Samaria (1 March 2009)

Samaria is a very diverse region in terms of topography. The southern portion of it, Ephraim, is made up of cenomanian limestone, which shapes the entire region like one huge mound, lifted up. The northern half called Manasseh, however, is quite different. Because of the fault lines in the earth, the ground is split up into smaller hills of cenomanian, and eocene with senonian in between, in a repetitious cycle. Because of this, the land in Manasseh is more open, with ridge routes running through it as well as wide valleys of senonian chalk and alluvial soil in between the larger mountains.


Shechem sits in the intersection of three of these valleys, the Michmathah, Salim, and Tirzah. It is situated nicely where the soil is good for growing crops, and where the hills surround the valleys. Where it sits, Shechem also has access to the routes taking you in any direction. To the north, the route past Tirzah takes you to Beth-Sean. If you turn right at Tirzah, the Faria Route takes you east to the Jordan River. Westward, the route end up at the Costal highway, while southbound, you head down toward the Watershed Ridge route to Jerusalem. It is not hard to see why the Patriarchs liked this place so much, and why it became the capital of the Northern Kingdom first. Yet at the same time these wide valleys and routes that connect at Shechem made the city just a bit too open to the outside, and the larger powers who would want to control the area, so that Israel could never really settle down there.
Since Shechem seems to be the central focus of the beginnings of Israel, dating back even to Abraham, the Mountains of Gerizim and Ebal seem to also take importance. They form the high sides of the Valley in which Shechem sits, and so protect it. Gerizim, although the smaller of the two, has been given greater importance in many traditions since the command was given from Moses to the people that the blessing should be on Mt. Gerizim and the curse on Mt. Ebal.
Those who still hold Mt. Gerizim to be holy, claim to be obeying the Pentateuch. The Samaritans are a small group of people, still living on Mt. Gerizim, who claim to be the true followers of the Torah. They say that the Jews were a group that departure from the truth to which they (the Samaritans) still hold. I find this interesting because the people known as Samaritans only came into historical knowledge during the inter-testamental period. If they existed from the time the Israelites entered the land, and they do not hold to the book of the Jewish Bible from Joshua on, where were they in everyone’s remembrance of history? Why did they not begin to be named and heard of until after the Assyrians settled people in the land of Samaria during the Northern Kingdom’s exile? How then, if the book of Joshua is not accepted, did they enter the land and end up living on Gerizim? Did they split from the rest when they came to Gerizim with Joshua?
These people are so devoted to carrying out the ceremonial sacrifice each year, they live on the mountain where Israel first entered the land, and yet I never knew they were still around or who they actually are. The only time I had heard mention of Samaritans was in the parable Jesus told about the “good Samaritan”. I wonder if the Samaritans have their own story of how they were preserved until today, as the Jews do. It would certainly be interesting to hear an explanation, since I don’t really know much about them.

Lastly, we stopped at Shiloh. It was the original site of the Tabernacle when the Israelites entered the land. There are three locations at Shiloh where the Tabernacle supposedly was set up. Because it was a tent as opposed to a building of stone, there aren't remains of it, making it pretty much impossible to locate for certain. There were inscriptions found under one spot, making mention of preists, and another is a large plateau which might have been a good foundation for the tabernacle to be placed, but no one knows for sure. One of the oldest wine presses was also found there, near the plateau. This is interesting also because in the valley next to Shiloh, the "valley of dancing dolls", is where the women of Shiloh were stolen and taken for wives by the Benjaminites after benjamin had been nearly wiped out by the rest of Israel...So there are some random facts about Shiloh. :)