The media are devoting great attention to infection in Israel's haredi (ultra-Orthodox) communities Kiryat Yearim (Telz-Stone) in the Judean hills west of Jerusalem was initially called the "local coronavirus capital." For almost a week there have been no recorded cases of infection there One of the residents was infected by a relative who arrived from France and then infected several more residents at a Purim party attended by dozens of Kiryat Yearim residents it was learned that 2,000 of the town's 6,000 residents and the number of people infected rose daily "We were much stricter than the government's orders" Kiryat Yearim Local Council head Yitzhak Ravitz (son of late MK Avraham Ravitz) told "Globes" that he attributed the halt in the virus to several severe measures that were far stricter than those ordered by the Ministry of Health "When isolation is observed with no compromises or cutting corners I closed down the grocery store almost completely and local council workers prepared the delivery "I didn't want to completely close down the supermarket in order to avoid an atmosphere of absolute depression but we completely eliminated the possibility of infection in public areas We closed down the local mikveh (ritual bath) and concentrated maximum effort on persuading the residents who was not obligated to go into isolation and issued binding rabbinical rulings that all the requirements had to be obeyed including the extra strict ones issued by the local council The public obeyed the instructions completely We enforced it mainly through explanations We went down to 150 people in isolation today A large proportion of the 30 people originally infected have recovered and everyone who was hospitalized has been released Worshippers formed minyanim in the streets and some of them prayed and sang together from separate balconies." "Globes": How do you explain the difference between you and other places with high concentrations of haredim Ravitz: "The haredim here are the same population as in Modi'in Illit We succeeded in fulfilling the heavenly commandment "And you shall take very good care of yourselves." The commander of the Harel regional police station called me to tell me that the orders were being fulfilled better among us than in all of the surrounding communities We took care to supply all of the residents' needs who opened an emergency tent supermarket in a place assigned for this by the local council and the supermarket began supplying food to all of the residents through a system of deliveries organized by the local council The residents can go there with restrictions on the distances between the people entering and maximum number of people in the space How do you help residents stuck in their homes most of whom have no Internet or television "There are families of 13 here in a 75-square meter apartment Think about how hard it is to keep them at home distributed games at the entrances to homes We opened a special phone line for people to hear Bible lessons Distribution takes place on Fridays with complete kits brought to the door of homes this includes books and booklets about the coronavirus there is a phone line with many extensions for any question and need for the residents including an emergency line for the Sabbath including a person whose test results arrived and we used a loudspeaker to tell the residents who had been in contact with him to enter isolation I also had to speak on the phone on the Sabbath because of the emergency situation." What do you suggest for other local authorities Make the hard and unpopular decisions.' It goes against the basic instinct of elected public officials to appease the voters who elect them I realized that we had to do everything to save lives; that's the most important thing This happened with closing down the supermarket even before the Ministry of Health ordered it "'Be a step ahead of the Ministry of Health Find out in advance whether someone is sick and isolate anyone who was in contact with him or her even before the Ministry of Health does it Close the grocery stores to ordinary shopping Ensure a regular supply of food through deliveries and cash registers were among the major causes of infection Provide activities for people in isolation and under closure Pray - a lot.' Had we not taken these measures "Anyone who takes the order lightly and infects other people is close to being a deliberate sinner and the religious law of pursuing a murderer applies to him" several weeks after it should have been done and in opposition to his earlier dubious instruction Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky instructed the public to strictly comply with the government's emergency regulations Kanievsky and other rabbis published responsa containing an absolute ban on attending synagogue and places of Torah study holding prayers in a minyan - even in the open air - a stringency that goes beyond the Ministry Health's rules "According to an order by the authority in Biblical law anyone who does not observe the rules issued by the Ministry of Health is classified as a rodef (attempted murderer) Everyone has the duty to hand anyone taking the instructions lightly over to the police If a telephone rings on the Sabbath for someone waiting for answer to a coronavirus test Someone who does not strictly obey the doctor's instructions should be rebuked." The opinion goes on to say that someone who takes the orders lightly and infects others is close to being a deliberate sinner and the law for an attempted murderer applies to him Rabbi Kanievsky gave his approval for contacting the legal authorities in the case of a person violating the regulations - not a popular act in haredi society - and to leave a telephone active and turned on This religious ruling comes after it was learned that the infection rates in haredi society are much higher than in other population groups among other things because of irresponsible behavior by a few people in this society hundreds of people from a group in Bnei Brak took part in a funeral of one of the group's rabbis This comes on top of other violations reported in recent days including weddings attended by dozens and hundreds of people and with dancing in which the participants held hands The police stepped up their patrols in haredi neighborhoods over the past few days In the Beit Israel neighborhood in Jerusalem a confrontation took place between police and several young haredim after one of them was detained for questioning Ministry of Finance director general Shai Babad told the Knesset today that the possibility of imposing closure on haredi neighborhoods or communities with a high proportion of infection was being considered It is impossible to avoid putting some of the responsibility on Rabbi Kanievsky who gave instructions three weeks ago to violate the instructions of the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education He ruled then that studies in yeshivot should be continued Beyond the direct consequences of this order it caused part of the haredi population to behave as if the rabbis knew better than the government and that they were not absolutely obligated to comply with the rigorous instructions It must be said that the situation among Sephardic haredim was the complete opposite and that all the leading rabbis in this sector called for total obedience to the instructions Many Ashekazi haredi rabbis joined this call citing examples from Brooklyn and haredi areas in the US mass breaches of the instructions could still be seen Part of the problem is attributable to poor communications in haredi society which is largely cut off from the Internet and television and the question of keeping large families confined within small homes the spread of the coronavirus in haredi society constitutes a failure of the entire Ashkenazi haredi leadership Rabbis and politicians did not take a firm stand with their constituency and demand that they comply with all of the rules with extra stringency This is particularly noticeable when the minister of health is MK Yaakov Litzman it must be said that in the largest Hassidic groups Reports and leaks indicate that haredi politicians were engaged in exerting pressure to lighten the restrictions rather than enforcing those restrictions on their public Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on April 1 © Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd A political imbroglio in the small council: incumbent head of the Kiryat Yearim (Telzstone) Council the residents can cast a protest vote using a green slip results showed that Yitzhak Ravitz won 63.9% of the votes But this is only Ravitz's minor problem As far as voting for the city council is concerned a real drama is unfolding in the local council as it has become clear that the largest list may run as an opposition to the head of the council This is the "Shatz" list that received 51.6% of the votes Archaeologists Extract DNA of Ancient IsraelitesA rare First Temple-period family burial opens the door to genetic studies on the true origin of the ancient Israelites - and their links to modern Jewish populations 2023Get email notification for articles from Ariel David FollowOct 9 ancient DNA has been recovered from the bodies of ancient Israelites living in the First Temple period a Holy Grail in the study of lost civilizations was enabled following the discovery near Jerusalem of a rare family tomb dating to the Iron Age So far the collaboration of archaeologists and geneticists has been able to extract genetic material from two individuals But it promises to pave the way for further research on longstanding questions about the origins of the ancient Israelites their links to earlier populations living in the Levant Preliminary results from the excavation and the DNA study were expected to be presented at a conference about new archaeological discoveries in Jerusalem and its environs on Wednesday and Haaretz has obtained an advance copy of the researchers’ paper The conference has since been delayed due to the ongoing conflict between Israel and Gaza when the Theft Prevention Unit of the Israel Antiquities Authority discovered a tomb in the village of Abu Ghosh which is right next to the biblical settlement of Kiryat Yearim so the archaeologists conducted a hurried salvage excavation Although only a fraction of the tomb had survived the researchers uncovered some 150 pottery vessels as well as the jumbled skeletal remains of at least 10 individuals Open gallery viewPottery from the Iron Age found at Kiryat YearimCredit: The Kiriath-Jearim excavations Those interred in the tomb included six adults This is consistent with the high mortality rate of children in ancient times Based on the pottery typology used in the funerary offerings it seems that the tomb was used for a prolonged period or late First Temple period according to the biblical chronology “I suppose that we are dealing with a family tomb whose members were buried there over a long period of time,” Finkelstein says because most of it was destroyed in recent years.” Finkelstein embarked on a quest to extract DNA from the people interred in the Kiryat Yearim tomb Open gallery viewThe hill of Kiryat Yearim surrounded by the village of Abu GhoshCredit: Ariel DavidWho is an ancient Jew whose communities first emerged in the Rhineland at the height of the Middle Ages What is their ancestral connection to the Israelites of yore By the way, these questions exist independently of the political conflict over competing claims to the Holy Land, although these issues are often coopted and distorted in the toxic debate over which modern population has the greatest link to the ancestral inhabitants of the Levant Open gallery viewCeramic jugs found at Kiryat YearimCredit: The Kiriath-Jearim excavationsA bona fide Israelite bone scientists have found some indirect evidence pertaining to the genetic origins of the Israelites – more about this later – by looking at the DNA of modern Jews as well as Bronze Age Canaanites who preceded the formation of the ancient Israelite identity But direct access to ancient Israelite DNA and all the information contained therein has so far eluded researchers There are several reasons for this. Firstly, well-preserved DNA is harder to find in the hot Middle Eastern climes. But this technical issue was partly overcome by the 2015 discovery that the petrous bone a part of the skull located behind the ear contains a much higher concentration of DNA than other bones meaning that at least some genetic material may survive in it even in warmer weather But not much headway had been made on the ancient Hebrews Open gallery viewWalls excavated at Kiryat YearimCredit: חפירות משפחת שמונAt Kiryat Yearim it was indeed the precious petrous bone that yielded genetic information about two of the individuals buried there But before we look at the – very preliminary – results we have wonder whether we can be sure about the cultural identity of the tomb’s residents It’s true that no ancient Hebrew inscriptions were found in the burial confirming that the deceased were Israelites the pottery assemblage is typical of what is found in late First Temple-period burials in Jerusalem Together with Kiryat Yearim’s proximity to what was then the capital of the Kingdom of Judah this suggests that the locals can indeed be identified as ancient Hebrews cultural identity and genetic background are not the same,” Finkelstein adds “Genetic background can be revealed by an ancient DNA study This is also true in the present: just look at the population of modern Israel.” the genetic data from Kiryat Yearim offers a first glimpse of how directly sampling remains from the First Temple period can shed light on the history of the ancient Hebrews The two sampled individuals were one male and one female The conference paper only discusses data from the Y chromosome and mitochondrial DNA sections of the genome that are inherited only from the father and mother respectively Data gleaned from the rest of the genome will be provided in an upcoming scientific publication “This is only partial data with a more detailed paper coming in the future,” Reich says “Sampling DNA from ancient Israelites is exciting as it should make it possible to test how they relate genetically to previous groups Open gallery viewקירות תמך שנחשפו ב חפירה ב קרית יעריםCredit: חפירות משפחת שמונAnd the Canaanites begat Abraham The highlight of the very partial results is that the Y chromosome in the man belongs to the J2 haplogroup a group of closely-related DNA sequences that is believed to have originated in the Caucasus or Eastern Anatolia a vast area including modern-day eastern Turkey This is important because, as mentioned, researchers have already mapped the DNA of ancient Canaanites, showing that they had a strong ancestral connection to modern-day Jewish and Arab populations. That research, published in Cell in 2020 also showed that the Canaanites in the Middle and Late Bronze Age (before the emergence of the Israelite identity) descended from a mix of Neolithic inhabitants of the Levant and a group that immigrated from the Caucasus or Eastern Anatolia This migration was already in motion in the Early Bronze Age, around 2900-2500 B.C.E., and is also visible archaeologically, with pottery from this period exhibiting strong influences from Anatolia and the Caucasus as seen in the study of ancient DNA of individuals from Megiddo and other places and is evident in the mention in historical texts of Canaanite officials in the Late Bronze Age with names that are not Semitic and originate in the northeastern Middle East While it’s too early to draw conclusions based on limited data from a single Israelite sample it is of note that the First Temple-period individual from Kiryat Yearim still carried the same genetic variations that the Canaanites displayed centuries earlier and which they in turn had inherited from the Caucasian newcomers that there is a connection between the genetic background of this person at Kiryat Yearim in the first millennium B.C.E and the Canaanites in the second millennium B.C.E.,” Finkelstein says “It’s not a complete surprise because we have evidence from other lines of inquiry small piece of evidence showing that the genetic pool is the same at this time we cannot say if this is representative of the entire population.” If researchers gather more data confirming that most Israelites indeed shared this ancestry with the Canaanites it would support something that experts have strongly suspected for a while that in fact the ancient Hebrews descended from the Canaanites The biblical stories stress a discontinuity between the Canaanites described as non-local descendants of a Mesopotamian-born patriarch Yet archaeologists have long noted that the similarities between Canaanite and Israelite material culture language and settlement patterns all suggest that the latter simply grew out of the former “In the last 30-40 years there is a general understanding that the Hebrews were mostly of local origin which means they were Canaanites and became Israelites in an identity-forming process that probably took a long time,” Finkelstein says the two individuals at Kiryat Yearim displayed two different haplogroups with similar counterparts already found in individuals living in Jordan some 10,000 years ago and in southeastern Europe around 7,000 years ago In later samples it is found in Iran and in those Canaanites sampled in Israel as well as all the way to the Baltic and Ural Mountains This suggests that this haplogroup’s initial source may have been somewhere in Neolithic Anatolia or the Levant hasn’t been previously detected in ancient DNA samples but is found in modern-day Basques This may point to an origin in the Mediterranean or the Near East this particular haplogroup may have spread with nomadic populations the samples from two ancient Israelites hint at ancestry from peoples in both Anatolia and Arabia Much more data and research are needed to understand how significative these results are whether they truly represent the ancestry of the region’s population at the time – and what they mean for our understanding of the broader story of the emergence of ancient Israel The excitement in the air is palpable at the Ben Yakir Youth Village near Hadera Everyone is waiting for the big event: the graduation ceremony for the village’s 12th-graders who are known as the “Lions of the Palm Tree.” The Jewish Agency’s Ben Yakir Youth Village was founded in 1974 and serves adolescent boys The village provides a wide range of therapies and social services Programs at Ben Yakir include: therapeutic horseback riding and care; sports and music; and a summer camp specializing in English and animal care The Jewish Agency’s four youth villages—Ben Yakir and Ramat Hadassah—provide normative cost-effective boarding school settings for youth ages 12-18 (a total of 860 in 2016-17) who suffer from severe emotional and social work services help them succeed in high school and enter the Israeli army with their peers The success of the youth villages is due to their holistic combined with the values of Zionism and social activism Alumni receive ongoing services from Jewish Agency staff including guidance on employment and finances scholarships for vocational and college studies and assistance preparing for college entrance exams Youth Villages were initially established to care for young Jews from around the world who arrived in Israel alone they provide an opportunity for Israelis to break the cycle of social marginalization and integrate as contributing Since the establishment of the Youth Aliyah movement in 1933 the villages have educated at least 300,000 children The graduation ceremony featured the presentation of certificates of excellence for outstanding students bringing a great degree of pride for the youths The graduates thanked the Ben Yakir teams which led them to their successes and achievements at the village—the therapeutic team that was always there to listen to them the teachers who insisted on pushing them to meet their goals It was one large family celebrating and reminiscing together Between Jerusalem’s ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods of Mea Shearim and Kiryat Ye’arim In the crowded alleys of Mea Shearim—one of the oldest Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem—life moves slowly but with purpose Around 30,000 ultra-Orthodox Jews live here in less than a square mile Many of them belong to strict religious groups that reject modern life and do not recognize the State of Israel flying flags from balconies in protest against Zionism Some Mea Shearim residents display Palestinian flags in protest against Zionism daily life brings contact with the “other.” Arab workers from East Jerusalem come and go—fixing things People speak with each other daily and live side by side near the Arab villages of Ein Nakuba and Abu Ghosh and the secular Jewish community of Neve Ilan is the ultra-Orthodox town of Kiryat Ye’arim about 6,500 people live in quiet coexistence There are no loud protests or political statements—just small moments of shared space a small narghile café has become an unexpected meeting point between Arab hosts and their ultra-Orthodox neighbors What started as a random encounter turned into something more A young ultra-Orthodox man named Yossi from Beit Shemesh was driving near the village when he got a flat tire A local Arab man helped him and pointed him in the direction of a café “I was the only ultra-Orthodox Jew there,” he said most of my clients are ultra-Orthodox Jews … The Jewish customers also light the fire before I cook “Yossi came in and smoked for the first time and that’s how the connection with the Haredi [ultra-Orthodox] community began.” most of my clients are ultra-Orthodox Jews,” says Abu Amir The Jewish customers also light the fire before I cook.” agrees that the café became more than just a smoking spot but I go to enjoy the narghile and the atmosphere.” This kind of small coexistence is common in Kiryat Ye’arim “But I’ll never support Palestinians over Zionist Jews What people in Mea Shearim do—putting up Palestinian flags—that’s just to make a point It’s not normal.” He adds that the relations between Arabs in Abu Ghosh and the ultra-Orthodox Jews in Kiryat Ye’arim are good “where people from different communities clash on a daily basis “I can walk through Abu Ghosh in the middle of the night and nothing will happen to me which isn’t the case in other parts of Israel,” he says The calm relationships in this area may not make headlines “An Arab friend from Abu Ghosh told me he works with Jews and shared how positive the experience has been for him especially compared to working within his own community,” said Orenstein It offers great quality at a fair price,” he said Home » Kiryat-Yearim Controversy: Was David Really a King or Just a Tribal Chief A recent dig at the Biblical site of Kiryat Yearim is a piece in the puzzle that may settle a raging feud among archaeologists: was King David a larger-than-life monarch who unified the Northern and Southern Kingdom or was he a local chieftain whose role the Bible exaggerated About three weeks ago, Prof. Israel Finkelstein an archaeologist from Tel Aviv University and a member of the National Academy of Sciences presented his findings from the excavations at Kiryat Yearim to a meeting of the national academies of science of Israel and France The site is relatively undisturbed and was unexplored until Prof The site is located approximately 6.2 miles west of Jerusalem. Finkelstein told Haaretz that the hill is clearly manmade created by four massive retaining walls creating an earth-filled platform Running north to south and from east to west in a completely straight line the walls were built with an error in the range of one degree In the Bible, the Ark of the Covenant was taken to Kiryat Yearim after it was returned by the Philistines The Ark was removed from the Tabernacle in Shiloh and taken into battle by Israel but the Philistines captured it placing it inside a Temple in Ashdod dedicated to the idolatrous worship of Dagon the idol in the temple toppled and its hands broke off The Philistines were struck with an epidemic of hemorrhoids and decided to return the ark The ark was not returned to Shiloh but was taken to Kiryat Yearim where it stood for 20 years until David took it to Jerusalem Finkelstein acknowledged that the Biblical reference indicated the city had some level of importance “It’s reasonable to assume there was a temple there,” Professor Finkelstein told Times of Israel the place where they took the Ark of the Covenant wasn’t Pof. Finkelstein, a respected and prominent figure in Israeli archaeology, has been the long-time proponent of a controversial theory that the Biblical description of the united kingdom of David and Solomon described in the Bible is an ideological construct the historical David and Solomon ruled over a small territory in the southern highlands “I see David and Solomon as historical figures – the founders of the Jerusalem dynasty. But at the same time, I see the text as layered,” Finkelstein told Haaretz there is very little information about his actual reign especially the material that describes him as a leader of a Habiru band on the southern fringe.” Finkelstein believes that his findings in Kiryat Yearim support this theory Finkelstein told Haaretz that the kingdom of Judah at that time was too weak to construct such an impressive structure He theorized that the hill was likely built by the stronger kingdom of Israel Finkelstein argues that the original version of the story about Kiryat Yearim was written in the early 8th century B.C.E by an author from the Kingdom of Israel during a period when the kingdom of Israel dominated the kingdom of Judah He suggested that the size and complexity of the site indicated that In addition to being the location of the Ark of the Covenant and place of worship it also functioned as an administrative center since it is conveniently situated between the two kingdoms the site is significant as it symbolizes the unification between the kingdoms of Israel and Judah The site was dated using a technique called optically stimulated luminescence which analyzes the last time quartz particles in the soil were exposed to sunlight This produced a broad date range between 1150 B.C although pottery sherds found at the site show that it was a hive of activity in the first half of the 8th century B.C Finkelstein views the Bible as a religious and political text combining various traditions written in Jerusalem in the seventh century B.C.E and onward Written during the reign of the kings of Judah it glorifies the kingdom of Judah and minimizes the role of the kingdom of Israel in the north Contrary to the Biblical account in which the Kingdom of Judah ruled the north under David and Solomon Finkelstein explains that it was actually the northern kingdom that was the stronger of the two Dr. David Ilan director of the Nelson Glueck School of Biblical Archaeology at Hebrew Union College was intrigued by the dig but suggested that the conclusions required more study “It seems a bit early to draw definitive conclusions from the data taken from that site,” Dr Finkelstein was recognized as a thorough researcher “He is essentially still trying to test his hypothesis of historical reproduction based on his reading of the Biblical text The literature and his presentation focuses on his theories and not on his findings.” Ilan emphasized that Finkelstein’s hypotheses could be largely misinterpreted if viewed in black-and-white Finkelstein is not throwing out the Bible,” Ilan stated.”He clearly cherishes the text He loves it because it is fascinating and so interesting to deconstruct His theory is based on a specific reading of the Biblical text and he has a lot of followers.” “People sometimes get that wrong about him,” Dr “He identifies strongly and loves his people As an academic and an archaeologist he puts things together in a different way He is certainly not anti-Bible or anti-Judaism it should be acknowledged that he has done a great deal for Biblical archaeology.” © ISRAEL365NEWS 2025 Privacy Policy Prophecy from the Bible is revealing itself as we speak Israel365 News is the only media outlet reporting on it Sign up to our free daily newsletter today to get all the most important stories directly to your inbox See how the latest updates in Jerusalem and the world are connected to the prophecies we read in the Bible Anybody who leaves the mechina is a thinking person and is a person who wants to make the most of themselves The Jewish Agency’s Kol Ami Jewish Peoplehood Academies bring together post-high school Israelis and their Jewish peers from abroad with the aim of strengthening the participants’ connection to the Jewish people The curriculum includes personal growth and empowerment building physical endurance and navigation skills and understanding the concept of a unified Jewish people and the development of self-identity and Zionism,” Gilad says “A healthy balance is maintained between all the various components....The mechina caters for a mixed group of youngsters from Israel and from the Diaspora...this eclectic experience impacts the consciousness of each and every participant They meet new people and think about what is good for them As an example of one of the academy’s key activities Gilad cites a hike that incorporates physical and psychological challenges The mechina places its emphasis not solely on training participants for military service but on a holistic approach to personal development are eager to give back by sharing their experiences and insights with current students “Anybody who leaves the mechina is a thinking person and is a person who wants to make the most of themselves,” Gilad says “We want people to leave here with a well-formed approach to life that they should leave here better prepared for the army and beyond.” The Israelite army was defeated and the ark fell into enemy hands The Philistines took it to Ashdod and placed it next to a statue of their god Israel's President's Chief of Staff Rivka Ravitz today celebrated the Brit Milah of her 12th child and Channel 12 commentator Amit Segal attended the event the President wished congratulations on his Twitter account: "Blessings and congratulations to the dear beloved mother Rivka Ravitz and the dear father Yitzhak Ravitz A new brother and uncle for the entire Ravitz family 42-year-old Ravitz has been working alongside Rivlin since 1999 where her husband Yitzchak was Deputy Mayor they moved to Kiryat Yearim where her husband is currently the head of the local council SearchArchaeologists to Search for Ark of the Covenant, 10 Commandments at Unexplored Jerusalem SiteLog InSubscribeThe Christian Post To enjoy our website, you'll need to enable JavaScript in your web browser. Please click here to learn how You are using an outdated browser. Please upgrade your browser to improve your experience 2017Archaeologists in Israel said some 20 km (12 miles) from Jerusalem that they had unearthed the oldest Hebrew text ever found while excavating a fortress city overlooking a valley where the Bible says David slew Goliath | (Photo: Reuters/Gil Cohen Magen)Archaeologists from France and Israel are reportedly planning on embarking on a mission in August to search for the Ark of the Covenant which is believed to contain the stone tablets bearing the 10 Commandments handed to Moses by God According to MailOnline and The Times of Israel the researchers are set to excavate the ancient site of Kiryat Ye'arim outside Jerusalem which is one of the last remaining unexplored locations in the region "The place is important for several reasons," said Professor Israel Finkelstein central site in the Jerusalem hills that hasn't been studied until now "It may be the only key site in Judah that hasn't undergone a systematic archaeological excavation." The Bible mentions Kiryat Ye'arim on a number of occasions describing it as a Judahite town situated near Jerusalem during the period of the judges and King David The archaeological dig is set to focus around a 20th century monastery dedicated to Our Lady of the Ark of the Covenant with much of the location believed to have been undisturbed "One of the tantalizing aspects of Kiryat Ye'arim is the likelihood of there having been an ancient temple at the site Such a discovery could help scholars better understand cultic practices in Judah during the Iron Age," the Times explained "In several parts of the biblical narrative Kiryat Ye'arim is alluded to as a site of religious worship It's referred to variously as Kiryat Ba'al Ba'alah and Ba'ale Judah in the Book of Joshua suggesting the site was at some point affiliated with worship of Ba'al storm god of the Canaanite pantheon," it added the famous Ark was stored at Kiryat Ye'arim for two decades before King David conveyed it to his capital in Jerusalem 1 Chronicles 13:3-5 reads: "Let us bring the ark of our God back to us for we did not inquire of it during the reign of Saul." The whole assembly agreed to do this from the Shihor River in Egypt to Lebo Hamath to bring the ark of God from Kiriath Jearim." it is reasonable to assume that Kiryat Ye'arim was a city of great significance the place where they took the Ark of the Covenant wasn't they refer to an important cult place," the professor explained Help keep The Christian Post free for everyone By making a recurring donation or a one-time donation of any amount you're helping to keep CP's articles free and accessible for everyone Hope you’ll give us another try and check out some other articles. Return to homepage. 2020Get email notification for articles from Nirit Anderman FollowNov 12 2020Kiryat Ye’arim is a wooded hill with a beautiful church is named for the statue of the Madonna and child that rises majestically from its roof Israel Finkelstein visited the site several years ago his gaze was drawn to an ancient stone terrace that bisected the slope it was straight-edged rather than rounded in keeping with the contour of the hill There must be a supporting wall stabilizing it Another thing that attracted his attention: Unlike the area’s other hills