Day 12: Nonsense on Nebo

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The Road Scholars had to rise early, but Mike and Bone woke up fine with it knowing this was their last day of Jordanian Breakfast Buffets!

Once on the road, Kamal knew his time with the Road Scholars was short so on the way to Mount Nebo, he stopped the Bus to give the group an extra perk in the morning. On the way to Mount Nebo, he had the Bus Driver pull over to check out a Crusader Castle?!

 

The Road Scholar Crusaders!

For a quick history lesson, Western Europeans, primarily the Franks (predecessor to the modern day French) listened to Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont in 1095 for a “Crusade” to drive the “vile heathens” out of the Holy land that was once Roman. The supposed goal was to assists the Byzantine (Roman) Empire against the invasions of the "Turks and Arabs" and "to destroy this vile race from the lands of our friends." However, the main objective quickly became the control of the Holy Land by the French Catholics, not the Roman Orthodox!

 

The Crusaders Hangout, Shobak Castle!

The crusaders arrived at Jerusalem in June 1099; a few of the neighboring towns (Ramla, Lydda, Bethlehem, and others) were taken first, and Jerusalem itself was captured on July 15. On 22 July, a council was held in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (Skeplicar!) to establish a king for the newly created Kingdom of Jerusalem. Raymond IV of Toulouse and Godfrey of Bouillon were recognized as the leaders of the crusade and the siege of Jerusalem, but Godfrey was crowned king.

By 1115, under the rule of King Baldwin, the Crusader King built Shobak Castle  since it was positioned along key trading routes and designed to control this key strategic location.

 

The castle was strategically important due to the fact that it also dominated the main passage from Egypt to Syria. This allowed who ever to hold the castle to tax not only traders, both those who were on pilgrimages to Mecca and Medina.

One of the major disadvantages of the site was an issue that the Crusaders encountered all over the Middle East, that issue is the lack of a reliable source of water. This problem was solved by the construction of a tunnel down the hill to two spring-fed cisterns. The tunnel allowed for defenders to go and retrieve water without exposing themselves to any attackers

It was from this location that many Crusader raids on caravan convoys were launched, leading to significant tensions in the area and eventual war. Saladin’s forces lay siege to the castle for several months before the fortress eventually fell in 1189.

After Kamal regaled Mike, Bone, and the Road Scholars in this early morning hour, they continued onto Mount Nebo.

 

The Dry, Desolate Jordanian Desert

It was a bit of a drive made easier by air-conditioned coach for several hours from Petra towards Mount Nebo, which was towards Amman. The Road Scholars had their last chance to check out the extremely dry and desolate desert that made up 80% of Jordan. Eventually, they came to a supposed religious site.

 

Holy Moses! Mount Nebo Nonsense!

Jordan is riddled with biblical sites particularly around the Moses Story, you know Charleston Heston! For example Moses brother Aaron was supposedly buried near Petra. While the Road Scholar tour did not stop for it, it is a popular Jewish, Christian, and mole site. So to is Mount Nebo. First, Mount Nebo isn’t really a mountain, it is just  an elevated ridge located in Jordan, approximately 2,330 feet above sea level. Mount Nebo is mentioned in the Bible as the place where Moses was granted a view of the Promised Land before his death.  Apparently Moses lost his cool with the Israelis during their 40 years wandering around. As the story goes they became very thirsty and so, cried out to God. God responded by instructing Moses to take his rod in his hand, but to simply “speak to the rock that is before their (Israel’s) eyes.”

However, upset with Israel’s constant whining and complaining against God, Moses instead struck the rock with his rod, and cried out, “Listen now, you rebels; shall we bring forth water for you out of this rock?” So, Moses disobeyed God—and even took credit to himself for bringing forth water…which is to say, he failed to treat God as holy.

Therefore, God said to Moses at that time, “Because you have not believed Me, to treat me as holy in the sight of the sons of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.”  A pretty petty reason after leading a bunch of  whiners for 40 years!!!

As he approached his death per the old book, Moses ascended Mount Nebo, in today's in Jordan, and from there he supposedly saw the Land of Canaan (the Promised Land), then died. A monument atop Mount Nebo commemorates Moses' death after seeing Canaan, across the Jordan valley since they really do not know if he existed and where he would have been buried. A purported grave of Moses is located at Maqam El-Nabi Musa, in the West Bank 6.8 miles south of Jericho and 12 miles east of Jerusalem.

Kamal showed Mike and Bone with the rest of the Road Scholars that the view from the summit does provides a panorama of the West Bank across the Jordan River valley. The city of Jericho is usually visible from the summit, as is Jerusalem on a very clear day, unfortunately, this was not a clear day.  

They then toured a Christian church from Byzantine (Christian Roman) times stands on the top of Mount Nebo. While the church is old, it has not been in perpetual use. The remains of the Byzantine church and a monastery were discovered in 1933. The church was first constructed in the second half of the 4th century to commemorate the place of Moses' death. The church design follows a typical basilica pattern. It was enlarged in the late fifth century AD and rebuilt in AD 597. The church is first mentioned in an account of a pilgrimage made by a lady Aetheria in AD 394. Six tombs have been found hollowed from the natural rock beneath the mosaic-covered floor of the church. Bellarmino Bagatti worked on the site in 1935. Virgilio Canio Corbo later excavated the interior of the basilica. It has been worked on sporadically during the 30s to the 80s, when 1984 (the magic of our Deeetroit Tigers!) it was fully re-opened.  

 

Holy Moses! Mount Nebo Nonsense!

As he approached his death per the old book, Moses ascended Mount Nebo, in today's in Jordan, and from there he supposedly saw the Land of Canaan (the Promised Land), then died. A monument atop Mount Nebo commemorates Moses' death after seeing Canaan, across the Jordan valley since they really do not know if he existed and where he would have been buried. A purported grave of Moses is located at Maqam El-Nabi Musa, in the West Bank 6.8 miles south of Jericho and 12 miles east of Jerusalem.

Kamal showed Mike and Bone with the rest of the Road Scholars that the view from the summit does provides a panorama of the West Bank across the Jordan River valley. The city of Jericho is usually visible from the summit, as is Jerusalem on a very clear day, unfortunately, this was not a clear day.  

They then toured a Christian church from Byzantine (Christian Roman) times stands on the top of Mount Nebo. While the church is old, it has not been in perpetual use. The remains of the Byzantine church and a monastery were discovered in 1933. The church was first constructed in the second half of the 4th century to commemorate the place of Moses' death. The church design follows a typical basilica pattern. It was enlarged in the late fifth century AD and rebuilt in AD 597. The church is first mentioned in an account of a pilgrimage made by a lady Aetheria in 394 AD. Six tombs have been found hollowed from the natural rock beneath the mosaic-covered floor of the church. Bellarmino Bagatti worked on the site in 1935. Virgilio Canio Corbo later excavated the interior of the basilica. It has been worked on sporadically during the 30s to the 80s, when 1984 (the magic of our Deeetroit Tigers!) it was fully re-opened.

Completely uninspired, Mike and Bone bought none of the nonsense, and waited for everyone else to get back on the Bus for the last site in Jordan, St Georges. 

 

Mapping out Ancient Palestine @ St Georges Church

 Madaba is an ancient city which has been inhabited for nearly 3500 years and contains the most impressive surviving work of art of the mid-6th century: a mosaic map of Palestine, located within St. George’s Church. Built in 560 AD, the map has 157 captions (in Greek) depicting all the major biblical sites of the Middle East, from Egypt to Palestine. It was originally around 150 feet long and 20 fee  wide, and once contained more than two million pieces. Although much of the mosaic has been lost, enough remains to sense the complexity of the whole. The visit to St Georges was a dull landing after a day in Petra, but was the last site in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Kamal took the Road Scholars to the beautiful Amman Airport, and passed the Team off to a Road Scholar leader that helped everyone through customs and gave everyone a airline ticket.  Bone thank Kamal with "Thanks for the Minoras"! opps "Memories!"

With that the team flew the 3 hours into Cairo and met their new leader Safwat Gabr, a great guy that got everyone on a new bus and took the whole team down to a hotel, right next to..........................

 

A Hotel View of the Pyramids!!

Per all hotels in Jordan and now Egypt the Boys needed to go through Airport style security scanners, when Bone opened the curtains in the Hotel, there it was the Pyramids! Mike and Bone chattered about how cool the next day was gonna be and drifted of to sleep with visions of three dimensional triangles in their heads!