In the conformation of the Judean hills the secret of the immense vitality of the Jewish nationality is probably to be found. Had the capital of Judea been placed at Cæsarea, on the high-road from Greece to Egypt—had it even been permanently fixed at Shechem, accessible through the open valley of Samaria, it cannot be doubted that Greek or Egyptian influence would have affected far more the manners and religion of the Jews. Remote and inaccessible in its rugged mountains, Jerusalem was removed from the highway by which the hosts of the Pharaohs advanced on Assyria. It could only be reached by one of three difficult passes, unless the whole country of Samaria were in the hands of the enemy. Hence in the mountains of Judea the national faith had a secure home. The Philistines overran the plains and even came up into the Shephelah; Egyptian and Assyrian monarchs conquered Samaria and Galilee, but a small band of undisciplined peasants was able, under the Maccabees, to hold at bay the armies of the Seleucidæ, and it required the fullest efforts of Roman energy and discipline to compass the destruction of Jerusalem under Titus or under Hadrian. The history again repeats itself in Crusading times. The Judean hills resisted long after all other parts of the country had been lost, and Saladin held Jerusalem undisturbed while Richard overran the plains.
The same natural conformation renders the construction of a railway to Jerusalem an engineering project of no little difficulty. Within the distance of a few miles the hills rise suddenly from the level of the Shephelah towards the narrow plateau, 2500 feet above the sea, on which the city stands; the ascent is rough and steep, and the valleys very deep, with rugged stony sides, and ledges of hard grey rock, thickly covered with shrubs, principally lentisks and arbutus, while here and there terraces have been artificially built up with dry stone walls for the cultivation of the olive.
Near the Gate of the Valley there is a little ruined Mukâm or “station” sacred to the famous Imâm ’Aly, to whom the deeds of Samson and Joshua are commonly accredited by the peasantry. It is conspicuous from the fine group of aged terebinths which shade the little mihrab or prayer niche. Ascending thence past the ancient village of Sarîs, we reached at length the hill above the modern Kuriet el ’Anab, a place which calls for more special description.
Kuriet el ’Anab, or the “town of grapes,” is generally called Kurieh only by the peasantry, and this suggests its identity with Kirjath of Benjamin, in the territory of which tribe the village appears to lie. It was supposed in the early Christian times to be the site of Kirjath Jearim, the “town of forests,” but this appears to be an unsatisfactory identification for several reasons. The place seems scarcely on the line of the boundary of Judah, as Kirjath Jearim was; it is not a hill with a “high” place, as we should gather Kirjath Jearim to have been from the account of the hill where the ark was kept; and lastly, the important part of the name bears no reference to the ancient title, derived from some mountain covered with thick wild growth which does not exist near the village.
The Crusaders fixed upon Kuriet el ’Anab as being the ancient Anathoth, their reasons being as usual very difficult to understand. They erected a magnificent church over a spring in the valley north of the village, dedicated to Saint Jeremiah of Anathoth, and this structure remains almost intact. On its walls the dim shadows of former frescoed paintings can be traced, and over these the names of pilgrims rudely scrawled like those of the modern tourists. The church is peculiar from the careless manner in which it has been constructed, the walls not being at right angles; thus the east wall is two and a half feet longer than the west, as we found in making the plan.
The village itself consists of stone houses of better appearance than those in the plain, surrounded by beautiful vineyards, the vines trailing over the stone walls like a green cataract flowing to the valley. The place, which derives its name from these vineyards, was once the seat of the famous native family of Abu Ghôsh. The most notorious of its chiefs, a robber, who held all pilgrims to the capital in terror, was killed by the Egyptian Government, pursuing its usual policy of exterminating the great native families; since death he has been canonised, and a Mukâm erected to him near the village. At Easter, the children of the place (which is often called Abu Ghôsh after the family) are to be seen seated along the road offering water in spouted bottles to the pilgrims. This charitable custom is rare in Palestine, though occasionally in use on some of the other pilgrim routes.
The next ascent brought us in sight of a very remarkable village on the right, now called Sôba. It is separated from the ridge on which the road runs by the deep and impassable valley which, for the greater part of its length, forms the northern boundary of Judah. The place struck me much at the time—a high conical hill crowned by a village surrounded by steep rocky ledges with thick growth of wild shrubs mingled with olives. I had afterwards occasion to visit it, and found it to be undoubtedly an ancient site. Not only are there traces of a Crusading fortress, which was called Belmont, but also many ancient Jewish sepulchres cut in rock. The peasantry say it was the palace of the Sultan of the Fenish, and that his daughter lived at a certain ruined convent near the road, which we saw surrounded with ancient trees—the wilderness formed from its original garden.
Since the telegraph line has been laid to Jerusalem, this tradition has been supplemented with the detail that the Fenish had a telegraphic wire from the hill palace to that in the valley. Another favourite abode of the daughter was not far from Latrûn. Again at Beit Jibrîn and at Keratîya we found a cavern, a garden, and a castle of the Fenish; and the fact that this tradition is confined to the district south of the Jerusalem road and on the edge of the hills, leads one to suspect that the Fenish were no other than the Felish or Philistines, for the peasantry almost invariably change their L’s into N’s in this manner.
But to return to Sôba. This fine site, standing out black against the sky, with its grand ravine and wild copses, is evidently an important spot; yet the name Sôba does not recall any Scriptural place, though not far different from the Hebrew Zuph where Saul met Samuel. In modern Arabic it means “a heap,” such as the grain-heaps of the threshing-floors, a title which applies well to the shape of the hill, but probably this is a corruption of some older word.
Sôba also was at one time honoured, like Latrûn, as the ancient Modin, the true site of which was however known to Saint Jerome, east of Lydda, where El Medieh is now found. The distance of El Medieh from Jerusalem is close on that given in the Talmud for Modin, although the tomb supposed by M. Guérin to have been that of the Hasmoneans proves to be of Christian origin.