Travel to the Holy Land and visit the Sea of Galilee Boat, known as the Jesus Boat, an ancient fishing boat from the time of Jesus, and for Christians the boat is one of the most precious and meaningful archaeological discoveries in the world.
The discovery at the Sea of Galilee was made by two brothers Moshe and Yuval Lufan whom were fishermen from Ginosar, or known as Gennesaret in Jesus times (Matt. 14:34, Mark 6:53), walking along the shores of the Galilee after a recent drought they noticed a mysterious object in the mud. A couple of weeks later, an ancient vessel saw the light of day for the first time since it sank nearly 2,000 years ago.
Expert scholars believe the boat was a combined ferry and fishing-boat, and some consider that it might have even served in a sea-battle against the Romans. Today millions of Christians whom have visited the museum during their holy land tour stop here, and while no one truly knows exactly who rode the boat or how it was used, it will always be “the Jesus boat” for the pilgrim believers serving as a powerful present reminder of the past of the Gospel stories of Jesus and his disciples, whom were fisherman themselves and there is little doubt that they used similar boats to the Sea of Galilee Boat you will witness on your holy land trip.
After a complicated restoration of the boat, it now is in display at the Yigal Alon Center at Kibbutz Ginosar. The boat was carefully crated with 12 different types of woods, which today still grow nearby the museum.
The Sea of Galilee Boat is historically meaningful to Jews as an example of the type of vessels used by their ancestors in the first century for both fishing and transportation. Previous to discovery of the boat there were only references by Roman authors, the mosaics, and the Bible giving insight in to the construction of these boats.
The ancient boat is also important to Christians because boats such as this played a large role in Jesus' life and ministry, and are mentioned 50 times in the Gospels. Because of this we highly recommend visiting the Jesus Boat on all Israel tours to the Galilee.