish Sabbath the day work of any kind was forbidden ignoring the prohibition Jesus made some mud with spittle rubbed it on the man's eyes and asked him to wash his face in the pool of Siloam [Music] for 800 years daughters of Jerusalem had descended the pools steep steps to fetch drinking water for their families it is safe to say that never in all these centuries had a man come here to wash away his blindness [Music] [Applause] [Music] the blind man's joy became other men's fury some of the Pharisees said angrily the man who did this cannot be from God because he does not obey the Sabbath law [Music] Jews in the measuring district of modern Jerusalem guard the ancient traditions as rigorously as the Pharisees did forbidding entrance to women considered immodest lead rest letting their sideburns grow into long ringlets as prescribed by the law of Moses using modern transportation on weekdays but stoning any vehicle that moves on the Sabbath if all of Israel would only keep the Sabbath once they quote the Talmud the Messiah would come here in Jerusalem we are driving to the Misha ream section where the Sabbath is observed very strictly and every resident of Jerusalem knows about the Sabbath and so do the visitors to whom the ways of observing the Sabbath are very noticeable when they come to visit Jerusalem commenting upon the Sabbath is dr. Reuben hammer who's professor of Jewish philosophy at the Jewish Theological Seminary in Jerusalem dr. hammer what is the origin of the Sabbath observance well the Sabbath appears in Jewish sources and Judaism first in the book of Genesis where the description of the creation is given and then at the end of the creation it says that God rested and hallowed that day upon which he rested the seventh day as the Sabbath then it appears again later on in the book of Exodus and in the Ten Commandments and both versions and we're told there that we are to observe the seventh day as a day of as far as creation is concerned the idea behind the Sabbath and creation seems to be that we are to recognize and remember at least one day a week that we are the creature we are the created and not the Creator there's only one creator and that's God the best way you can remember the creation is by saying I will cease on this day from doing anything which is creative I will let God do all the creating and I will just admire what he has done so I don't cut anything I don't change anything I don't build anything I don't even use fire because fire which is specifically prohibited in the in the Bible from use on the Sabbath day is the symbol of creating something fire takes one thing and changes it into another on the Sabbath the human being says no that's not for me I'm not the one that changes things I am the one that admires that which God himself has made he is the real creator of all time there are customs and maybe even regulations is connected with the Sabbath and yes right there are regulations definitely and so you have for example regulations which say that you're not supposed to engage in any commerce no money is to be spent no stores are to be opened and as you said when people come to Jerusalem they see everything is closed on the seventh day but I think it should be emphasized here by the way that all of these Sabbath regulations can be broken as a matter of fact must be broken if there is a good reason to do so in order to save a human life the Sabbath is not the ultimate end human life is the ultimate end from Sabbath adds to our lives and if there's ever any danger involved then you're allowed to break it and as a matter of fact Jewish law requires you to break in so a doctor can do whatever has to be done that day or a policeman can do the things and then he has to do or anybody can because life and to keep a person away from danger and from pain that's what Judaism is really all about the Bible says you're to live by them and not to die by them living by the laws of God not dying by them isn't too far from Christ's own statement the Sabbath was made for man not man for the Sabbath as a boy in Nazareth Sabbath Eve would have been the highlight of the week for Jesus [Music] [Music] Sabbath bread was usually extra special one never put it to his lips without the prayer breasts be thou Lord our God King of the universe who brings forth bread from the earth the Sabbath was not intended to be sad in joyless but a day of song a day of rejoicing [Music] come my friend to meet the bride let us welcome the Sabbath they sing [Music] foolish am i a little salami a little evening Coleman of stores here I said the MACD as what they Amish be a miserable Astoria son [Music] traditional for Shabbat record ministers in early times the recitation that now begins the Sabbath meal then closed it there was evening and there was morning the sixth day thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all their hosts and the Lord blessed the seventh day and hallowed it because on it he rested from all the work which he had created this was the Saturn which Jesus said God had a from tank when the Jewish authorities protested his healing on the Sabbath Jesus said my father is always working and I must work to not was one thing to challenge the law and quite another to claim God as his father to make himself equal to God that was blasphemy this saying John tells us made the Jewish authorities more determined than ever to kill him they tried to develop a dispute between his disciples and the disciples of John so Jesus left Judea and went back to Galilee on his way he had to go through Samaria no Jew passed through Samaria if he could possibly avoid it Jews hated the Samaritans and the Samaritans the Jews Mount Gerizim is the center of samaritan worship according to the Samaritans their problems with other Jews go back nearly 3,000 years a dispute arose over the site of the temple the Samaritans claimed that Mount Gerizim should be the spot David the king said it should be Jerusalem and it was there that the temple was built 400 years later Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem and it's temple he took the people in the south captive and sent them to Babylon in the north a handful of Samaritans was left behind they continued on Mount Gerizim the sacrifices that had been offered in Jerusalem [Applause] to this day the Samaritans celebrate Passover on this holy mountain [Music] sacrificing their animals just as it was done in the time of Jesus now the Samaritans accepted only the first five books of the Bible the books of Moses all the rest they rejected when Cyrus the king of depressions allowed the Jews to go back home they rebuilt their Temple in Jerusalem the Samaritans felt that they had preserved the true worship of God during 70 years of captivity and they now felt that the temple was again being built in the wrong place the two peoples who were originally one at a split that was never mended the division became more acute as the Samaritans offered their services to the army of Herod and after that under the Romans fought against their fellow Jews in Samaria the Bible tells us Jesus came to a town named saikai near the field jacob had given his son joseph Jacob's Well was there and Jesus tired out from the trip sat down by the well it was about noon this Byzantine church was built over Jacob's Well to commemorate Jesus visit as you can see it has no roof but it is not a ruin it was never finished it was almost completed when the Arabs over in Palestine in 630 ad since the church was not complete they did not bother to destroy it they simply built their own mosques nearby the well in the altar beneath the floor of the uncompleted church which is attended by a Greek Orthodox priest the inheritors of the Byzantine priests who built this church and were killed here sometimes history repeats itself in 1979 the archimandrite of the Greek Orthodox Church was killed right here in this Chapel as he was serving this altar father Gregorius what was the name of the man who died here his name is aluminous and what did he do here is there was the superior of this convent and the Arab terrorist broke into this place threw a grenade in heck they are Kim and dried to death with an axe and here is the well where the Samaritan woman came to draw water it was noon the heat of the day certainly not a normal time for a woman to leave the cool shelter of her home and go to the well not unless the woman was deliberately avoiding other women not unless she was the butt of their jokes or the object of their caustic gossip to such a woman jesus said would you please give me a drink she looked at him in amazement and said how is it that you a Jew asked me for a drink when I am a Samaritan woman and he said if you knew the gift of God and the one who is asking you you might ask him and he would give you living water she said where's your bucket Jacob who gave us this well had a bucket are you greater than our Father Jacob and he said if you had the water that I have to give it would be like a well of water in you springing up to life eternal she said I wish you would give me some of that water so I don't have to come out here like this at noon to draw water and he said why don't you have your husband help you and she said I don't have a husband and he said you can say that again you've already had five husbands and the one you have now is not your husband changing the subjects he said I always wanted to know where to worship God here on Mount Gerizim or in Jerusalem as you people say and without irritation he went on to say the time is coming when you will not need to worship God in any special place or he is a spirit and those who worship Him by the power of his spirit the worship him as he is and she said when Messiah comes he'll tell us everything and Jesus said I'm the one the one that's talking to you just then his disciples returned from the town where they've been buying food and the woman left her waterpot stare and ran through the town shouting to the people I just met a man who told me everything that I ever did in my whole lifetime could he possibly be the Messiah because of what the woman told them many Samaritans believed that Jesus could be the Messiah the large crowd came out to see him and asked him to stay with them he did for two days at the end of that time they were saying to the woman now we believe not because you told us but because we've heard it for ourselves he is the savior of the world Jesus had said earlier no man is a prophet in his own hometown or among his relatives now he had more understanding and appreciation among the enemies of his people than he had among his friends or even his own disciples [Music] you [Music] if Jerusalem was ever a city flowing with milk and honey it is more so today food from as far south as the Sinai and as far north as the borders of Lebanon enters the ancient city as the Damascus Gate Arabs seem to have cornered the market on everything edible or drinkable [Music] even Jews are enticed by Arab bread its taste is reminiscent of wafers made with honey and its texture may be as light as the men on which the children of Israel ate [Music] millstones like those used in Jesus day still operate in Upper Galilee producing flour from a grain so fine that Galilee sweet was once earmarked for sacred use in Herod's jerusalem temple [Music] here in the district Jesus once called home Galilee's unique flowers being turned into Israel's most unique bread the art is believed to be as old as the land itself handed down from mother to daughter since the dawn of Jewish history the unleavened bread used by Christ in the Last Supper may have closely resembled this bread in size and texture sometimes called a stop it was perfect for dipping into stews or folding into a knapsack for instant nourishment on a long journey to first century man bread like this was the most important part of his diet it is no accident that the Lord taught his disciples to pray for all their bodily needs in the simple words give us this day our daily bread here in the synagogue at Capernaum Jesus said to his disciples I am the bread of life if anyone eats this bread he will live forever the bread that I give him is my flesh this started an angry argument among them they said how can this man give us his flesh to eat jesus said whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and I will raise him to life again on the last day my flesh is the real food and my blood is the real drink clearly Jesus was talking about a human sacrifice the sacrifice of himself Jesus intended to give his body for the whole world to eat and his blood for the whole world to drink upon hearing this some of his disciples left and would not follow him any more human sacrifice was so repugnant to first century Jews that the slightest suggestion of it was bound to send people on their way especially when he implied that he himself would be the sacrifice [Music] below are the ruins of hud surah this was the largest city in the land of Canaan when Abraham first set foot in the promised land earlier in this century an archaeological expedition began probing had Sora's ancient foundations they were searching for evidence of Joshua's annihilation of the city at the time of the Canaanite conquest [Music] according to the Bible the advancing Israelite troops were instruments of God's wrath inflicting vengeance upon a civilization which practiced the most despicable form of human sacrifice offering its own infant children in fiery Holocaust to the gods archaeologists found that the city had indeed been destroyed by an invading army precisely at the time and precisely in the manner the Bible describes archeologists also found examples of Canaanite idolatry mysterious monoliths pointing skyward and treating help from the moon God depicted by a disc with a crescent [Music] this is a human representation of the moon God his arms outstretched to receive offerings from his suppliant but where in the ruins of this city was evidence for human sacrifice where was the horrible abomination which the book of Deuteronomy said was the cause for hot sore and all the land of Canaan feeling God's fierce anger no indisputable evidence could be found not in hots or not in any Canaanite city yet the Old Testament Scriptures insist that the practice virtually pervaded the whole land of Canaan from the lush high places of the north to the arid deserts of the South some scholars were ready to dismiss these biblical accounts as historical poppycock then an unexpected discovery was made on the coast of North Africa [Music] tonisha and officials had caught an unauthorized searcher trying to carry off an unusual stone it turned out to be a monument more than 2,000 years old a tombstone from the long destroyed city of Carthage the stone Bork grisly and gravy it was of a priest holding an infant in his arms apparently making the child ready for sacrifice [Music] Carthage had imported its religion lock stock and barrel from the land of Canaan this monument was to be archaeology's first tangible evidence of the Canaanite abomination which the Old Testament prophets had so vehemently protested probing the spot where the Prowler had found the engraved tombstone mm so small sandstone blocks each monolith was inscribed with a sacrificial dedication to the Lord Bale Haman the Lord bailed was a Canaanite deity whose popularity eventually overshadowed hot sores moon-god [Music] under nearly every stone was a small clay pot containing the ashes of an infant thousands of examples of human sacrifice in one a small area half a millennium before Christ the Jews themselves sacrificed infants to bail when Jesus called himself the bread of life and identified that bread with his body which he would give in sacrifice it was opening a floodgate of memories nightmares to be exact of a holocaust the Jews wanted desperately to forget Jesus was also evoking another memory from Israel's past it was a story of human sacrifice as old as father Abraham here in Jerusalem the Mount where the Great Dome of the rock now stands once bore the name Mount Moriah it is now a Muslim shrine here on this rock tradition says God made his final test of Abraham he was ordered to go to Mount Moriah a Canaanite high place and to offer his son Isaac as a human sacrifice what was to have been a new beginning must now have looked like a dead end not knowing the Lord's command with his father Isaac asked Abraham father where is the lamb for the sacrifice Abraham told the boy God will provide torn between his love of God and his love for his son Abraham piled the wood to burn him in the required Holocaust an angel of God stayed his hand and provided another sacrifice [Music] this was the final test of Abraham's love and loyalty to God he would give even his beloved son the sacrifice was not accepted would never be accepted it was harsh but vivid testimony that God wanted no human sacrifice animal sacrifice however continued it is still done in Samaria by Samaritan priests in the celebration of the Passover and so animal sacrifice grew until in the great day of the temple thousands of sheep were sacrificed here every year that is not include the goats and birds offered to God our story concerns a change in that sacrifice even more dramatic than the one that substituted animals for humans [Music] it was a change the disciples needed help to understand so Jesus painted a picture for them from everyday life I am The Good Shepherd jesus said I know my sheep and they know me and I'm willing to die for them this is what the father commanded me to do in the past men believed that angry gods demanded the sacrifice of their sons the opposite is true Jesus was saying the true God is willing to sacrifice his son for the sake of mankind [Music] the disciples still could not understand at that point he set his face toward Jerusalem and the final confrontation but before he reached Jerusalem there was to be another stop it too concerned death the death of a friend Lazarus this is the church in Bethany named after Lazarus his sisters Martha and Mary sent a message to Jesus saying your dear friend Lazarus is sick Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus and yet he stayed where he was for two more days when Jesus arrived in Bethany he found that Lazarus had been buried four days before Bethany is about two miles away from Jerusalem and many Judeans had come out to visit Martha and Mary and to comfort them about the death of their brother when Martha heard that Jesus was coming she went out to meet him but Mary stayed in the house with their friends Martha said if you had been here my brother would not have died but I know that even now God will give you everything you asked for it jesus said your brother will rise to life again I know Martha said he will rise to life again on the last day some sects of Jews believed in resurrection notably the Pharisees possibly the Essenes the Sadducees did not Jesus said to Martha I am the resurrection and the life if anyone believes in me he will live even though he dies whoever lives and believes in Me will never die do you believe this Martha said I do believe I believe that you are the Messiah the son of God who has come into the world I am the resurrection and the life those are the words in Latin above the altar of this church built as usual on crusader foundations above byzantine ruins this was a convent in Crusader times the whole complex of course being a church that honors the tomb of Lazarus pilgrims would make their way through the chapel of this convent past the stone chairs used by the sisters to enter this door which leads to the tunnel the passageway to the tomb of Lazarus followed by pilgrims throughout the years but now they stop here the passageway has been walled up ever since the Arabs destroyed the Crusader church and built their mosque right over the tomb of Lazarus today one of Christendom's most sacred sites is Muslim entered by a special tunnel constructed to replace the original entranceway that was blocked it is one of the least disputed sites in all of Christendom unlike many other tombs the tomb of Lazarus had a slab of stone laid flat over the entrance to the grave it is just as the Gospels describe it and Martha called Mary her sister the people who were with her comforting her followed her because they thought she was going to the grave to weep there when she came to the place where Jesus was as soon as she caught sight of him she felt down at his feet and said Lord if you had been here my brother would not have died Jesus watched her weeping and also the people with her weeping Jesus heart was touched and he was deeply moved where have you buried him he asked come and see Lord they answered he ordered the stone to be taken away with a loud voice he cried out Lazarus come out Lazarus came out untie him said Jesus and let him go [Music] this is Jerusalem seen from Bethany it was that close people who had come to visit with Mary saw what Jesus did and believed in him but some returned to the Pharisees and reported to them what Jesus had done healing and teaching even unorthodox teaching may be one thing but raising a man from the dead is on a different order of magnitude ironically bringing life to Lazarus became the ultimate argument in bringing death to Jesus the Pharisees and the chief priests met with the council and said if we let him go on in this way everyone will believe in him and the Roman authorities will take action to destroy our temple and our nation Jesus left Bethany knowing that he had charted a course from which there was no turning back nor did he want to he said anyone who starts to plow and then keeps looking back is of no use for the kingdom of God its own the Word of God as a farmer so is the seed some had fallen on rocky ground and had borne no grain that type of soil represented the chief priests and the Pharisees but some of the seeds had also fallen in good ground and had borne much grain continuing the same imagery jesus said to his disciples a grain of wheat remains no more than a single grain unless it is dropped into the ground and dies if it dies then it produces many grains Jesus was speaking of his own death now less than a week away the next day as Jesus stood on the Mount of Olives overlooking Jerusalem a large crowd would heard about the raising of Lazarus came out to greet Jesus seeing Jesus mounted on a lowly donkey the crowd exploded into ecstatic shouts the Prophet Zechariah had prophesied that the Messiah King would make his triumphal entry into Jerusalem on precisely such a humble beast of burden impetuously the crowd carpeted Christ's path with their outer garments and cut palm branches from the trees to wave at him as one welcome to King in those days all the while they sounded praised our God blessed him who comes in the name of the Lord God blessed the king of Israel but Jesus looked beyond the crowd to the city he was about to enter and he wept over it as he wept over Jerusalem Jesus said if you only knew today what is needed for peace but now you cannot see it the time will come when your enemies will surround you with barricades blockade you closing in upon every side they will completely destroy you and the people within your walls they will leave not one stone upon another because you did not recognize the time when God came to save you [Music] the destruction Jesus foresaw had its roots in his native Galilee a band of Jewish freedom fighters called zealots lived with their families in these Galilean mountain caves for nearly a century they lived in relative safety plotting small-scale guerrilla attacks against the Roman oppressors then in 65 ad the zealots launched an all-out revolt and Rome responded with vengeance [Music] [Applause] from Galilee the Roman sword was to descend on the Jerusalem Jesus had wept over [Music] Titus the son of the Roman Emperor later Emperor himself swept down the countryside burning destroying the zealots held out for a long time in Jerusalem it had to be taken wall by wall street by street finally the Romans came to the great bastion of the temple here with me along the western wall of the temple area in Jerusalem stands general Khayyam hetsig who is known to people all over the world is the former ambassador of Israel to the United Nations and as a military commander and a student of public affairs you probably have a very good view of what actually happened in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD what was the military situation at that time well the Jewish revolt against the Romans began five years before 70 AD and there was a Jewish uprising at a time against the local Roman governor and that spread throughout the country Titus came all the way from Alexandria to take command of the troops to India he came up yes and they took command he brought with him four legions what kind of situation did he find inside the city when he got here the Jewish air forces in the city were commanded by two previous rivals namely John FG Scala or is known in Israel as Johan and goosh Halawa who had fought in the Galilee and with the remnants of his forces had reached Jerusalem and Simon burger ah the Jewish forces then withdrew into the temple and now the temple had not been built for defenders one of the most beautiful buildings in the world at a time but it was massive just look at the walls here and you'll see what sort of building there was at the time you can just imagine what the whole the whole process of trying to breach anything like this they tried to breach the wall of the temple for six days they hammered away with the battering rams but they couldn't do it it was so formidable and then finally they said they set up a fire at the gate the gate was made of metal and it had inside wooden components and they kept stoking the fire until the metal melted and then the wood caught fire and they broke in to the temple area the Jewish forces then under Yohanan Gousha lava withdrew to the outer portico where they fought and they were defeated there and they were finally pressed into the inner portico which can comprise the sanctuary and also the men's section and the women's section of the inner area the battle there continued and finally the Romans by sheer dint of force began to overcome it this this really had affected the population of Jerusalem a great deal oh the population was in a terrible state they were just being massacred they were starved and wherever the Romans took over they just massacred our men women and children nobody remained alive finally they now broke into the inner sanctuary and here on the ninth of the month of AB which is sometime in July August 650 seven years to the day after the first temple had been destroyed by Babylonian invaders the temple fell to the Romans they took a large number of prisoners who were afterwards used in gladiator combats and various circuses that were put on they were killed in all of them and they took them also back to Rome together with many of the things taken from the temple where they are the subject of the Titus arch which was set up there Titus gave instructions then not one stone was to be left on another in Jerusalem the city was put to fire and destroyed completely how could the Romans have destroyed a fortress as formidable as Herod's temple what engineering secret did simple Roman soldiers possess to knock down walls built up 200 tons limestone blocks the stones the Egyptians used to build the pyramids weighed only 15 tons you throughout history not one invading army ever succeeded in sending the pyramids tumbling to the ground the answer lies in the type of rock Herod used in constructing the temple it was limestone and the Romans knew that limestone held a secret flaw the Romans thrust oil-soaked rags and wood between the two hundred ton limestone blocks with which Herod built this temple and set the wood on fire since limestone holds water the water boiled the vapor built up pressure and the rocks exploded Rome's battering rams had barely made a dent in the great walls of the temple but they had succeeded in opening gaping holes in Jerusalem's lighter outer walls Roman artillery was based on two principles the bow and torsion artilleryman inserted long flaming arrows into the centermost wooden groove torsion was applied to these inner ropes by twisting the locks at counter and bottom then the fiery projectiles were let fly catapult oook an even greater toll a boom in life [Music] when the artillery had done its job a rope released a drawbridge from Rome's assault towers hundreds of Roman soldiers would descend on the wall and the enemy resistance would soon give way to surrender there were three separate was Jerusalem had not surrendered easily five continuous months it had mocked Rome's finest legions and her heaviest artillery until a fierce panic forced some of its citizens to flee the city into the enemy's waiting arms Titus made an example of the captives by his own count he crucified five hundred Jews a day forty years earlier when Jesus wept over Jerusalem this had been the terrible vision that brought tears to his eyes [Music] Surrender did not come until the Romans set fire to the temple with the dwelling of the God of Israel in flames the fire of Jewish resistance flickered and finally went out but the fulfillment of Jesus prediction that this temple would be destroyed was almost 40 years in the future on this day before Passover Jerusalem seemed destined to endure forever through this Golden Gate according to tradition Jesus riding down from the Mount of Olives made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem once Jesus entered the city he went into the temple and overturned the tables of the moneychangers Jesus told them that God said my temple will be a house of prayer but you are making it a hideout for thieves [Applause] Jesus through all the merchants out and the Pharisees tried to trap him with questions force him to convict himself as he taught right here on these very steps teacher they asked what do you think is it against our law to pay taxes to the Emperor or not Jesus aware of their evil plan said you hypocrites you try to trap me with questions show me the coin for paying the tax so they brought him a coin a Roman Denarius Jesus asked him whose face and name are these they answered the Emperor's well then said Jesus paid to the Emperor what belongs to the Emperor and a God what belongs to God to Jesus over concern with money our taxes in with food or clothing was a symptom of lack of trust in the Heavenly Father look how the wildflowers grow he told his disciples not even King Solomon with all his wealth had clothes as beautiful as one of these flowers there's God who clothes them only be all the moisture to clothe you the religious authorities were becoming desperate they had not been able to trap Jesus in anything specific because of the following he had gathered they were unwilling to attack him publicly you hypocrites he said to them you cleaned the cup and plate on the outside while the inside is full of what you have gotten by violence and selfishness from the great staircase of the temple Jerusalem's main cemetery was clearly visible Jesus used it as a symbol of his adversaries hypocrisy you teachers of the law and Pharisees he said you are like whitewashed tombs which look fine on the outside but are full of bones and decaying corpses on the inside on the outside you appear good to everybody but inside you are full of hypocrisy and sin infuriated by his condemnation they demanded a sign that he was truly the Messiah as his followers claimed jesus answered them destroy this temple and in three days I will build it up again how will you build up the temple in three days they asked it took 46 years to build this temple the temple Jesus was speaking about was his body after he was raised from death his disciples remembered that he had said this Thursday Jesus gave Peter and John these instructions go and get the Passover meal ready for us to eat he told them to find a man carrying a water jar follow that man into the house he enters Jesus told them and say to the owner of the house the rabbi asked where is the room where my disciples and I will eat the Passover he will show you a large furnished room upstairs and there get everything ready they found everything as Jesus had told them and prepared the Passover meal it was Thursday night now the Passover was on Friday that year how is it that Jesus prepared this holiest of all ceremonies a day early after he ate the Passover he was captured by the temple authorities the next day he was tried by the Roman prefect condemned and executed his body was hurriedly taken down from the cross and buried so that a corpse would not desecrate the Passover Sabbath the Gospel writers were absolutely certain when they wrote that Jesus ate the Passover on Thursday night but they never explained why we do know that here in the Western Hills there was an Essene community devout Jews who objected to what they felt was undue pagan influence upon the religious life of God's chosen people to separate themselves from an impure religious establishment they celebrated all religious festivals a day early Jesus was also critical of the religious leaders and some have speculated that it was here in the western hills in the sceen community that the disciples found the upper room prepared for Passover that does not mean that Jesus was an S scene in fact he was supposed to them on many counts but he may very well have used s seen religious facilities and also followed the sceen religious calendar for the Passover in this year people are used to seeing pictures of the Last Supper in which Jesus and His disciples set up right at the table much as we do but there's considerable evidence that they used the triclinium the Roman method of eating the Gospels indicate that the disciples were reclining at the table we matched students from the American Institute of Holy Land studies to help us see this Passover Feast the last one Jesus was to eat with his disciples the host seat was the center one on the left-hand side that would certainly have been occupied by Jesus it was customary to lean on the left arm and to eat with the right hand it would seem from the various accounts in the gospel that John sat on Jesus right side and Judas on his left Peter and John had been commissioned to prepare this passover feast and when Judas took the second place of honor on the left side of Jesus it may be that in a fit of pique Peter went to the very bottom of the table on the opposite side John tells us that Jesus tied a towel around his waist poured some water in a basin and began to wash his disciples feet and to dry them with a towel at a feast it was customary for servants or slaves to do the washing of the guests feet jesus said them an example which they were to follow mr. Dunn maybe you can tell us a few things about the Passover what does it commemorate well the most memorable event in the Israelite history is the captivity of the Israelites in Egypt and the Passover meal itself commemorates the deliverance by god of the Israelites from the Egyptian bondage so the music kind of a celebration and it has all kinds of foods some of which represents something I suppose in this history there were many common foods which were used during the Passover Feast probably in significantly larger quantities because it was a feast olives which of course was a very common food in antiquity in Palestine grains Barley's but the other items that you see on the table here were symbolic in their use in the Passover meal for example you have the hora set which is made up of date honey raisins apples and figs and it's a mixture which is to symbolize the the mortar which was put between the bricks by the Israelites when they were bricklayers during their Egyptian captivity then of course you have what are known as bitter herbs onions radishes which were taken and dipped in salt water and then eaten and the bitterness was supposed to remind the eater of the cruelty of the bondage of the Israelites when they were in Egypt then you have some parsley which was taken and also dipped into the salt water and then eaten remembering the tears of the angels which were shed for the Egyptians who drowned when God parted the Red Sea and then closed it on the Egyptian army I imagine it was a lot of Scripture and also a certain order in this and there's a Hebrew word that means order Seder it's the word used for this meal and so often what was the order of the meal before they took part in the meal they would ask God's blessing on it they would take the bread and lift it up towards heaven while breaking it they would say blessed be thou God King of the universe who brings forth grain from the from the earth the wine then was taken and then lifted up towards heaven and the same prayer was recited blessed be thou Lord king of the universe who brings forth fruit from the vine when you mentioned the Passover meat and that was always lamb wasn't it since the first Passover the lamb was prepared in a stew like substance and unleavened bread which was to symbolize the haste with which the israelites had to leave their captivity and Egypt was taken and since they didn't have utensils in the first century the stew was poured into a bowl and was eaten with the unleavened bread what was the significance of the lamb the Israelites would kill an unblemished lamb put the blood on the doorpost and eat the entire lamb and then the Angel of Death would pass over their household only touching the households he did not have the blood on the lentil post it was a magnificent feast and now we come to the end of it don't we with a lamb generally generally at this point the third cup was taken it was drunk and the final Thanksgiving was given to God for the meal and after that point no other food was to be taken at all and at this point Jesus produced a big surprise they were totally surprised that at this point when no other food is to be taken that Jesus would suggest to eat some more and of the bread he said this is my body given to you and of the wine he said this is my blood of the New Covenant my blood poured out for the forgiveness of sin as they left the supper the traditional Psalms were sung I shall not die but I shall live and recount the deeds of the Lord the Lord has chasing me sorely but he has not given me over to death yet Jesus had given himself over to death for the sins of the world with that knowledge Jesus and His disciples went to a place named assembly honey Tony what did [Music] [Applause] happen oh yeah [Music] gethsemane in hebrew means olive press it was an olive grove on the same Mount of Olives Jesus had descended when he entered Jerusalem as the Messiah King a few days earlier these trees in the background we're here when Jesus was or more accurately the roots were here when Titus and his Roman army destroyed Jerusalem in 70 AD he cut down every tree within ten Roman miles of Jerusalem no cover for infiltrators no fuel no food no oil the roots lived and the trees grew again the trees have in their own way then resurrected the Church of All Nations here in the garden of gethsemane is comparatively new the church was built with the donations of the people of sixteen nations before the altar which is shaped like a cup lies the stone which is the traditional place to which Jesus withdrew and prayed then he returned to the three disciples and found them asleep and he said to them how is it that you were not able to keep watch with me for even one hour keep watch and pray that you will not fall into temptation the Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak once more Jesus went away and prayed my father if this cup of suffering cannot be taken away unless I drink it your will be done then he returned once more and found the disciples asleep they could not keep their eyes open after praying a third time using the same words he returned to the disciples and said are you still sleeping the hour has come for the Son of Man to be handed over to the power of sinful men get up look here comes the man who is betraying me Jesus was still speaking when Judas one of the twelve disciples arrived with him was a large crowd sent by the high priests and the elders Judas had given the crowd a signal the man whom I kiss is the one you want arrest him Judis went straight to Jesus and said peace be with you teacher and he kissed him and so they asked him whether he was Jesus of Nazareth he said yes [Music] Peter who had a sword drew it and struck the high priests servant cutting off his right ear after taking care of that ear jesus said to Peter put your sword back in its place those who live by the sword will perish by the sword and so the disciples left and Jesus was taken under guard back to the city and to the fate his enemies had prepared [Music] you [Music] [Music] to first century Jews the occupying Roman forces were the sons of darkness and Pontius Pilate the high priest of darkness yet pirate believed that his rule as prefect of Judea with bringing Israel out of darkness into the light where does the truth lie who was this man whose memory of brilliant Christians keep alive every Sunday when they say the Creed I believe in Jesus Christ who suffered under Pontius Pilate was the man who sentenced Jesus to death the high priest of darkness or was he a victim of circumstances beyond his control punches was his family name pilot or pilatus in Latin means man armed with a pillow the Pelham was different from a simple javelin it had a barbed head embedded in its target it could not very easily be pulled out half of the shaft was made of iron which gave the peel him and unusually heavy weight it was not necessary to hit the body of an opponent it was enough just a Piercy shield a weight of the iron chef' pulled the shield to the ground rendering it useless the peelings barbed head held stubbornly in place until it was too late this weapon became the symbol of Roman world conquest man armed with a pelham was an excellent name for the one who became the symbol of Roman might in Judea and for 10 years was its governor Caesarea on Israel's Mediterranean coast was once capable of providing Anchorage for a hundred Roman war galleys this was the port of entry for the ship that brought Pilate to Judea in 26 AD Caesarea had been built by Herod the Great as a tribute to Caesar Augustus the statue of augustus taller than the olympian zeus still overlooked the harbor from the magnificent temple Herod had dedicated to his mentor the city was once a gleam with marble marble statues marble streets for twenty years this had been the Roman capital of Judea now it was the home of its new governor Pontius Pilate although pilots governmental seat was at Caesarea at least once a year he left his headquarters on the shores of the Mediterranean and paid a visit to Israel's former capital the Golden City of Jerusalem the occasion was the Passover of the Jews [Music] the Bedouin Market in Beersheba is the closest modern example of ancient Jerusalem at Passover time Pilate would have found Jerusalem turned into one vast marketplace Jews and Jewish converts perhaps numbering a hundred thousand poured into the city from every corner of the Roman Empire not only to observe the Passover but also to sell their merchandise there were exotic spices brought from Mesopotamia cakes and wheat grown on Mount Ephraim jewelry and adornment fashioned in Alexandria and Rome and of course eggs and chickens from the nearby suburbs of Jerusalem to put it in modern terms Passover was the greatest tourist event of the year and in two thousand years it is interesting to see how little tourism has changed the Talmud even speaks of souvenir sellers Goldsmith's hulking miniature gold and Jerusalem's so that the tourists could go home with a lasting memory of the holy city the pilot and his ordered Roman mind Jerusalem at Passover must have seemed the epitome of chaos [Music] as governor he needed to be on the scene lest things get out of control at the same time he needed to be isolated from it all for the sake of his own sanity so he ensconced himself here and what modern Jerusalem calls the Citadel these are the last remaining ruins of the palace built by Herod the Great this archaeological model shows how Herod's palace looked in the days of Pontius Pilate perhaps the most striking feature of Herod's palace was the central courtyard where the Jews would one day bring Jesus to Pilate for trial ordering its marble pavement were carefully manicured lawns where Pilate could enjoy expanses of lush green irrigated with water brought all the way from Bethlehem exotic fountains caught his eye spewing water from statuary in the Roman men are here Pilate relaxed in his own paradise in a world carefully removed from the Jews their Passover may have and their strange religious ritual [Music] live always solve it the same oh it was now Thursday evening of what Christians would later call Holy Week in every Jewish dwelling the head of the household recited a benediction for the removal of leaven and then the ritual search began leaven means fermented dough bread made with yeast was obviously one of the things considered leavened and had to be removed from the house before Passover down to the last crumb since the women had spent most of the week cleaning the house it might be that no offending leaven could be found and so it became the custom that members of the household would place crumbs of bread around the house specifically for the ritual search in Jewish thought leaven is regarded as a symbol of corruption and impurity all such things must be removed the sacred Passover might not be defiled there call facility de la Pilate obviously would not have been a witness to things so Jewish nor would he have been a witness to what had been going on in the palace of Caiaphas that same Thursday night many scholars believe that here below church in Jerusalem's western hills are the remains of Kay Ephesus once rather sumptuous estate after interrogating Jesus all night the high priest assembled his council somewhere in this spot at dawn on Good Friday to render a verdict [Music] are you the Messiah the son of the blessed God Karras ask Jesus I am answer Jesus and you will all see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of the Almighty and coming with the clouds of heaven the high priest tore his robes and said you heard his blasphemy what is your decision they all voted against him he was guilty he should be put to death the guard slapped Jesus and led him away found a great deal of research has gone into the events attending the arrest and trial of Jesus dr. Paul L Meyer professor of ancient history at Western Michigan University has put his own research on this subject into a book titled first Easter Joseph Caiaphas the high priest at the time certainly played a prominent part in all of this what do we know about kfs the first century Jewish historian Josephus for example tells us that Joseph Caiaphas was the son-in-law of anis the original high priest of Jerusalem who managed to place five of his own sons also in the position of the high priesthood and he was now the father-in-law of Joseph Caiaphas the present and incumbent high priest who had been in that position by the way for the past 15 years caphis himself had some reason for taking the action that he did oh yes he certainly did he was doing this really in good faith you see he was worried about the political implications of Jesus and his movement before Jesus came along there had been 13 major revolutions against Roman authority so that any messianic figure who attracted a large following among the people might indeed grow into a political challenge to Rome itself and then Pontius Pilate the governor would have to look in then of course there were also religious reasons for kfs to want Jesus put out of the way because Jesus had blaspheme Jewish monotheism so Caiaphas would conclude the belief in one God how can there be a son of God in that case there were motives as well don't forget that Jesus in cleansing the temple and overthrowing the tables of the moneychangers was actually attacking a concession that was controlled by Caiaphas and Anna's themselves and there were personal reasons to Jesus had attacked the famous political and social parties of the Pharisees and the Sadducees called them really some rather interesting names and so for all these reasons they thought it was incumbent upon them to secure the trial and condemnation of Jesus of Nazareth whether for personal or professional reasons is it possible that kafirs thought that he was doing God a service he probably really did think exactly that otherwise the Romans will come and destroy our temple and our city said kfs it is expedient for one man to die rather than the whole nation be sacrificed early on Good Friday morning Jesus was taken from Caiaphas palace to the palace of Pontius Pilate the Jewish authorities requested that Pilate hear the case not inside the walls of the Caesarea but under the open sky in the courtyard of his palace Jews considered any Gentile house ritually impure and beginning with the search for leaven the night before any contamination any impurity which could render one unfit to celebrate the Passover was avoided at all costs since pilots courtyard was open to the air and the Jews could attend the trial here without fear of defiling themselves let the child begin who brings the charges they sin he dren what are the accusations against this man in the name of the high priest of Israel and the Council of the seventy we have found this man guilty of misleading our people telling them not to pay taxes to Caesar and claiming that he is the Messiah a king [Music] bring him it is an irony of history the wise men came to this same Palace 33 years earlier asking where is he that is born King of the Jews here Jesus is standing where they stood on trial for being the king they saw it very interesting charges are you the King of the Jews are you asking this for yourself or is it because of what they told you look I'm not a Jew charge doesn't concern me but your own people and the chief priests handed you over to me you're certainly upsetting them is it true are you the King of the Jews My Kingdom does not belong to this world that you are a king I was born and came into the world for one purpose to speak about the truth what is truth bring him it was a Roman custom at the time of the Jewish Passover for the governor to release any prisoner the crowd chose it's time to release a prisoner to you release Barabbas [Music] Barabbas was an actual criminal a murderer and what shall I do with this man why what crime has he committed they screamed that he had started riots all the way from Galilee to Jerusalem this man a Galilean [Applause] then his parents subject when Pilate learned that Jesus was from Galilee the region ruled by Herod Antipas the son of Herod the Great he sent Jesus to Herod's Jerusalem residence Herod Antipas was very pleased when he saw Jesus he had heard a great deal about him and he'd been wanting to see him for a long time he hoped to see Jesus perform a miracle he asked many questions but Jesus made no answer Herod Antipas like his father was a cunning man more so than pilot he was also a cultured man capable within his own limitations of a certain urbane compassion he was not a religious man and he had an air of faint amusement that often passes for having an open mind toward things religious Jesus refused to speak to him the chief priests and the teachers of the law came forward with strong accusations Jesus refused to answer them Herod let his soldiers have their fun with him mocking him and pretending humility to a king but Herod remembered the people's reaction when he murdered John the Baptist he was not about to make this same mistake twice so Herod sent Jesus back to Pontius Pilate Pilate in the end would be stuck with the problem of what to do with Jesus Pilate tried to soften the crowds bloodthirsty mood by handing Jesus over to his soldiers for torture [Music] prisoners did not always survive the brutal rule with [Music] the Roman whip was a series of leather flails tipped with iron points that ripped the flesh and then they took branches from the thorn bush and made a crown of thorns out of it jamming it down on Jesus head they didn't do this to punish him for being called King of the Jews they really didn't care about that at all they were just having their fun with Jesus it was like the games they played this series of lions looking something like children's hopscotch was used for a very popular military game called the Kings game Julius Caesar when he made his move to become dictator of Rome crossed the Rubicon in defiance of a long-standing Senate order and as he did so he said the dice have been cast they were knucklebone dice like this with which the soldiers played the Kings game the winner was King for a day he could treat the losers as if they were his subjects in some Greek cities someone was made king for the year after being given everything for a whole year he was slaughtered and his blood offered to the earth goddess in sacrifice in that case the winner died in this case the king died after the soldiers had played the Kings game with Jesus he was brought out dressed in the mocking symbols of royalty here is the man look at him you call this man a king he's already been whipped isn't that enough what shall I crucify your king no king but Caesar [Applause] bring the bass I am NOT responsible for the death of this man this is your doing I'll release Barabbas let Jesus be crucified [Applause] Jesus was always pictured as carrying his cross over his shoulder with a long shaft dragging behind him but this was not the Roman way the upright shaft had already been erected on the grounds of execution used over and over again what the prisoner carried was the cross beam this heavy beam of wood placed on the neck or on the shoulders could cut deeply into a man's body and scripture tells us that Jesus fell under its weight an innocent bystander Simon of Cyrene II was pressed into service or volunteered to help carry this being of wood at 9:00 in the morning they nailed him to a cross between two thieves while spectators came and went at least three stayed below the cross and waited John the Beloved Disciple Mary the mother of Jesus and a Roman centurion in six hours Yeshua God saves would draw his last breath for the salvation of humanity his death had been tested as the ultimate act of love the ultimate act of forgiveness [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] as he died the Gospels tell us darkness came over the land whether a natural phenomenon or supernatural none can say with certainty one can only say that at three o'clock it was night and the one who called himself the light of the world had descended into the darkness of death scholars believe that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre covers the actual site of Calvary where the lifeless body of Jesus was now suspended between Earth and heaven the beginning of the Sabbath was drawing rapidly near and a body could not stay on a cross to avoid this desecration the Jewish authorities asked permission of Pilate to break the legs of the crucified Men this was done so that the legs would no longer carry the weight of the body with the additional strain the lungs would collapse and would suffocate the men quickly the soldiers went to the first men and broke his legs and then to the other when they came to Jesus they saw that he had already died and did not break his legs to make sure that he was dead a soldier plunged a spear into his side and out poured blood and water this was done the gospel tells us so that the scripture might come true not one of his bones will be broken now a man named Joseph of Arimathea a member of the Sanhedrin who had not agreed with the council decision came forward and asked permission of Pontius Pilate to bury the body of Jesus a member of the Sanhedrin could ask a special favor of the Roman prefect we do not know whether Joseph's opposed the decision in the council or whether he remains silent now at any rate having received permission from Pilate he had the body of Jesus taken down and put into his own tomb now this is the traditional slab of anointing where the body of Jesus was hurriedly prepared by Joseph of Arimathea and his servants and possibly members of the family and friends of Jesus there was no time for proper washing and anointing using pointment sand perfumes as the process required when three stars can be distinguished in the sky the Sabbath begins by that time the body has to be in the tomb [Music] so the body was hurriedly wrapped and put into the tooth women planned return and to prepare the body properly for burial and the Sabbath was over [Music] the 19th century structure inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is said to be built on the ruins of Christ's actual burial place [Music] a demented Calif hacked the original two bits in the 11th century only a commemorative shrine now stands where the tomb of Jesus may once have stood here is a typical tomb of the first century Jewish law forbids contact with a dead body so in this room mourners could gather technically separated by that wall from the ritual uncleanness which contact would bring in the inner room of a tomb on the anointing slab with spices and ointments the body was prepared for burial and then wrapped in cloths properly prepared the body was then pushed into one of these niches these tombs were usually built with a disc-shaped stone many of them larger than this one and weighing many tons the stone was held in place by wooden blocks when the wooden blocks were pulled loose the stone rolled down effectively sealing the tomb it took massive equipment to open it again unless it were opened supernaturally [Music] [Applause] the Gospels tell us that very early on Sunday morning the women came out to the tomb carrying the spices they had prepared they found the stone rolled away from the entrance so they went in but they did not find the body of Jesus all of a sudden two men appeared in bright shining robes full of fear the women bowed to the ground as the men said to them why are you looking among the dead for one who is alive he is not here he has been raised remember what Jesus said to you when he was in Galilee the Son of Man must be turned over to sinful men be crucified and three days later be raised to life again the women returned and told the eleven disciples and all the rest but they thought what the women said was nonsense then Peter and John ran out to the tomb they found the grave clothes lying on the ledge and nothing else dr. Mayer that stone rolled away and the scene disclosed inside has certainly given rise to a lot of ideas about what really happened there what do you see in the open tomb first of all we have to accept it as a datum of history and I think it is now a provable fact of history that on Sunday morning the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea in which Jesus was buried on Friday was indeed empty now I think we can prove this as a historical datum something that has not really been done before but we have enough evidence now to make that very strong conclusion what evidence do you have two sorts of evidence first of all the familiar argumentation is strong circumstantial evidence it seeks to answer that all-important question where did Christianity begin and the answer is only one place on earth not Galilee not Judea as a whole but in one city Jerusalem point is this in Jerusalem Christianity could least of all have begun if the decaying body of Jesus were available for view in all the hubbub that followed when kfs is trying to stop the movement imprison the Apostles the first thing they would have done Caiaphas would have done would have been to conduct an inquiry after the two moved the stone aside and say look there's the body of Jesus if that would have been available it would have been a wooden stake through the heart of Christianity right at the start we never would have heard of a sect again the other argument and I think the new argument which is very significant is the fact that we have positive evidence in hostile sources that the tomb was empty now in a court of law this would be called an admission against interest it's where a point is brought up that somebody hates to bring up in the prosecution because it favors the defendant but he has to admit it because the whole world knows it's true and he'd be proven a liar if he said anything else well we have positive testimony to the empty tomb in the rabbinical traditions associated with Jesus which i think is extremely strong evidence that there was a missing body on Sunday morning because otherwise it would have been against their particular interest to even mention that fact where do you find that mentioned not only the rabbinical traditions but also Justin Martyr one of the earliest church fathers mentions that as late as the middle of the second century emissaries from Jerusalem were still fanning out across the Mediterranean world with this naturalistic explanation for the resurrection namely the body was stolen but the point is this if you are saying the body is stolen or missing you are all but shouting the fact that the tomb is empty and that is the whole point it's a provable historical fact in 1978 a city in Northwest Italy called Turin displayed a mysterious object that some people have called a proof of the resurrection of Christ it was only the second time in this century that it had been seen by the public the relic is a burial cloth containing a ghostly image life size of an unclothed bearded man [Music] some believe that it is the very burial cloth that joseph of arimathea placed around the body of jesus two thousand years ago at the close of the exhibit 32 scientists came to turin with 72 crates of sophisticated instruments and electronic gear in hope of cracking the secrets of the shroud in the quarters of an old royal palace the Shroud of Turin was carefully unveiled and the scientists began their tests the scientist whose specialty seems farthest removed from the study of earthly phenomena is Don Lin here we are at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena California with Donlan the deputy manager of the science office associated with a Voyager space exploration what is this contraption that stands behind us here it's a full scale model of the Voyager spacecraft an 1800 pound robot that is currently exploring the outer planets of our solar system how is it that a felon like you engage in this kind of project should become interested in the Shroud of Turin well we were asked if we'd ever applied any of the space-age processing techniques that we use to enhance and assemble pictures that come back from the spacecraft we'd ever applied them to images of the Shroud and that's curiosity took over from there and that's how I'm in the project now you were part of a team of 32 scientists that went to Turin to examine the Shroud what did you see when you got there it's a unique cloth it's a solid piece of cloth and has fairly this indistinct it's not a high contrast image of a man the front and back of a man who has been appears to have been scourged beaten crowned with thorns possibly there's a heavy blood stain on the side it has all of the marks that are consistent with the treatment given to Christ he force crucifixion dr. Eric jumper one of the chief coordinators for the project is an authority on the cloth itself we're looking here at a photograph of an ancient piece of linen which we know goes back to at least the 1350 s and there are several marks and images on the cloth the most noticeable which are these horizontal lines that you see dark lines these are actually burn marks that occurred when the shroud was involved in a fire in 1532 you also see some triangular marks depicted here and there these are actually patches placed on the cloth to help restore some of the integrity lost at the time of the fire also we see watermark images here and there again water damage done to the cloth at the time of the 1532 fire but by far the most interesting images on the cloth are the body images which lie along the center and you see here hands crossed over the groin the pectorals of the chest and the face and superimposed on his body image our blood images for example here in the wrist and the placement of these images leads one to believe that we're looking at the image of a man who's been crucified and because of that the placement of these images people believe this may be the burial cloth of Jesus now science wants to look at that phenomena see if it's possible that this could be authentic and here we see the body image slightly enhanced we have a better image of this in color let me take a look at that this is much closer to the way the Shroud actually looks we see again the burn marks the blood on the wrists see the hand there and you can see just how subtle the image on the shroud actually is if we continue along the Shroud we see again the face and if we continue further the back of the head shoulder blades buttocks legs extending out this way as if a body was placed on the cloth and then the cloth unfolded over the body now the images that exists here is interesting but it is not spectacular in 1898 Secunda Peale was given permission to photograph the Shroud for the first time exposed his plates to the image on the shroud and then he took them back to his darkroom to develop them he was expecting the normal kind of distorted image that you get with a negative but instead he got this rather spectacular image somehow the image on the shroud is itself a negative now this raises a question if this is a medieval forgery why would the artist produce an image which could not be fully appreciated until the advent of photography some 500 years later in 1389 when the Shroud was first put on public exhibition in France a local bishop had denounced it as a forgery there were many shrouds of Christ's forged during the 14th century so the bishop was naturally suspicious it was only the amazing photograph of Segundo Pia 500 years later that led to renewed speculation that the Shroud might be authentic in 1977 a year before the scientific community descended on Turin doctors jumper and Jackson traced the outline of the shroud on a cloth and compared it with a live man of matching height and build every body contour matched the image of the shroud exactly the most startling discovery came when the team created this three-dimensional image from a photo of the Shroud with an image analyzer normally used to provide enhanced photos of the planets in the solar system jumper and his associates discovered that the Shroud has built into it three-dimensional information no other known photo possesses such qualities this discovery electrified the scientific community more than anything else it prompted the visit to Turin by the team of 32 distinguished scientists in 1978 for five solid days they worked around the clock some photographed others using sticky tape took small samples from the surface of the cloth and then submitted the samples to microscopic study bombarding the Shroud with infrared ultraviolet light and x-ray they searched for clues to the shrouds chemical makeup they found that the cloth is hand-woven linen of the type used at the time of Christ that the image on the shroud lies only on the surface and doesn't penetrate the fibers of the linen if the image were painting by a medieval artist any paint known to man would have soaked into the fibers finally they concluded that what appears to be blood on the Shroud does have the chemical consistency of real blood well what do you feel about the Shroud after going through all this process of scientific investigation what does the shroud mean to you personally I think what it what it really means to me and in the whole investigation has been fascinating it's been a tremendous experience ah but the important thing about it is the the story that's on it is a visual a picture of the passion and death of Christ all of the wounds the punishment everything that he was subject to is all laid out in great detail on on the Shroud you can see in fact you can feel it I think that may be one of the most significant things is rather than hearing it as a story as something imaginary or that existed at one time you can stand there and literally feel it there's no conclusive scientific proof that the Shroud is the burial clothing of Jesus but the Gospels are concerned with other evidence supplied by Jesus himself that he was alive and well that very afternoon on a road to a small town near Jerusalem two disciples met with a stranger he asked them why the long faces they said do you mean to tell us that even though you are a stranger in Jerusalem you don't know the things that happened this weekend and he said what things and they said we thought he would have been a prophet in Israel but now he is dead and our hopes are dead with him and Jesus said is that so and he told them a long story beginning with Moses and the prophets how that the Christ should come and should suffer and then enter into his glory but still they did not understand when they came to their home they said it is late in the evening come and stay with us but he made as if he would go further then they said at least come in and have something to eat with us and he did and he took the simple bread that they put before him broke it and blessed it as was his custom and they knew him he did not stay and they did not stay that story has been retold and relived through the centuries in the forty days following his resurrection Jesus appeared many times in many places not only to his closest disciples but also to over 500 of them at one time the last time was here on the Mount of Olives the site of his ascension after blessing them Jesus was taken up into heaven two men dressed in white suddenly stood beside the disciples men of Galilee they said why do you stand here looking up at the sky this Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come back in the same way that you saw him go into heaven [Music] this is Jesus world where he was born and raised where he lived and moved where he died and rose again from the dead these are the kingdoms of that world along with kingdoms yet to be known in Africa the Orient North and South America Australia and the Isles of the sea those who came after would carry his message to the ends of the earth knowing the awesome task he had given them he left them with a promise remember I will be with you always to the end of the age peace alone I leave with you my peace alone I give the last word comes directly from him Shalom [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

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Published: Mon Nov 16 2020