LandMinds:
The Hidden Waters of TzubaDavid Willner and Barnea Levi Selavan
June 26, 2011
In the gentle hill country of Judah, west of Jerusalem, a short 2-week excavation wrapped up this past week. The site is compelling, its context a mystery. A cavernous cistern lies a short distance from Kibbutz Tzuba. The site - not yet open to the public - began to reveal her secrets nearly a decade ago. Under the direction of archaeologists
Dr. Shimon Gibson and
Dr. James Tabor, a picture has begun to emerge of an Iron Age site (8-7th centuries BCE) that likely evolved into a Byzantine place of purification.
(listen to the LandMinds interview with Dr. Gibson here)The unassuming hill country, its age-old terraces accenting the topography, led Gibson to an intriguing find. On the walls of the cistern is a rudimentary - but clearly identified - representation of John the Baptist. John the Baptist (Yochanan HaMatbil) was an itinerant Jewish priest and preacher who lived in the first century of the Common Era - who many consider to be the earliest proponent of a new Jewish cult - Christianity. As the story goes, he was the teacher of Jesus. In true Herodian-style the daughter of Herod, Salome, asked for his head on a platter - and daddy accommodated all too willingly.
From an archaeological point of view the site resembles other sites dotting the country - with a water system evoking parallels to Tel Beit Shemesh (Iron Age II - level 4). The walls are heavily plastered, with a thick layer typical of early sites. As the centuries unwound, the cistern slowly filled, through an elaborate series of pools, with fine silty material that provided a mother lode of clay. Gibson reasonably theorizes that the clay was used to produce pottery during First Temple times - but is clear in his assessment, that in the first century CE until the mid-second century - the stratigraphy evidences an inexplicable practice. Gibson speculates that (Jewish) visitors to the site, would stand in the water on silty "embankments", and would break - intentionally - pottery jugs. The practice seems to have gone on for close to a century and a half. Another puzzling feature is a large stone situated at the bottom of the stairs leading down into the cistern. Clearly chiseled into the top of the stone is an impression of a right foot. Gibson feels that visitors would place their foot on the stone and anoint themselves as part of some type of cultic practice. So far, there is no historical record to ascribe to this practice. But by the 4th and 5th centuries CE, - the Byzantine Period - the cistern was so filled with silt and debris, that immersion was no longer possible.
It is at this relatively late time in history that an anonymous visitor chose to engrave some enigmatic iconography into the plaster of the cistern. By Gibson's reckoning, early Christians associated the cistern/cave to the local history of John the Baptist - a short distance away from his home town of Beit HaKerem (today's Ein Kerem). As a Jew living in late Second Temple times, from a family tracing its lineage to the family of Aaron the Priest (Kohen), the laws of ritual purity and impurity would have been part and parcel of the weltanschauung of every priest serving in the Temple. It is a simple step to trace the relationship between "baptism" and the ritual immersion of the Jews - a process designed to remove ritual impurity that so much typified Jewish life.
Wine, olive oil, and other agricultural products all required a constant state of purity - presuming they were to be used either as part of the Temple service or eaten by those concerned about conducting their lives in a state of ritual purity. Even someone who was not personally careful would still begin the processes of producing oil, wine, and grains in a state of total purity until the portions for the priest and Levite were separated, since the Levite's portion also contains ten percent for the priest. A priest could only consume these foods in a pure state. Many tracts of the Mishna and Talmud apply their focus to the highly detailed minutiae of the laws pertaining to ritual purity and impurity. And remarkably, though the Second Temple period is exemplified by an ever-expanding data base of identified mikvaot - ritual baths for the removal of impurity - the First Temple period is noteworthy for its incredibly meager record in that area. So a First Temple period cistern, with wide elaborate steps leading into it, that is later co-opted as a potential ritual site associated with immersion, may be a remarkably compelling clue to First Temple ritual purity processes.
The LandMinds interview with Shimon Gibson is a featured interview on the LandMinds show, airing on Wednesday June 29th, 2011 at 5pm Israel time on www.israelnationalradio.com, and will then be made available for podcast.
If you are interested in visiting the site, it is a short drive from Jerusalem, and located two minutes down the road from Kibbutz Tzuba. There is also an elaborate "Gat" - wine press/production installation - just at the entrance to the kibbutz. If you are interested in Jewish history, give the Kibbutz a call to schedule a visit (http://tzuba.co.il/english.htm).
Shimon Gibson is a British-born archaeologist working in Jerusalem, where he is currently a Senior Associate Fellow at the W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research. He was recently appointed adjunct Professor of Archaeology at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
James D. Tabor is Professor and Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
