Masada

After church today, we had our monthly meeting for the Grace Book Club.  I mentioned in a previous post that we read The Dovekeepers this month, which was an amazing book.  Angela came prepared, as always, with pictures on her tablet of Masada that included scale models of Herod's temple as well as actual photographs of what Masada looks like today.  Apparently there is a museum at the site that opened in 2007 and the author visited it and was able to be more accurate in her telling of the story since she was actually there and saw the ruins.  She was able to know exactly where the dovecote was in relation to other buildings for example.

In reading about Masada, I also found out this interesting fact:


"The Chief of Staff of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), Moshe Dayan, initiated the practice of holding the swearing-in ceremony of soldiers who have completed their Tironut (IDF basic training) on top of Masada. The ceremony ends with the declaration: "Masada shall not fall again." The soldiers climb the Snake Path at night and are sworn in with torches lighting the background."

And lastly, I always thought that it was a confirmed fact that the Jews committed mass suicide to avoid being slaughtered by the Romans who had seiged Masada.  However, only 30 skeletons have been found at the site and there is no evidence of a mass burial.  This is odd since apparently there were 960 inhabitants at the time of the mass suicide.  I doubt that the Romans moved all the bodies off of Masada.  So it remains a mystery as to whether it was all a myth or did in fact happen.

What I Learned: It is not an historical fact that the Jews committed mass suicide at Masada.  Also, the Israeli Army uses Masada for their swearing-in ceremony.