Catching up

I can't believe how quickly the time goes! I feel bad for neglecting my blog. Thanks to all of you have faithfully been checking it. I'll try to do better from here on out!

Last week was focused mostly on the class. We finished reading the book of Ruth, and enjoyed acting it out and discussing the text, all in biblical Hebrew. The instructors, Aaron and Brian, are excellent teachers who helped us make so much progress in our facility with the language. They are inspirational!

We took a field trip this week to Neot Kedumim, a biblical landscape preserve. They have attempted to recreate certain aspects of the landscape that would have existed in biblical times. So, they have cleared woods that were planted in more recent times and planted plants, trees, and shrubs that would have existed earlier. I'd been here before, and it is a fascinating and wonderful place to visit.

We continued our study reading Ruth there. Ruth 3:2 says,

Now Boaz, with whose women you have worked, is a relative of ours. Tonight he will be winnowing barley on the threshing floor.

There is a reconstruction of a threshing floor at Neot Kedumim, so we read the chapter while sitting in that place. Here is a picture of what a threshing floor may have been like (click to enlarge):



There was still grain left from the recent harvest, so our instructor, Brian, demonstrated how barley would have been winnowed. There was even wind so we could see how the wind blew the heavier chaff away and left the grain.




It was really fascinating!