ii. Description. -The Lake presents 'a beauti- ful sheet of limpid water in a deeply depressed basin' (BRP- ii. 380), its average below sea level being 682^ ft. ; but with the season of the year the level may vary to the extent of 10 ft. The rise and fall are dependent on the rainy season on the one hand, and, on the other, on the melting of the snows on Hermon as the spring advances ; and
SEA OF GALILEE
Moderrv names thus O Irbtd, Josephus If It QGadara BihlijcaJL •• " •MAGDALA
W.SoA.K. Johnston, Limited Edinburgh. Sc London.
SEA OF GALILEE
SEA OF GALILEE
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it is this latter cause that generally, in conjunc- tion with the later rains, brings about the high level at the time of harvest (Jos 3*^). But as the heavier rains decrease before the melting of the snow begins, there may have been already a fall of as much as 3 ft. even in March. The Sea is 13 miles long; by 7 across at its broadest part — between Mejdel and Kersa ; but in the clear Eastern atmosphere it looks much smaller than it really is. From no point on the western shore can it be seen in its whole extent at one time ; but frona the slopes above Tell ^(Im, or from almost any point on the eastern shore, it is all visible. It is not quite oval, but rather pear- or harp-shaped (113?), narrowing to the southern end. The sea level and the configuration of the shores have not changed to any considerable extent during the past nineteen centuries, so that, in so far as hills and valleys, ravines and slopes to the seashore are concerned, their present description gives a very true conception of what they were in Gospel days. On the west the hills are not so high and generally not so steep as on the eastern side ; but they approach more closely to the shore, and are more rugged and stony. On the western side, from a short distance above what was once the western outlet of the Lake into the Jordan, and stretch- ing some 3 miles up the Lake-side, the hills— here somewhat rounded and tame, and with but little that is picturesque in their form — slope down to the water's edge. Then to the north of this comes a strip (Heb. npi, which .seems to justify the identifi- cation of Tiberias Avith the older Kakkath, Jos 1935 ; Megilla, 5b, 6a ; G. A. Smith, HGHL p. 447) about 2^ miles long and J of a mile broad at its widest part, and at the north end of this is the modern town of Tiberias. Passing it, we have another 3 miles of sloping hills, broken about midway by the Wachj Abu el- Amis. At Mejdel we now enter el-Ghuiveir, the well-known Plain of Gennesaret. Behind the village to the Avest is Wady HamAm, known in the early centuries as •^xa-iN ny;??, and containing in its clifi's the once famous caves of Arbela (Ant. XIV. xv. 4). This is certainly the wildest and most impressive gorge around the whole Lake. On its south side it bears some resemblance, though on a far grander scale, to the crags around Arthur's Seat. There is the same perpendicular wall, but here it rises in places to a heiguit of 1500 ft.; and there is also the same mass of broken rocks, making a steep slope to the plain beloAv.
El-Ghuiveir curves along the Lake from Mejdel to Kha,n Minyeh, a distance of 3 miles, and it has a breadth of one mile. In addition to the stream from Wady Hamctvi, it is watered by three others from ' Aiii Mudatiwarah, Wady Rabadryeh, and Wady Leimon, and these flow throughout the year. Just behind Khiin Minyeh and its fountain 'Ai7i ct-Tln at the N.W. corner of the Lake, the rounded hill Tell Oreime slopes down to the water's edge, ending in a series of sharp rocks — the only place around the Lake where we find anything like a elitf beside the shore. Around the face of Tell Oreime there is a deep rock-ciitting now used as a pathway, but in ancient times an aqueduct, as is attested by the discovery of the remains of the old piers of its continuation across the next valley to 'Ain et-fAbigha. Remains of masonry show that the water was led eastward as well as westward from the towers built around the springs of et-TAhigha ("EiWT6.wr)yov of Nicephorus), so that there can be little doubt that this is the spring of Capernaum mentioned by Josephus [BJ III. X. 8). From this point onward to the Jordan tlie hills again extend do^wn to the shore, but by gentler slopes than even to the south of Tiberias. Between ct-TAbigha and Tell Hum the shore forms
a number of semicircular creeks, which, with the sloping embankment at this jioint, assume the shape of amphitheatres. Studying the subject on the spot, the present author was convinced that one of these must be the place where the sermon from the boat was preached (Mt 13'^ etc.). Some- thing peculiar in the tones of our voices induced us to test the acoustic properties of the place, and we found that a speaker on the boat could be heard far up the slope, while the hum and bustle of a crowd on the shore would not disturb him.