Baalbek looks delicious, I’m sure you will agree (see “Colossal Enigmas”). Makes you want to go there. But dismiss the thought. It is in the Beka Valley, home to 30,000 Syrian troops occupying Lebanon. Our author, an Israeli professor, has never seen the site he writes about so eloquently. Even before the Lebanese civil war and the occupation by Syrian troops, he would not have been able to visit Baalbek, because he is an Israeli. Let’s hope that soon peace will prevail and we will all be able to visit the site.
If Baalbek, which was once a major tourist site, is no longer accessible, the rest of the issue includes sights (from Pompeii) and a site (in Egypt) that only recently became see-able. The sights from Pompeii (Field Notes), we know, are going to shock some of our readers. They come from the newly opened exhibit in Naples of pornography from Pompeii. Should we have published these pictures? Our readers will decide. But aside from the pictures, the sexual standards that prevailed in Pompeii makes us realize how infinitely varied is the human condition. You may not like it, but, still, it was there. And if you are curious, as I am, you will want to understand the society that produced it.
If Pompeii is a spectacle, the newly discovered Roman-period mummies in Egypt (“Mummies”) are spectacular. The vast deserts that enclose Egypt seem continually to surprise us. An editor at Time-Life books once told me that whenever they publish a series on flowers, they always begin with roses; and whenever they do a series about ancient peoples, they always start with the Egyptians. He didn’t know why, but he knew what appeals. There is no denying the fascination we have with ancient Egypt. What accounts for it? Is it the way the mummies seem to stare back at us from that “undiscover’d country from whose bourn no traveller returns”? Or is it simply the mysterious nature of the entire civilization?
Like Baalbek, our main feature article—on how the Crusaders altered the Temple Mount (“The Holiest Ground in the World”)—also has its contemporary resonances. As I write, Israeli newspapers are running articles about how the Waqf, the Moslem religious trust that controls the Temple Mount, is engaging in construction work that is destroying ancient remains in violation of Israel’s antiquities laws. When the Crusaders transformed the Dome of the Rock into a church and set a cross atop the golden dome, there were no such laws. The Crusaders obeyed only the laws of war and, as they saw them, the laws of God. The Crusader period constitutes a fascinating chapter in the history of this site, which has been holy for 3,000 years and continues to be the center of controversy. Perhaps here, too, there are some lessons to be learned.
As always, the past gives us a lot to think about the present.
Baalbek looks delicious, I’m sure you will agree (see “Colossal Enigmas”). Makes you want to go there. But dismiss the thought. It is in the Beka Valley, home to 30,000 Syrian troops occupying Lebanon. Our author, an Israeli professor, has never seen the site he writes about so eloquently. Even before the Lebanese civil war and the occupation by Syrian troops, he would not have been able to visit Baalbek, because he is an Israeli. Let’s hope that soon peace will prevail and we will all be able to visit the site. If Baalbek, which was once a major […]
You have already read your free article for this month. Please join the BAS Library or become an All Access member of BAS to gain full access to this article and so much more.
