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Old City Cairo



The Old City part of Cairo, also known as Heliopolis or On, has been around from the time of Joseph and is built on the main road connecting Egypt with Palestine. This is the place where many Jews would have fled in the Babylonian conquest, and logically this is the part of Egypt where Joseph and Mary would have come to flee the wrath of King Herod.

Two of the places we visited in the Old City were the Jewish Synagogue and the Abu Serga Church. The synagogue in the Old City is where the Geniza documents were discovered. They were the oldest copies of the Hebrew Bible until the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The Abu Serga Church is the oldest (or second oldest) Coptic church in Egypt, and according to the Coptic tradition is built directly over the place where Joseph, Mary, and Jesus lived for a couple years when they fled to Egypt. It is very possible, but I have never been one to put much stock in the place. It was still cool, though, because this is the first place we have visited where Jesus once was.

I wonder if Jesus was actually old enough to remember seeing the Pyramids…

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Of Boats and Falcons




Edfu Temple:
I doubt you have ever heard of this temple before, yet it is one of the best-preserved of the ancient world’s temple. The temple is dedicated to the falcon-headed god Horus, who is the god of protection and healing. According to Egyptian mythology, Horus battled with Set, the evil brother of Osiris, (the name for “Satan” was derived from “Set”). During this epic grudge match, Set gouged out one of Horus’ eyes, and since then (for some reason), the “Eye of Horus” has been a symbol of protection and healing. Displaying the Eye was believed to safegaurd against evil spirits and the like. This temple is also home to one of the best-preserved statues of Horus in falcon form.

One of the most intriguing things about this temple is that archaeologists discovered the remains of an ancient Egyptian ark. There are also reliefs on the wall depicting the priests of Horus carrying the Ark in the same manner as the Levitical Priests were commanded: poles slid through rings on the sides of the ark, carried over the shoulders. This ark (and presumably all Egyptian gods had an ark) was designed like one of the Egyptian sun-boats, only scaled down. Its long, slender hull carried a shrine in the middle in which would be placed an idol of the god along with a set of the 14 Egyptian commandments (and possibly other “relics” of sorts). It would not be too far-fetched to assume that when God told Moses to build him an Ark of the Covenant for him and the 10 Commandments that Moses would have built something very similar to the Egyptian ark (and not some sort of box or treasure chest).

We also learned at Edfu that the Egytians believed the ground to be holy wherever their gods were. No one was alowed to wear sandals inside the temple, and the priests would transport the ark barefoot. The only exception to this was in times of war, when everyone needed to be prepared for fight or flight. This Egyptian practice manifests itself in the stories in Exodus as well. First, God told Moses to remove his sandals for he was standing on Holy Ground. Second, God commanded the Hebrews to partake of the Passover (a holy feast) with their sandals strapped so they would be ready to flee.

It was about this point in the trip that the entire story of Joseph through Moses started to really click. I began to realize just how much of a connection the Hebrews would have had to the culture and religion of Egypt. Regardless of this, God used what they knew in order to establish his covenant with them. He had no problem taking something from one culture and using it to his glory. This is one reason I know that God is awesome.

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Faith building in the land of Egypt

It’s incredible how much can happen in 8 days. The land of Egypt is so rich, so saturated with history and stories that it would be nearly impossible to take it all in, even with decades of study. Our tour guide, Osman, (who is one of the best men I have ever met) is by far also one of the best tour guides in all of Egypt. He is professional Egyptologist, tour guide, hieroglyphics teacher, and Biblical historian. Not only did he take us around to all the famous sites, but at each one he did his best to tie in all the geography, temples, etc. to the stories in the Bible. I never realized just how much Egypt had to do with the development of Judaism and ultimately Christianity.

I would like to start my summary of our trip by recording some of the things I learned that my Sunday school teachers never knew:

– The pyramids were seen by Abraham, Joseph (and his entire family), Moses, and Jesus

– There is technically more than one Temple. When Judea was overrun and many Jews taken captive and Solomon’s Temple was destroyed, many Jews escaped to Egypt and built a full-scale replica of the Temple, complete with priests and a sacrificial altar. In fact, a second full-scale replica was built on an island in the Nile called Elephantine Island (which archeologists are excavating right now). What’s more, the Egyptians built a temple of their own called the Temple of Philae which is based off of those other two replicas of Solomon’s Temple.

– The Ark of the Covenant probably wasn’t a big box. It would have been shaped like a small boat with a shrine area in the middle and two cheribum on either end. (I will post a picture later) How do we know this? Because in the Egyptian temples (which included a “Holy of Holies” where the god was and only the high priest could enter) the god was kept in an “Ark” which was a small boat with two long poles on either side which the priests used to carry the ark. Also, the 14 Commandments of Egypt were kept on display inside the ark. Moses, growing up around the main temple complex in Luxor, would have seen this ark taken out of the temple on many occasions.

– When the Israelites were encamped around Sinai and built a golden calf, it was most likely a representation of the goddess Hathor, one of the main goddesses worshiped in the time of their enslavement.

– The Egyptians had a god in their pantheon named Set, who was the god of chaos, evil, and the wilderness. From the name of Set, the Jews derived the name for Satan.

– The Egyptian priests made a practice of removing their sandals when they were inside the Temple, which was considered “holy ground”. God told Moses to remove his sandals, for he was standing on holy ground.

– The only exception to this practice of removing their sandals was during a time of war, when every man had to be prepared for fight of flight. God told the Israelites on the night of the Passover to keep their sandals on as they ate the meal, for they were getting ready to run. Paul told Christians in Ephesians 6 to keep our shoes on, which is the preparation of the gospel of peace, during a time of spiritual warfare.

– Early Christians made it a practice to use pagan symbols as their own symbols of the faith. For instance, they ancient Egyptians used a symbol called an ankh, which was the “key of life” carried by all the god, representing the Nile river. It looks like a cross with a circle on the top. Early Christians in Egypt used this symbol as their own to represent the life which we have in Christ.

OK, I’ll stop here for now. There’s more I could talk about, but I’ll leave that until the actual trip summary. I wanted to go ahead and write this stuff down before I forgot about it. All of this goes to show that God, in His infinite wisdom, has no problem with reaching people on their level. He used the things which the Israelites knew. He met them where they were and showed them the way to himself. Our God truly is an awesome God.