Meraba
City near Nazareth on the road to Mount Carmel and Sicaminon.
Description
Jesus, leaving Nazareth, leads his followers towards Bethlehem in Galilee, along the Esdraelon Plain."during the warm hours we shall stop on the mountain overlooking Meraba [...] They take to the road again, climbing a hill, the one lying across the valley [...] They reach the top [...] they enjoy a delightful sight, because the view is beautiful, with the Mount Carmel chain on their left [...] where the mountain ends, there is the sea, a shining, open, endless sea".[1]The description is so precise that it is possible to pinpoint the location of this pause to within a few meters. Another time, it is again at the foot of the Merala hill that Jesus gathers the peasants of Johanan ben Zaccai,
"a wood of holm-oaks in the lower slopes of the hill on which Sephoris rises. The Esdraelon Plain is no longer visible, as it is beyond the hill where they are. But there is a much smaller plain between this hill and those in the region of Nazareth"[2]
Its name
Merala, Maralah, Meraba. Today Nahalal, mentioned in the Bible.[3] This town was rebuilt in the plain at the foot of hills where the town of Timrat and the vineyards of Shimron, a wooded hill, are located.
Where is it mentioned in the work?
GRM 247. GRM 432.
Learn more about this place
Village assigned to the tribe of Zebulon[3] Called Mahalal in the time of the Talmud and Mishna. Identified with Ma'lûl, southwest of Nazareth. The description of the panorama (Judea) from the summit of the Merala hill is rigorously accurate. Today, the hill is still covered with oaks. From the eastern slope, there is a view of Japhia and the hills of Nazareth, and from the southern slope, of the Esdraelon Plain, Carmel, and the Mediterranean Sea.
Explore
- 32° 42’ 10’’ N / 35° 13’ 34’’ E /
- +250m
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Notes and references
Article partially based on the Geographical Dictionary of the Gospel by Jean-François Lavère.- ↑ GRM 247.1,3.
- ↑ GRM 432.1.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Joshua 19:15; Judges 1:30.