Bethel

Bethel is the name of a place often used in the Hebrew Bible. It is first mentioned in Genesis 12:8 as being near where Abram pitched his tent. Later in Genesis, it is the location where Jacob dreamt of seeing angels and God, and which he therefore named Bethel, "House of God." The name is further used for a border city located between the territory of the Israelite tribe of Benjamin and that of the tribe of Ephraim, which first belonged to the Benjaminites and was later conquered by the Ephraimites. Eusebius of Caesarea and Jerome describe Bethel in their time as a small village that lay 12 Roman miles north of Jerusalem, to the right or east of the road leading to Neapolis. Most academics identify Bethel with the Arab West Bank village Beitin, a minority opinion preferring El-Bireh. Ten years after the 1967 Six-Day War, the biblical name was applied to the Israeli settlement of Beit El, constructed adjacent to Beitin.

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