Nazareth Village - June 15 - Part 2

 Today Nazareth is the largest Arab city in Galilee--about 800,000 people.  In Jesus day there were about 400 people.

 Nazareth Village "replicates a working farm as it would have existed in first-century Nazareth" "it has been faithfully restored using materials and building methods that would have been available in Jesus' time"(from the Nazareth Village brochure).  

 400 year old olive tree

 Replica tomb

 Inside the tomb

 "The archeological findings of cultivated terraces, a watchtower and the wine press hewn into the limestone bedrock, preserved virtually intact, provide a direct connection to the past and to Jesus' life in Nazareth."(from the Nazareth Village brochure)

Olive press

The dressed characters didn't do much talking.  But after our tour guide gave his talk in the carpenter's shop someone from our group recognized "Joseph" from the plane.  He started talking...he just came from Texas! :-)

The only full-sized replica of a first century synagogue in the world.

These high windows make the synagogue feel like it's air-conditioned.

"14 Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside. 15 He was teaching in their synagogues, and everyone praised him.

16 He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
19     to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”[f]

20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him.21 He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

22 All spoke well of him and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his lips. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?” they asked.

23 Jesus said to them, “Surely you will quote this proverb to me: ‘Physician, heal yourself!’ And you will tell me, ‘Do here in your hometown what we have heard that you did in Capernaum.’”

24 “Truly I tell you,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown. 25 I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. 26 Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. 27 And there were many in Israel with leprosy[g] in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.”

28 All the people in the synagogue were furious when they heard this.29 They got up, drove him out of the town, and took him to the brow of the hill on which the town was built, in order to throw him off the cliff.30 But he walked right through the crowd and went on his way."  Luke 4