Mount Gilboa: Where King Saul died

And now we've come to Mount Gilboa, where Saul, Israel's first king, and his sons died. 

Or rather, the view from this mountain. It's likely Saul and his sons were killed closer to the base of it. And then, of course, their headless bodies were carried back to Beit She'an and hung from the city gates (of the town on top of the tel).

Do you remember why this mountain is barren?

In 2 Samuel 1, David cursed it for being the place where Israel's first king died. More than 3 millennia later, except for a patch where the Jewish National Fund planted some trees, the mountain is still bare.

Now, it's a place for people to come and hang out, picnic, and even hang glide over the Jezreel Valley. There are kibbutzim at the base of it, and hiking trails up to the place called "Saul's Shoulder".

WOW! Definitely a surreal place to visit in the Jezreel Valley.

King Saul's last battle: the view from Ahab and Jezebel's back porch

I’m actually not sure if there is anything cooler that looking out over the Jezreel Valley while your guide reads from the Bible and says, “So, Saul’s men were camped there at the trees” (bottom right of the below photo)

“and the Philistines were near there” (the town on the left edge) “and then Saul went to the witch of Ein Dor over there” (not pictured) “who foretold his defeat and death.

When Saul and his sons retreated in battle to Mount Gilboa” (the barren mountain below),

they died (Saul fell on his sword)… and then their headless bodies were taken back to Beit She’an, which you visited before lunch!”

😂

Oh, and all of this was told to me while we were sitting from the back porch of Ahab and Jezebel's winter palace in the Jezreel Valley. 😱

I don't really have pictures of the ruins, because they are all covered up and dangerous to wade through. They were behind me, but because of the rise of the mountain, I couldn't really see anything. Apparently, there's nothing there to really see, as it was never built back up into a park.

Just this amazing view, and the ability to see exactly the last battle of Israel's first king.

Oh, and do you remember why Mount Gilboa is barren? 

Where Gideon's men drank from the spring

There's nothing like a cool drink on a hot day!

Unless you're Gideon, and the way your army of 10,000 men drank from the spring means that all but 300 of them have to go home. 

Gideon was nervous about going to battle against the joined forces of the Midianites, Amalekites, and other eastern armies (120,000 soldiers), and he wanted as many men in his army as possible. Completely understandable. 

(the view from the opposite mountain)

But God wanted to show that He was the victor.

So he whittled down Gideon's army bit by bit, until this final test, here, at Ein Harod (not Herod).

This is the actual place where Gideon's men drank (Judges 6-8). The water comes up from the cave. While a fence blocks the entrance of humans, you can see where it comes out. 

The water is so clear that you can see the bottom.

Today, this place is a national park where people can come and play in the springs, camp, and enjoy the beauty of the Jezreel Valley.

Gideon's army would have camped on top of the mountain and came down to drink at the spring.

After visiting this site, I watched Sergio and Rhoda's video about this place. At the end, they point out something really cool: the water in this spring comes an underground water resevoir underneath the ancient cities of Nablus and Jenin in the West Bank. Gideon's hometown of Ophrah (not Oprah, haha) is in the same area.

They also found a photo of this place from over a 100 years ago, and it gives a better idea of how 10,000 men could have gathered and drank from here:

They also noted the lack of trees in the photo... so all of the ones present in today's time (photo above) have grown in the last century. WOW!

And, in case you were wondering... no, I didn't drink from the springs, haha. :)

Beit She'an: Trapped in Time

Beit She’an is one of those places that I knew was cool when I visited in 2017, but was unable to fully grasp just how incredible it was. I think I was on overload at the time.

So when I went back, I got to be amazed all over again!

One of the 2 cities of the Decapolis as mentioned in the NT that is in Israel (the other being Susita in the Galilee), Beit She’an was a thriving Roman city during Jesus’ day. It was built at the foot of a tel dating back millennia- the same place where the Philistines hung the headless bodies of King Saul and his sons over the walls (1 Samuel 31:8-13). From a theater to a bathhouse and public toilets, this place had it all.

The bathhouse:

View from the main street (cardo):

The cardo, or the main street going through the center of town:

The statues here show at least 1 thing this city was known for...

Until 749 AD, when a massive earthquake shook the entire region- the largest in recorded history. All this splendor fell down and cracked open, stately columns rolling this way and that until they finally stopped laid in testament to the tectonic game of pick-up sticks the earth played on that fateful day. When the city was found and excavated, coins dating to 749 AD were found, marking the exact date of destruction almost as well as a stopped clock.

These columns are massive... grown men can't wrap their arms around them.

Once again, I went up to the top of the tel. The view was stunning!

On a clear day, you can see all the way into Jordan from the other side:

At the top of the tel lie more ruins, this time of the Philistine village. But, they dug deeper and even found the governor’s house from when the Egyptians controlled the area! That’s MILENNIA ago!

WOW! If you ever get a chance to visit Beit She'an, I highly recommend it! The magnitude of it is overwhelming.