Be'er Sheba and Arad Pre-trip

I will have more on these sites after we take the students to them, but for our faculty pre-trip, I was able to take my daughter, Rachel.  It was fun to familiarize her with basic archaeology and to show her some landscape she has not seen yet.

Jared Ludlow's son Joseph also came.  He and Rachel, along with two of the Harper teenagers, are taking seminary together, where they are studying the Old Testament.  It was interesting for them to see the site where Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob often stayed (even though the ruins come from other periods).

This is a reconstruction of a horned altar found in Be'er Sheva

Artist's depiction of the late Bronze Age city

Rachel at the well of Be'er Sheva. Abraham and Isaac each dug wells here

Looking down at the later water works

Rachel in the water tunnel

Back to the modern era: Josh Ludlow, Rachel, and I at McDonalds!

After lunch we went futher into the Negev to the site or Arad.  Most of the ruins are Canaanite, though there is an Iron Age Israelite fortress above the earlier city.  An interesting thing about the Israelite city is a small temple, one of  several that have been discovered in Judah.  Hezekiah and then Josiah dismantled these alternate sanctuaries to that of Jerusalem.

The small  Holy of Holies in the Arad Temple complex