#Hidden colors 3 black jesus series

The stone is already seen as one of the most important discoveries in biblical archaeology in decades. Carved onto its faces were a seven-branched menorah, a chariot of fire and a hoard of symbols associated with the most hallowed precincts of the Jerusalem temple. In the center of the sanctuary, the archaeologists unearthed a mysterious stone block, the size of a toy chest, unlike anything anyone had seen before. It had a mosaic floor frescoes in pleasing geometries of red, yellow and blue separate chambers for public Torah readings, private study and storage of the scrolls a bowl outside for the ritual washing of hands. Though big enough for just 200 people, it was, for its time and place, opulent. This story is a selection from the January-February issue of Smithsonian magazine BuyД«ut as Avshalom-Gorni stood at the edge of the pit, studying the arrangement of benches along the walls, she could no longer deny it: TheyвЂ™d found a synagogue from the time of Jesus, in the hometown of Mary Magdalene. Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine now for just $12 Some scholars argued that the вЂњsynagoguesвЂќ in the New Testament were nothing more than anachronisms slipped in by the GospelsвЂ™ authors, who were writing outside Galilee decades after JesusвЂ™s death. If there were any in Galilee in JesusвЂ™s day, they were perhaps just ordinary houses that doubled as meeting places for local Jews. Synagogues, as we understand them today, did not appear anywhere in great numbers until several hundred years later. Galileans, mostly poor peasants and fishermen, had neither the need nor the funds for some local spinoff. Galilean Jews were a weekвЂ™s walk from Jerusalem, close enough for regular pilgrimages to Herod the GreatвЂ™s magnificent temple, JudaismвЂ™s central house of worship. The Gospels say that Jesus taught and вЂњproclaimed the good newsвЂќ in synagogues вЂњthroughout all Galilee.вЂќ But despite decades of digging in the towns Jesus visited, no early first-century synagogue had ever been found.ДЇor historians, this was not a serious problem.

#Hidden colors 3 black jesus series

Soon, a series of rough-cut stone benches emerged around what looked like a sanctuary. The workers squatted in the mealy soil and dusted carefully with brushes. It was there, beneath a wing of the proposed guesthouse, that their picks clinked against the top of a buried wall.Дina Avshalom-Gorni, an IAA official who oversaw digs in northern Israel, ordered all hands to this square of the excavation grid. TheyвЂ™d say shalom, they assured the priest, as soon as they checked a final, remote corner of his land. Summer temperatures had ticked into the 100s, and the site prickled with bees and mosquitoes. In truth, the archaeologists didnвЂ™t want to be there either. вЂњAlmost done?вЂќ heвЂ™d ask, emerging in his clerical robes from a shipping container that served as a makeshift office. The IAA archaeologists had mucked around on SolanaвЂ™s 20 acres for a month and found little. All that remained now was an irksome bit of red tape: a вЂњsalvage excavation,вЂќ a routine dig by the Israeli government to ensure that no important ruins lay beneath the proposed building site. Just three months earlier, Pope Benedict XVI had personally blessed the cornerstone. HeвЂ™d gotten building permits for a chapel and a guesthouse with more than 100 rooms. By that summer of 2009, heвЂ™d already raised $20 million for his retreat, which he was calling the вЂњMagdala Center.вЂќ HeвЂ™d bought four adjoining parcels of waterfront land. Solana is an urbane, silver-haired priest with the Legionaries of Christ, a Catholic order founded in Mexico. Across the modern two-lane highway was a small town Israelis still call Migdal, because it was the presumed site of Magdala, the ancient fishing city that was home to Mary Magdalene, one of JesusвЂ™s most loyal followers. Just up the road was the вЂњevangelical triangleвЂќ of Capernaum, Chorazin and Bethsaida, the villages where, according to the Gospels, Jesus mesmerized crowds with his miraculous acts and teachings.

When Jesus returned to his boyhood hometown to preach, the Gospels say he was rejected by a mob.ДЄs he paced the dusty shoreline of the Sea of Galilee,В Father Juan Solana had a less-than-charitable thought about the archaeologists from the Israel Antiquities Authority: He wanted them to go away.Д®verything else had fallen into place for the Christian retreat he planned to build here. Overlooking the Sea of Galilee, Bethsaida was a dayвЂ™s walk from Nazareth.