Sunday, July 23, 2006

Ein Yael

Archaeologist Gershon Edelstein found a Christian Star of David in a mosaic floor in Ein Yael (En Yalu), in south Jerusalem’s Rephaim Valley, in a farm with a Roman villa from mid-third-century A.D. He wrote about it a long report from which I quote:
In the last week of the 1988 season, we uncovered the mosaic floor of the circular room of the bathhouse, a floor encircled by a triple-twisted rope pattern, familiar to us from the mosaics in the living area of the villa. However, to our surprise a double-twisted rope in the center forms a hexagram, the familiar six-pointed star, or Shield of David (in Hebrew, Magen David).
Yehudah Rapuano, who participated in the excavations, discusses in his article the possibility that this place commemorated Philip’s baptism of the eunuch, related in Acts 8.
I went to see this Star of David in the mosaic floor in Ein Yael and to take a photo of it, but it was taken for reconstruction and I don't know when they will put it back.

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