Waynesboro Church Of Christ

Welcomes You!

Here are some articles and sermon outlines you may find interesting. Click on any title for the full text.

The Archaeological Significance of Samaria on the New Testament Text

March 25, 2007

Matthew Morine

Professor Dr. Terry L. Edwards

The New Testament World 528

1 December 2006

The Archaeological Significance of Samaria on the New Testament Text

Reading through the New Testament brings one to the terms of Samaria and the Samaritans. These terms are quickly defined as a place and a people. But a closer study of these terms will provide a better understanding of the Biblical text. Understanding the culture and structures of Samaria helps one discover a deeper perspective on Jesus’ interactions with the Samaritans and the land of Samaria.

The paper’s focus will be to highlight the corresponding elements of the Biblical text with the archaeological discoveries of Samaria. The paper seeks to deal with the city and important surrounding areas that affect the exegesis of the New Testament. The paper will attempt to secure this result by providing a general history of the area. Then a discussion of the cultural development of the Samaritans will be given. Also, important archaeological sites that appear in the New Testament text will be explored. Hopefully, after these points are given, there will be a better understanding of Samaria during the time of the New Testament.

A Developmental History of Samaria
The area now known as Samaria was purchased by the former army general, Omri, for a royal residence. Omri transferred his capital from Tirzah to this recently bought land (Rousseau and Arav 240). In BC 870 he paid two talents of silver to a man named Shemer. 1 Kings 16.24 records this account, “And he bought the hill Samaria from Shemer for two talents of silver; and he built on the hill, and named the city which he built Samaria, after the name of Shemer, the owner of the hill.” Unfortunately, during this early period in the development of Samaria and the Samaritan people, there is “difficulty in determining the exact religious situation in Israel in the ninth century” (Jack 132). At best, the material is fragmentary and uncertain. There is confirmation that there was a flurry of religious activity, but so few particulars remain that it is difficult to get a trustworthy picture. The first mention of the name of Samaria in an extra-biblical artifact comes from the Stela of Adad-nirari III. The Stela was discovered in Iraq in 1967 (Page 483-484).

The area was a high hill, which was easily defended. It had a marvelous view westward to the Mediterranean, but this view was hemmed in because of higher hills to the north, south, and east (Wright 69). The hill that the city rested on was 42 miles north of Jerusalem and about 25 miles west of the Jordan. The city stands at the end of a ridge and is surrounded by a valley (Rousseau and Arav 240). This beautiful new city lasted from BC 870 to BC 721 when Sargon II laid siege to the city. With this attack the Kingdom of Israel was destroyed. 2 Kings 17.5-6 states, “Then the king of Assyria invaded the whole land and went up to Samaria and besieged it three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria and carried Israel away into exile to Assyria, and settled them in Halah and Habor, on the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.” There is also archaeological confirmation of this Biblical event. There is a display found concerning Sargon II’s conquest of Samaria. This artifact was found at an excavation at Horsabad. On this display Sargon boasts about conquering the house of Omri and taking a large number of people into captivity. Descriptions of Sargon II concerning this event are found in the palace on numerous artifacts. Also, during excavations at Kalhu-Nimrud, a prism which is now known as the Nimrud prism mentions the conquest in detail. This was not the end of the city of Samaria because the city was rebuilt as the administrative capital of the Assyrian Kingdom. Sargon II even comments in the Nimrud prism that he repopulated the city after the siege (Becking 25-30).

Even after the Persian nation overtook the Assyrians, Samaria continued to be the political headquarters (Wright 69). In fact, a man named Sanballat was the governor in the land (Neh. 2.19). At this point in Samaria’s timeline, there is little activity.

Alexander the Great enters the picture next for Samaria. He overtook the city and deported many Samaritans to Shechem. After Alexander the Great died, the city passed under Ptolemaic and then Seleucid rule. At this point the fortifications of Samaria were reused and strengthened by “beautifully constructed round towers” (Wright 70).

The next major transition in power happened in BC 128 when the Hasmonean John Hyrcanus took the cities of Samaria and Shechem. He annexed the area to the Jewish state in BC 111. It remained this way until the Romans took control of the land in BC 63. At that time the territory was placed under the authority of the governor of Syria.

The city of Samaria went through a rebuilding in the first century under the reign of Herod the Great. In fact, Herod attempted to bring the city back to its former glory. The city functioned as a fortress to protect Herod’s hold on the country and to make a statement to the Roman nation of his gratitude to Caesar Augustus, who promoted him. At this time, the name of the city was changed to Sebaste in honor of Augustus. There was also a temple constructed to honor the emperor. Along with the temple construction, Herod enclosed the city with a new fortification wall that was more than two miles long (Wright 70-71).

The story of the city of Samaria is one of restoration and destruction. The city seems to be continually conquered and rebuilt by a new master. Peace and tranquility never ruled long in this city known as Omri’s home. Ever since its founding, Samaria’s journey has been one of conflict.

The Development of the Samaritan Culture
There are two accounts of the origin of the Samaritan culture. The Samaritan version insists that they are descendants of the North Israelite tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh. They claim to be part of the remnant who survived after the conquest of the Assyrians in BC 721. The Samaritans place the beginning of the separation from the Jews at the time when Eli moved the sanctuary from Shechem to Shiloh. The Samaritans consider this to be the beginning of both an illegitimate priesthood and place of worship.

On the other hand, the Old Testament paints a different picture of the origins of the Samaritans. The Jewish nation claims in 2 Kings 17 that the Samaritans are descendants of groups of pagan nations which were brought into the region of Samaria by the Assyrians from other lands which Sargon II conquered. The Jews consider the Samaritans to have come from heathen tribes. In regard to the changing of the place of worship, the Jews argue that the veneer of Israelite religion practiced by the Samaritans is the result Assyria influence (Anderson 940). The Bible’s account of the separation of the Jews and the Samaritans seems “to be a piece of later Jewish slander against the rival religious community that chose Shechem and Mount Gerizim rather than Jerusalem and Mount Zion as its holy place” (Ferguson 534). Ferguson also mentions that the Samaritans wanted to be called samerim, which means “keepers of the Torah” because the Samaritans rejected the rest of the Hebrew Bible and only accepted the first five books classically ascribed to Moses. The Samaritans rejected the designation of someronim, which means “inhabitants of Samaria” (534). By the time of Jesus, the Samaritans were a religious and culturally distinct people.

The Jews and the Samaritans had some religious tenets in common: both had an uncompromising faith in worshipping the one God, a strong desire to avoid idolatrous images, loyalty to the Law of Mose, a feeling of being God’s chosen people, and a messianic expectation of the future. Even with these similarities, the Jews considered the Samaritans to be an impure people.

At the heart of the tension between the Jews and the Samaritans was the issue of the place of worship. The Jews considered Mount Zion to be holy while the Samaritans thought that Mount Gerizim was sacred. During the days of Alexander the Great, some noble families in Samaria moved to the ancient site of Shechem and built a temple on Mount Gerizim. Though John Hyrcanus destroyed this temple two centuries later, nevertheless the people still considered the site to be holy and continued to worship there (Ferguson 535). John Hyrcanus was a “Jerusalem Jew” (Bull 59). This must have added to the mounting racial tensions between the Jews and the Samaritans. The sacredness of the mount can be traced back to ancient Samaritan tradition. A prominent Samaritan theologian of the early Christian era provides some of the reasons for considering this mountain holy. He states that the mount is called Har ha-Kedem, which means “the ancient or eastern mount,” because it was a twin of the Garden of Eden. The Samaritans even claim that the mount was revealed when the dry land was uncovered in Genesis and that even Adam’s form was made from the dust of Mount Gerizim. The legend of Mount Gerizim continued to Noah’s time. In Samaritan tradition, Mount Gerizim was the highest mountain in the world. The mount was even the first land that Noah saw as the water was receding after the flood (Anderson 217). With this storied past, no wonder there was a conflict over the proper place of worship in Jesus’ time.

This conflict over the correct place of worship is mirrored in John 4. In this text Jesus has a discussion with a Samaritan woman. During the dialogue she mentions the raging debate over which mount to worship God on. John 4:20-21 states, “Our fathers worshiped in this mountain and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall you worship the Father.’” As Jesus was discussing the proper place of worship with the woman, one could easily imagine that both the woman and Jesus could be looking at the remains of the century old ruins from the temple. The piece of the wall of the lost temple that the Samaritan woman mentions has possibly been discovered. Anderson states “a large structure of unhewn stones built in the Hellenistic period, has been excavated beneath the ruins of the later Zeus temple” (218). The temple was renamed possibly Zeus Hellenios or Zeus Xenios after the reign of Antiochus IV from BC 175 to BC 164. Up until 1980, there had been no earlier remains found on the temple mount (Anderson 219).

The temple certainly was one of the most contentious aspects of the tension between the Samaritans and the Jews. It does seem appropriate for Luke to record that the progression of the Gospel would begin in Jerusalem and make the natural leap to the Samaritans based on the mutual connection in the belief in Yahweh (Acts 1.8). But as much as it seems natural for the Samaritans to be the first group to be evangelized by the Way, it seems just as much improbable because of the bitterness on both sides. Even Jesus’ disciples experienced hostility in a Samaritan village in Luke 9.52. Luke 9:51-56 illustrates “the typical hostility showed toward Jews” (Marshall 403). After James and John saw this snobbery, they asked the Lord if they could call down fire on the Samaritan village (Luke 9.54). There was extreme dislike and distrust on both sides. The Samaritans would not want to hear the Jews, and the Jews would not want to include the Samaritans. The Jews had a complete disrespect for the Samaritans. This could be why the hero in the Good Samaritan parable is someone from Samaria. This would have rebuked the Jews even more. Being a Samaritan was an insult to the Jews. Jesus truly broke the racial mold of the Jews when he stayed with the Samaritan converts in John 4.39-42. This racial attitude was possibly why Philip traveled to the city of Samaria to preach Christ to the people and not one of the Apostles (Acts 8:5-8). A Hellenistic Jew had to be the first to reach out to the Samaritan people. Remember that even Peter struggled with racism after many years after the establishment of the Church (Gal. 2. 11-13). The Samaritans were the natural first recipients of the Gospel based on the foreshadowing of Christ in John 4: 39-42 (Kostenberger 163-164), but there certainly would have been some racial prejudice to overcome along the way.

There seems to be no defining event that caused the complete separation of the Samaritans and the Jews. The Samaritans did not consider themselves inferior to the Jews; in fact, the Samaritans saw themselves as superior because they viewed themselves “as true Israel and heirs of the promises of God to Israel, and their version of the Pentateuch as the original one direct from Moses” (Beasley-Murray 60). But after years of drifting away from one another religious and culturally, these groups, Jesus finds, have strong feelings concerning one another. There seemed to be bigotry on both sides of this racial dispute.

Roman Period Archaeological Discoveries
Many of these archaeological find were from three campaigns. In 1908 to 1910, G. Schumacher, G.A. Reisner and C.S. Fisher made the pilgrimage into Samaria. Another major project of excavation happened during 1931 to 1935, under the direction of J.W. Crowfoot, E. L. Sukenik; both K.M. Kenyon and G.M. Crowfoot were responsible for the publication of the findings. Some minor archaeological campaigns took place in 1965 to 1967, which were directed by F. Zayadine, and in 1968, J.B. Hennessy led another minor campaign (Purvis 915).

After the punishment inflicted on Samaria by John Hyrcanus, the city went into a serious decline but was not completely abandoned. The city did not regain its former glory until Pompey came in BC 63 and annexed the district and made it part of the Roman province of Syria. In BC 57-55 Gabinius became proconsul and began a restoration of the ruined city, but this did not compare to the work which Herod the Great did in rebuilding the city of Samaria (Parrot 102-103). During the time of Herod the Great, Samaria was at a peak period of settlement in the region. Even the marginal stony lands were settled and cultivated by the local population.

In the city of Shechem, excavations revealed important parts of the Roman city. On the site there were found remains of a theater, a hippodrome, an amphitheater, a section of the street of the cardo, and stairs leading to the temple of Zeus which were located on Mount Gerizim. Also, a three foot section of the city’s wall was discovered (Dar 929).

The theater was found at the foot of Mount Gerizim with a part of it built into the side of the mount itself. It is a large theater with a diameter of approximately 110 meters. There is a row of seats, probably belonging to some of the wealthy residents of the city, which are engraved with names (Dar 929). Maybe these were some of the season ticket holders of the ancient world.

During the Hellenistic period as well as the Roman period, there was extensive construction of field towers. A typical field tower is a small stone structure which measured about four by four meters. The towers were used for agricultural purposes, especially in the production of grapes and wine. Hundreds of these towers have been surveyed in both Northern and Southern Samaria. (Dar 930).

Also during the Roman period the road structure reached its peak. The roads extended into most of the surrounding areas linking its settlements and the farmer to his fields. During the Roman period, the ancient main routes to and from the city became part of the King’s highway. There were milestones along these routes on the King’s highway. These widespread roads connoted an organized administration of social and economic openness (Dar 930). Samaria was a well developed economic trade city judging by the road system; no wonder Jesus did not want to by-pass Samaria on his way to Galilee. The custom of the day was to travel around Samaria and go through Peraea, which was, like their own province, ruled by Herod Antipas, because the Jews did not desire to travel through this area (Parrot 117). But Jesus knew that the quickest route would be through Samaria (Keener 274). Jesus was not going to allow prejudice to slow down the progression of His ministry.

One of the most significant archaeological finds was the temple build by Herod the Great as a memorial to Caesar Augustus. The centerpiece of the Samaritan city this temple was constructed above the Israelite palaces. On the north side of the sanctuary, there was a court area. It measured roughly 80 yards by 80 yards and was enclosed by several concentric walls. From the court area, there were some beautiful stairs that consisted of two flights of steps which measured 30 yards wide. These stairs were enclosed by two long and narrow corridors. Also, it is believed that the temple was surrounded by other buildings on the south and west sides. One building is believed to have been a priest’s house, while the other building is believed to have been associated with emperor worship. This seems plausible since the temple was built in honor of Caesar Augustus. At the foot of the grand stairs was an altar which measured 4 yards by 2 yards by one yard and one foot. The altar was surrounded by pillars belonging to the imperial age. On the site there was also a badly damaged statue which is thought to have represented Caesar Augustus. This statue was discovered on the staircase. To the north, a second temple-like building was unearthed. On the temple site there were few artifacts because the area showed signs of already being worked over by others in ages past. One of the significant discoveries was an inscription to Serapis and Isis. There was an octagonal pedestal dedicated to Kore, along with two reliefs decorated with a conical cap which had an eight-pointed star on top. In fact, Parrot speculates that Simon the Sorcerer of Acts 8. 9-11 could have been a priest of Kore (119). The eight-pointed star is a symbol of Dioscuri. Also, there might have been found fragments of a statue of Artemis on the site (Parrot 107-110).

Another major archeological site that has New Testament significance is Jacob’s well. This well is mentioned in John 4 verse 6 by the Samaritan woman. It is traced back to Genesis 29.1-3. The well was at the foot of Mount Gerizim. It was also at the mouth of the valley before Shechem. Most scholars believe that the present location of Jacob’s well is, in fact, the genuine site where Jesus had the discussion with the Samaritan woman.

Conclusion
With the beginning of transference of the capital of the Northern king Omri, to the ransacking of the Roman legions; the city of Samaria has had a tumultuous past. The city has been destroyed and restored throughout the ages. During the centuries, the city of Samaria developed a distinct culture and religion. Thus, by the time of Jesus in the first century, there was well developed dislike from the Jews for these supposed half-breeds and pagan practitioners of Yahweh worship. Fortunately, archeological evidence has remained of some of the most contentious disputes. The temples on Mount Gerizim are a reminder of the heart of the religious controversy, and the ancient roads remind one that racism and not difficulty of travel caused the Jews to by pass the Samaritan territory. The archeological artifacts testify of a lost city, but not of a forgotten world.






Works Cited
Anderson, Robert T. “Mount Gerizim: Navel of the World.” The Biblical Archaeologist
43 (1980): 217-221.

________________. “Samaritans.” Anchor Bible Dictionary. 1st ed. 1992.

Beasley-Murray, George R. John. Word Biblical Commentary. Waco: Word Publisher,
1987.

Becking, Bob. The Fall of Samaria: An Historical & Archaeological Study. New York:
E.J. Brill, 1992.

Bull, Robert J. “An Archaeological Context for Understanding John 4:20.” The Biblical
Archaeologist 38 (1975): 54-59.

Cogan, Mordechai. “For We, Like You, Worship Your God: Three Biblical Portrayals of
Samaritan Origins.” Vestus Testamentum 38 (1988): 286-292.

Dar, Shimon. “Samaria (Archaeology of the Region).” Anchor Bible Dictionary. 1st ed.
1992.

Dickerson, Patrick L. “The Sources of the Account of the Mission to Samaria in Acts 8.
5-25.” Vestus Testamentum 39 (1997): 210-234.

Ferguson, Everett. Backgrounds of Early Christianity. 3rd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
2003.

Hjelm, Ingrid. The Samaritans and Early Judaism: A Literary Analysis. Sheffield:
Sheffield Academic Press, 2000.

Jack, J.W. Samaria in Ahab’s Time: Harvard Excavations and Their Results with
Chapters on the Political and Religious Situation. Edinburgh: T&T. Clark, 1929.

Keener, Craig S. The IVP Bible Background Commentary of the New Testament.
Downers Grove: InterVaristy Press, 1993.

Kostenberger, Andreas J. John. Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament.
Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2004.

Marshall, I Howard. The Gospel of Luke. The New International Greek Testament
Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978.


Page, Stephanie. “Joash and Samaria in a New Stela Excavated at Tell Al Rimah, Iraq.”
Vetus Testamentum 19 (1968): 483-484.

Parrot, Andre`. Samaria: The Capital of the Kingdom of Israel. London: SCM Press,
1958.

Purvis, James D. “Samaria.” Anchor Bible Dictionary. 1st ed. 1992.
Rousseau, John J, and Rami Arav. Jesus and His World: An Archaeological and Cultural
Dictionary. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995.

Wright, G. Ernest. “Samaria.” The Biblical Archaeologist 22 (1959): 67-78.