The Eshtemoa Synagogue, located 15 km south of

Hebron Hebron ( ar, الخليل or ; he, חֶבְרוֹן ) is a Palestinian. city in the southern West Bank, south of Jerusalem. Nestled in the Judaean Mountains, it lies above sea level. The second-largest city in the West Bank (after Eas ...

in as-Samu,

West Bank The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...

, refers to the remains of an ancient

Jewish synagogue A synagogue, ', 'house of assembly', or ', "house of prayer"; Yiddish: ''shul'', Ladino: or ' (from synagogue); or ', "community". sometimes referred to as shul, and interchangeably used with the word temple, is a Jewish house of worsh ...

dating from around the 4th–5th century CE.

History

Eshtemoa, identified as modern as-Samu, was an ancient city named in the Bible (). During

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: * Rome, the capital city of Italy * Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lett ...

and

Byzantine period The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

, Eshtemoa was described as a large

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

village. 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 ...

(''Nedarim'' 6:10 - Leiden Ms.) recalls a man who lived there, named Ḥasa of Eshtemoa.

Description of synagogue

The remains of the synagogue were identified by L. A. Mayer and A. Reifenberg in 1934, in which site they describe a recess in the wall, once used as a

Torah Ark A Torah ark (also known as the ''Heikhal'', or the ''Aron Kodesh'') refers to an ornamental chamber in the synagogue that houses the Torah scrolls. History The ark, also known as the ''ark of law'', or in Hebrew the ''Aron Kodesh'' or ''aron ha- ...

("Heikhal"). In 1969–70, a full excavation of the site under the guidance of Ze'ev Yeivin revealed that the building occupied the most prominent site in the village. Ancillary buildings attached to the synagogue were removed in order to reveal the old structure. The old synagogue was built in "broadhouse" style without columns and measured by . Entry was by any of three doors along its eastern side and one of the three niches recessed into the northern wall functioned as the Torah Ark. The building housed a mosaic floor and displayed external ornamental carvings. Four seven-branched '' menorahs'' were discovered carved onto door lintels and one of them is displayed in Jerusalem's

Rockefeller Museum The Rockefeller Archeological Museum, formerly the Palestine Archaeological Museum ("PAM"; 1938–1967), and which before then housed The Imperial Museum of Antiquities (''Müze-i Hümayun''; 1901–1917), is an archaeology museum located in East ...

. Along the northern and southern walls of the synagogue were built two benches, one on top of the other, of which only remnants remain. After the Muslim conquest, the synagogue was converted into a mosque and a ''

mihrab Mihrab ( ar, محراب, ', pl. ') is a niche in the wall of a mosque that indicates the ''qibla'', the direction of the Kaaba in Mecca towards which Muslims should face when praying. The wall in which a ''mihrab'' appears is thus the "qibla ...

'' was added. The ''mihrab'' was built in place of the bench that ran along its southern wall. According to a local tradition, this addition was made during the conquest of Salah a-Din, rather than during the early Muslim conquest of the Levant. The western wall is still standing to a height of . Many architectural elements of the building have been reused in the modern village.Raphael Greenberg, Adi Keinan
Israeli Archaeological Activity in the West Bank 1967-2007: A Sourcebook
Ostracon 2009. pg. 136. . Near the eastern flank of the synagogue there was built a Crusader church in the 12th-century.

References

{{commons category, Eshtemoa old synagogue Eshtemoa Archaeological sites in the West Bank Eshtemoa Mosques converted from synagogues 4th-century establishments in the Byzantine Empire Biblical cities Talmud places he:א-סמוע