♪ (music) ♪ (Sergio) <i>Beit Shearim,</i> <i>the most ancient, extensive
Jewish cemetery in the world.</i> <i>The wealth of artistic adornments
contained in this necropolis</i> <i>is unparalleled anywhere.</i> This place is nothing but conventional and holds one of the world's
greatest mysteries. What does a perfectly leveled
and rectangular, a nine-ton slab of glass doing in the middle of a burial cave? Also, why did this small
Jewish town of Beit Shearim need gates, walls, guard tower? What were they protecting? Stay tuned to find
the answers to these questions. ♪ (music) ♪ (Sergio) Beit Shearim was accidentally
discovered by Alexander Zaid, a Russian immigrant
who made the Aliyah in 1904. He was a famous guard
who had a hobby: to dig. In one of the outposts,
he came here and started digging. What he found is one of the greatest
archaeological discoveries in Israel. An ancient Jewish necropolis. Lets go and take a look. Archaeologists found here
over 30 burial cave systems. In addition to that, some artifacts and inscriptions in three languages:
Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. One of those inscriptions said "Bisara." Its Greek for "Beit Shearim,"
the house of gates. This is the most ancient,
extensive Jewish cemetery in the world. There is nothing like it
in its artistic adornments. After the destruction
of the second temple in 70 AD, the Sanhedrin, the Jewish supreme council, moved from Jerusalem to here. With them, the head of the Sanhedrin, Yehuda ha-Nasi. Rabbi Yehuda ha-Nasi is believed
to be buried right here in this cave system. We have inscription
of the names of his family that are buried here and other heads of Sanhedrin. It's incredible. Why are there so many burial caves here? Why are they so fancy? One theory is that after the Romans had prohibited the Jews to be buried
on Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, Beit Shearim became the alternative. After the head of the Sanhedrin
was buried here, practically, every other Jew
wanted to be buried by his side. After all, who wouldn't want
to be buried next to the Prince of Judah? But maybe there is another reason. For the longest time, historians were baffled
by the name of this place. It's called Beit Shearim--
the house of gates-- but where are the gates? Where are the wall
that are connected to those gates? Why such a small town
would need gates and walls? ♪ (music) ♪ <i>Last year, archaeologists
had finally excavated a Roman era gate,</i> <i>and a guard tower right next to it.</i> <i>This confirmed the name of the town</i> <i>but also posed a riddle:</i> <i>why did this town need them?</i> <i>What were they protecting?</i> (Sergio) The answer to that question <i>might just lie in one
of the world's greatest mysteries.</i> A nine-ton ancient slab of glass found in the middle of a necropolis. You're looking at this, and you're saying,
"Wait a second, it's a rock!" It looks like a rock,
it feels like a rock. Somebody in the 1950s
suggested that this is glass, and they laughed at them. In 1963, they were making
a research about the ancient glass. They drilled a sample
out of the middle of the rock. It took them hours to drill through, and they took it to the lab. The analysis from the lab showed that the chemical composition
of this material is glass. In fact, it is nine ton of it. Nine ton of glass! That equals to 60,000 perfume bottles. <i>To produce such a slab of glass,</i> <i>they would need: 12 tons of raw material.</i> <i>20 tons of fuel,</i> <i>an 1,100-degree centigrade furnace</i> <i>that burns 5-10 days continually.</i> <i>To put it in to perspective,</i> <i>imagine, 12 full truck loads of sand,</i> <i>250 wood logs</i> <i>that if you put on top of each other,</i> <i>would come out almost twice higher
than the Empire State Building,</i> <i>and a furnace that can melt most metals.</i> The question is:
why is this glass not transparent? The answer lies
in the chemical composition. This glass is defected. It has twice more lime
than it's supposed to have-- 16% instead of 8%. What is this glass doing here? One theory is that this cave
was turned in to a glass factory, or at least they tried. In the process of making it, as this place was very hot
and burning for five days, lime from the limestone from the ceilings dripped down into the raw material and added more lime than it needs to be, making it defected. They left this factory
and said it's a goner. That theory is a bit bizarre because why would they
start a glass factory in the middle of the cave, a burial cave? That's a difficult one to answer. But there's another theory. One that is very interesting. (Sergio) <i>Until recently, scholars believed</i> <i>that glass was first invented
in Egypt 3,000 years ago,</i> <i>but recent discoveries
have led the researches</i> <i>to push the date back
by 800 years into the land of Ur.</i> <i>That's right. Abraham's home town.</i> <i>The technology followed him into Canaan,</i> <i>then to Egypt, then back to Canaan,</i> <i>From there it spread across the world</i> <i>with the help of the Roman Empire.</i> <i>Here are the interesting facts.</i> <i>The remains of the largest
glass factory of the ancient world</i> <i>is found nowhere else but Israel</i> <i>on the coast of Hadera.</i> <i>A whooping 17 ancient furnaces.</i> <i>Another fact: the oldest
blown glass ever found</i> <i>was also discovered in Israel</i> <i>in the Jewish quarter of Jerusalem.</i> <i>Is it possible that the secret recipe
of glass making</i> <i>was passed from father
to son among the Hebrews?</i> <i>So what about this giant slab of glass?</i> <i>In 1 Kings 6:4,</i> <i>the Bible describes how Solomon
constructed the temple windows,</i> <i>“He made narrow windows
high up in the temple walls.”</i> <i>Looking at this verse in Hebrew
shed more light on the mystery.</i> <i>(speaks in Hebrew)</i> <i>The word "shkufim" means "transparent,"</i> <i>and the word "atumim" means "sealed."</i> <i>Transparent and sealed windows.</i> <i>Could this be referring to glass?</i> <i>Is it possible that King Herod
rebuilt the second temple</i> <i>with actual giant glass windows
inside of it?</i> <i>Could it be that after the destruction
of the temple in 70 AD,</i> <i>one window survived</i> <i>but got contaminated in fire
by the limestone temple walls?</i> <i>What if the Jews were able to move
this window to Beit Shearim?</i> <i>This crazy theory</i> <i>would explain why such a small town
needed walls to protect it</i> <i>and why every other Jew
wanted to be buried</i> <i>by the last remaining holy article
from the temple.</i> It might just be
that I'm touching a temple artifact. Did you like this video? Subscribe bellow
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They drilled a sample hole, right in the fucking middle of it?!
An article on this: https://www.cmog.org/article/mystery-slab-beth-shearim