Pville Pastor: Indiana Jone Rides Again

Petra, Jordon, Monday 10:30pm
Have you seen the film “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade”? Today we got to pretend we were Indiana Jones riding into the great ancient city of Petra. Ok, Sandy rode a horse and I rode a donkey, but like the camels at Sinai my little donkey climbed a long and steep mountain path while Sandy’s horse just trotted along a short flat path. Petra is the most stunning ancient site I’ve ever seen. It is currently one of 20 sites in the world being considered for the new version of the “7 Wonders of the World”. Just like in the movie which was filmed here at Petra, we walked a path for about a mile through a literal crack in the mountain left by an earthquake. At the end of the path we came into a valley in front of an unbelievable first century BC monument literally carved out of the limestone mountain. The monument is actually a building called “The Treasury” and was built, or actually chiseled, in honor of a deceased king. My words and my photos will never do justice to the shocking beauty of this place. “The Treasury” structure gets all the publicity, but it is only the tip of the iceberg here. We spent the day exploring an entire city hewn from stone. At one point our group gathered in a cave-like room about the size of PCC’s student center and sang the hymn “Holy, Holy, Holy”. Petra is not of great importance in the Bible, but there are a couple of interesting connections. Many scholars believe that the Magi who visited the Christ-child originated from Petra. It was the world’s greatest market for frankincense in the first century and was known as “Arabia” even though it is in modern Jordan rather than Saudi Arabia. It is also the likely destination of the Apostle Paul when he reveals in Galatians 1:17 that he spent time in “Arabia”.

The government of Jordan allows only the local Bedouin people to sell to the tourists at Petra. A couple of thousand Bedouins lived in the cave-rooms of Petra until about 20 years ago when the government moved them out and into government housing next to the archeological site. The Bedouin people sell various trinkets and souvenirs along with taxi rides via horses, donkeys, and yes my favorite… wookies… I mean camels. I chose to spend my money on the donkey because I didn’t want to walk the 1000 steps up to the monastery carved from stone at the top of mountain opposite the entrance to Petra. While it was comforting to be a lot closer to the ground on the donkey compared to the camel, it was actually more challenging to stay aboard for the trip up the steep trail that once again consisted mostly of literal steps carved into the mountain. Brett, a young guy in our party who is 20-something lost his balance in the first 5 minutes of the ride and went sprawling head-first to the ground. I was relieved to see him get up laughing and climb back on board his little donkey. Sorry, I didn’t have my camera ready for the moment. Falling off at that point wasn’t so bad, falling off when we were going up the mountain would have been a serious problem. Back to the Bedouns… it was evident that entire families survived through sales to tourists. It was common to see women selling at a little table beside the path while caring for an infant. Small children were trained to play up the “cute factor” as they sold small polished stones. I rented a donkey from Aaron who was a determined salesman, but also delightful 23 year old. By the end of the 2-hour journey up to the monastery and back we had established something of a relationship. With little formal education Aaron had learned English and Spanish and little bit of several other languages from tourists. It continues to be as much fun to meet the people as it is seeing the sites. I think you’ll enjoy the pics of Petra below. Tomorrow we visit Mt Nebo, where Moses looked over into the Promised Land before he died and the Jordan River among other places in Jordan before crossing into Israel.