Tent Work in Palestine: A Record of Discovery and Adventure

by C. R. Conder

The Bedawîn of the district have a well-known tradition regarding the site of Jiljûlieh. Over the coffee and pipes in the evening, after the day’s work was done, they related it to us. By the old tamarisk once stood the City of Brass, which was inhabited by Pagans. When Mohammed’s creed began to spread, ’Aly, his son-in-law, “the lion of God,” arrived at the city, and rode seven times round it on his horse, Maimûn. The brazen walls fell down, destroyed by his breath, and the Pagans fled, pursued by the Faithful towards Kŭrŭntŭl; but the day drew to a close, and darkness threatened to shield the infidels. Then ’Aly, standing on the hill which lies due east of the Kŭrŭntŭl crag, called out to the sun, “Come back, O blessed one!” And the sun returned in heaven, so that the hill has ever since been called the “Ridge of the return.” Here stands the Mukâm, or sacred station of ’Aly, and here also is the place where Belâl ibn Rubâh, the Muedhen of the Prophet, called the Faithful to prayer after the victory.

Such is the legend. In it we see mixed up and assigned to the Imâm ’Aly ibn Abu Tâleb, and to Belâl ibn Rubâh, two episodes of the life of Joshua—the fall of Jericho and the battle of Ajalon.

At first one is tempted to believe this to be a genuine tradition, for Jerome tells us that Gilgal was shown, in his time, as a deserted place, “two miles from Jericho, and held in wondrous reverence (miro cultu) by the people of that region.” When, however, we examine the question more fully, the original source of the story seems doubtful. It attaches to the site of a monastery, it is related by the descendants of a race which only entered Palestine with Omar in the seventh century; and, above all, it is connected most probably with another Crusading tradition, for the Chapel of the Apparition of St. Michael to Joshua stood, in 1185 A.D. (as Phocas tells us), below Quarantania, apparently just where the present Mukâm of ’Aly is to be found.

It may appear strange, and perhaps improbable, that the Bedawîn should retain and hand down Christian traditions derived from monks. Yet, within this very district, there is a second undoubted instance which may here be given as illustrating the above.

The Quarantania, or Kŭrŭntŭl mountain, has, from the twelfth century down, been shown as the place to which Our Lord retired for the forty days of fasting in the desert. Near to it the Crusaders also looked for the “exceeding high mountain” whence the Tempter showed Our Lord “all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them” (Matt. iv. 8). Sæwulf tells us that the site of this mountain was three miles from Jericho. Fetellus places it north of that town, and two miles from Quarantania. The measurements bring us to the remarkable cone before noticed, called ’Osh el Ghŭrâb, or “Raven’s Nest.”

The story is wonderfully illustrative of the simplicity of men’s minds in the twelfth century, for the summit of the “exceeding high mountain,” whence all the kingdoms of the world were to have been seen, is actually lower than the surface of the Mediterranean, and it is surrounded on every side by mountains more than double its height. This tradition is nevertheless still extant among the Bedawîn. The valley which comes down from the side of the mountain is called Mesâ’adet ’Aisa, “the ascension of Jesus;” and the name has, no doubt, its origin in the tradition that Our Lord was carried by Satan to this conspicuous summit. It can hardly then be doubted that mediæval monkish traditions still linger among the Arabs of the Jordan Valley.

Another great antiquarian question claimed our careful attention from the Jericho camp. It was that of the “Cities of the Plain” or “Ciccar.” The Crusaders placed them south of the Dead Sea, and their supposed sites of Sodom (Usdum) and Zoar (Zûeirah) are easily recovered. The Moslems believe, as did also Josephus, that the wicked cities lie beneath the Sea of Lot, as they call the Lake Asphaltites; but the geological evidence all goes to prove that the Dead Sea must have existed pretty much in its present condition in the time of Abraham, and that such a convulsion as they suppose cannot have occurred within historical times. Modern scholars, therefore, have sought anew for the sites of Sodom and Gomorrah, Zoar, Zeboim, and Admah. It seems almost certain that these cities should be placed north of the lake, because the term Ciccar applies properly to the Jordan Valley and to the Jericho plain; our utmost efforts were therefore directed to the discovery of the sites of the Cities of the Plain (or Ciccar) in this direction. Over almost every acre of ground between Jericho and the Dead Sea, I rode day by day. The whole is a white desert, except near the hills, where rich herbage grows after the rains. The time of year was most favourable for such exploration, because no long grass existed to hide any ruins. In all that plain I found no ruin, except the old monastery of St. John and a little hermit’s cave, and it seems to me probable that no other ruins will ever there be found.

With regard to this subject several points require to be kept in memory. The ancient record, which commences so curiously “in the days of Amraphel king of Shinar” (Gen. xiv. 1), refers to events which occurred four thousand years ago. The cities are said to have been overwhelmed by fire, and their names were blotted out of the later topography of the time of Joshua. To expect to find their ruins is manifestly to disregard the Bible history, and even had they not been overthrown, what hope could there be of their preservation at the present time, when the buildings of Herod, twenty-one centuries later, are not now in existence?

In the second place, there is no very accurate indication in the Bible of the position of the cities: they were in the Vale of Siddim, “which is the Salt Sea,” but they may have been very far apart. One thing alone seems pretty certain. If they were near the Salt Sea they would also probably have been situated near fresh-water springs, as Engedi is situated. Such springs are few and far between in the neighbourhood of the Dead Sea, and none occur along the north shore, or in the plain immediately near it. On the north-west, however, there is one fine outflow of water at ’Ain Feshkhah, and higher up the Jordan Valley springs are abundant.

Although no ruins were found by the Survey party, and, as I have urged above, were not to be expected, yet there are names in the district, applying to portions of the ground, which seem to me to have a possible connection with those of Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboim.