The Dead Sea. Bethlehem. The Sea of Galilee. Jericho. Babylon. Cairo. These are but a few of the places visited by these courageous writers in the Travels through the Bible Lands Collection (15 Vols.). During the turn of the nineteenth century, traveling to and across the Holy Land was a dangerous and arduous journey for a Westerner. These diverse explorers–missionaries, writers, cartographers, theologians, ethnographers, diplomats, archeologists–risk the danger to trek the deserts between Egypt and Turkey, survey the caves of the Dead Sea, dig in the dirt of Babylon, fight disease in Beirut, spread the gospel in Turkey, and stand in awe of the pyramids of Egypt.

Newly ordained at age twenty-five, Henry Jessup made a life changing decision to join the foreign-missionary service of the Presbyterian Church. For fifty-three years Jessup was a missionary in Syria, and the incredible story is recounted in this two-volume autobiography. Spreading the Gospel through famine, drought, war, hostile governments, and sometimes primitive living conditions, Jessup’s life and adventures in Syria are unforgettable. Volume one covers his work on translating the Bible into Arabic, his founding of the Syrian Protestant College, and his recalling of the Syrian Massacre that he witnessed in the summer of 1860.