Can you believe the Bible? And does it really matter? How can you be sure that the Bible is all it's cracked up to be? Join David Curry, pastor, author, and worldwide traveler, as he shares his knowledge of many biblical places throughout the Middle East. He will take you on a journey through numerous archaeological finds that prove the validity of the biblical narrative, showing that you can believe what many have rejected. Welcome to the biblical wonders in the Middle East.
Here is your host, Pastor David Curry. I'm very happy that you have joined us today for biblical Wonders in the Middle East. Last time, we traveled through Egypt and revealed the interesting prophecies against the papyrus plants, against the many idols at Memphis, and the amazing prophecy that there would not be any more princes of Egypt.
We also pointed out the relief in a temple complex built by Romeses II that contained a relief revealing the war between the Hittites and the Egyptians. You know, it's amazing that the first peace treaty ever recorded between nations was between the Egyptians and the Hittites. Today, we want to share with you more about the Hittites who were originally based in Turkey.
The amazing thing is that many scholars believe the Hittites actually mentioned in the Bible over 60 times could only be a mythological nation. Why was this? Because until a little under a century ago, nothing had been found about this nation. And so you can understand that archaeologists and others thought that maybe it was mythological.
But then they came across ruins in the south of Turkey, which they named Kharkemish. This was the first of the Hittite towns found. Since then, over 30 more have been discovered throughout Turkey.
In Ankara, the capital of Turkey, today, there's a museum which is fully dedicated to items found in hiddite areas. We'll come to that a little bit later. Well, let's start our journey today to Istanbul.
This is the largest city in Turkey. And this straddles the bosprus. This is the waterway that divides Europe and Asia.
This waterway allows shipping from the Mediterranean Sea into the Black Sea. You know, at one time, the waters, the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea were not connected. In fact, several years ago, the National Geographic magazine had articles that revealed that scientists believed that a huge dalug came and the two were then connected and have been connected ever since.
Some scientists believe that the salt waters of the Mediterranean were washed into the Black Sea and that they're sitting over the fresh waters of the Black Sea. Well, the articles in the National Geographic magazine say the scientists then made expeditions into the Black Sea. And when they sent divers down near the Turkish border, they discovered, indeed, that there was fresh water below the salt waters.
And then they went onto the land areas. They were still under the sea, but they found manmade articles, which they believed were about 10,000 years old. And you know what? They then postulated that this was the first evidence discovered that might fit in with the Bible story of Noah's flood found in Genesis, the 7th chapter.
It's just amazing how many times science discovers historical finds that support the Scriptures. In spite of these finds, belief in the Bible is not universal. But as you can know, in this series, we are giving evidence to support the credibility of God's wonderful word.
The Holy Scriptures in Istanbul is a very fine archaeological museum. There are three items there that I'll mention and I think you'll find rather interesting. One is the bust of Alexander the Great.
It's a very good likeness of this young Greek king who overran the world. He took his troops down to Succor in India. By this time they were weary and they were fed up with war, and they all turned back to Persia and finally to Babylon, where Alexander died.
He probably died of malaria. He was only 32 years old, but had conquered the then known world. As we mentioned last time, when he conquered Egypt, he placed on the Egyptian throne a European king, and thereafter all the kings of Egypt were from Europe, just as Ezekiel the prophet had predicted.
There'd be no more a prince of Egypt in the museum. There's also a very fine sarcophagus of Alexander the Great inside the museum. It has beautiful and intricate carvings on the outside.
The second find in the museum that I want to draw attention to is that of the Salome inscription. This was discovered in Jerusalem and brought into Turkey. It was found in the tunnel that was built to take water from the Guillon spring into the pool of Siloam.
This meant that Jerusalem would have a water supply in times of war. It's often called today Hezekiah's Tunnel because King Hezekiah was the Israeli king who commissioned this tunnel. The inscription describes the diggers of the tunnel coming from each end, and they're meeting somewhere in the middle of the tunnel.
In fact, when you go into the tunnel today, you come to about the center and you can find that there was quite a difference between the two sides. One side is a little more to the right and the others are a little more to the left, but at least they met, and that's a long time ago, so we can be amazed at that. The writing on the Salam inscription is in a very old form of Hebrew, and so it has become quite valuable.
The third find that I found of interest was a Baptistry. This was outside the museum in the grounds given to reasonably large items. I found many such Baptist trees in Europe and the Middle East.
Baptism by immersion was practiced in the early Christian church, as Paul in the 6th chapter of Romans talks about the Christian being baptized into Jesus Christ. This baptism was only by immersion. The only kind of baptism that the Bible talks about and which early Christians practice.
So here in Turkey was one of those baptistries used by the early Christian church. Another nearby museum worth a visit is the Top Capi Museum. It was once a palace building used by the Shahs.
Now it houses the sword and cloak of Muhammad, the founder of Islam, an abundance of jewels, many large diamonds and precious stones. Outside the palace you can get a very good view of the Bosphorus waterway which divides Europe and Asia, which I mentioned earlier. From many places in Istanbul one can get a good view of the Hagia Sophia, or the Church of the Divine Wisdom.
This was an important Byzantine structure in Istanbul and one of the world's great monuments. It was built at a Christian church in the 6th century under the direction of Justinian I. When Yereslab the Wise visited Istanbul from Russia, he was amazed at the Sofia Hagir and went back to Kiev to build an even better structure.
I'm not sure he achieved this, but he did build a very fine cathedral in Kiev. In subsequent such centuries, the Hagia Sofia became a mosque and then it was made into museum and more recently a mosque. Again, the building reflects the religious changes that have played out in the region over the centuries.
Having minarets and inscriptions of Islam, as well as lavish mosaics of Christianity, it's a very huge building. The Muslims plastered over many of the wonderful mosaics. But the last time it became a museum, many of the plastered over mosaics were uncovered.
The originals must have been fantastic, for even the uncovered ones shows some of their original beauty. A visit to Istanbul must also include the very large covered bazaar. One can purchase almost anything here, including carpets, Rolls Royce, cars, pottery and fruit and vegetables and all sorts of things.
The place is huge, but unfortunately a place where pickpockets come from. Many countries ladies have to be very careful to watch their purses and mend their wallets. In 1923, a treaty was made at a conference in Lusan, Switzerland.
This treaty formed the barriers of modern Turkey and relinquished the rights Turkey had over the oil fields of the Middle East. It also included a law that Christianity could no longer build churches in Turkey. The rule of the time, Mustafa Camel, was friendly to the west, but he did not want Christianity to grow in his Muslim country.
But by this time in 1923, the 7th day Adventist Church had several hundred members, but no church. In 1957, there were two earthquakes which were over seven degrees on the richer scale, which damaged many cities and towns throughout eastern Turkey. Dr norsbomb, a 7th Adventist religious liberty leader in Europe, had made very good friends with the Minister of War in Turkey.
His name was Adam Menderez. Now that earthquake had destroyed so much, so Adventists around the world built up two whole villages which were damaged in the earthquake. Adam, the Turkish War Minister, asked Dr Norsman what Turkey could do to thank the Adventists for their gift to Turkey.
Norseman replied we have many members in Turkey. Allow us to build a church in Istanbul so they can worship in peace and safety. Adham replied I'm not the Minister of the Interior.
If I were, I'd certainly allow this privilege. Norseman replied we will pray that you will get the job. But Adam replied I don't know that I even want the job.
But two weeks later, believe it or not, adam was made the Minister of the Interior and he then kept his promise. We have a very nice church in the heart of Istanbul. I am often amazed at the way God works today, as he did in Bible times.
Later we traveled by bus to Ankara, the capital of Turkey, and it took about 4 hours for the journey. Here one can see the imposing mausoleum of kamalata Turk. He was the ruler who endeavoured to bring Turkey into the west.
He requested that the men of Turkey dress in suits as they did in the west. Interestingly enough, you can go to Turkey and you'll still see them in the same dress of a century ago. In the First World War.
He fought the British and the Anzacs at Gallipoli. He lost many thousands of troops, as of course did the Allies. There's a memorial at Gallipoli and the statement attributed to Mustafa Kemel at a Turk is worth repeating.
This is what it says those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives, you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mohammeds to us, where they lie side by side in this country of ours.
You, the mothers who sent their sons from faraway countries, wipe away your tears. Your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives in this land.
They have become our sons as well. You know, one cannot feel emotion surge as this statement is read. As you look out over the thousands of graves holding thousands of Anzacs and British, then you read this statement from one who was an enemy at that time.
It's almost unbelievable. A very important museum in Ankara is the Anatolian Archaeological Museum. Here is a very good display of Hittite discoveries when you know that a hundred years ago many were critical of the Bible because it mentioned the Hittites.
Nothing had been discovered of these people and many wrote that these were just a mythological people because there were no discoveries. But then at Kharkamesh in southern Turkey, on the border of Assyria, ruins of the Hidites were discovered and soon more than 30 other cities were found in Turkey and this museum reveals many artifacts had been discovered. Displayed are bracelets and other jewelry in gold and silver and precious stone.
Some reliefs of priests worshipping and the people who were bowing to their kings. Yes, the Hiddites were real people and not mythological at all. About four or 5 hours by bus northeast of Ankara, we arrived at the more Hittite ruins.
Here at Hashis and Boguskali there's a fortress wall that protected the Hittite sanctuary. There are several gates. One is the lion gate with a sculpture of a lion protecting that gate.
Then there's the king's gate. And the king now is in plaster of Paris because the original king was taken and put into the museum. In Ankara.
There's also a tunnel built of rocks laid one on top of the other. It's an entrance from the outside the fortress to the inside. There's no mortar at all.
And the tunnel is quite an achievement for the ancients. It must be at least 100 meters long. And I have to admit that I traveled through that tunnel a little faster when I realized that there was no mortar holding those thousands of rocks together.
Inside the fortress were a number of buildings such as temples. On one wall there are several leafs of Hiddite gods and a row of soldiers with their weapons drawn. I guess these were to protect their gods.
So much for the Hittites being mythological characters. We traveled by plane from Ankara to KaiserI, which airport was a gateway to Cappadocia. In the small museum I photographed some beautiful ceramic vases made by the Hittites and discovered just before our arrival.
The curator of the museum allowed me to photograph these objects, providing I didn't print them in a publication for at least a year. Well, I didn't do that for a few years. Our next journey wound us up the hills and mountains to Cappadocia.
It was quite a dusty journey as the roads were not sealed at that time. I wanted to get to Cappadocia, you know, before I left home, which at that time was in Indrakargal, New Zealand. I'd received in the mail a book on Turkey published by Time Life.
Inside were magnificent pictures and stories of Cappadocia. It mentioned, among other things, that Christians had fled from the coastal regions at first because the Romans persecuted and the Romans were followed by Islam. They had been in this wilderness area for something like eight centuries.
Finally, they were wiped out by the Muslims. Many centuries before, Mount Urkeis had spouted out volcanic ash and rock over a huge area. A snow, rain and wind came on the area.
Over the centuries, they'd left huge delicmite type of formations. In these sandstone formations, the Christians had made many homes and also churches. In the Garome Valley alone there are six churches.
One was where they had the communion service and inside it there's a very large table. Another had a Baptistry inside. Not a large Baptistry, but enough to baptize a person in by immersion.
Another known as the Dark Church. The ceiling of this is covered with fresco paintings of christ and the Apostles. Other valleys had more churches and meeting places for these people who, as Revelation Twelve mentions, fled into the wilderness where God had a place, a refuge for them on cliff faces.
These early Christians had made roosts for pigeons. Well, these pigeons laid eggs much the same as poultry today and the Christians would eat these. The pigeons also deposited in their roots good manure, which is used for the gardens and growing of vines and other fruits.
For the land around Is, all sandstone and it needed that manure. The Hittites had also come to this area and dug deep caverns where they lived in comparative safety for some time. They actually cut out two stories of homes and tunnels to the homes that they lived in.
However, when the Christians came here, would you believe it, they cut out eight more stories down into the depths for homes and worship areas. To these they channeled air and water canals. Once, when I brought a group of people here, I asked our young Turkish guy to take us to the Baptistry built underground.
I asked him to explain what the Christians did in the Baptistry. He explained how they had a channel for the water supply and that a whole family or a lot of people could be baptized at once. And you know what he said? You know, they put them right under the water.
He was quite surprised when I told him that the group had all been baptized in a similar way, but of course not underground. Cappadocia is mentioned twice in the Bible, once in the Book of Acts and then again in Peter. In Acts two and verse seven, among other nations, Cappadocia is mentioned as people from the area were in Israel at the time of Pentecost and heard the Gospel truth from the Apostles.
Then in one Peter one and verse one, he writes about God's chosen people in Cappadocia as well as other areas populated by Gentile Christians. In fact, do you know what? Cappadocias was one of the larger areas of the Roman Empire. As mentioned earlier, it became a haven for Christians not only fleeing from Roman persecution on the coastal areas such as Ephesus, Myrna and Pergamos, which we'll talk about next time, but also from Armenia.
Many Armenians settled here, for it was away from the habited areas where Christians were under severe persecution. Toward the end of the 14th century a few of these people from Cappadocia fled the onslaughts from Islam and traveled to join up with the Waldanses in northern Italy. That's a story of its own.
We flew from Ankara to Isma. There were only about three flights a week into Isma at that time. It was an evening flight and we arrived around 930 in the evening.
We traveled in a bus from the airport to what was known as the terminus. From this terminus we hired a taxi and explained to the driver that we wanted a good but reasonably priced hotel. This, of course, was all in sign language, though he spoke no English.
He got the message and we eventually arrived at a nice hotel. I generally went ahead and made the arrangements and so left my friend caring for our luggage. The hotel was acceptable, and as I was signing the papers and letting them copy our passports, some young boys, anxious for a few lira went out to help with the luggage.
When I had finished and went out, the boot was emptied, the taxis on its way and the boys were taking the last of our luggage to our room. As usual, the first thing I did was to put my coat on a hanger, but it wasn't to be found. I had put in the boot myself and I covered some of our cases with it, but it wasn't in the room anywhere.
My traveling companion was very tired and wished me luck in trying to find the taxi holding my coat. I went to the management and they suggested the police station. Nearby.
I found a tall police officer that I had to look up to and with sign language for. He had no English and I had no Turkish. He eventually realized that I had lost my coat and that was in a taxi boot.
We found a similar chev taxi arranged for the charges for half an hour and we were off up and down the well lit streets of Isma. This was a city of around 2 million at that time. We'd been traveling Isma Street for about 20 minutes when I suggested we go back to the terminus.
As I mentioned earlier, there were only three planes a week and that taxi driver thought this a crazy idea to go back to the terminus. I must say that over the last 20 or more minutes I've been praying that we would locate the taxi in my coat. You see, my coat had four large pockets that my wife had made in the lining.
These contained the films we had taken and the new ones yet to be used. Over 200 films, all told, with 36 pictures on each, were in those pockets. Pictures from Hong Kong, Nepal, India, Pakistan, Israel, Egypt and all over the Middle East.
Pictures that I would use in many evangelistic campaigns. So I prayed hard, and then it seems that God was telling me to go back to the terminus. The taxi driver further insisted in Turkish that was not a good idea, but I insisted and eventually we had it for the terminus.
I must say my heart was in my mouth, as it were. But as we came to the terminus, believe it or not our original taxi came out of a side street and parked in front of us. God's timing is so wonderful.
My prayers had been answered in finding this taxi and at the terminus. The taxi driver in the other car was surprised to see me as I persuaded him to get his key and open the boot lid. When he did, I could see my precious coat in one corner of the boot.
It had come off the car cases that I'd put it over with the fast and fierce driving of that Turkish taxi driver and not seen by my friend in the dim light outside the hotel. It was left there in the boot. I then put it on the backseat of my new taxi and we headed for the hotel.
I couldn't help thanking God for helping me on that night in Isma. I began to meditate on the fact that Isma, or Smyrna as called in Bible times, had suffered much, and now I was certainly empathetic with them knowing they had suffered much tribulation. As we came to the hotel, the taxi sped by to the police station.
I looked at my watch and we'd just been half an hour, so there's no more to pay. I wondered what he was up to. As soon as we came to the police station, the taxi driver ran up the steps and brought back the tall policeman who proceeded to open the back door of the taxi, grabbed my coat and ran back up the steps.
I was not willing to let my coat get out of my sight, so I followed him. We went into a room where there was a large table and he threw my coat over the top of the table. There you could see clearly the four pockets bulging with films.
Obviously, the taxi driver who had seen the coat with its pockets previously had informed the policeman, who also thought that I might be a smuggler. When he opened the zip pockets, he pulled out a number of the containers, each holding a film with at least 36 pictures. He didn't seem to know what they were and opened the first aluminium container that held a film.
He unscrewed the lid and let the cassette holding the film drop to the table. He did this with several more. I tried to explain that these were films of pictures taken in India, Nepal, Egypt.
He didn't understand. He brought in another man who was worse at understanding English. Finally he said, Ah, touristy picture.
I was now free to take my coat and get back the hotel to our room. The Lord had answered my prayers and have to tell you that I was so grateful to have my coat with all of my pictures intact. Again.
We have shared some interesting facts from Turkey which confirm the historical facts of the Bible. Let me encourage you to look at our website 3abnaustralia.org.au
Click on the Listen button and you'll find this and many other interesting programs. We look forward to having you in our next program of Biblical Wonders in the Middle East. May God bless you and keep you in his wonderful love.
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