BET SHEARIM

MY ISRAEL:

BET SHEARIM - The Jewish Necropolis.

Located 20 kilometers SW of Haifa on the border between the Jezreel valley and the Lower Galilee. BET SHEARIM featured prominently between the 2nd century C.E & 4th century C.E.

The city rose in importance after the Jewish revolt against Roman domination known as the Bar Kochba revolt. (132 C.E. - 135 C.E.). With the defeat of the Jewish uprising, Hadrian (117 C.E. – 138 C.E) the Roman emperor of the period, banished the Jews from Jerusalem & forbade Jewish burials on the Mount of Olives and other locations in the Jerusalem area.

Additionally Hadrian renamed Judea to Palestine to sever the Jewish connection to the land. I do however feel compelled to labor this point, as it was the Romans & not the Arabs who renamed Judea to Palestine. Further proof of this is evidenced by the fact that there is no letter “P” in Arabic. Israel’s adversaries apply this renaming technique to Judea & Samaria by renaming the area the “west bank” thereby negating the historical facts in order to sever the Jewish connection to the land.

The decrees issued by Hadrian forced the Jewish masses to relocate to the northern part of the country. The mass migrations resulted in BET SHEARIM replacing Jerusalem as the central burial site for both local and diaspora Jewry.

These migrations included the Sanhedrin, an assembly of 71 elders known as rabbis appointed to sit as a tribunal in every city. It was primarily a religious legislative body with certain political & judicial functions. After the destruction of the 2nd Temple in 70 C.E, the Sanhedrin was reestablished in Yavne, a city located to the south of Jaffa. From Yavne it moved northwards to the Western Galilee, first to the city of Usha & then to the city of Shefaram. The Sanhedrin then moved to BET SHEARIM, located on border between the Jezreel valley and the Lower Galilee & later to Tsippori in the Central Galilee, finally ending up in Tiberius on the shores of the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee).

The most important personage of the Sanhedrin during the BET SHEARIM & Tsippori locations was undoubtedly Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi (135 C.E. - 217 C.E.). He foresaw that the Jewish exile could result in the Oral law being forgotten, which until this point was handed down by word of mouth. Whilst in BET SHEARIM he began to gather all the laws and write them down in the Mishna.(a collection of the Jewish oral traditions known as the Oral Torah). Due to health reasons, Rabbi Yehudah ha-Nasi later moved to Tsippori were he spent 17 years of his life & continued compiling the Mishna. Yehuda HaNasi died in 217 C.E. & buried in BET SHEARIM, as were his two sons Gamaliel & Shimon.

THE JEWISH NECROPOLIS:

In 1936, a man by the name of Alexander Zaid discovered a "new" catacomb in BET SHEARIM. To date 21 catacombs have since been discovered. Catacombs are underground cemeteries made up of halls and passages, which contain wall recesses called loculi & house sarcophagi, which are stone coffins adorned with relief sculptures and inscriptions. The sarcophagi are hewn from Lapis Asius, a type of limestone able to consume the flesh of corpses. Most of the remains date from the 2ndto the 4th century C.E. Inscriptions are engraved in Greek, Hebrew & Aramaic & reveal that its former “residents” hailed from Bet Shearim, the Galilee, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq & Yemen.

NOTE TO COHANIM: The Asra Kadisha (The Committee for the Preservation of Gravesites) have been involved with the site since 1959 and as far as I am aware have removed all remains.

The city underwent a turbulent period at the start of the Byzantine period (324 C.E. – 640 C.E.). The Jews revolted in 352 C.E. against the rule of Gallus, the brother-in-law of the eastern Roman emperor of the period, namely Constantine 2. Gallus fiercely suppressed the revolt, which resulted in the partial destruction of the city. The Galilee earthquake of 363 C.E. did not help matters either & the city was reduced to a small village.

Besides the discovery of oil lamps and a glassmaking facility from the early Islamic period (640 C.E. – 1099 C.E.) no relevant finds from later periods have thus far been unearthed. During the Ottoman period (1516 – 1917) the Turks decimated the resident oak tree forests to build the railway line & sold the land which included 24 Arab villages to the Sursak family, a Greek Orthodox Christian family who resided in Lebanon. The Sursak family in turn sold the land to the Jewish National Fund (J.N.F.) during the British Mandate period (1917-1948). The sale included lands from the Arab villages of Harithiya, Sheikh Abreik and Harbaj. 59 Arab tenants from the three villages were evicted & paid 3,314 pounds in compensation.

Besides the previously mentioned catacombs, the site is home to the remains of a synagogue, a basilica, an olive oil press, cisterns & other archaeological building remains.

On the summit of the BET SHEARIM hilltop sits a bronze statue of Alexander Zaid mounted on a horse overlooking the Jezreel valley. Alexander Zaid was one of the founders of the Bar Giora defense group, a Jewish self-defense organization founded in 1907 whose aim was the settling & guarding of the land against Arab attackers. In 1938 he was ambushed & murdered by the local Arabs.

Ron Traub (Tour Guide & Architect). Website: rontraub-tours.com Photo’s: Rimonah Traub.