{"id":388,"date":"2013-11-13T08:25:28","date_gmt":"2013-11-13T13:25:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/?p=388"},"modified":"2013-11-13T08:25:56","modified_gmt":"2013-11-13T13:25:56","slug":"vds-feature-the-jezreel-experience","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/2013\/11\/vds-feature-the-jezreel-experience\/","title":{"rendered":"VDS Feature: The Jezreel Experience"},"content":{"rendered":"

by\u00a0Rhonda Siggers, MDiv2<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>When I was a child, my grandmother traveled the world.\u00a0 I remember vividly two trips she took.\u00a0 The first was her trip to Hawaii from which my gift was a hula skirt that I attempted to wear to school as clothing.\u00a0 The second was her trip to the Holy Lands which included Israel and the surrounding areas.\u00a0 She had a vessel filled with water from the Sea of Galilee that I remembered looking at every time I visited her.\u00a0 I was five at the time, and once I was tall enough to reach it, I was disappointed to find the water had evaporated.\u00a0I lost my grandmother in the fall of 2011, but she instilled in me a curiosity about the world and the Bible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Fast forward to the fall of 2012 when Dr. Franklin visited my Hebrew Bible class.\u00a0 As she explained what we would experience, I felt as though this was a chance to encounter what my grandmother had over twenty-five years ago.\u00a0 While I understood that it was an archeological dig and that it would require a tremendous amount of work, this was a once in a lifetime opportunity.\u00a0 If it were up to me, I would require a trip to Israel of every Divinity Student at Vanderbilt.\u00a0 It is one experience to read the Biblical text for its religiosity or its historical context, but making the connection to what you know, or thought you knew about where the stories of the Bible come together, is a powerful experience.<\/p>\n

The archeological dig was one aspect of the trip.\u00a0 It connected me with the land and the text, but the field trips and the exploring that I did on my own is what will leave a lasting impression.\u00a0 While I was in Israel, I visited Nazareth, Jerusalem (the new and old city), Bethlehem, and several archeological dig sites.\u00a0 Churches are in abundance, but there were two places where I felt an affinity to God. At the Wailing Wall\/Western Wall in the Old City where women and men pray separately, there is something that is inexplicable in the utterances and prayers of women in that space.\u00a0 Although languages from all over the word are spoken, both the praises and requests are clear.\u00a0 In that space, I personally felt God\u2019s presence.\u00a0 The other location is the Sea of Galilee.\u00a0 As we approached it, I was humbled and all I could do was remain silent while in that space.\u00a0 The sheer awesomeness of both of those experiences is something I will carry with me for the rest of my life.\u00a0 I am grateful that Vanderbilt assisted in providing me with the opportunity to experience Israel and the surrounding areas.<\/p>\n

<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by\u00a0Rhonda Siggers, MDiv2 When I was a child, my grandmother traveled the world.\u00a0 I remember vividly two trips she took.\u00a0 The first was her trip to Hawaii from which my gift was a hula skirt that I attempted to wear to school as clothing.\u00a0 The second was her trip to the Holy Lands which included…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1576,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[89,88,113,112,31],"class_list":["post-388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-feature","tag-israel","tag-jezreel-expedition","tag-nazareth","tag-religion","tag-vanderbilt-divinity-school"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1576"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":396,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions\/396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.vanderbilt.edu\/vanderbiltdivinity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}