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Thomas McCollough (Tomas McCollough), a senior researcher at the archaeological detachment, leading excavations at the ancient Jewish settlement of Khirbet-Kan, which existed in the period from 323 BC. until 324 AD, told The Daily Star publication that a network of underground galleries and halls in which the first Christians prayed was found. Last year, Israeli archaeologists found nearby, in the modern town of Reineh, an ancient workshop for making stone vessels for water (Jews for religious reasons chose to use stone dishes instead of earthenware).

Archaeologist Jonathan Adler (Yonatan Adler) and his colleagues found evidence that stone vessels for water ("waterpots") of the same type used at the Biblical wedding in Cana were made in this workshop. “We were shocked by the fact that for the first time in the history of the excavation we were able to find material evidence of the production of stone vessels in the Galilee,” Adler said then.

 

Miracle in Cana.
Makovsky Vladimir Egorovich. 1887 Oil on canvas.
   Vitebsk Regional Museum of Local Lore

 

Thomas McCollough said that he was able to find the place where Jesus performed his first miracle. Turning water into wine during a wedding in Cana of Galilee is considered the first of the 11 miracles of Christ described in the New Testament. John the Evangelist narrates that Jesus and his mother were invited to the marriage feast, but at the height of the celebration it turned out that the hosts had run out of wine. Since the newlyweds were good friends of the Virgin, she asked her son to help them. Christ ordered to fill 6 empty stone vessels with water. When they began to fill the bowls, it turned out that water had become an expensive wine.

The right to be called the Cana of Galilee of the Gospel of John is now claimed five places. Most often, tourists are taken to Kafr Kanu, where the Wedding Church is located, built in 1883, allegedly on the very spot where Jesus transformed water into wine. “However, in fact, Kafr-Kan has nothing to do with biblical history,” says Thomas McCollough. “She was identified with Cana of Galilee at a later time, in the early 18th century, when Franciscan Catholics began to dispose of Christian pilgrimages. They were interested not only in historical accuracy, but in convenient access to the place. ”

The archaeologist believes that the true Cana of Galilee is located on the site of the ancient settlement of Khirbet Kahn, 15 kilometers from Nazareth - the city of Christ’s childhood and youth. This version is confirmed by the results of archaeological excavations that have been conducted in these places since 1998. None of the places claiming to be the biblical Cana has such a set of historical evidence and material evidence as Hirbet-Kahn, Thomas McCollough is sure. It is fully consistent with the geographical description in the Gospel and rabbinical sources. The village is located near the Sea of ​​Galilee in the Lower Galilee. The fact that during the time of Christ it was inhabited by Jews is confirmed by the presence of a Roman-era synagogue and other ritual structures, pieces of ceramics with an inscription in Hebrew and the discovery of 6 Maccabean coins that led the uprising against the Seleucid yoke in the second century BC.

“When Jesus traveled with his disciples around Galilee, Hirbet Cana was a rather large village with about 1,200 people,” McCullough says. - Geographically, it is located in the very center of the places where Jesus lived and preached. As follows from the Gospel, Kana was a safe haven or, one might say, a strong point for His wanderings. It was here that Christ and His disciples invariably returned when they were confronted with a hostile reception in Judea. ”

It is also important that the Christians of the Byzantine period believed it was Hirbet-Kan that same Biblical Kan, as the results of the excavations show. Professor McCollough and his colleagues discovered an underground Christian complex consisting of four halls connected by galleries. They have been used for mass pilgrimage for nearly a thousand years. In one of the halls, remains of plaster were found, some of the layers of which are dated by Byzantine time, and some - the era of the Crusades. This means that the halls served as a sanctuary for a very long time - from about 415 to 1217. The names of pilgrims were preserved on the walls of the halls (the custom to write their names on the walls of temples in the hope of the Lord’s mercy was widespread at that time), as well as the graffiti “Lord Jesus” in Greek.

In the cave was also found the cover of the sarcophagus with Maltese crosses, which, apparently, was used as an altar. One side of the tombstone is polished by the hands of many generations of pilgrims who stroked it during prayer. Above it was discovered a wall niche with the remains of two stone vessels. “There was room for four more!” Emphasizes Thomas McCollough, pointing to the coincidence of the total with the number of stone waterpots at the wedding with the participation of Jesus. The ancient pilgrims were clearly convinced that the miracle happened precisely at Hirbet Kan.

In the first miracle of Jesus, the Church sees a deep symbolic meaning. Jesus warns the mother that “My hour has not yet come,” but still gives in to her request to help the bridegroom. The Orthodox and Catholic traditions see this as an expression of the special power of the prayers of the Virgin for people. Theologians believe that Jesus established and sanctified the sacrament of marriage by his presence at the marriage feast and by performing his first miracle during it. In the interpretation of St. Cyril of Alexandria, the conversion of water into wine is a symbol of the change of the Old Testament New. Also, according to a number of modern theologians, the miracle symbolizes the change of the era of Jewish ritual ablutions by the age of the Messiah.