The famed city of Jericho is one of the oldest cities in the world. By the time the Israelites watched its walls fall down under Joshua’s command (Joshua 6), Jericho was already thousands of years old. Located on a plain where the Jordan River enters the Dead Sea, the heavily fortified city stood guard over the entrance to Canaan from the southwest, which meant the Israelites had to conquer it in order to safely enter the Promised Land. With its hot desert climate and abundant springs, Jericho was known as the “city of palm trees” (Deuteronomy 34:3). Centuries later it was likely near Jericho (which had moved further south) where Jesus was baptized (Matthew 3:13; Mark 1:9; Luke 3:1-22; John 1:26-34), and he also encountered Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1-10) and a blind man named Bartimaeus there (Mark 10:46-52). Jesus’ story of the Good Samaritan tells of a man overtaken by robbers on the steep route descending from Jerusalem to Jericho (Luke 10:25-37). About ten miles southwest of Jericho lay the forbidding wilderness of Judea, where Jesus fasted and was tempted by the Devil (Matthew 4:1-11; Mark 1:12; Luke 4:1-13). The desert community of Qumran, who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls, was also located nearby.
Philistia
One of the most well-known stories of the Bible is David’s defeat of Goliath, a Philistine giant from the town of Gath (1 Samuel 17). The Philistines may have originated from the island of Crete and settled along the eastern Mediterranean coast around the time of the Judges (Jeremiah 47:4; Amos 9:7). As the Philistines pushed further into the interior of Canaan, they often came into conflict with the Israelites, who resided mostly in the hill country (Judges 3:31; 10:7; 13:1; 1 Samuel 4:1; 7:10; 12:9; 13:3; 14:52; 17:1; 19:8; 23:5; 24:1; 31:1; 2 Samuel 5:18-19). The Philistine threat was likely one of the reasons the Israelites eventually demanded a king to help rally the nation (1 Samuel 9:16). The five primary cities of Philistia were Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ekron, Gath, and Gaza (Joshua 13:3; 1 Samuel 6:17), and these may have been what was in young David’s mind as he chose five stones in preparation to face Goliath (1 Samuel 17:40). The Israelites subdued the Philistines (2 Samuel 8:1; 1 Chronicles 18:1), but the area remained largely Gentile throughout Bible times. In the New Testament, Peter traveled to the nearby cities of Lydda and Joppa and healed Aeneas and Dorcas (Acts 9:32-43), and Philip the Evangelist (one of the original deacons of the early church) met an Ethiopian eunuch on the road to Gaza and explained to him that Jesus is the Messiah foretold in the Scriptures (Acts 8:26-40).
Magi Worship Jesus
Perhaps as much as two years after Jesus’ birth astrologers called Magi came from the East to worship the newborn king of the Jews, for they had seen a star in the heavens that indicated he had been born, and it directed them to Jerusalem. They asked King Herod where the child was, and he asked the leading priests and teachers of the law, who correctly pointed them to Bethlehem. So the Magi traveled five miles south to Bethlehem, and the star directed them to the house where Jesus and his family lived. There they worshiped Jesus and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Then, being warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, the Magi returned to their homeland by a different route. An angel then warned Joseph in a dream to flee to Egypt with his family to escape Herod’s wicked plan to kill the newborn king.
The Story of Jesus’ Birth
The story of Jesus’ birth actually begins in the little town of Nazareth, where Joseph and Mary lived. The angel Gabriel appeared to Mary there and announced to her that she would give birth to the Messiah and that she was to name him Jesus. Soon after this Mary traveled to visit her relative Elizabeth in the hill country of Judea, perhaps near Bethlehem, a 70-mile journey that would have taken Mary about 3 days on foot. Mary stayed with Elizabeth, who was also pregnant and would give birth to John the Baptist, for three months before returning to Nazareth. As the time drew near for Jesus to be born, Mary and Joseph were required to travel to Bethlehem, the town of their ancestor David, to be counted in a Roman census. There Mary gave birth to Jesus.
Cilicia, Cyprus, and Syria
When the apostle Paul described his native city of Tarsus in Cilicia as “no ordinary city” (Acts 21:39), he wasn’t just spouting empty hometown pride. The whole region of Cilicia, along with the city of Tarsus, already formed a key part of the Hittite Empire even before Moses’ time, and the land had been fought over by virtually all the major civilizations throughout Bible times. Likewise the island of Cyprus–the home region of Paul’s coworker Barnabas–had a similar history as an ancient and prestigious civilization. And the nearby city of Antioch, the home church of Paul and Barnabas, had once been the capital of the mighty Seleucid Empire, and by the time of Paul it was one of the largest cities in the entire Roman Empire. Antioch was where believers were first called “Christians.”
