Lot's Wife Pillar, Mount Sodom, and Zohar Fortress

in the last day of our Dead Sea trip we decided to get in the car and explore the south of the Dead Sea region no matter where you turn here you'll find something of biblical and historical significance there's the endless routes and paths and little roads into the mountains and monuments and structures in the mountains full reservations new pools are formed because of the Dead Sea drying out and it's incredible there's so much to do here in this episode we'll explore the valley of the zohar brook which is mentioned in the bible as the way of freedom and we'll explore the ancient roman fortress that stands on top of a moral stone hill we're in the very interesting location in the middle of this valley surrounded by just limestone rock is a fortress then we'll continue south to mount Sodom which has a peculiar looking pillar named after Lot's wife that's Lot's wife and underneath it a cave which some believed to be the place where Lots wealth with his daughters so join us on an adventure in this marvelous and unique place on earth in the south of the Dead Sea there is a place called Zoar Brook it is not to be confused with zoar the place to which lot escaped from Sodom and Gomorrah even though these two sounds similar in English in Hebrew language they're entirely different words the entrance to this valley is somewhat hard to spot it's a little turn from the main road 90 which takes you on a dirt road and then a few yards later it leads you to a scenic drive by the edge of a cliff in between beautiful limestone and marl stone mountains [Music] this road is believed to be the way of Adam mentioned in second Kings 3 when the king of Israel Judah and Edom went to fight the Moabites and to get to Moab they took this way but after seven days they ran out of water and after Elijah's prayer God provided an abundance of water to this valley even though there was no rain so scholars believe that this location fits the biblical story because it rains afar off in the mountains so you cannot hear the rain but then the rain water does not get absorbed into the ground but rather drains down the mountains into this valley filling the cisterns and the water dams that they excavated here [Music] [Music] [Applause] a few years back archaeologists started digging and looking into the history behind this place what they were surprised to find there's very little information left behind who lived there who were the people why this fortress was built and what was this road [Music] so a few different theories started to be developed one of them is that this fortress is built in a very strategic Elise in the center of the atom way this way is believed to later become the trade route during the Roman Byzantine or the Crusader Mangala periods to carry the salt produced in the Dead Sea into the heart of the land and historians speculate that this fortress served to protect the road and perhaps even collect access on the salt trade there is even a lookout power carved out of the bedrock located in front of the fortress it would be a great place for soldiers to observe the incoming traffic [Applause] but all these are theories which have not much archaeological sport first survey dated this fortress to the Roman time while a later conducted survey placed it into the Crusader period the lack of archeological evidence to build a proper storyline can be attributed to the easily crumbling moral stone look at this what looks like once used to be steps is now look at this so looks like this one slide the crumble so easily you don't want to attempt to climb this [Music] as it looks look look Wow look at that like a better [Music] there are two pillars for Lot's wife one in Jordan and one in Israel the Jordanian pillar has a much better shape of a human and an interesting cave with archeological findings from the Iron Age while the Israeli pillar looks more like a giant truck with a salt cave underneath it would make no sense to figure out which one is the real pillar because according to the book of Genesis the pillar shouldn't even be above the cave at all but rather in the plain that's Lot's wife so what we see here today is just a reminder of the story rather than an artifact [Music] it looks like Lot's wife was yeah maybe a relative of like the fully Nephilim or Goliath or Yannick Emer but the interesting part about this place is the actual mountain rather than the pillar itself this mountain is called mount Sodom and if you examine it with your eyes you'll notice that there are no plants or vegetation on it that is because Mark Sodom is made of 80% salt it is one giant mountain of salt and since salt dissolves much faster than limestone this mountain is home to the longest single natural salt cave in the world it is merely 2 and a half miles long and until recently it was open to the public but today it had been closed due to the danger of falling salt rocks cave of lot and his daughters were they hit after they left or so or Asafa Betsy and it's as from there they left and went to dwell in the caves so it's very much possible in the world that caves like these over here you know when we read about it and you read that they lived in they went up to the mountains and in a cave there in my in my head mountains are you know those green big where you have a lot of trees and everything but the mountains in this area they're just sand desert that they're bare there's nothing on them so I I've never thought about it like that and it must have not been easy especially in the heat and all that but there are plenty of caves in those mountains I mean Lennie it's amazing and there are some sources of water you got to know where they are but if you don't you'll die out here because that's sea so salty you can drink it do nothing with it so to get fresh water you know where you get to know where there those reservoirs are where the streams are otherwise you die in here this is nice a little bit of shade hobo's shame you know after swimming in the Dead Sea like the oily oily part because it's oily and salty and everything and then you stand in the Sun and it feels somebody's frying you deprived and you don't need like seasoning [Laughter]

Channel: Sergio & Rhoda in Israel

Views: 784,851

Rating: 4.7306523 out of 5

Keywords: Sergio and Rhoda, Israel, Travel, Bible, Travel in Israel, Israel Tour, Lot's Wife, Mount Sodom, Zohar Fortress, Zohar Brook

Id: Xow2Ad4b84Q

Length: 10min 35sec (635 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 04 2018