Balat is not a neighborhood you would visit in the standard tour to Istanbul. If you want a real taste of Istanbul and the people who live there, wander around a smaller craftsman, artisan, coffee shops and second hand clothing shops on cobblestone streets in the neighborhood of Balat.
Around the press, the team uncovered dwellings and courtyards that hint at an early village economy. The winemaking enterprise was likely community-based, tied to the cycles of agriculture and celebration. Megiddo’s residents were already part of a regional network that shipped jars of oil, grain, and perhaps even wine to Egypt and the wider Mediterranean world.
The plague of Amwas first struck the Muslim Arab troops encamped there before spreading across Syria–Palestine and affecting Egypt and Iraq. The Plague of Amwas was the first major pandemic that hit the early Muslim communities.
Cult worship was largely practiced and even sanctioned in the Holy Land while Jerusalem's Temple stood.
They were found in a 4000 year old tomb. Begging the question – why a jar of decapitated toads? What strange customs did our ancestors practice? According to archaeologists who uncovered the recent finding, the frogs were part of ancient funeral practices. Researchers say these fascinating findings from an Israel Antiquities Authority excavation near the […]
Christian fires burned on hilltops where pagan fires had burned for 1000 years. The Irish made lanterns out of turnips to guide 'Stingy Jack' and other wandering souls caught in the netherworld while warding away the evil spirits with frightening masks and Jack O' lanterns made from carved turnips.
Driving Christians out of their territory and female genital manipulation are just another couple of past-times for ISIS when they are not beheading infidels
The crescent moon is a symbol of Islam. Muslim, Jewish and Christian holidays revolve around cycles of the moon. So it’s no big surprise that an ancient structure, devoted to the moon, has recently been uncovered in Israel.
If Jesus had a Facebook account, this could be his profile picture. So says Richard Neave, a medical artist famed for reconstructing legendary faces from antiquity. (See the reconstructed face of Ramses II here). With a team of Israeli archeologists and British scientists, he recreated what they claim is the most accurate image of Jesus. For […]
The Skateistan skateboarding school first established in Kabul shelters girls and street kids from Afghanistan's harsh realities. Since then, it has been so successful, the non-profit NGO has established two more locations.
While limiting children, or not having them at all, is a good way to fight global warming and the demise of our poor planet, there is nothing more inhumane in being told how many children you can have.
Treading the path of righteousness involves the ecology too. It had never occurred to me that if I were to go camping on Mt. Meron for the upcoming Lag B’Omer celebration, that I’d actually be on pilgrimage. I never thought of my visits to the Western Wall in Jerusalem as a pilgrimage. But during the […]
A couple of years ago in Dubai we interviewed the Green Sheikh – a beloved figure in the United Arab Emirates who is a devoted father and husband, hyper productive activist, and a faith leader. Plus he is smart- PhD smart. Referencing the many expatriates living (and generating wealth) in the country, he said something […]
Green Pilgrim Jerusalem hosts a week-long international symposium on greening pilgrimage, with major religious leaders from around the world. Faith and community leaders from around the world will be speaking on ecological, urban and social development as influenced by mass pilgrimage. Our report on the massive urban sprawl that Mecca is becoming illustrates the ecological […]
Matzah balls, the only Eastern European food that crossed over to Sephardic cuisine. While Ashkenazic Jews have enthusiastically adopted the spicy foods of Israeli’s Sephardic communities, there hasn’t been much culinary exchange from the other direction. Ordinarily, Sephardic Jews (Middle Eastern and North African origin) wrinkle their noses at the foods of Eastern European Jewry. […]