Lake Galilee

“ The whole race of men there are idealists. There was not a better place than this Galilee in all the world for Christ to be born in. This is the spot of all the world for a new religion. These Galilean peasants are not reasoners, they are simply believers. They are the children of faith. Sad enough it is that the centuries of time, and the hands of war, changed all the beautiful scene. Even the climate lost its loveliness—there is almost nothing left that is lovely in dear Galilee any more save its enchanting lake. ”

“ Nazareth was a little town high among the hills of Galilee. It still stands there, but it is not so large a town as it was when Mary and Joseph and the Child Jesus lived there. Then Galilee was full of cities and villages, and men and women were busy among its fields, and vineyards, and gardens, and the shores of the beautiful Lake of Galilee were lined with the boats of fishermen.
Nazareth was more quiet than the crowded cities by the Lake. A great green plain lay below it, and a narrow road winding among the limestone rocks led up to it. ”

“ There is the Lake of Galilee as you see it from Gadara, with the hills of Naphtali above it, and Hermon filling all the north. There, is the pro [Pg 422] spective of the Jordan Valley as you look up from over Jericho, between the bare ranges of Gilead and Ephraim, with the winding ribbon of the river's jungle, and the top of Hermon like a white cloud in the infinite distance. There is the forest of Gilead, where you ride, two thousand feet high, under the boughs of great trees creaking and rustling in the wind, with all Western Palestine before you. ”

“ The aqueduct which thus forms our singular roadway is about three feet wide; emerging from it, after we turn the angle of the rock, we find ourselves overlooking a little bay, into which rushes a brawling torrent, the largest which enters the lake excepting the Jordan, and which here turns a mill. It is, however, only a few yards long, as it bursts from the ground in great force, in what is by far the most powerful spring in Galilee, and is, without doubt, the celebrated Fountain of Capernaum mentioned by Josephus as watering the plain of Genesareth. ”

“ From that time he becomes a teacher of men. On the peaceful hills, and in the quiet hamlets of Galilee, or along the pleasant shores of the lake of that name, men heard his gracious words, and admired while they marveled at the wisdom of one untaught in schools and unlearned in man's petty wisdom. The synagogues of the Jews also resounded with his doctrines, and the tones of his voice so mild among the pastoral people of Galilee, swelled into mighty notes of denunciation, when he approached the centers of population where wickedness more abounded. ”

“ Galilæa, in 33° north latitude, bounded on the south by Samaria, on the west by the Mediterranean, on the north by Syria, on the east by the river Jordan and the lake Gennesareth, comprehended the possessions of Asher, Naphtali, and Zabulon, with part of the allotment of Issachar. The northern division of the province was thinly inhabited by Jews, and was sometimes called Galilee of the Gentiles ”

“ After the ascension, all the apostles seem to have removed their families and business from Galilee, and to have made Jerusalem their permanent abode. From this time no more mention is made of any part of Galilee as the home of Peter or his friends; and even the lake, with its cities, so long hallowed by the presence and the deeds of the son of man, was thenceforth entirely left to the low and vulgar pursuits which the dwellers of that region had formerly followed upon it, without disturbance from the preaching and the miracles of the Nazarene. ”

“ And the Pasch of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem."
The miracle just performed naturally bound His own kinsfolk to the Master. Accompanied by these " His brethren," and by His disciples, He takes His Mother with Him to Caphamaum, then the most important city of Galilee, and the centre of a thriving commerce, favorably situated on the Lake of Gennesareth. This city was to be the chief centre of our Lord's public labors in Galilee during the three ensuing years. ”

“ From KAUFMANN KOHLER Ph.D., Rabbi of Temple Beth-El, New York:
The true history of Jesus is so wrapped up in myth, the story of his life told in the gospels so replete with contradictions, that it is rather difficult for the unbiased reader to arrive at the true historical facts. Still the beautiful tales about the things that happened around the lake of Galilee show that there was a spiritual daybreak in that dark corner of Judea of which official Judaism had failed to take sufficient cognizance. “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone” of a new world. ”

“ Once, as He passed along the shores of the lake of Galilee, He had seen two fishermen casting their net into the sea, and had "said to them, Come after Me, and I will make you fishers of men, and immediately leaving their nets, they followed Him." ”

“ Let us consider what we may learn from the verses of Scripture which stand at the head of this message. You there see Jesus crossing the lake of Galilee, in a boat with His disciples. You see a sudden storm arise while He is asleep. The waves beat into the boat and fill it. Death seems to be close at hand. The frightened disciples awake their Master and cry for help. He arises and rebukes the wind and the waves, and at once there is a calm. ”

“ It rises 200 ft. above the sea, the hills on both sides being some 1500 ft. higher. The whole drainage is collected by the Kishon, which runs through a narrow gorge at the north-west corner of the plain, descending beside the ridge of Carmel to the sea. The broad valley of Jezreel on the east, descending towards the Jordan valley, forms the gate by which Palestine is entered from beyond Jordan. Mount Tabor stands isolated in the plain at the north-east corner, and rather farther south the conical hill called Nebi Duḥi rises between Tabor and Gilboa. The whole of Lower Galilee is well watered. ”

“ Moreover, the cities lie here very thick, and the very many villages there are here are every where so full of people, by the richness of their soil, that the very least of them contain above fifteen thousand inhabitants. In short, if any one will suppose that Galilee is inferior to Perea in magnitude, he will be obliged to prefer it before it in its strength ”

“ Across the valley to the south is the Hill of Moreh and the Samaritan hills beyond. (9) Two perennial brooks, the Wady Fejjas and the Wady el-Bireh, [31] flow down through southeastern Galilee into the Jordan. The result is that lower Galilee is made up of a series of irregular hills (of which the Nazareth group, a little south of the centre, is the chief) separated by a network of broad, rich, intersecting plains. It combines the vistas and large horizons of the north with the fruitfulness of the plains. Here many different types of civilization meet and mingle. ”

“ And here are oak-trees, broad-limbed and friendly, clothed in glistening green. Let us rest for a while in this cool shade and forget the misery of the blazing noon. Below us lies the gray Jordan valley and the steel-blue mirror of the Dead Sea; and across that gulf we see the furrowed mountains of Judea and Samaria, and far to the north the peaks of Galilee. Around us is the Land of Gilead, a rolling hill-country, with long ridges and broad summits, a rounded land, a verdurous land, a land of rich pasturage. ”

“ Only in memory will I walk along the orchard creek and hunt for crayfish, think and stare as a boy thinks and stares. I had several pals... We had niches in cliffs where we often hid. We had an old fig we liked to climb; there was a cave where we lit fires. We found menhirs and dolmen—strange, strange things! In Galilee we had a stout little boat and we’d drift, drop anchor, fish for chromis and watch the pelicans.
There’s a feeling to my Nazareth: the stars are brighter there, the sun seems a little bigger, the wind a little cooler. ”

“ Now the people and the land of Peræa are not like unto the people and the land of Galilee. For in Galilee the fields are small, and they till corn and vines and olives; and the men are exceeding stubborn and resolute, neither very rich, nor very poor. But in Peræa they have great pastures, and some are rich in flocks and herds, while others have scarce bread to eat; moreover the men are of an unstable disposition, fond also of wealth, and given to ease, and not so steadfast as the men of Galilee. ”

“ The ridge of mountains lying between the coast plain and the Jordan valley form the backbone of the country. Here, more than elsewhere, the Israelites made their homes, on account of the hostility of the inhabitants in the lowlands. This ridge is a continuation of the Lebanon range, and extends as far south as the desert. In Upper Galilee the mountains reach an average height of two thousand eight hundred feet above sea level, but in Lower Galilee they are a thousand feet lower. In Samaria and Judaea they reach an altitude of two or three thousand feet. ”

“ Century after century they have continued the repairs, sometimes making mistakes, but never asking the question, fatal to all good work, "Is it worth while?" There it stands, surveying its vast plain for thirty miles around, with its air of unbroken security.
Jutting out from the tower, westward, is the so-called Galilee Porch. It is conjectured that it was so named because, as Galilee was the district of the Holy Land furthest from Jerusalem, so this western porch was the part of the sacred building farthest from the High Altar. ”

“ And now there went a great fame abroad among the neighboring people of the courage of the Hebrews; and those that heard what a number of men were destroyed, were greatly affrighted at it: so the kings that lived about Mount Libanus, who were Canaanites, and those Canaanites that dwelt in the plain country, with auxiliaries out of the land of the Philistines, pitched their camp at Beroth, a city of the Upper Galilee, not far from Cadesh, which is itself also a place in Galilee. ”

“ The upper part of Galilee is everywhere mountains and valleys, with villages perched on the mountain tops or clinging to their sides, and sometimes nestled in the valleys. Just where the plain ends and the mountains begin, we find a long range of steep hills. If we climb to the top of this range, on one side we see the plain stretched out, and far in the distance the Mediterranean Sea; and on the other, or northern slope of the hills, we come to the city of Nazareth. There the mother of Jesus lived as a young girl before her son was born, and there Jesus lived during most of his life. ”

“ A beautiful external nature tended to produce a much less austere spirit—a spirit less sharply monotheistic, if I may use the expression, which imprinted a charming and idyllic character on all the dreams of Galilee. The saddest country in the world is perhaps the region round about Jerusalem. Galilee, on the contrary, was a very green, shady, smiling district, the true home of the Song of Songs, and the songs of the well-beloved. ”

“ The beautiful climate of Galilee made the life of these honest fishermen a perpetual delight. They truly preluded the kingdom of God -- simple, good, and happy -- rocked gently on their delightful little sea, or at night sleeping on its shores. We do not realize to ourselves the intoxication of a life which thus glides away in the face of heaven -- the sweet yet strong love which this perpetual contact with nature gives, and the dreams of these nights passed in the brightness of the stars, under in azure dome of infinite expanse. ”

“ Now Phoenicia and Syria encompass about the Galilees, which are two, and called the Upper Galilee and the Lower. They are bounded toward the sun-setting, with the borders of the territory belonging to Ptolemais, and by Carmel; which mountain had formerly belonged to the Galileans, but now belonged to the Tyrians; to which mountain adjoins Gaba, which is called the City of Horsemen, because those horsemen that were dismissed by Herod the king dwelt therein; they are bounded on the south with Samaria and Scythopolis, as far as the river Jordan ”

“ Perhaps He is going back and forth between Galilee and the solitude of the wilderness. This so-called "wilderness" is nothing more than the secret hills beyond the Jordan, or the mysterious edge of the near-by desert coming up to them like a speechless sea. At this moment He is again in Nazareth, and the wondering villagers again see Him at His daily toil. He is still learning by rote the striking maxims and proverbs of the Jewish masters. ”

“ Pushing rapidly across the open valley we startle gazelles from their hiding-places among the reeds. Then, near the river, we pass several encampments of Bedouins whose tents are black as those of Kedar. At last, after being in the saddle all of ten hours, just at sun-set, we reach the Jordan at the bridge of Jisr el Mejamia, six miles south of the Sea of Galilee. ”

“ There is occasionally found in a cathedral, or other large church, a porch of unusual depth, known as a Galilee. Here, during Lent, those assembled who were bidden to do public penance; the coming of Maundy Thursday being the signal for their admission once more into the church itself. Ely has a western Galilee entered by an arch, divided by a central pillar, and filled in the upper part with tracery. Lincoln has a Galilee, deep and dignified in plan, with a vaulted roof. ”