Welcome, peaceful viewers, to A Journey through Aesthetic Realms. Together, let us go to the ancient Holy Land’s city of Jerusalem to continue our visit to a museum that is truly unique in the world: The Bible Lands Museum Jerusalem.

People from all faiths, ages, and backgrounds can explore the wonders of the cultures of the Ancient Near East – and their fascinating interrelationships. From the dawn of the first civilizations all the way to the early Christian era, walking through these treasure-laden galleries is journeying through the pages of the Bible, as well as deep into our shared human spiritual heritage.

For this, the Bible Lands Museum Jerusalem, which first opened its doors to the public in 1992, has been acclaimed internationally as a center for learning and understanding toward peace.

Director Ms. Amanda Weiss further explained the museum’s noble ideal.

I see a personal challenge in this museum, as director of the museum, to creating programming that reaches out to people of all faiths and all ages. It’s a museum that enables people to come, to learn, and to understand. And if you create guided tours and programming that help people reach that level of understanding, then hopefully you break down some of the barriers and prejudice.

Now, Dr. Filip Vukosavovic, the greatly knowledgeable curator of the museum, will give an overview of the museum’s collection and show us some of the fascinating historical pieces.

What we try to show in this museum is the lands, cultures and peoples which are mentioned in the Bible, which are actually the topic of the Bible in so many ways. So what we can see is really Mesopotamia, we can see Egypt, we can see Syria, we can see Turkey, we can see so many cultures, languages, nations and peoples. We can show that history throughout 9,000-10,000 years, from the beginning of humanity until approximately Middle Ages.

The Holy Bible is viewed as a rich history book by the Bible Lands Museum Jerusalem. Visitors can relive the time of Jewish kings and the first ever Jewish Temple in the Holy Land.

We have a number of objects coming from the First Temple period, both seals, jars, stones, amulets, which definitely come from the First Temple period. They depict many different things: amuletic protection, or they’re connected to agriculture or to taxes or to various things.

We just see through many of these objects, not only the First Temple period but through many other periods, that people just lived everyday normal life, just as we do nowadays. We go to work, we come back, we take care of our family, we play with our children, we pay our taxes.

The museum’s founder was Dr. Elie Borowski, a renowned Polish art and history expert a lifelong collector of precious Ancient Near East art pieces. The peace-loving visionary Dr. Borowski stated, “The future of mankind has its roots in the past. Only through understanding our history we can build a better future.” Indeed, the Bible has deeply influenced Western civilization and its moral and spiritual values.

A number of these objects, a lion next to the calf, or a good shepherd, they’re all objects which really depict this desire by just an everyday human for a better life, for peace, for stability, for themselves and their children.

I think the message of peace and love is extremely important. Jesus talks about love and peace all the time. Again I just mention a little bit about this absolute balance in nature between animals and nature, and humans; where there will be no wars, and just the message of peace is extremely important, especially in the New Testament, and definitely it’s one of these things which billions of people, I believe, preach nowadays and believe in.

Next, curator Dr. Filip Vukosavovic leads us to several of the galleries at the Bible Lands Museum Jerusalem, introducing us to some of the museum’s highlights and their spiritual significance.

Bible Museum Jerusalem gives an overview, historical overview, of the ancient areas from approximately 9000 BC up to medieval time, early Christianity. So what every visitor can do actually is start in Gallery #1 up to Gallery #20 and see approximately 10,000 years of history of humanity in the ancient near East. And there are definitely a number of objects which are absolute must-to-see.

And one of these objects we have right here. This is Gallery #6. And the object is right in front of us, #11, which is a shell. It’s a shell inlay, which was… This piece was probably a part of a throne room chair, let’s say, as a very nice decoration. And the object depicts a famous Mesopotamian god, Ninurta, who is fighting a seven-headed monster. Now the object again is very small because actually it is probably furniture inlay.

The object itself has a very important spiritual message that, just like nowadays, people actually struggle with various things in their lives, it’s a fight between good and evil, between sin or purity. So in ancient times, Mesopotamia, actually this shell inlay depicts the same thing. It depicts a very positive god, Ninurta, who actually fights a rather negative creature, seven-headed monster. So the object not only depicts ancient Mesopotamian mythology, but actually it can be translated very easily into nowadays’ world.

We are standing in Gallery #2, where we have another extremely important object that I’d like to show you. It’s a ball, as you can see, and the ball depicts a very strange scene. It depicts lions and calves just laying next to each other. Usually, Mesopotamian ancient Near Eastern mythology in art, usually we see a lion attacking a calf, but in this scene we simply have a lion laying next to a calf and a calf laying next to a lion.

It’s a scene which is very actually familiar to people from both the Old Testament, the New Testament. In the Book of Isaiah, the prophet Isaiah talks about a time where a child is going to sit next to a snake’s hole and to play with a scorpion, or a wolf is going to lay next to a sheep. We are simply talking about a time period of just balance, of peace both between humans and… between humans and animals, and all the animosities which actually we see nowadays will disappear.

So this ball, which actually is approximately five thousand years old, tells exactly the same story: the story of a beautiful balance of peace, of equilibrium – probably the best word to describe this scene. And then we have the same story from Revelations, where once Messiah comes for the second time, he will bring the eternal peace. We’re in gallery #14, and we are standing next to a vitrine, which contains a number of stamp seals coming from the First Temple period.

Why I want to talk about these seals? Because in the Bible, it’s very clear that the God Himself is not supposed to be depicted in any way or form. No images, no figurines, no objects, which in any way or form depict God. But that didn’t stop people from using God’s name and adding to their own personal names.

For instance, both #1, 2 and 3 – #1 gives the name of Gadiyahu, which means “the Lord is my fortune.” Number two says Beniyahu, meaning “the son of God.” Seal number three says Hananiyahu, which means “the Lord is gracious.” We maybe have only couple of instances where the God of Israel was depicted. But other than that, the only real connection between the Israelites and the Lord, the God of Israel, is through many of these stamp seals.

Okay, so we are in Gallery #18, where I would like to show another very, very interesting object. And that object… artifact is right here. It’s actually a part of the sarcophagus, which dates to approximately 250-300 year CE, so Common Era. It’s not as old as some other artifacts which I already showed. But what is very impressive about this object is actually this scene right here, which is a corner of the sarcophagus, because it contains a depiction of a man, of a bearded man, and he holds an ewe, a lamb, on his shoulders.

Now, if we didn't know any better, we just saw something like this, we would say, “Well of course it has to be the imagery of the scene of Jesus carrying a sheep.” Because very often, Jesus, after saying in the New Testament, in the Gospels, that he is a good shepherd, very often he would be depicted in the art as a young man or a boy carrying a sheep or lamb on his shoulders.

But what’s very interesting about this sarcophagus is it actually depicts a Greek god Hermes, or a Roman god Mercury, which is one of the same gods, it just depends are we’re talking about Greeks or about Romans. It’s simply a scene of a good shepherd. What’s also very interesting, in the Old Testament we have King David, who is known as a good shepherd. Also Moses is known as a good shepherd.

Even earlier, we can go back to Babylonian times, famous Babylonian King Hammurabi, who writes in his famous law code, he writes, “I am a good shepherd.” Almost every king or ruler or a spiritual leader wanted to present himself as a good shepherd, meaning he wanted to show himself as the one who takes care of his own people.

So ancient Babylonian kings would say that, “I am taking good care of people that God gave to me.” So also Jesus, he comes to Earth to take care of his own sheep, those who believe in him. It shows that imagery like this is very common, not only New Testament, Old Testament, but throughout the Mesopotamian history.

We have various topics, various iconographies that kept repeating over and over again, simply because they carry a very strong message. Again what is this message? It’s taking care of somebody else. Now it’s exactly the same thing as we hope nowadays, my prime minister or your president would do the same. So stories like this were famous, are still famous, and really continue being important throughout the history of humanity.

As our visit to the Bible Lands Museum comes to a close, Dr. Vukosavovic and Ms. Weiss express their wishes for our present-day civilization, which are also messages of the museum.

Tolerance, in the first place. Of course, world peace, but tolerance for me is definitely the most important thing.

I believe that there’s room for everybody on this planet, in this world, and that we all have the right to exist, and to worship the way we choose to, and to believe the way we choose to believe. I believe that museums, in particular the Bible Lands Museum, play a very important role in education, in helping us reach a greater level of understanding and mutual respect.

To find out more about the Bible Lands Museum Jerusalem, please visit

Thank you, Ms. Weiss, Dr. Vukosavovic, and the Bible Lands Museum Jerusalem for your endeavors to expand people’s cultural and spiritual horizons. May the special museum’s artifacts of the past aid in shaping our minds for a shared peaceful future.

Thank you, open-minded viewers, for joining us today on A Journey through Aesthetic Realms. Coming up next is Our Noble Lineage, after Noteworthy News, on Supreme Master Television. May your life be enriched by your spiritual treasures within.