Desert Dunking: 2,000 years ago & next week.

Where did the Baptist dunk Jesus?

Winter, AD 27

Sorry, I don't know. And nobody else knows, either.

But I'm going to be doing some self-dunking wayyy out in the desert next week, and I'm distracted. I looked into John's baptism spot and found more claimants than you can shake a stick at. So I'll give you an overview of John's sweet spot, and then I'll give you a peek into my sweet spot for next week's dunkings.

Where did John Baptize Jesus?

Ready? Okay, jump into the time travel machine with me. Our first stop is 1200 BC. Gideon has been selected by God to judge Israel, and his first job is to kick out all the Midianites who had been oppressing Israel (Judges chapter 7). God gives him victory in battle and Gideon rouses up the tribe of Ephraim to chase them back over the Jordan River. They chase them as far as Beth-Bara and capture their kings. Now Beth-Bara is Hebrew for "place of the [river] crossing," likely a shallow ford where the water won't sweep you away. But since Beth also means "house," this could be the housing location of a ferry-boat crossing. Starting from Ephraim's territory going east, the most likely spot would be the river crossing near Jericho (not far from Jerusalem) where God parted the waters to bring the Israelites into Canaan.

Why did I just say all that? Hang on, I'll get to that. But remember Beth-Bara.

Back to the time machine. This time you set the dial for AD 27, when Jesus gets baptized. (Remember that Jesus was born in 4-5 BC, so he's about 31-32 years old.) Click forward a couple months on the time machine and we find Jesus inviting his first disciples to a wedding in Cana. They walk to Cana (couldn't hail a taxi) and get there on the third day, before the wine was poured.

Now if John was baptizing near Jericho, Cana is a fur piece--some sixty miles if you're a winged creature, and considerably farther if you're a biped. So maybe John was baptizing a bit closer to Jesus' home territory of Galilee. Hang with me, we'll get back to this also.

Time machine time: Set the dial for AD 90. Here we find John the Evangelist (I say he's the same  as John the Apostle) writing his magnificent Gospel. The other three Gospels have been out in print for 30 years or so, but none of the other evangelists have thought that the location of Jesus' baptism was important enough to tell us about it. And then, and then, and then, along comes John, and he tells us that "these things took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan" (John 1:28, NASB).

But wait a minute. My beloved KJV says that "these things were done in Bethabara beyond Jordan." What's going on here? For the full answer--or at least a hint--we will have to hop back in to the time machine.

Set the dial for AD 220. Here we find a man named Origen, who's one of the ancient Fathers of the Church. He's got the gospels in his hand, and he's using them as a gazetteer--a written atlas--and he's touring the Holy Land trying to find all the places where Jesus stepped foot. (Not recommended, by the way--the gospels were written to teach us the Kingdom of God, not a history or geography lesson.) But Origen can't find any such place as "Bethany beyond Jordan."

Now hold still--this won't hurt, I promise. We're going to do a lesson in "Textual Criticism." Now Origen has seen many copies of John's Gospel, and nearly all of them said "Bethany beyond Jordan," but a couple of them say Bethabara." Not only that, but Origen's translation for Bethabara is "House of Preparation," which he thinks is a quite fortuitous name for the site of Jesus' baptism. (His translation is wrong, but never mind that.) Origen adopts Bethabara as the "more accurate" reading, and others began to follow his teaching. Those others include John Chrysostom, another Father of the Church, some 60 years later. Chrysostom says, "Bethany is neither beyond the Jordan, nor in the desert, but is somewhere near Jerusalem," so that is not logical.

So most of the earliest and best manuscripts say "Bethany," while a few others, supported by  two venerable fathers of the church, say "Bethabara." Which shall we choose? The textual criticism test is this: If the original autograph that John the Evangelist wrote said "Bethabara," why would anyone change it to "Bethany?" Bethabara is the "easier" text, and we can't explain why it would have been changed to Bethany.  Here we apply the guideline of "choosing the more difficult text," which is "Bethany beyond Jordan." In this case we have actual history of why it got changed.

(By the way, this is not the only time that Origen fooled around with the text of the Gospels. There's confusion about where Jesus met the man with a legion of demons, and in John: Episode Two I had to deal with that. But that's for a future blog post.)

Okay, back to the time machine. Take us home. You do remember how to operate this contraption? Good, then engage.

Today, if you consult the Biblical maps, you may find "Bethany beyond Jordan" on some of them, and "Bethabara" on others, but maps will disagree on where to place the dot that shows its location. Some maps even have both names. If you think that the mapmakers are guessing, you are probably correct, because there is no definite archaeological evidence for the site of Jesus' baptism. Oh yes, there is archaeological evidence for churches and monasteries supposedly at the sweet spot (both on the Jordan and far from it), but those ancient Christians were likely guessing also. Besides, we gotta have a location somewhere, 'cause the tourists are coming, and they want to see it.

And me too. Plus, I had to have a location for it because I'm writing a book with lots of action that takes place there. So I found at least one map that showed the spot as being on the Jordan just south of the Sea of Galilee and I picked that one. Why? First, that spot is on one of the caravan routes between Damascus and Jerusalem, and I figured that would bring a lot of customers in for this "baptism" thing he was doing. Also, if I were doing the hike, I think I could make it from there to Cana "on the third day." I'd really like to do that some day. And I didn't wanna have to resort to holy teleportation to get Jesus and his disciples to the wedding on time.

But, back to my distraction, which is probably a good thing. Without it, there's no telling how long and boring I would have made this blog post.

So, where am I going next week?

Here's a photo of that. This is the Wizard Pool, one of the hot soaking pools near Palm Spring in the Saline Valley, a suburb of Death Valley National Monument. When I lived there in ages past, there were 3 year-round residents in the valley--me and two others. The temperatures remained below 118 degrees in the daytime, and above 7 degrees at night.

West of this spot is Lower Warm Spring, a former hideout for Charles Manson and various hippies. It is accompanied by several soaking pools, some tables, a lawn, and real pit toilets. East of this spot is Upper Warm Spring, still undeveloped and natural. 12 miles west of here are the Inyo Mountains, rising steeply to Ten Thousand Feet.

I'M GOING!  It's been 20 years since I've been there. My family and their friends are going also! We're going hiking in the Inyos!  We're having a potluck on Thanksgiving! 

Did I mention I was distracted?

There won't be a blog post next Friday, 'cause I don't have a carrier pigeon to carry the text out to someone who has access to the World Wide Web. This place doesn't even have radio reception, except from Boise Idaho on AM radio during night-time hours only. Besides, I'm distracted.

Pray, please, for safe travel. See you in two weeks.