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Most scholars identify Bethel with the modern-day village of Beitin, located in the West Bank, 5 kilometers (3.1 mi) northeast of Ramallah. [4] After the fall of the Crusader kingdom, Bethel was left in ruins under the rule of Saladin, remaining uninhabited for centuries until the mid-19th century when modern-day Beitin was established. [5]
According to Genesis, Abraham built an altar between Bethel and Ai. [2] In the Book of Joshua, chapters 7 and 8, the Israelites attempt to conquer Ai on two occasions. The first, in Joshua 7, fails. The biblical account portrays the failure as being due to a prior sin of Achan, for which he is stoned to death by the Israelites.
Beitin is identified with the ancient settlement of Bethel, and preserves its ancient name. [6] [5] [4] The site was first settled during the Chalcolithic period.Sherds from the Early, Intermediate, Middle and Late Bronze Age, as well as the Iron Age I and II, the Persian, Hellenistic, Roman, [8] the Byzantine [8] [9] and Crusader/Ayyubid periods have been found. [8]
However, even by the time of the prophetess Deborah, Bethel is described as being in the land of the Tribe of Ephraim. [23] Some twenty years after the breakup of the United Monarchy, Abijah, the second king of Kingdom of Judah, defeated Jeroboam of Israel and took back the towns of Bethel, Jeshanah and Ephron, with their surrounding villages. [24]
After the breakup of the united monarchy, Jerusalem continued as the capital of the southern Kingdom of Judah. The ownership of Bethel is also ambiguous. Though Joshua allocated Bethel to Benjamin, by the time of the prophetess Deborah, Bethel is described as being in the land of Ephraim .
The former kingdom of Judah then became the Babylonian province Yehud, with Gedaliah, a native Judahite, as governor (or possibly ruling as a puppet king). According to Miller and Hayes, the province included the towns of Bethel in the north, Mizpah, Jericho in the east, Jerusalem, Beth-Zur in the west and En-Gedi in the south. [18]
One he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan. And this thing became a sin; the people came to worship the one at Bethel and went as far as Dan to worship the other. His concern was that the tendency to offer sacrifices in Jerusalem, which is in the southern Kingdom of Judah, would lead to a return to King Rehoboam.
The term Bethel or Beth-El appears in the Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament, but opinions differ as to whether these references are to a god or to a place.. Porten suspects that the Bethel mentioned in the Book of Jeremiah at chapter 48, verse 13 is a reference to the god Bethel, rather than the city named Bethel. [6]