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The Promised Land.
樂土，福地，希望之鄉。
This is the view from Mount Nebo in Jordan.
這是約旦的尼波山。
According to the Bible, this is where Moses died after leading the Israelites for 40 years through the wilderness, on the very threshold of the God-Promised Land he was never actually allowed to set foot in.
據圣經記載,這就是摩西耗費40余年帶領以色列人穿過茫茫荒野后來到實際上他從未允許涉足神所應允的樂土前就死去的地方。
You don't have to accept the Bible as literal truth to believe that, 3,500 years ago, something extraordinary and fateful in world history did happen over there on the other side of the Jordan Valley.
你不必對圣經的一字一句錙銖必較,早在3500年前,世界歷史上意義重大的事情的確發生在約旦河谷的另一邊。
Trying to understand what remains as urgent and necessary for me as it once was for Sigmund Freud.
對我來說試圖了解殘留下什么才是當務之急,因為對西格蒙德·弗洛伊德曾經也是如此。
But the first people in the modern era to actually go there and explore the history of the Jews from the ground up weren't Jewish at all.
但在現代實際上第一個前往那里探究猶太人的歷史的并不是猶太人自身。
They were evangelical Christians, Victorian scientists, surveyors, clerics and military engineers, funded by bishops and philanthropists.
這些先驅是由主教和慈善家所資助的福音派基督徒,維多利亞時代的科學家、測量員、神職人員和軍隊工程師。
150 years ago, the Palestine Exploration Fund despatched a series of expeditions to the place its supporters called the Holy Land.
150年前,巴勒斯坦探索基金會派遣一系列考察隊前往稱為圣地的地方。
They wanted to prove the truth of their Christian faith by discovering the Jewish foundation stones on which that faith stood.
他們想通過找尋猶太人信仰的基石證明基督教信仰的真理。
Equipped with the latest in technology that Victorian science could provide, they sought nothing less than the precise grid references for the places where the miraculous events described in the Book of Exodus actually took place.
配備了維多利亞時代的科學可以提供最新的技術,他們仍然找尋不到在《出埃及記》中所描述的神奇事件實際發生的精確網格坐標地點。
That's a lovely one, isn't it?
這很可愛,不是嗎?
That's just beautiful!
太漂亮了!
Felicity Cobbing, curator of the PEF collection, showed me the fruits of their labours.
PEF收藏館的館長向我展示了他們的勞動成果。
