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Bethsaida
Julias
A city east of the Jordan River, in a
“desert place” (that is, uncultivated ground used for grazing)
possibly the site at which Jesus miraculously fed
the multitude with five loaves and two fish (Mark 6:32; Luke 9:10).
It may be possible to identify this site with the village of
Bethsaida in Lower Gaulanitis which the tetrarch Herod Philip I
raised to the rank of a polis in the year 30/31, and renamed it
Julias, in honor of Livia, the wife of
Augustus. It lay near the place where the Jordan enters the Sea of
Gennesaret (Ant., XVIII, ii, 1; BJ, II, ix, 1; III, x, 7; Vita,
72). This city was most likely located at et-Tell, a ruined site on
the east side of the Jordan on rising ground, 2 km from the sea.
This distance poses a problem however. Why would a fishing village
be so far from the water? During Biblical times the water level of
the Sea of Galilee was higher and came up to the base of et-Tell. A
combination of three hypothesises can explain this:-
- Tectonic rifting has uplifted et-Tell ( the site is located on
the Great African-Syrian Rift fault)
- the water level has dropped from increased population usage,
land irrigation, and
- the Jordan delta has been extended by sedimentation.
Dissenters suggest two other sites as possible locations for
Bethsaida: el-Araj and El-Mesydiah. Both of these sites are located
on the present shoreline, however, preliminary excavations have
revealed only a small number of ruins not dating from before the
Byzantine Period. Schumacher is however inclined to favor
el-Mes‛adīyeh (a ruin and winter village of Arab et-Tellawīyeh)
which stands on an artificial mound about a mile and a half from
the mouth of the Jordan. However, the name is in origin radically
different from Bethsaida. The substitution of sin for cad is easy;
but the insertion of the guttural ‛ain is impossible. No trace of
the name Bethsaida has been found in the district; but any one of
the sites named would meet the requirements. To this neighborhood
Jesus retired by boat with His disciples to rest a while. The
multitude following on foot along the northern shore of the lake
would cross the Jordan by the ford at its mouth which is used by
foot travelers to this day. The “desert” of the narrative is just
the barrīyeh of the Arabs where the animals are driven out for
pasture. The “green grass” of Mark 6:39, and the “much grass” of
John 6:10, point to some place in the plain of el-Baṭeiḥah, on the
rich soil of which the grass is green and plentiful compared with
the scanty herbage on the higher slopes.
Bethsaida
of Galilee
Here dwelt Philip, Andrew, Peter (John 1:44;
John 12:21), and perhaps also James and John. The house of Andrew
and Peter seems to have been not far from the synagogue in
Capernaum (Matthew
8:14; Mark 1:29, etc.). Unless they had moved their residence from
Bethsaida to Capernaum, of which there is no record, and which for
fishermen was unlikely, Bethsaida must have lain close to
Capernaum. It may have been the fishing town adjoining the larger
city. As in the case of the other Bethsaida, no name has been
recovered to guide us to the site. On the rocky promontory,
however, east of Khān Minyeh we find Sheikh ‛Aly eṣ-Ṣaiyādīn,
“Sheikh Aly of the Fishermen,” as the name of a ruined weley, in
which the second element in the name Bethsaida is represented (see
also Al Minya). Nearby is the site at ‛Ain et-Ṭābigha, which many
have identified with Bethsaida of Galilee. The warm water from
copious springs runs into a little bay of the sea in which fishes
congregate in great numbers. This has therefore always been a
favorite haunt of fishermen. If Capernaum were at Khān Minyeh, then
the two lay close together. The names of many ancient places have
been lost, and others have strayed from their original localities.
The absence of any name resembling Bethsaida need not concern us.
Bethsaida was the birth place of Saint Peter.
Were there two
Bethsaidas?
Many scholars maintain that all the New Testament references to
Bethsaida apply to one place, namely, Bethsaida Julias. The
arguments for and against this view may be summarized as
follows:
-
Galilee ran right round
the lake, including most of the level coastland on the east. Thus
Gamala, on the eastern
shore, was within the jurisdiction of Josephus, who commanded in
Galilee (BJ, II, xx, 4). Judas of Gamala (Ant., XVIII, i, l) is
also called Judas of Galilee (ibid., i, 6). If Gamala, far down the
eastern shore of the sea, were in Galilee, a fortiori Bethsaida, a
town which lay on the very edge of the Jordan, may be described as
in Galilee.
- But Josephus makes it plain that Gamala, while added to his
jurisdiction, was not in Galilee, but in Gaulanitis (BJ, II, xx,
6). Even if Judas were born in Gamala, and so might properly be
called a Gaulanite, he may, like others, have come to be known as
belonging to the province in which his active life was spent.
“Jesus of Nazareth” was born in
Bethlehem. Then
Josephus explicitly says that Bethsaida was in Lower Gaulanitis
(BJ, II, ix, 1). Further, Luke places the country of the Gerasenes
on the other side of the sea from Galilee (Luke 8:26) - antípera
tḗs Galilaias (“over against Galilee”).
- To go to the other side - eis tó péran (Mark 6:45) - does not
of necessity imply passing from the east to the west coast of the
lake, since Josephus uses the verb diaperaióō of a passage from
Tiberias to
Tarichaeae (Vita, 59). But
- this involved a passage from a point on the west to a point on
the south shore, “crossing over” two considerable bays; whereas if
the boat started from any point in el-Baṭeiḥah, to which we seem to
be limited by the “much grass,” and by the definition of the
district as belonging to Bethsaida, to sail to et-Tell, it was a
matter of coasting not more than a couple of miles, with no bay to
cross.
- No case can be cited where the phrase eis to peran
certainly means anything else than “to the other side.”
- Mark says that the boat started to go unto the other side to
Bethsaida, while John, gives the direction “over the sea unto
Capernaum” (Mark 6:17). The two towns were therefore practically in
the same line. Now there is no question that Capernaum was on “the
other side,” nor is there any suggestion that the boat was driven
out of its course; and it is quite obvious that, sailing toward
Capernaum, whether at Tell Ḥūm or at Khān Minyeh, it would never
reach Bethsaida Julius.
- The present writer is familiar with these waters in both storm
and calm. If the boat was taken from any point in el-Baṭeiḥah
towards et-Tell, no east wind would have distressed the rowers,
protected as that part is by the mountains. Therefore it was no
contrary wind that carried them toward Capernaum and the “land of
Gennesaret.” On the other hand, with a wind from the west, such as
is often experienced, eight or nine hours might easily be occupied
in covering the four or five miles (8 km) from el-Baṭeiḥah to the
neighborhood of Capernaum.
- The words of Mark (Mark 6:45), it is suggested, have been too
strictly interpreted: as the Gospel was written probably at Rome,
its author being a native, not of Galilee, but of Jerusalem. Want
of precision on topographical points, therefore, need not surprise
us. But as we have seen above, the “want of precision” must also be
attributed to the writer of John 6:17. The agreement of these two
favors the strict interpretation. Further, if the Gospel of Mark
embodies the recollections of Peter, it would be difficult to find
a more reliable authority for topographical details connected with
the sea on which his fisher life was spent.
- In support of the single-city theory it is further argued that
- Jesus withdrew to Bethsaida as being in the jurisdiction of
Philip, when he heard of the murder of John the Baptist by Antipas,
and would not have sought again the territories of the latter so
soon after leaving them.
- Medieval works of travel notice only one Bethsaida.
- The east coast of the sea was definitely attached to Galilee in
AD 84, and Ptolemy (circa 140) places Julius in Galilee. It is
therefore significant that only the Fourth Gospel speaks of
“Bethsaida of Galilee.”
- There could hardly have been two Bethsaidas so close
together.
- But:
- It is not said that Jesus came hither that he might leave the
territory of Antipas for that of Philip; and in view of Mark 6:30,
and Luke 9:10, the inference from Matthew 14:13 that he did so, is
not warranted.
- The Bethsaida of medieval writers was evidently on the west of
the Jordan River. If it lay on the east, it is inconceivable that
none of them should have mentioned the river in this
connection.
- If the 4th Gospel was not written until well into the 2nd
century, then the apostle was not the author; but this is a very
precarious assumption. John, writing after AD 84, would hardly have
used the phrase “Bethsaida of Galilee” of a place only recently
attached to that province, writing, as he was, at a distance from
the scene, and recalling the former familiar conditions.
- In view of the frequent repetition of names in Palestine the
nearness of the two Bethsaidas raises no difficulty. The abundance
of fish at each place furnished a good reason for the recurrence of
the name.
Notes
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