moria: Jordan Day 1, Saturday November 9: Neighbours connected and a world apart

Today started early, leaving at 6am to make our way north to cross the border into Jordan. These two countries are close together. They physically are only separated by a fertile valley and a very small river that floods maybe once a year. We discussed in class this week how these two countries, Jordan and Israel, are connected similar in many ways. They are made up of people groups who have similar or related backgrounds. The lands that they are on are made up of the same types of rocks for the most part. Industries are much of the same as well.

Yet even though these countries are similar in many ways and they are technically at peace with each other the border crossing is met with the typical Middle Eastern security things which make North American border crossings seem like a luxury. Part of that whole process was saying goodbye to our bus driver and bus from Israel and after crossing getting on a new bus with a new driver, a Jordanian tour guide and a tourist police man. I found that having a tour guide with our group changes the dynamic. He brings in a different perspective to exploring the land. I find so far that he knows a lot of the history but the connections and the discussions that we have had in the past he is not as inclined towards. So for these impression reports I’m going to continue to try to draw connections and consider things, but it might not be done with as much ease as in the other ones.

Throughout today we were considering whether the rift valley and the Jordan River provides the two countries with a a connection or with a boundary. It can be looked at both ways in my perspective. The two countries both have significant reasons to be in the fertile region around the Jordan River. In a land where water is a valuable resource, none of the water is put to waster, so much so now that the Dead Sea has been going down quite steadily in the past years. Yet at the same time the Jordan provides a boarder. It seems that Joshua and the people of Israel surprised the land of Canaan by being able to cross the Jordan River when they did. In the story of David sending his parents to Moab while Saul was out trying to take his life, David seems to see the land across the Jordan as a different area and an area of less risk for their life.

cattle transport we saw while traveling

In a conversation that a couple of us had someone pointed out that it seem that from a visual aspect if traveling from west to east the land looks inviting and open. The rain shadow creates a fertile area on the western side of the hills leading into Jordan. But if travelling from east to west the land looks less inviting as the rain shadow creates a significant wilderness everywhere east of Jerusalem up to the Jordan valley.

Pehel looking across to Israel

herding ducks...

We looked at three of the four major crossing of the Jordan River. There were many other crossings that the locals knew about but the four major ones were used by people from every nation that was on their through this area.

The first one was the Bethshean crossing where we actually crossed is one of the biggest. The city of Bethshean is right across from the city of Pehel/Pella. The two cities were connected and seem to be a link for connecting the different sides of the valley.

A little further south was the Adom crossing at the Jabbok River. This was the crossing the Jacob took when he returned to the land of Canaan with his wives and also where he wrestled with God. The Farah valley is just a little bit south on the Israel side and leads directly up to Shechem the original capital of Israel. Succoth was the name of the city that was built there and it acted like a backdoor for the kingdom of Israel, protecting it from invaders from the East and providing an escape for a king who might have felt threatened by things going on in the land of Israel.

Another crossing that we briefly talked about was the one that goes just south of the Sea of Galilee.