Day 4

Day four. It’s cold. I still need sunscreen. That pretty much sums up today, January 31^st. We went on a great archeological dig. We were broken up into three groups and we each got to dig for old pottery, climb through old traps used to catch the Romans, and take a tour of old cemeteries.  The great thing about all these places is that we were looking and exploring ruins from the time of Bar-Kochba, who to some people was believed to be the Messiah.

But tonight is Shabbat, so once we got back to the Kibbutz we all just chilled out and cleaned. A lot.

The trip has been great so far. Despite the long school hours (11 to be exact), I’m enjoying what I’m learning. Yesterday in class we discussed creation. We looked at different stories of creation, and debated how we see God. One of the arguments was the limit of God’s power. Should he be able to control all that humans do or simply create them. It prompted me to think about the extent of our free will. Is it boundless and completely up to us or is God in there somewhere. Did he just create us and let us think? Is he in our head guiding us somewhere? Or were we created in his image, with certain characteristics that he chose that influence us? There are many possibilities, but my preference is the third description. We have limitless free will, but the way that we were each specifically made, in God’s image, us certain instincts or decision making skills. I hope that makes sense.

Tomorrow we are headed to Jerusalem and to a Debbie Friedman memorial concert. Its going to be amazing. Lets just hope that an old Jewish women doesn’t yell at me again.

Shabbat Shalom,

Shoshana J