Mts. Ebal and Gerizim

The book of Kings recounts how all Ten Tribes were exiled by the Assyrians and replaced by foreigners, and Ezra–Nehemiah rejects them as non-Israelites. Yet other biblical and Second Temple texts, along with the archaeological record, show that northern Israelites continued to live in Samaria well into the Second Temple period. Far from vanishing, the northern tribes maintained a temple and priesthood that cooperated with their southern neighbors and played a role in shaping the Pentateuch.

The Book of Joshua describes Israel waging a military campaign against Jericho and other southern cities. The Song of the Sea (Exodus 15), on the other hand, depicts Israel crossing the Jordan, and YHWH bringing them directly to a temple.

Jews have long understood “the place that YHWH will choose” to mean Mount Zion in Jerusalem, while Samaritans have interpreted it as Mount Gerizim near Shechem. Archaeology and redaction criticism converge on a compromise solution: it refers to a series of places, one place at a time.

An enormous ancient altar from the early twelfth-century B.C.E., uncovered at the site of El-Burnat, sheds light on the biblical account of Joshua’s altar at Mt. Ebal as well as on the famous story of Jacob crossing his arms to bless Ephraim over Manasseh with the birthright.

The textual remnants of a Second Temple religious polemic between Judeans and Samaritans about where God’s chosen mountain lies.

Mount Gerizim appears in the Pentateuch as the mountain of blessing and plays a prominent role in Samaritan tradition, but the Jewish tradition sidelines this mountain and the Samaritans themselves in a polemic that began more than two and half thousand years ago.