The photograph on the cover is the interior of a “house” in Ramaka. My nephew, who took the photo when on duty in Palestine, says the house “has obviously been swept and garnished for the occasion.” He goes on to say, “Probably quite 14 people sleep in this cavern, which would be quite dark without the flash-light by which the photo was taken. The doorways are inadequate, and the windows (if any) small and barred.”
Thomson, in his “Land and the Book,” says: ― “It is not impossible, to say at least, that the apartment in which our Saviour was born was in fact a cave. I have seen many such consisting of one or more rooms, in front of, and including a cavern where thee cattle were kept. It is my impression that the birth actually took place in an ordinary house of some common peasant, and that the Babe was laid in one of the mangers such as are still found in the dwellings of the farmers in this region. That house may have stood where the convent does now, and some sort of cave, either natural or made by digging the earth away for building and for the roofs of houses, may have been directly below, or even included within its court. Thus all the demands of the tradition would be met, without resorting to the suspicious circumstance of a cave.”
We are interested in these dwelling places in Palestine, but we know that He who was born in lowliness and cradled in a manger is in His Father’s house in heaven now, preparing, a place for those who love Him.