WHERE/WHEN?
Starts: Sunday June 2nd
Where: Rarotonga, Cook Islands
Subject: The Exodus – Where exactly did Pharaoh’s Army meet its Fate?
1. Australian PIX magazine of July 1960. This was by no means the earliest press report of the boat-shaped formation which appeared following an earthquake some time in 1948. It was photographed during an aerial survey and subsequently commented upon by Capt Ilhan Durupinar, an officer in the Turkish Armed Forces. Long before this a newspaper article headed ‘We have seen Noah’s Ark… but not on Mount Ararat’ was published in France-Soir, 31 August 1949. Although written in a jocular style, the article is nonetheless significant historically, since it indicates that two Turkish journalists had visited the area and given location and dimension details which have been confirmed by subsequent investigation as reasonably accurate. The article gives the location as ‘Al Judi on the Mesopotamian border’ and describes the object as a vessel 500 ft long, 80 ft wide and 50 ft high. This report establishes that the site was known and reported in the press as a possible ark location in the year following what appears to be its initial appearance in 1948–some ten years before Durupinar is said to have identified it in 1959. Andre Parrot, Curator-in-Chief of the French National Museums and Professor of the Ecole du Louvre, made reference to this Turkish newspaper report in his Déluge el Arche de Noe, Delachaux et Niestle, Neuchatel 1953, which was translated from the French by Edwin Hudson and first published in its English edition by Camelot Press Ltd, London and Southampton in 1955. Read more
The Ark of the Covenant was the focal point of the Old Covenant sanctuary system, and deeply significant are the truths it taught. The blood sprinkled by the High priest onto the mercy seat was symbolic of the shed blood of Christ, our High priest, who ministers for us today in the sanctuary in heaven.