Egypt

This will be the first blog posting to include pictures. Having had the recent opportunity to travel to Egypt, Sinai, Jordan and Israel, I saw some things there that made the Bible more meaningful. I hope to pass along a few things that will be useful to the reader. In this blog, let's talk a little about Egypt. We've all seen pictures of the pyramids, and we know that they were burial places of the Egyptian rulers. And while it was interesting to see them, they looked about like what you would expect. One picture shows that the Sphinx is aligned with a major pyramid. I never realized that there is an alignment or that the Sphinx was sitting right by the pyramids, but they are very close. And there are lots of sphinxes in Egypt, most much smaller. They kept guard over their surroundings. But there is so much more going on in the area of the pyramids. One thing that most people don't know is that behind the pyramids for miles in two directions, there is continual underground construction done by the ancient Egyptians. While much of it has not been excavated, there is a large expanse, miles of it, that is in storage pits. You can see an example in the photos shown. This apparently relates to the 7 years of plenty, followed by the 7 years of famine in Joseph's time (Genesis 41:47-49). "Now in the seven plentiful years the ground brought forth abundantly. So he gathered up all the food of the seven years which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities; he laid up in every city the food of the fields which surrounded them. Joseph gathered very much grain, as the sand of the sea, until he stopped counting, for it was immeasurable." They had to have places to store enough food for 7 future years, so they apparently dug these pits for that purpose. A typical pit would be something like 150' long and 50' wide by 40' deep. These are my estimates, but are close enough for you to get the idea. In one photo you can see the steps going down into the pit.

One final thought has to do with the proximity of all this. I was amazed to see that all of this is just on the southern outskirts of Cairo. I stayed in the Mena House Hotel, a converted palace of old on the southern edge of Cairo. Cairo and this hotel are in the fertile crescent with lush, tropical environs with palm trees, Nile river, gardens, crops, all quite green and fertile. Just 300 yards behind the hotel were the pyramids and all that we have been discussing. It is the beginning of the desert. There is no transition; none. And once you hit the desert, there is nothing but pyramids and desert for as far as you can see and beyond.

This is close to where the Israelites dwelt for about 400 years, until Moses, under God's direction, led them out of Egypt and headed for the Promised Land by way of the Sinai Peninsula. Lord willing, we'll talk about the Sinai in the next blog. Thanks for reading!