ISRAEL PHOTOS IV -- Pilgrimage


TABGHA

Tabgha is east of Magdala about two miles west of Capernaum. It is at the site of the heptapegon; meaning seven springs in Greek. It has been reported two of the seven have ceased flowing.

Egeria (c. 382) said there was a church in memory of the multiplication of the loaves at Tabgha. In 1932 a mosaic showing the fish and the loaves on a tile mosaic was uncovered by Dr. Mader and Dr. Schneider.


Church Mosaic Floor Constructed in the Fourth Century -- Tabgha

New Guide To The Holy Land, Father Barnabas Meistermann, 1907, London:

St. Jerome described St. Paula’s journey to Lake Galilee and Tabor about 380. In St. Paula’s letter to Marcella she makes it clear she visited the place of the first multiplication of loaves on the western shore of the lake. St. Sylva of Aquitaine, who went to Galilee a few years later, says, after speaking of Capharnuam: “There, on the shore of the lake, stretches a plain covered with grass and palms in the middle of which area is seven springs, each one with a great abundance of water. It is the plain on which the Saviour fed the crowd with five loaves and two fishes. A church has been built above the stone on which the Saviour placed the loaves. Theodosius (530) points out at 5 miles from Magdala, “Bersabee, which means seven fountains, the place where the Saviour baptized His apostles, and fed the 5000 men with five loaves and two fishes. 9th cent. St. Epiphanius, the Hagapolite, points out 2 miles to the west of Capernaum, on the shore of the lake, the great church called Heptapegon and the plain where the Saviour worked the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves."

Saewulf, Daniel, Fretellus, John of Wruzburg, Theodoric, Phocas, Burchard, and other pilgrims agreed in assigning to this spot the first multiplication of loaves. Some early investigators assumed Tabgha was the site as the place of the feeding of the 5,000. Some early travelers thought this place was Bethsaida. Bethsaida meant "House of Fish." Later scholars using Josephus as a guide located Bethsaida at Et Tell to the east of the Jordan. More recent pilgrims assigned the spot of the feeding of the 5,000 to the NE corner of the Sea of Galilee where the mountains and hills nearly touch the lake south of the plain of the Jordan River delta.


This is an artesian spring at Tabgha. It is one of the strongest springs in Israel bursting forth from the rock at full force.

Another large spring at Tabgha


Cross-shaped limestone baptismal at Tabgha. There were cross shaped basins at other Byzantine Era
churches in Israel in the Negev. One form of baptism is immersion by pouring water over another's head.

Nazareth Synagogue
Churches of the Annunciation
Latin Tradition -- Mount of Precipitation
Nazareth Aerial View
Museum of the Basilica
Hot Springs at Tiberias
Stone Water Jars at Capernaum
Capernaum
Tabgha
Bethsaida
A 1909 Galilee Fishing Description
The Giant Mustard Plant
Kursi and the Gadarene Demoniac
Jar of Ointment
Cana
Wheat and Tares

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