Bethmaus, ( gr, Βηθμαούς) or Beth Maʿon (), also called Maon, was a Jewish village during the late
Second Temple
The Second Temple (, , ), later known as Herod's Temple, was the reconstructed Temple in Jerusalem between and 70 CE. It replaced Solomon's Temple, which had been built at the same location in the United Kingdom of Israel before being inherited ...
and
Mishnaic
The Mishnah or the Mishna (; he, מִשְׁנָה, "study by repetition", from the verb ''shanah'' , or "to study and review", also "secondary") is the first major written collection of the Jewish oral traditions which is known as the Oral Torah ...
periods, and which was already a ruin (''Tell Maʿūn'') when
Kitchener visited the site in 1877. It was situated upon the hill, directly north-west of the old city of Tiberias, at a distance of one
biblical mile
Biblical mile () is a unit of distance on land, or linear measure, principally used by Jews during the Herodian dynasty to ascertain distances between cities and to mark the Sabbath limit, equivalent to about ⅔ of an English statute mile, or wh ...
, rising to an elevation of above sea-level. It is now incorporated within the modern city bounds of Upper
Tiberias
Tiberias ( ; he, טְבֶרְיָה, ; ar, طبريا, Ṭabariyyā) is an Israeli city on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. A major Jewish center during Late Antiquity, it has been considered since the 16th century one of Judaism's Fo ...
.
The
Midrash
''Midrash'' (;["midrash"]
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. he, מִדְרָשׁ; ...
(''Genesis Rabba'' § 85:7) says of the village, "Beth Maʿon, they ascend to it from Tiberias, but they go down to it from Kefar Shobtai." The
Jerusalem Talmud
The Jerusalem Talmud ( he, תַּלְמוּד יְרוּשַׁלְמִי, translit=Talmud Yerushalmi, often for short), also known as the Palestinian Talmud or Talmud of the Land of Israel, is a collection of rabbinic notes on the second-century ...
, citing a variant account, says that they would go down to Beth Maʿon from its broad place.
History
Based on the potsherds found ''in situ'', the place was inhabited as early as the
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a historic period, lasting approximately from 3300 BC to 1200 BC, characterized by the use of bronze, the presence of writing in some areas, and other early features of urban civilization. The Bronze Age is the second pri ...
and
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...
.
Josephus
Flavius Josephus (; grc-gre, Ἰώσηπος, ; 37 – 100) was a first-century Romano-Jewish historian and military leader, best known for ''The Jewish War'', who was born in Jerusalem—then part of Roman Judea—to a father of priestly d ...
, the Jewish general turned historian, mentions that when he was put in charge of the public affairs of
Galilee
Galilee (; he, הַגָּלִיל, hagGālīl; ar, الجليل, al-jalīl) is a region located in northern Israel and southern Lebanon. Galilee traditionally refers to the mountainous part, divided into Upper Galilee (, ; , ) and Lower Galil ...
by the people of Jerusalem during the war with Rome, he moved with two of his fellow-legates who were
priests of Aaron's lineage from
Sepphoris
Sepphoris (; grc, Σέπφωρις, Séphōris), called Tzipori in Hebrew ( he, צִפּוֹרִי, Tzipori),Palmer (1881), p115/ref> and known in Arabic as Saffuriya ( ar, صفورية, Ṣaffūriya) since the 7th century, is an archaeolog ...
to the village ''Bethmaus'' (henceforth: Beth Maʿon), a village situated four furlongs (
stadia
Stadia may refer to:
* One of the plurals of stadium, along with "stadiums"
* The plural of stadion, an ancient Greek unit of distance, which equals to 600 Greek feet (''podes'').
* Stadia (Caria), a town of ancient Caria, now in Turkey
* Stadi ...
) distant from Tiberias. It was at Beth Maʿon that Josephus met
Justus of Tiberias Justus of Tiberias (Tiberias, ca. 35 AD - Galilee, ca 100 AD) was a 1st century Jewish author and historiographer. All that we know of his life comes from the ''Vita'' which Flavius Josephus apparently wrote in response to the assertions made by Ju ...
. There, they convened a meeting with the principal persons of Tiberias, to discuss a plan to demolish a house built by
Herod the Tetrarch in Tiberias, and which had the figures of living creatures in it (contrary to Jewish law), but to restore the royal furniture of that house, consisting of
candlesticks
A candlestick is a device used to hold a candle in place. Candlesticks have a cup or a spike ("pricket") or both to keep the candle in place. Candlesticks are less frequently called "candleholders".
Before the proliferation of electricity, candl ...
made of Corinthian brass, and of royal tables, and of a great quantity of uncoined silver, to the king. However, when Josephus took leave of Beth Maʿon and went into Upper Galilee, before Josephus and the senate of Tiberias could carry out their schemes, certain mariners and poor people of Galilee had plundered the house built by Herod of its effects, and taken away the spoils.
In the early 2nd-century CE, following the
Bar Kokhba revolt
The Bar Kokhba revolt ( he, , links=yes, ''Mereḏ Bar Kōḵḇāʾ''), or the 'Jewish Expedition' as the Romans named it ( la, Expeditio Judaica), was a rebellion by the Jews of the Judea (Roman province), Roman province of Judea, led b ...
, Beth Maʿon became the residence of one of the priestly clans known as ''Ḥuppah''. Around this time, representatives of the twenty-four
priestly wards moved and settled in the Galilee. In the 20th-century, three stone inscriptions were discovered bearing the names of the priestly wards, their order and the name of the locality to which they had moved after the destruction of the Second Temple: In 1920, a stone inscription was found in
Ashkelon
Ashkelon or Ashqelon (; Hebrew: , , ; Philistine: ), also known as Ascalon (; Ancient Greek: , ; Arabic: , ), is a coastal city in the Southern District of Israel on the Mediterranean coast, south of Tel Aviv, and north of the border with ...
showing a partial list of the priestly wards; in 1962 three small fragments of one Hebrew stone inscription bearing the partial names of places associated with the priestly courses (the rest of which had been reconstructed) were found in
Caesarea Maritima
Caesarea Maritima (; Greek: ''Parálios Kaisáreia''), formerly Strato's Tower, also known as Caesarea Palestinae, was an ancient city in the Sharon plain on the coast of the Mediterranean, now in ruins and included in an Israeli national park ...
, dated to the third-fourth centuries; in 1970 a stone inscription was found on a partially buried column in a mosque, in the Yemeni village of
Bayt al-Ḥaḍir, showing ten names of the priestly wards and their respective towns and villages. The Yemeni inscription is the longest roster of names of this sort ever discovered unto this day, and mentions the priestly course in Beth Maʿon. The seventh-century poet,
Eleazar ben Killir
Eleazar ben Kalir, also known as Eleazar HaKalir, Eleazar ben Killir or Eleazar Kalir (c. 570c. 640) was a Byzantine Jew and a Hebrew poet whose classical liturgical verses, known as '' piyut'', have continued to be sung through the centuries dur ...
, echoing the same tradition, also wrote a liturgical poem detailing the 24-priestly wards and their places of residence.
In the 3rd-century CE,
Rabbi Yohanan
:''See Johanan (name) for more rabbis by this name''.
Johanan bar Nappaha ( he, יוחנן בר נפחא Yoḥanan bar Nafḥa; alt. sp. Napaḥa) (also known simply as Rabbi Yochanan, or as Johanan bar Nafcha) (lived 180-279 CE) was a leading r ...
officiated in the synagogue of Maon and was called to render a decision in the case of a ritual slaughterer (''
shochet'') who had improperly slaughtered a chicken and whether or not he was to be held liable on that account.
In extant Turkish documents dating to May 1566, the Ottoman ruler, Sultan
Suleiman the Magnificent
Suleiman I ( ota, سليمان اول, Süleyman-ı Evvel; tr, I. Süleyman; 6 November 14946 September 1566), commonly known as Suleiman the Magnificent in the West and Suleiman the Lawgiver ( ota, قانونى سلطان سليمان, Ḳ ...
, ordered that water be drawn from Beth Maʿon and brought to Tiberias,
[Heyd, U. (1966), p. 199] the purpose of which is not now known, although thought to have been for agricultural crops. By April 1566, when the work had not yet been completed and the workers (under
Don Joseph Nasi) demanded more money from the Sultan to complete the project, the Sultan refused to set aside more money for the project. Below Beth Maʿon, between the ruins of the ancient village and Tiberias, are found two natural springs.
References
Bibliography
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External links
* Survey of Western Palestine, Map 6
IAA Wikimedia commons
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Bethmaus
Geography of Israel
Ancient Jewish settlements of Galilee
Galilee
Geography of Palestine (region)
Talmud places