Magdala map
Posted on 09/23/2023 9:44:32 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
But while history and archaeology tell us a great deal about Taricheae, we know very little about a Galilean town or village that would have been known as Magdala in the first century...
No contemporary early Roman sources mention a town called Magdala on the western shores of the Sea of Galilee. However, both the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds—the two major collections of Jewish oral law and commentary written down between the third and sixth centuries—do reference the existence of one Magdala—Migdal Nunayya, or "Tower of the Fish"—in very close proximity to Tiberias... In one story, the second-century rabbi Shimon bar Yohai is said to have "passed in front of the synagogue of Magdala" immediately after his departure from Tiberias (Pesiqta of Rab Kahana 11.16), while a story in the Jerusalem Talmud notes that the two locations were so close that their courtyards were even connected (y.Ma'aserot. 3.1 [50c]).
What do we take from all this? During the first few centuries C.E., the only "Magdala" recorded along the shores of the Sea of Galilee was Migdal Nunayya, a village located about half a mile from ancient Tiberias. This village was clearly not Taricheae, a significant port city situated 4 miles north of present-day Tiberias at the site we know today as Magdala.
(Excerpt) Read more at biblicalarchaeology.org ...
When I get to heaven, I’ll ask Mary.
Towns move.
Usually for economic reasons.
I was surprised to learn that the small town I grew up in was not always where it is today.
When the railroad was built, the town moved to be beside it, about two or three miles.
Of course it wasn’t overnight, it too a generation or so.....................
This town didn’t, merely the name did, as happened a lot with Holy Land place names. Misidentifications really got going under Byzantine rule.
Tourism.
“Hey! If we change our town’s name to ‘Magdala’, we can get all those stupid Eurotrash tourists to come here and spend their gold and silver to buy our trinkets!”................
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