Walk to Bethlehem Week 6 Report. October 26 to November 1, 2020 This week we began following the path, in reverse, that the Holy Family probably took when they fled Israel to evade Herod’s wish to kill the baby Jesus. I say probably because nothing was written down in those days but stories about the Holy Families journey into Egypt were handed down for generations until they were finally recorded. We had another good week with 23 participants and 679.5 miles, more than enough to walk the path through Egypt and make a side trip to Alexandria. Little is known about Jesus’ youth. We all know the story of his birth in a manger and of the Magi’s visit to the babe. We have heard the story of Herod soliciting the Magi to report back their findings about the birth of Jesus so that he could go and “worship” the baby. The Magi dreamt of Herod’s wrath about Jesus being the King of the Jews and chose to avoid Herod when they left Bethlehem. The Holy Family went to Jerusalem to present their son at the Temple (Luke 2:22-34). but Luke never mentions the flight into Egypt. Neither Mark nor John have anything to say on this matter. Only the Gospel of Mathew mentions it. When Herod realizes the Magi weren’t coming back, he assumes they never found the baby, Then Herod heard about Jesus being presented in the Temple and the prophecy from Simeon about Jesus’ being the Redeemer of Israel, Herod is furious and orders a slaughter of all infant males under the age of two in the Bethlehem area. The gospel of Mathew (2:13-18) reports that Joseph was warned in a dream about Herod’s intent to kill the infant Jesus and that Joseph packed up the family and escaped by night to escape Herod’s wrath. It also mentions the return of the holy Family to Nazareth in about 4 B.C., after Kind Herod’s death in 4 B.C. Now some of you are probably wondering how Jesus could have been born in the B.C. era rather than having his birthday set at 1, A.D or C.E., as is now the current non-religious designation for A.D. Your Tour Director checked this out. Apparently, the designation for B.C. and A.D. was not set until the third century and the person determining when Jesus was born was off by several years. Therefore, Jesus’ birth occurred 4-5 years before the date set for the A.D. designation. Also, there was no zero year in that system of indicating time. So, if Herod died in 4 B.C., and the Holy Family’s trip into Egypt took 3 years, Jesus must have been born around 7 B.C., not 1.A.D. The Coptic Church which was originally part of the Catholic Church believes strongly in the flight of the Holy Family to Egypt. So, while we are here in Egypt, we are going to walk the path the Coptic Church believes the Holy Family took to evade Herod, but we will be walking it backwards into Israel. The Coptic Church has long been a strong supporter of Mathew’s version of the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt. It has collected the stories about the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt since it’s early years and has many places on the route of the Holy Family where churches have been built and where annual celebrations occur. It is important to understand a bit about the history of the Coptic Church. Coptic Christianity began in Egypt about 55 A.D., making it one of the five oldest Christian churches in the world. The others are the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, Church of Jerusalem, and Church of Antioch. Copts say their founder was John Mark, one of the 72 apostles sent forth by Jesus Christ and author of the Gospel of Mark. Peter met Mark, who joined him in his preaching and wrote down Peter’s sermons. Mark later went to Egypt and founded the Coptic Church. Copts count him as the first of their chain of 118 patriarchs, (popes). Mark bears the title of the first Coptic Pope. The Roman empire persecuted the Coptic Church during the third and fourth centuries. At the Council of Chalcedon, in 451 A.D., Coptic Christians split from the Roman Catholic Church. Rome and Constantinople accused the Coptic Church of being monophysite or teaching only one nature of Christ. The Coptic Church said it was miaphysite, meaning it recognized both Christ’s human and divine natures "being joined inseparably in the 'One Nature of God the Logos Incarnate. Politics also played a major role in the Chalcedon schism, as factions from Constantinople and Rome vied for supremacy, accusing the Coptic leader of heresy. The Coptic pope was exiled, and a series of Byzantine emperors were installed in Alexandria. Among the consequences was that an estimated 30,000 Copts were killed in this persecution. Arabs began their conquest of Egypt in 645 A.D., but Muhammad had told his followers to be kind to the Copts, so they were permitted to practice their religion provided they paid a "jizya" tax for protection. Copts enjoyed relative peace until the Second Millennium, when further restrictions hindered their worship. Because of these strict laws, Copts began converting to Islam, until by the 12th century, Egypt was primarily a Muslim country, but the Coptic Church has grown around the world. Copts number about 12 million in Egypt today, with over one million in other countries, including Australia, France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Great Britain, Kenya, Zambia, Zaire, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and South Africa. There are more than 80 Coptic Orthodox churches in the United States and 21 in Canada. The Coptic Orthodox Church continues to hold talks with the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church on matters of theology and church unity. The Coptic Church is in communion with the Holy See. Although Matthew's account is the only reference to this flight into Egypt in the four Gospels, there are many traditions and manuscripts which supposedly discuss this flight. These traditions and manuscripts have a number of miraculous stories occurring on the voyage, with, for example, palm trees bowing before the infant Jesus, the beasts of the desert paying him homage, and an encounter with the two thieves that would later be crucified alongside Jesus. These stories of the time in Egypt have been especially important to the Coptic Church, which is based in Egypt. Throughout Egypt there are many churches and shrines that claim to mark an area where the family stayed during their three-year journey in Egypt. On the next page is a map of the path the Holy Family traveled. We will have to do a little back tracking to walk the entire route which we will have accomplished by the end of our walk to Bethlehem, but it seemed too confusing to attempt to integrate sightseeing of the very ancient pyramids and other ancient sights with the flight of the Holy Family. While the Holy Family took about three years to make this trip, they stayed in many places along the way, presumedly so Joseph could use his carpentry skills to earn money to take care of his family. Also, there were many Jews already living in Egypt and there may have been some family connections for the Holy Family to visit. (For those of you who would prefer an audio-visual account of the Holy Family’s flight and the various events of that trip, there is a YouTube video available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aqmc8WbCQtc Note that it covers the trip in the order in which it occurred, not the reverse path we took. Also, it covers some of the trip which we haven’t yet completed. The video last about 13 ½ minutes.) We took another felucca ride up the Nile to visit Mount Durunkah, which was the end of the flight path for the Holy Family. Mount Durunkah, left the Holy Virgin Mary Coptic Orthodox Monastery at Mount Durunkah in Assiut governorate Upstream at Mount Durunkah, 5 miles south of Asyut, the family are said to have sheltered in a large cave, around which has been built the Deir al- Adrah (‘Convent of the Virgin'), visited by over a million Coptic Christians each August for the annual Festival of the Virgin. Dayr Durunkah is worth the visit for its beauty alone. The monastery has been completely renovated since 1955. Today it consists of many churches. The Monastery of Dayr Durunkah is better equipped than many of the other places on the route of the Holy Family to receive large numbers of pilgrims and visitors. For this purpose, several hundred houses have been built against the slopes of the mountain– about one hundred meters above the agricultural land. From there one has a splendid view of the Nile Valley. In the convent we visited a large cave where according to tradition, the Holy Family has stayed before taking a boat northward to return to the Holy Land. The cave, probably once a pharaonic quarry, attracts hundreds of thousands of pilgrims yearly, especially during the festival of the Holy Virgin in August. Many come after the recurrent apparitions of the Holy Virgin in the past decades. Pictures of Dayr Durunkah above and below Muharraq Monastery at Mount Koskam, the Holy Virgin Mary Coptic Orthodox Monastery at Mount Durunka The oldest altar-stone in history - Monastery of Al-Muharraq, Assuit, right Now it was time for the Holy Family to set out for what is, arguably, the most meaningful destination of all in the land of Egypt, the place where there would be "an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt".