Tent Work in Palestine — Part 36

Crossing the narrow valley on another July day, the Survey-party ascended the eastern brow of Ebal. The Mount of the Curses is even more barren than Gerizim, the Mount of Blessing. Cactus-hedges clothe its feet, on which the culture of the cochineal insect has lately been tried without success. The slope of steel-blue rock is less abrupt than that of Gerizim, but a band of precipitous cliffs exists near the summit. The mountain is dome-shaped, its top (3076·5 feet above the sea) is higher than those of any mountains near, though both in Judea and in Galilee more lofty points occur; thus Ebal is a conspicuous object from all sides, especially from the north and from the maritime plain. The southern face of the hill has no springs on it, but many occur on the north. The southern slopes are covered with corn, and at sunset the orange-coloured flush over the bare rocks produces a startling contrast to the rich foliage of the valley beneath.

There are three curious places on Ebal; one of which is a rude stone building, enclosing a space of fifty feet square, with walls twenty feet thick, in which are chambers. The Samaritans call it part of a ruined village, but its use and origin are a mystery. It resembles most the curious monuments near Hizmeh, called the "Tombs of the Sons of Israel.” The second place is the little cave and ruined chapel of Sitt Eslamîyeh, "the Lady of Islam,” who has given her name to the mountain. It is perched on the side of a precipice, and is held sacred by the Moslems, who have a tradition that the bones of the Saint were carried hither through the air from Damascus. The third place is a site the importance of which has not been previously recognised. It is a little Moslem Mukâm, said once to have been a church, called 'Amâd ed Dîn, the "Monument of the Faith.” The name thus preserved has no connection with Samaritan tradition, but it is undisputed that the sacred places of the peasantry often represent spots famous in Bible history. It is therefore perhaps possible that the site thus reverenced is none other than that of the monumental altar of twelve stones from Jordan, which Joshua erected, according to the Biblical account, on Ebal, and not on Gerizim as the Samaritans believe, charging the Jews with having altered the names (Deut. xxvii. 4). The hill-top on which this monument stands is called Râs el Kâdy, "Hill of the Judge.” It was here that the Crusaders placed Dan, the site of Jeroboam's Calf Temple, and the present name may perhaps be connected with this theory, Dan ("the Judge”) being translated into the Arabic Kâdy ("Judge”), just as it has been at the true Dan, now Tell el Kâdy, at the source of Jordan. The idea that Dan was to be sought on Ebal originated, no doubt, in the acceptance by the Crusaders of the Samaritan site of Bethel on Gerizim, at the foot of which mountain, according to the mediæval writers, the golden calves were made. This view cannot, however, be supported from the Bible narrative.