Frankfurt! (or also "A Journey from East to West")

School began October 23rd, about three weeks after I arrived in Oberursel. I spent most of that time on campus, playing soccer, drinking, talking, and hanging out with the other students. I did make it into Frankfurt one weekend, and it turned out to be very interesting. I honestly didn't have much of a plan; I picked out two museums at least to visit, and looked at various churches that I could visit, and thought that those would fill up the rest of the morning and the afternoon (like the museums in Berlin). Oh how wrong I was. 

I left about 10, and first went to the Bibelhaus, a museum about...you guessed it...the Bible. The basement was about the text of the Bible, but especially the Old Testament, the main floor was about the NT and life in Jesus' time, and the upper floor held an exhibit of life in Abraham's time. There was a replica of the Isaiah scroll, one of the best preserved scrolls from collection of the Dead Sea Scrolls; it wasn't as impressive as one would think, since I'd seen another replica during the Dead Sea exhibit in Milwaukee (twice), and also have it split up into pdfs on my computer (anyone can find these pdfs online if they really have a burning desire to look at them). I downloaded them during my increased interest in textual criticism, which hasn't quite fully gone away. 

There were some Greek papyri (below is a portion from Matt. 25:41-26:39) and the beginnings of an exhibit on the Christmas story.


The New Testament room had some artifacts showing life in the New Testament times; there was a model fishing boat, instruments from the era, and a model of the heel bone with a nail through it, showing conclusively that criminals were indeed nailed to crosses (somehow in doubt among critical scholars prior to this find). After I was seen taking pictures of the boat, an employee informed me that pictures were not allowed. Oh. Oops. Considering that I didn't see "no photography" signs anywhere in the museum, I dutifully obeyed and didn't take any more pictures, but didn't delete the ones I had taken. Actually, that's a lie...I did take more pictures, in the room on the third story. The cut-away of the temple was just too interesting to not take a picture of it. But next time...next time I won't take pictures.

(As a side note, I don't understand this prohibition on taking pictures. I don't mind it if they charge for permission to take pictures, as several churches or cathedrals do, but I see pictures as advertisement. I know that most people don't have blogs and won't put pictures up on them, but I'm doing that while advertising for these places, and I really do encourage my readers to visit the Bibelhaus, the Ikone Museum, and everywhere I go, even if I give less-than-stellar reviews of different parts of the places. If I don't like a place, I won't take pictures of it and won't talk about it.) 

So after that run-in about pictures, I was more cautious about looking for "no photography" signs. The Bibelhaus took almost no time at all to explore...it was so small and mostly tried to teach more about Christianity to those of the population who had little to no idea of what was in the Bible. For me, it really didn't have much to offer (I say this as a theology student, mind you); I was expecting a lot more artifacts and more papyri. Nonetheless, it was worth my time, and I'd encourage you to visit it.

The next museum that I visited was an Icon Museum. This was a fascinating museum, but also very small- basically just one room with an open balcony, filled with icons. I didn't know what to expect coming here; I guess I knew it would be small, because icons can be very expensive, and there's really not many of them. Plus, the Orthodox tend to actually use them by praying to/through them, so a museum is not a normal home for icons. Nonetheless, here are some of the most impressive ones. (No, I did not ask for permission to take these pictures, nor did I see signs prohibiting me.) This is also where the alternate title to my blog gets the "East" part, referring to Eastern Orthodoxy, that part of the church that excommunicated and was excommunicated by the Roman Catholic Church in the Great Schism. You'll see where I get the "West" part later. I had quite the time picking out which icons to show, but you can see the full collection here:  https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151214458918788.483894.500163787&type=1&l=29b50743c3

Something to help you read the icons: 

The Icon Museum was on the opposite side of the river to the city of Frankfurt; here is an absolutely beautiful photo of the city of Frankfurt from the opposite bank.

Before I crossed the river, there was a church near the bridge, so I decided to visit. It was the Three Kings Church, presumable EKD, but it was beautiful inside.

Finally I made my way across the river to the Römer District of Frankfurt; this is the old part of town, which was left in ruins after WWII. Nonetheless, everything was rebuilt with a mind toward restoration, so it has an old look to it (which is quite different from the modern "Neustadt," which is full of bustling commerce, bankers, and shopping. From here I mostly just wandered around, visiting places that looked interesting without really a plan toward anything. For if you remember, my only plans of the day were to see the Bibelhaus and Ikone Museum and a few churches, thinking that would take up my whole day. It was only 1pm by this time.

So the first thing after crossing the bridge that I noticed was a Historical Museum. It honestly didn't look very big at first sight, but I paid the entrance fee, took a map, and decided to see what it had to offer. At first there wasn't much; I could climb a tower that was original to Frankfurt and overlooked the river, and then see a room about the history and restoration of city. The tower held a display of the inner mechanics of a clock.

Before WWII: 

After WWII: 

The red is old (before the war), and the blue is what has been rebuilt since the war 

Another room held an exhibit about the third world countries involved in WWII (which I suppose is important if you're going to call it a "World" War). It wasn't as spectacular as you might think (I didn't take any pictures- see my above statement about my suggesting things to see), but I walked through it. Then, I explored the second wing, which had much more to offer than the map suggested. First, I went downstairs to the basement, which showed the foundations of an old tower built on this spot in the city wall. There was a model of what they think it looked like.

Next, as I went upstairs, probably 4-5 stories in total, there was exhibition after exhibition of various themes. This museum certainly wasn't like the Deutsches Historisches Museum, which went chronologically through history. This didn't have the space for that, but did have some nice exhibits, which focused more particularly on something in German culture or history. I enjoyed each one, and I'll summarize them here.

First: German literature and scientific work of the 19th Century. Fascinating stuff, especially since these fields of study were booming in this time of German unity. 

Next: Medieval Weaponry. You bet I took a lot of pictures here. :-) 

Coins and expensive things, which I tried to get a picture of both: 

China! (not the country...) Actually, it'd be more accurate to call this "porcelain."

Edit: After doing some research in the portion of the internet which is rhetorically abhorrent to me- Internet forums that feature rants by supposed experts over inanely stupid and pointless things, in this case being the difference between porcelain and china- I've found that I simply don't care anymore. China is porcelain is china, apparently. Tomato tomato, potato potato, my glass is empty either way.

Not far away was the center of the Altstadt, which was very beautiful and decorated neatly.

In this "Platz" was a church, the St. Nicolas' Church, and while it was small and probably not used much, it was beautiful.

Finally, I walked not too far away to the Cathedral (Frankfurter Dom). You can see it in the picture of Frankfurt's skyline, and it was quite a sight. I was very impressed with its restoration and accompanying museum. There was some construction or excavations in front of it; I couldn't exactly figure out what they were doing.

The first thing I did was climb the tower. It was probably taller than the Berliner Dom, which I also climbed, and it was certainly harder to climb- the passage was narrower, and we had to accomodate those coming down, none of whch needed to happen in the Berlin Cathedral, the way that it was set up. So it was a squeeze sometimes, and I got a kick out of some Spanish-speaking tourists counting the number of stairs on their way down. I realized that I haven't heard Spanish in quite a long time. 

Oberursel is that-a-ways -->

Walking down, I toured the cathedral itself, which took my breath away. I have yet to see Rome, but it's amazing how the Catholic Church can collect its funds and build such beautiful places of worship. Like almost every major building project in Frankfurt, red standstone from the nearby quarry was used in its construction. I saw the same thing in Mainz at the Cathedral there, and in many churches in the area.

And...here's the 1000th picture I've taken since leaving for Germany. 

After visiting the Cathedral, I went through the two-part museum nearby, and I got my fill of marvelous chasubles, thuribles, gilded crucifixes, and communion ware. The ornateness and cost of everything also stunned me. You can see a lot more here: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151214458918788.483894.500163787&type=1&l=29b50743c3

 

A rose chasuble? Think again...the sign said it was supposed to be scarlet, for the red Sundays. 

So, having seen the Dom and its museum, I wandered a little bit more around Frankfurt's Römerberg before returning to the seminary. There's a few more museums in Frankfurt that I want to see, but I'll leave those for another, colder day. 

Fall is a beautiful time to wander around Frankfurt. The red buildings really complement the changing of the leaves, and I enjoy a little bit of a nip in air. It can get a bit rainy and overcast here, so I have to pick which days I can take pictures outside. Obviously overcast is appreciated, but I can't take pictures in rain. There's a few other cities in the Frankfurt area that I'm probably going to visit and tell you about. As the time of writing this, I've already been to Herford, three hours north of here, to visit some good college friends. I'll update you on that and give you the pictures that I took. So for now, Tschüss!