We're quite sorry about the dry spot in blogging lately. It turns out that it's really hard to find internet access in the middle of the forest. Fortunately I have a few hours here in Jerusalem for Pesach to get the ball rolling again.
Day 8 consisted of three mountains in a row: Tabor, Yehuda, and Yonah. The good/bad thing about the Israel Trail is that often there are extensive detours off of main paths/roads that show you beautiful sights of interest. Har Tabor could've been a nice short switchbacked climb up for around two hours. Instead, they took us literally straight up and down the mountain in an hour and fifteen minutes. I was really really hurting by the end of this climb, which was made worse by the fact that it was right at the beginning of the day.
The good news was it was absolutely stunning once we finished.
The mountain is mentioned for the first time in the Bible, in Joshua 19:22, as border of three tribes: Zebulun, Issachar and Naphtali. The mountain's importance stems from its strategic control of the junction of the Galilee's north-south route with the east-west highway of the Jezreel Valley. Deborah the prophetess summoned Barak of the tribe of Naphtali. "Go and to mountain of Tabor and take with you ten thousand men of the Naphtali and Zebulun tribes". From the peaks of the mountain, the Israelites attacked and vanquished Sisera and the Canaanites.
In the days of Second Temple, Mount Tabor was one of the mountain peaks on which it was the customed to light beacons in order to inform the northern villages of holidays and of beginnings of new months. In 66 AD during the First Jewish-Roman War, the Galilean Jews retrenched on the mountain under the command of Josephus Flavius, whence they defended against the Roman assault.
According to Christian tradition, Mount Tabor is the site of the Transfiguration of Christ, during which Jesus began to radiate light and was seen conversing with Moses and Elijah. The scene is in the Synoptic Gospels, as well as alluded to in 2 Peter, but neither account identifies the "high mountain" of the scene by name. The earliest identification of the Mount of Transfiguration as Tabor is by Origen in the 3rd century. It is also mentioned by St. Cyril of Jerusalem and St. Jerome in the 4th century.[1] It is later mentioned in the in the 5th century Transitus Beatae Mariae Virginis.
In 1101, when Crusaders controlled the area, the Benedictine monks rebuilt a ruined basilica and erected a fortified abbey.[2]
Currently, on the mountaintop there are two Christian monasteries. In 1924, an impressive Roman Catholic church of the Franciscan order was built on the peak of Mount Tabor, Church of the Transfiguration. The church was built upon the ruins of a Byzantine church from the fifth or sixth century and a Crusader church from the 12th century. The monastery's friars have lived near the church since the Ottoman control in 1873.
We ended up sleeping just outside of the modern city of Tzippori, at the grave of Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi, who redacted and compiled the Mishna over 1500 years ago.
-Jeremy
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