New record for Nazareth Village
by Mennonite Mission Network, Virginia Mennonite MissionsPrint Article Email to a Friend
NAZARETH, Israel—Last October and November, record numbers of visitors experienced the light of Jesus at Nazareth Village. According to Shirley Roth, executive director of Nazareth Village through Mennonite Mission Network and Virginia Mennonite Missions, more than 6,000 people toured the village in October, and nearly 5,400 came in November. Both figures eclipsed the village’s previous record for attendance in a month, set in March 2007.
Interest in the recreation of first-century life often increases during the region’s November olive festival. Many November visitors came to watch the village’s first-century olive press—a donkey turning a heavy stone to c 63,rush the olives visitors place on a pestle. Roth says Nazareth residents still use olives for food, economic exports, soap, perfume and curative balms. First-century residents also would have used the oil for religious ceremonies and their lamps and burned the pits for light and heat. The olive oil used for the tour-ending room of light ties together the November olive festival with the December celebration of Jesus’ birth.
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