In the footsteps of the forerunner - Ein Kerem, home of John the Baptist
Ein Kerem
Ein kerem is today a neighborhood of Jerusalem at its southwestern tip. Yet, it has retained its “village” charachter, or in other words, it has not changed very much. So walking the alleys of Ein Kerem, one could imagine the young John walking just ahead of us.
John the Baptist
It is beleived that John the Baptist was born and grew up in Ein Kerem. The two churches – the Church of the Visitation and John Ba Harim Church – both built recently on much older ruins dating back to the Crusaders (12th century) and to the Byzantine period (4-7th centuries). The two churches commemorate two events from the Gospel of Luke chapter 1. The visitation of Mary to Elizabeth, both of them with infants in their wombs and the birth of John and his circumcision 8 days later.
The Magnificat and Bendictus
Two significant prayers emerged from the two events for which the two churches were built. The Magnificat or Song of Mary, one of the most ancient Christian hymns, and the Benedictus or Song of Zachriah.
Saint Marie Alphonsine and Major General Charles Gordon
Two adjacent compounds in Ein Kerem tell two fantastic stories about two exceptional individuals. One has left us a house, the second has left us with a huge mulberry tree planted in 1874.
Marie Alphonsine was canonized (became a saint) in 2015. She was born as Daniel Ghatas, a Palestinian Christian who founded the Rosary Sisters Order that educates children untill this very day.
Charles Gordon was a British military officer who came to Jerusalem for about a year, and chose to live in Ein Kerem close to the alleys that John the Baptist walked. He identified the Garden Tomb as the site where Jesus was crucified, buried and resurrected, rather than at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.
The tour
In this three to four hour walking tour in Ein Kerem, we will walk in the footsteps of the forerunner, the Immerser, John the Baptist. We’ll start at the Church of the Visitation, stop just outside the house of Saint Marie Alphonsine, then pay respect to the mulbery tree planted by Charles Gordon, visit Mary’s spring, and continue to John Ba Harim Church. From there we will walk to the tip of Ein Kerem to the Sisters of Zion compund and the grave of Alphonse Ratisbonne a Jew converted to Christianity and formed the Sisters of Zion Order.
We will walk through the picturesque alleys of the village that has not changed much during the last 2000 years, and aside from enjoying a stop at one of the coffee shops, we will attempt to better understand John’s childhood.
To register for this tour, please press the button below. It will transfer you to my contact page, through which we will converse to refine all the details – any limitations you may have, where and when we meet, etc.
