Highlights of Visiting Nazareth
Exploring the Hometown of Jesus Christ---Today and Yesterday
When visiting modern Nazareth, be sure to also stop by Nazareth Village. It's here you can travel back in time, 2,000 years, to the time when Jesus Christ was a child.
Since the 4th century, Christians have journeyed through Nazareth on pilgrimages. Located in northern Israel about 88 miles northeast of Jerusalem, Nazareth is the largest Christian center in Israel with a population of about 60,000 (half Arab Muslim and half Arab Christian.) Upper Nazareth (Nazaret Illit) has a population of 49,000 Jews of Ethiopian, Russian and other nationalities.
Modern Nazareth
As you arrive in modern Nazareth, it’s quite different from the little village where Jesus Christ grew up as a child. Steep narrow streets wind throughout sloping hillsides lined with white stoned houses anchored on stilts. To westerners, it resembles a Middle Eastern San Francisco.
Nazareth Village
It’s here at Nazareth Village where you enter the world of Mary, Joseph and young Jesus. Located on the only remaining area of unused farmland, Nazareth Village is less than one-third of a mile from where the young Jesus spend his boyhood, learning carpentry.
As you enter through the stone doorway, you go back more than 2,000 years to a Galilean village and farm where less than 100 people called Nazareth home.
Surprisingly, several of your Nazareth Village guides are American born Christians who have chosen to live and work in Israel. A typical first century house with pottery home furnishings, a synagogue, and other sites give tourists an idea of what it was like to have lived at the time of Jesus. You can enjoy a weaving demonstration, as well as visit a first century carpentry shop, examining authentic tools used by Jesus and his earthly father, Joseph.
As you enjoy the goats, sheep, and donkeys feeding on hillsides, just as they did 2000 years ago, you gaze across to the skyline of modern Nazareth, noting the stark contrast.
Leaving, you're given free samples of communion cups and pottery to remember your tour. However, when you receive any gifts in Israel, you must remember to report it at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion International Airport when you fly back home. Just be sure to have your communion cup and pottery souvenirs easily assessable so you won’t have dig through your bag while going through security.
The Basilica of the Annunciation
Built on two levels, the modern Basilica of the Annunciation (also known as the Church of the Annunciation) stands over the traditional site where Mary received the message from the Archangel Gabriel that she would be the mother of Jesus, the Savior of the world. The angel went to her and said, ‘Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.’" (Luke 1:28)
Nazareth a Treasure to Archaeologists
Just as many Holy Land sites, Nazareth continues to be excavated by archaeologists. As more excavations take place, Christians learn more about Nazareth at the time of Jesus. Recent excavations can be viewed by tourists below the northern courtyard of the Church of the Annunciation, which was built in 1969.
Importance of Nazareth to Christians
Nazareth is important to Christians because it’s here where Jesus spent his boyhood years before beginning his ministry. At about age 30 he transferred his home base to Capernaum. However, he returned to his Nazareth synagogue although he was rejected.
(“And He said, “Truly I say to you, no prophet is welcome in his hometown.” Luke 4:24).
When Christians grow discouraged because they're rejected for sharing their faith with relatives, they should consider how even Jesus had wasn't received by his own hometown. However, He didn’t let these setbacks stop him as He went on to minister to thousands of others in need of healing and salvation.
