"WITH THE LORD ONE DAY IS AS A THOUSAND YEARS"

As pilgrims to the Holy Land we have the amazing opportunity to walk in, to touch, and to be in historic places where people of faith and ordinary people lived thousands of years before our visit!  Such was the experience at Tel Arad where we walked among the discovered ruins of this ancient biblical city.  The city itself is located in eastern Negev, in close proximity to the Dead Sea.  True, Arad is not numbered among the most important cities in the bible; it is mentioned four times (Numbers 21:1, 33:40, Joshua 12:14, and Judges 1:16). 

But the history of Tel Arad can be told through three different periods: Canaanite Arad, Israelite Arad, and settlement following the Israelite period.  The ancient city of Arad contained a temple, which was a miniature of Solomon's temple in Jerusalem, and everything else a village would have had (e.g., streets, houses, a palace, a well, etc.)  The temple at Tel Arad is the only temple that has been discovered which still had the altar and the Holy of Holies in tact.  For us pilgrims, it was an opportunity to imagine what their people's worship would have consisted of.  

Many of us walked around the ancient village, which was enclosed by a wall.  Looking out from the grounds to the nearby towns, it was possible to envision what it would have been like for those ancient settlers who may have plotted to go into battle with a nearby town or see an army approaching their camp.  The experience we all had at Tel Arad was an eye opening experience, as I overheard some of my classmates comment on their experience at lunch and on the bus. One stated that it was unbelievable that we were able to walk back into time where people lived over six thousand years ago, if not more.  Another person believed that this place helped us to personify why Israel is called “the land of milk and honey”.