Continuing the Jesus Path from Tiberius to Capernaum

Tiberius had too much traffic coupled with construction and one way streets to be characterized as it is in the travel book as a sleepy little town. As is our wont, we had no reservations and realized that we were stuck with either the Tiberius Hostel or a $300/night hotel. We chose the hostel and were not unhappy. It’s location was central and accommodations were not bad. The cold shower was its only drawback. Meir, the administrator was helpful and the place was clean but shabby. We had a private room and bath so we were content enough. Neither of us felt that great that day so it really did not matter.

The day included figuring out how to get change to put into parking meters, exchanging our car for a smaller car that was more comfortable and had an AUX jack for the iPod. Let’s hear it for a Mazda 2. [Its small size became particularly useful this evening in Acre (AKKO)--story to follow]. We then treated ourselves to tea on the waterfront, amazed at how warm the day was considering how chilly it had been in Jerusalem and even Nazareth. The owner of the restaurant was from Miami, Florida and was happy to talk about the places I used to go with my father, like Home Depot on 163^rd St, North Miami Beach. I think she was a bit homesick.

The next day we both felt better and took off in search of dead rabbis. We found the tomb of Maimonides and and maybe that of Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai and some other rabbis that were within walking distance of the hostel. As stated in the guide book everything was in Hebrew and it was hard to figure out who was buried where. One thing for sure though, it is considered a holy site by the Orthodox and they come here to pray, men on one side of divide and women on the other. If you are curious about how Maimonides got to Tiberius from Cairo where he died, and even if you are not, the story goes that before he died he told his people to put him on a camel and bury him where the camel expired. The camel took him to Tiberius and was buried. Unfortunately we have no information about the fate of the camel.

Outside of town we found the grave of Rabbi Akiva buried on a high hill overlooking the city. A beautiful view and no Romans running up to get him.

After our visit to these Jewish holy sites we made our way to Christian sites. Just like in the United States, the Catholics really know how to pick land with beautiful views. The views in conjunction with a bright, sunny, warm day reinforced the spiritual feeling of the places we visited: Mount of Beatitudes, Church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes, Church of the Primacy of St. Peter, Capernaum with the remains of a fisherman’s house (could have been Peter’s) and a synagogue from the 3^rd Century built on top of a first century synagogue (Jesus could have preached there). And a Greek Orthodox monastery. While walking through Capernaum we hooked up with an English speaking group and got the story. The guide was very good and humorous. He kept saying that no one could validate that these places actually were the places mentioned in the Christian Bible because there were no signs left saying “Jesus slept here.” We chatted with the guide as we walked towards the parking lot. He asked if we were Jewish and when I said yes he wanted to know if we were Messianic (Jews for Jesus) Jews. He assumed as did everyone that if you visited these sites you were Christian of sorts. He asked us where we were going and we told him we were headed west to Acre but did not know where we were going to stay that night. He gave us the name of a kibbutz with a guesthouse. And that where we ended up.