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Hinnom Valley Review

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Hinnom Valley

Fodor's Review:

The Hinnom Valley achieved notoriety in the 7th century BC during the long reign of the biblical king Menasseh (697-640 BC). He was an idolater, the Bible relates, who supported a cult of child sacrifice by fire in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom. Its very name in Hebrew – Gei Ben Hinnom, contracted to Gehennom or Gehenna – became a synonym for hell in both Hebrew and New Testament Greek.

In the late 1970s, Israeli archaeologist Gabriel Barkai discovered a series of Old Testament-period rock tombs at the bend in the valley, below the fortresslike St. Andrew's Scots Church. A miraculously unplundered pit yielded "grave goods" like clay vessels and jewelry; the most spectacular finds, however, were two tiny rolled strips of silver designed to be worn around the neck as amulets. When unrolled, the fragile pieces revealed a slightly condensed and damaged version of the biblical priestly benediction, inscribed in the ancient Hebrew script. (The original, in Numbers 6, reads: "The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.") The 7th-century BC text is the oldest biblical passage ever found. The tombs are an open site, to the left and behind the new Menachem Begin Heritage Center.

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