A resort rises at site where Jesus may have taught

From The New York Times: 

For the Rev. Juan M. Solana, it was the spiritual equivalent of striking oil.

When he set out to develop a resort for Christian pilgrims in Galilee, he unearthed a holy site: the presumed hometown of Mary Magdalene and an ancient synagogue where experts say Jesus may well have taught.

The project, which Father Solana, a Roman Catholic priest, describes as “providential,” will be blessed by Pope Francis during his visit to the Holy Land this month.

The story starts in 2004. Father Solana, who directs the Pontifical Institute Notre Dame of Jerusalem Center, a century-old complex that provides accommodations and a serene gathering place for Christian pilgrims, thought of building a similar facility in the Galilee region of northern Israel, where the Bible says most of Jesus’ ministry and miracles took place.

After a search for suitable land, four privately owned plots were acquired on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee near the small Israeli town of Migdal and the destroyed Arab village of Al-Majdal. Both were named for the ancient town of Magdala, where the name of Mary Magdalene, one of Jesus’s most faithful followers, suggests she was from.

Father Solana’s plan was to knock down the holiday cabins of the old Hawaii Beach resort, built there in the 1960s, and erect in their place a hotel for 300 guests, a restaurant and a lakeside spirituality center for prayer and contemplation. Architects were hired, and the building permits finally came through in 2009. All that remained before construction could begin in earnest was to carry out a salvage dig on the site, a routine requirement in Israel. The Roman Catholic Church and the archaeologists dispatched by the Israel Antiquities Authority did not expect to find anything significant, and intended to get the dig over with as quickly and cheaply as possible.

But their spades struck history only a little more than a foot below the surface: a stone bench that, it soon became evident, was part of the remains of a synagogue from the first century, one of only seven from the Second Temple period known to exist, and the first to be found in Galilee. A local coin found in a side room of the synagogue was dated from the year 29 — when Jesus is thought to have been alive.

Those involved in the project say it immediately brought to mind a biblical verse, Matthew 4:23: “Jesus went all through Galilee, teaching in its synagogues, preaching the good news of the Kingdom of God, and curing the sicknesses and the ailments of the people.” The site of the dig was only about five miles from Capernaum, a known center of Jesus’ activities.

Soon it was clear that the site was not just near Magdala; this was Magdala.

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