Page 50 - Holyland Magazine - 2016 Edition
P. 50
Full troughs by desert wells
and water holes supported
the livestock of nomads for
millennia. Photo: Avnisan
neglected; however, the Hebrew word be’er Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, ancient cities, such as Jerusalem, where
or its derivatives appear in dozens of place sat down by the well… When a Samaritan they were used as recently as 50 years
names, indicating that they were built near a woman came to draw water, Jesus said to ago, or the famous waterworks of Masada,
well. One such well is found in Be’er Sheva, her, Will you give me a drink?” (John 4:1-26) which helped the hundreds of zealous Jews
meaning “The Well of the Oath” or “The Well besieged on the desert hilltop to survive
of the Seven (ewes)” (Genesis 21:22-33). The cistern years of Roman siege over 1,900 years ago.
Although many have attributed the well to
the patriarch Abraham, it was actually dug If water was God’s blessing, drought, on the Bedouin in the Judean desert still utilize
many centuries later. But scholars have other hand, was a curse or a punishment from the cistern that supplied water to the
determined that it is at least 1,100 years old, God, usually followed by famine. Jeremiah, Hashmonean and Roman fortresses of
according to an inscription found inside it. who prophesized such punishment (Jer Horkania or Herodion over 2,000 years
Recently the Be’er Sheva municipality has 14:2-3), was among those who experienced ago, and the Bedouin of the Negev desert
renovated the well and is opening a Bedouin the dry cisterns from within (Jer 38:6) - since continue to water their flocks using cisterns
arts and crafts center at the site. empty cisterns were also used as prisons, dug by the Nabatean traders over 1,900
and he as well as Jacob’s son Joseph (Gen years ago.
One of the wells preserved over the millennia 37:22) were but two of those dumped in
is Jacob’s well in Nablus (Shechem, in such pits. The spring
Hebrew), some 30 miles north of Jerusalem,
where Jesus meets the Samaritan woman: Digging waterholes (cisterns) was not easy, Considered to be the source of “living water,”
“So he came to a town in Samaria” … near but it did help in collecting rain and runoff springs were always an important source of
the plot of ground Jacob had given to his water to be available during the dry season. water for the cities that sprang up nearby
son Joseph. Jacob's well was there, and Numerous cisterns are dotted across and were used for ritual baths and baptism,
the Holy Land and can be found in all the as well as drinking and agriculture. During
