FROM Tiberias to Nazareth is a seven hours’ journey. Our way lies across a rocky, hilly country. The sun is hot. The heat seems to have positive weight. Icarus would not have had to soar very high beneath this fierce sun, before his “waxen wings” would have “melted” and let him down with a crash. The reflection from the rocks is almost like the hot breath of a furnace.
Look! yonder to the right, and not far away, are eight or ten gazelles dashing down the steep hillside. Their tongues are lolling out; they have been up on the elevated table-lands, and now, dry, hot, and thirsty, they are making their way to the Sea of Galilee. How swift they go! And yet Asahel, we are told, was “as light of foot as a wild gazelle.” The men of Gad, who swam the swollen river to join King David, had the “faces of lions” and the “feet of gazelles.” Isaiah, when speaking of the beauty of Babylon, could bestow no higher praise than to say: “She is as the gazelle of kingdoms.” Solomon says: “My beloved is as beautiful as a gazelle leaping up the mountains, skipping upon the hills.” To see this swift-footed animal, going with parched lips to the sea, reminds one of the Psalmist’s earnest words: “As the hart (the gazelle) panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God.”
The Arab word “gazelle” is not used in the Bible, yet it is generally understood that the “roebuck” of Scripture is the same animal. They are plentiful here, and may be found in all sparsely settled sections of the country. South of Hebron they are sometimes seen in droves of from fifty to a hundred. They are not so large, but are otherwise very much like our American deer. Their flesh, like the antelope and venison of America, is considered delicious, and the Nimrods of to-day are constantly on their track. The gazelle, however, having a swift foot and a keen eye, is seldom hung up before an Arab’s fire.
We are now upon what is thought to be the corn-field referred to in Matthew 12:1. “And at that time Jesus went on the Sabbath day through the corn, and His disciples, who were an hungered, began to pluck the ears of corn and to eat.” The field is still worked and it will soon be seed-time again. The corn referred to was of course wheat, as our Indian corn was not then, and is not now, known to Eastern people.
PALMS IN BUSH FORM.
After five hours and a half in this scorching sun, we are thoroughly prepared to appreciate the grateful shade of the great olive and palm trees under which we are now resting. We are in Cana, of Galilee, whose history is sacred and whose name is familiar to all Bible readers. Yes, here on this rough, rocky hillside, is Kefr Kenna—the village of Cana—where Jesus made wine of water. Few passages of Scripture impress me more than the account of this wedding feast. I read, “And the third day there was a marriage in Cana, of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there, and both Jesus and His disciples were called to the marriage.” It was during this wedding feast that Christ turned water into wine. “This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana, of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory, and His disciples believed on Him.” Christ’s first miracle, wrought at the beginning of His public career, was, we see, turning water into wine. And the night before His crucifixion, He took wine and said: “This is my blood,” and “without the shedding of blood there is no remission.” I see a significance, therefore, in the fact that the first miracle was making wine. That miracle was prophetic. It pointed to something yet to come. That miracle was, in Christ’s thought, closely connected with the Cross and Man’s Redemption.