The Armchair Archaeologist

The shade structures have all been  taken down, disassembled, and hualed up to the breakfast building to be put away for another year.  The same for the tools--wheelbarrows, turreahs, axes, and buckets.  The NEC has been swept and brushed, removing any loose sand, dust, or rocks.  The mosaic floor has been re-covered, awaiting further conservation efforts.  The 2007 team has undoubtedly had a final tour of the entire Hippos site, including the areas in which the Haifa team and the Polish teams worked.  Cameras were carried up to the dig by all, and a final group photograph was taken.  Memories....

Off in the distance, to the east, one can see the hills of the Golan Heights.  To north, lie Kursi and Bathsaida.  And to the west, directly across the lake, is Tiberias, our own "city of lights."  And the lake...the Sea of Galilee...what wonders happened there.

Undoubtedly, on the last morning of the dig, each of the team members stood looking out at the horizon, turning slowly 360-degrees, trying to commit to memory this view, this landscape, these images.  Wondering where the previous four weeks has gone--how the weeks could have slipped by so quickly, even as the days, especially the hot, sweaty, exhausting mornings dragged by.  Trying to absorb "it all."  Wondering if they will be able to adequately describe their experiences to the many people to whom each will be returning.  Wondering if they'll ever hear of Israel, and the Byzantenes, and archaeology, and think of them in the same way in which they did a month ago. Wondering if they'll ever hear the old familiar Bible stories in exactly the same way. Wondering if they'll ever be the same again.  They won't.  I'm not.   

See ya next year!

Wayne, NE   Rhoda called me last evening to let me know that at nearly that particular moment, 8 hours ahead of our time zone, the reburial of the remains was taking place at Hippos.  For the rest of the evening, although phsically I was sitting here in my home entertaining some family friends, mentally I was transported to our little Northeast Church, joining with the Concordia team in praising God for the life and faith of those ancient individuals.  Once again, I was deeply moved by the faith and fellowship that links us all...to each other over the miles and through the centuries, and to our Lord of all creation.  It was a very humbling experience.  As I watched Andrea's clips of the reburial on her blog today, I felt as if I were there also.  To God be the glory!

As I write this on Tuesday evening, it’s Wednesday morning in Israel, and the group is heading up the hill. It’s the first time all month that I REALLY AND TRULY wish I were digging with the group at Hippos this year. Unlike Nancy, who’s pinning away in Nebraska, and Linda, Arny, Jim, Glenn, Marc, Andrea, and Kristina (all repeat volunteers), I did not catch the archaeology bug during my first experience. I thoroughly enjoyed it, but the truth is, I probably have more thoroughly enjoyed my last three weeks state-side than I would have digging in Israel. I’ve been to NYC with a friend, had meals with good friends each week I’ve been home alone, and later this week will travel to Valparaiso for the Regular Annual Meeting of the Lutheran Deaconess Conference. While there, I’ll celebrate the 30th anniversary of my consecration as a deaconess.

But RIGHT NOW I wish I were in Israel, for at sunrise on Wednesday morning Israeli time, the Hippos group will celebrate a brief ritual as they rebury the remains of “the holy twelve,” as Mark has dubbed the remains dug up during the last 2 seasons from the burial chamber in the chancel. The anthropologist’s report is complete, and she determined that at least 12 people had been buried there (3 in the stone sarcophagus and 9 underneath it, predating the burial of the sarcophagus in the chamber). Last weekend I pirated materials from funeral rites on the Greek Orthodox Church in America web site and compiled a reburial service. Section of text were rearranged and reworded to fit the situation, but at its core the brief rite has as its origin Greek Orthodox funeral rituals, which is only appropriate for the reburial of Byzantine Christians.

This hymn says far more poetically why I wish I were at Hippos today:

Rejoice in those saints, unpraised and unknown,
who bear someone’s cross, or shoulder their own;
they share our complaining, our comforts, our cares:
what patience in caring, what courage is theirs!

Rejoice in God’s saints today and all days!
A world without saints forgets how to praise.
In loving, in living, they prove it is true:
their way of self-giving, Lord, leads us to you.

Wayne, NE    Here's a news flash:  Being an "Armchair Archaeologist" is hard!!  No, I'm not covered with dirt and sweat, and no, I don't get up every morning at 4:00 am (it's 5:45 for me), and no, I don't even do any pottery cleaning, just the supper dishes are challenging enough for me.  What is hard is trying to make insightful comments about what the group of "real" archaeologists are doing.  The participants who are blogging from the kibbutz are doing an extraordinary job of describing what is going on up at the dig, or at the kibbutz, or even on their weekend tours, that my meager attempts to add something meaningful kind of fall flat.  Sorry, Dr. Schuler. 

There is one thing that I'd like to emphasize, even though it's already been touched upon by Andrea in her latest blog, and that is the connection that I, sitting here at my home computer in Wayne Nebraska share with those over at the kibbutz, and also with those volunteers who've already returned to their homes, even though I never even met some of them.  That connection is the one we share also with those ancients who built the church that we humbly call "our little Northeast Church" and who worshiped there, and even those revered souls who have their final resting place within the walls of our little church: the bond we all share by our belief in the Lord Jesus.  Distance, circumstance, and even time are all transcended by the faith we share in the true God.  Through that faith, we are all connected to each other--ancient ones to current diggers, current diggers to those who've gone back home, those who've gone back home to those who weren't even a part of the dig this year in any way but the most peripheral--we are all one in the Lord.  THAT, my friends, is the most incredible of all connections.

In her blog Andrea joked about the Jerusalem trip as “running where Jesus walked.” Although an apt description of much touring by Christian pilgrims, there’s no question that a visit to Israel/Palestine permanently alters the way one hears the Scriptures. After riding DOWN the road from Jerusalem to Jericho (a drop of 3500 feet in less than 25 miles), I can’t help but picture that “down-ness” when I hear the start of parable of the Good Samaritan: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho . . .” This morning in church during the reading of the Gospel I heard some other familiar words with fresh ears:

“After this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go. . . . The seventy returned with joy, saying, ‘Lord, in your name even the demons submit to us!’ He said to them, ‘I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning. See, I have given you authority to tread on snakes and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy . . .’” Luke 10:1, 17–19

Last summer for the first time in my life I saw a scorpion up close. It was a scary sight—bigger than I imagined and a bold creature that posed for the camera. It was frightening enough to see it up close while wearing boots and long pants. I would have felt much more vulnerable had I been in a long skirt and sandals, standard dress in first-century Palestine, where everyone was familiar with these stinging creatures. I imagine first-century mothers always worried that their curious young children playing outside might encounter one under a rock. How meaningful Jesus’ words would have been to his first-century audience: He proclaims to them that the power of the kingdom of God is greater than that of the demons who possessed people’s minds, greater than the fear people had of these fierce-looking creatures encountered daily that could cause pain to the body. In three years, when this Gospel reading appears again in the lectionary, I’ll still have this vivid picture in my mind’s eye:

Photo by Glenn Borchers, 2006

Wayne, NE   I've been thinking about the dig and the volunteers for the past three days.  Remembering the jet-lag.  Remembering the new sights, sounds, smells, activities.  Remembering the heat and humidity!  But most of all remembering the excitement of the "what is to come." 

I laughed (and shuddered) when I read Kristina's blog about the beetle crawling up her pant leg.  It reminded me of a similar experience in 2005--ask Andrea about the cockroach episode!  Kristina, just wear your knee-pads; not only will they keep the critters out of your pants, they'll also keep your tender knees from becoming yucky scaley old things!

I was interested to read in another one of the blogs that all of the work in the squares was outside the actual walls of the Northeast Church.  (For those who don't know, the excavation site is divided into squares by the superimposition of a "grid" on the area; one axis of the grid is labeled with letters, the other with numbers.  The name of the square denotes it's location:  E-8 or whatever.)  I'll be very interested to see what is discovered under the areas that in the previous years were just the ground over which we walked and on which we piled rocks and buckets of dirt.  Who knows what we were covering up!

Breaking open a square is probably the most tedious and labor-intensive of jobs.  As noted in another blog, there are many, MANY large rocks to move, each one of which must be carefully cleaned around to determine if it's anything of importance--Dr. Schuler's call.  Removing the top level of the soil is pretty slow going. Until my first day on the dig, I thought that archaeological excavations  were accomplished mainly with dental picks and toothbrushes and other such small instruments.  Not so.  Pick-axes and turreahs (I hope I spelled that correctly) are used to loosen the soil, and then buckets filled with the loose soil, and then dumped.  Repeat umpteen times.  Stop for a water break.  Fill and dump again.  You get the picture.  This is hard work.

Kudos to all of the volunteers for making it through the first few days.  Keep the information coming!

Yesterday afternoon I saw the “Group of Nine” off at the Minneapolis/St. Paul airport. I was joined by parents, children, and siblings of the nine Hippos diggers flying out of the Twin Cities. The Nine successfully met up with five others in Atlanta last night—only to have their departure to Tel Aviv delayed by nearly two hours! But they are airborne as I write, with an estimated arrival time of 7:11 pm Israel time (not the scheduled 5:25 pm). I do not envy their travel saga! It will be well after dark by the time they arrive at Kibbutz En Gev, and a very short night before they head off at 8:30 am on Saturday on the trip around the Sea of Galilee. Sunday will be their first workday. A jet-lagged group will gather in the kibbutz parking lot for the 4:45 am bus ride most of the way up to the site. They’ll have to hike up the rest of the mountain in the early morning light and start by pulling weeds. Watch out for those scorpions!

Hmmmm. I'm getting e-mails from veteran volunteers who say the food is fine. Here's evidence. Let everyone make her or his own judgment!

Wayne, NE     OK, this is my first ever blog!  Being, as Rhoda so kindly puts it, "mature" (aka over 40), I've not had the need or opportunity thusfar in my life to do any blogging.  When Dr. Schuler asked if I'd join Rhoda and blog as an "Armchair Archaeologist" my first thought was "How do I tell this very smart man that I don't know how to blog???"  Not to worry, Dr. Schuler is used to explaining--patiently--new concepts to people of all ages.  So here I am, and here goes!

Having participated in the dig the previous two summers, I'm feeling a little (alright, more than a little) sad at missing this year's dig.  But I'll have plenty here at home to keep me busy, and being able to participate as a state-side blogger is still pretty exciting.  I remember well the feelings voiced by some of the new participants--being excited, nervous, a little scared, but most of all, being unable to believe that I was about to be included in what up until that point had just been a dream of mine.  How fortunate I felt at being included in such an experience!  Back in 2005, when I was preparing to go on the dig for my first time, people wondered how I could consider going halfway around the world and do extremely difficult physical labor in an area of the world in which the political situation was dicey at best, with people I'd never even met.  Well, I looked at it this way:  The people I would be working with would all share at least one intrest with me--archaeology--and I am a product of the Lutheran college system, as were many of the others, and above all, we all had in common our faith in the Lord who would be with us throughout our trip, dicey political situation notwithstanding.  THAT was a great comfort to me.  To be in the land of Jesus, to walk where He (maybe) walked, and to swim in the same Sea of Galilee on which He walked....well, it still blows me away!  All of the members of the 2007 team have many, many exciting, exhausting, and sometimes deeply moving experiences to look forward to! 

Now, some advice for the new members:  First of all, go straight to your suitcases,  take out half of what you've packed, and leave it at home!!  Invariably, you'll have too much stuff, and those suitcases get heavy when you're lugging them around the various airports.  Just make sure you don't take out any Band-aids, baby powder (to absorb moisture), or granola bars--you'll need to stash a couple of those in your backpack daily to supplement the cuisine up at the dig! Don't worry too much about sunscreen, at least for up at the dig--you'll be so covered with dirt and sweat after the first 10 minutes of work that you'll have plenty of "natural" sunscreen.  As far as the bug spray goes, believe it or not, you really don't need it.  And it doesn't work on scorpoins, anyway! (Ha!)  Secondly, crazy as it sounds, WOOL SOCKS really are the greatest for keeping your feet comfortable.  Along those same lines, make sure your boots are broken in!  And finally, keep an open mind--but not an empty head--and be ready for the experience of a lifetime!  Rest assured that you will learn more without even trying than you have ever learned in your lives.  I envy all of you!

Dr. Schuler, Linda, Andrea, Glen, Arny, Dark Load, Kristina, I hope to see all of you next year!  Have a beer in the pub for me!

God speed and safe travels to all of you!

Just days to go! After sending off the "Final instructions" e-mail to the diggers---thinking it was my last---I realized I have at least three more loose ends to tie up. Will it ever end? Nancy says she gets more depressed about not going this year with each passing day. I was that way too, until I read Kristina's first blog entry and was reminded of the bugs, other wildlife (sorry, Glenn! I know their presence is of great interest to you), and the sunburn. I will NOT miss those first few days when scorpions show up as people disturb the rocks on the surface, nor will I miss exposing my fair complexion---my father's redhead gene may be recessive for my hair color, but not my skin type---to the blistering sun. Of course, I packed #30 sun screen and applied it liberally, but no sun screen is sweat proof, so it was a losing battle. I looked like a beet the first couple days, and everyone was worried I was coming down with heat stroke.

And there are other things I won't miss. When Mark and I were in Evansville, Indiana earlier this month for a Schuler family visit, we did the 2007 Hippos report during the Bible class hour at his home church. My section of the presentation was titled "all the dirt on the dig." I talked about the daily routine and commented (as the plate of breakfast food came up on the powerpoint presentation) that people do not come back as volunteers year after year because of the cuisine. I will not miss the mediocre kibbutz food nor the ambience of the breakfast hall---an abandoned 1940s Israeli Defense Force building with every surface covered in pigeon manure.

But I do have regrets about not going this year, mostly about the people. Participation in the dig builds a sense of community among the diggers that transcends the generations. I wasn't surprised to see the warmth between Linda and Nancy at the Newark airport last year. Since the two were the only "mature" (aka, over 40) adult women on the 2005 dig, a bond between them was natural. However, I was surprised to learn this spring from Amanda Bundy, a CSP student from Hibbing, Minnesota, that Arny Friend (who's from the St. Louis area and nearly old enough to be Amanda's grandfather) and his wife made a point of looking up Amanda and her family when they were visiting his wife's relatives in the Hibbing area. The Bundy and Friend families went out to dinner together. Apparently, during brief week that Arny and Amanda were both at Hippos, the two had a conversation about family and concluded they might be related---that was enough to cement a relationship that now extends to their families! Then a couple of weeks ago in casual conversation, Andrea Chandler mentioned that, when she's on her way back to St. Paul after visiting her mother in western Nebraska, she always stops in Wayne, Nebraska and has lunch with Nancy. Okay, after visiting her mother, she stops and has lunch with another woman old enough to be her mother! I will miss getting to know a great group of people this year. I'm counting on the on-site bloggers to fill us in not only on the finds on from the NE church but also on the stories that reflect the building of community among the diggers.

By the way, last night Nancy and I talked by phone (discussing what, exactly it is, about which we are supposed to blog). Nancy, who's already planning to return next summer commented: "I hope they have a good season but don't find anything too spectacular until next year." I'm hoping for no lost passports, no trips to hospital emergency rooms, and no emergency evacuations of diggers this year!