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Kfar Bar'am synagogue
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Kfar Bar'am synagogue
The Kfar Bar'am Synagogue (Hebrew: כְּפַר בַּרְעָם), also known as the Kafar Berem Synagogue, is the archaeological ruins of two former ancient Jewish synagogues, located at the site of Kafr Bir'im, a former Palestinian Christian village, in what is today the Bar'am National Park. The synagogue is in the Galilee region of the Northern District of Israel, approximately 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) from the border with Lebanon. It is estimated that the former synagogue was completed in the 3rd century, during the Roman period, likely by c. 220 CE, and was located in the medieval Jewish village of Kfar Bar'am.
The façade of the 3rd-century synagogue faces south, towards Jerusalem, as the custom of most synagogues, and was replete with a covered portico containing six stone columns.
It was first identified as a synagogue in modern times in 1852 – along with other similar remains in Galilee – by Edward Robinson in his Biblical Researches in Palestine.
The name is often assumed to mean "Son of the People," incorporating the Aramaic word bar בר, meaning "son" and the Hebrew word am עם meaning "people". However, if like at Shfar'am, both elements are Hebrew, the name could derive from a literary Hebrew word בר indicating cleanliness, purity, pristineness and wholesomeness - "The wholesome people" or "wholesomeness of the people".[citation needed]
Kafr Bir'im was established in ancient times, during the Roman period, in Talmudic times, most likely by c. 220 CE. According to Jewish tradition, Pinchas ben Yair (2nd-century CE) was buried in Kfar Bir'im. It was inhabited by Jews until the 13th century, if not later. After a period of Muslim inhabitation, by the 19th century the village was entirely Christian, comprising Maronites and Melkites. A church on the site, the Maronite church, was in regular use.
The village was badly damaged in the Galilee earthquake of 1837. The local church and a row of columns and other standing remains of the ancient synagogue were thrown to the ground.
Along with other such structures in the Galilee, the ruins were first identified as a synagogue in modern times in 1852 by Edward Robinson in his Biblical Researches in Palestine. Robinson wrote of his visit to Kafr Bir'im:
As these remains were the first of the kind that we had yet seen; and were of a style of architecture utterly unknown to us; we were at a loss for some time what to make of them. They were evidently neither Greek nor Roman. The inscription, if authentic, obviously marks both structures as of Jewish origin; and as such, they could only have been synagogues. We were, however, not satisfied on this point, until we found at Meirôn the same species of architecture, in the acknowledged remains of an ancient Jewish synagogue. We afterwards found the ruins of like structures at Irbid, Tell Hum, Kedes, and perhaps other places in Galilee; all marked with the same architectural peculiarities. The size, the elaborate sculptured ornament, and the splendour of these edifices, do not belong to a scattered and down-trodden people; such as the Jews have been in these regions ever since the fourth century. These costly synagogues, therefore, can be referred only to the earlier centuries of the Christian era; when Galilee was the chief seat of the Jews; and Jewish learning and schools flourished at Tiberias. All these circumstances would seem to mark a condition of prosperity and wealth and influence among the Jews of Galilee in that age, of which neither their own historians, nor any other, have given us any account.
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Kfar Bar'am synagogue
The Kfar Bar'am Synagogue (Hebrew: כְּפַר בַּרְעָם), also known as the Kafar Berem Synagogue, is the archaeological ruins of two former ancient Jewish synagogues, located at the site of Kafr Bir'im, a former Palestinian Christian village, in what is today the Bar'am National Park. The synagogue is in the Galilee region of the Northern District of Israel, approximately 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) from the border with Lebanon. It is estimated that the former synagogue was completed in the 3rd century, during the Roman period, likely by c. 220 CE, and was located in the medieval Jewish village of Kfar Bar'am.
The façade of the 3rd-century synagogue faces south, towards Jerusalem, as the custom of most synagogues, and was replete with a covered portico containing six stone columns.
It was first identified as a synagogue in modern times in 1852 – along with other similar remains in Galilee – by Edward Robinson in his Biblical Researches in Palestine.
The name is often assumed to mean "Son of the People," incorporating the Aramaic word bar בר, meaning "son" and the Hebrew word am עם meaning "people". However, if like at Shfar'am, both elements are Hebrew, the name could derive from a literary Hebrew word בר indicating cleanliness, purity, pristineness and wholesomeness - "The wholesome people" or "wholesomeness of the people".[citation needed]
Kafr Bir'im was established in ancient times, during the Roman period, in Talmudic times, most likely by c. 220 CE. According to Jewish tradition, Pinchas ben Yair (2nd-century CE) was buried in Kfar Bir'im. It was inhabited by Jews until the 13th century, if not later. After a period of Muslim inhabitation, by the 19th century the village was entirely Christian, comprising Maronites and Melkites. A church on the site, the Maronite church, was in regular use.
The village was badly damaged in the Galilee earthquake of 1837. The local church and a row of columns and other standing remains of the ancient synagogue were thrown to the ground.
Along with other such structures in the Galilee, the ruins were first identified as a synagogue in modern times in 1852 by Edward Robinson in his Biblical Researches in Palestine. Robinson wrote of his visit to Kafr Bir'im:
As these remains were the first of the kind that we had yet seen; and were of a style of architecture utterly unknown to us; we were at a loss for some time what to make of them. They were evidently neither Greek nor Roman. The inscription, if authentic, obviously marks both structures as of Jewish origin; and as such, they could only have been synagogues. We were, however, not satisfied on this point, until we found at Meirôn the same species of architecture, in the acknowledged remains of an ancient Jewish synagogue. We afterwards found the ruins of like structures at Irbid, Tell Hum, Kedes, and perhaps other places in Galilee; all marked with the same architectural peculiarities. The size, the elaborate sculptured ornament, and the splendour of these edifices, do not belong to a scattered and down-trodden people; such as the Jews have been in these regions ever since the fourth century. These costly synagogues, therefore, can be referred only to the earlier centuries of the Christian era; when Galilee was the chief seat of the Jews; and Jewish learning and schools flourished at Tiberias. All these circumstances would seem to mark a condition of prosperity and wealth and influence among the Jews of Galilee in that age, of which neither their own historians, nor any other, have given us any account.