Letters from Palestine: Written during a residence there in the years 1836, 7 and 8Paxton, J. D. (John D.)
Religion
Letters from Palestine: Written during a residence there in the years 1836, 7 and 8
Paxton, J. D. (John D.)
Palestine -- Description and travel
Among those travellers who spent the night in the court of the
church, was a sick man for whom we felt most deeply. He lived near
Constantinople, and had visited the Holy Land as a pilgrim. He had
left a family at home; was well dressed; rode a good horse, and
travelled with a company of the better sort of pilgrims. He had been
unwell for several days; but as his company could not or would not
stop, his great unwillingness to be left induced him to travel on,
when under a raging fever. On Sabbath morning he was utterly unable
to rise--and seldom have I seen a person that more needed medical
aid. We tried to do what we could for him; but I had not the medical
knowledge which his case called for. While I stood over him and
felt his pulse, he gazed on me with a brightening countenance; no
doubt in the hope that I might give him relief. He tried to make
me understand the nature and seat of his pain; but he spoke modern
Greek, and we had no one that could interpret; and, moreover, his
case was one that was utterly beyond my skill. Never did I feel
so deeply my need of medical knowledge; never did I feel more
deeply how impotent is man to save his fellow-man. When I turned
from him in despair of doing anything that would at all benefit
him, he seemed to read my feelings; and never did I see a deeper
disappointment than was expressed in his looks. It seemed to say,
You see I am dying, and yet you do not save me.
We gave him some simples, which might possibly afford momentary
relief. His company had left him. We prevailed on the Greek priest
to take him into his family, and had him conveyed there. What became
of him I know not. There was little prospect of his living.
The lake is a pretty sheet of clean, fresh water, about twelve miles
long and six miles broad, of an oval shape. The water deepens very
gradually on the western side where I visited it. I saw many small
fish in it; but saw no means for taking them. It is said, however,
that the Jews have a fishery at the southern part, and take a good
many. I saw but one boat on the lake. It would hold eight or ten
men--it lay off the town--but I saw no one in it during the time I
was there.
The banks of the lake were more precipitous on the eastern than on
the western side; and as it seems to have been on the eastern side
that our Lord healed the demoniac, and permitted the devils to enter
the swine, I could not but think that it did argue that the swine
were possessed, that the whole herd should leap from the top of such
a precipice into the sea.
The town of Tiberias stands on the western side, about mid-way
of the lake, and on the edge of the water; it is walled, and has
a small garrison in it. The population is but a few thousand,
possibly not above 3,000. Most of these are Moslems; there are a few
Christians of the Greek church, and a small number of Jews.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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