Page 29 - HaMizrachi Purim Australia 5781

PLACES IN ISRAEL THE PEOPLE AND THE LAND

Eve Harow

Bar’am and Purim

ust three kilometers from Lebanon and this is also the case in other Galilean fifth century building of churches and
on Israel’s northern border lie the Talmudic towns where the synagogues Samaritan synagogues around the Land.
Jremains of the ancient Jewish village are older than the signs of settlement One of the interesting traditions con-
of Kfar Bar’am. Founded in all likeli- around them. nected to Bar’am is of it being the burial
hood during the Second Temple period, place of Mordechai and Esther, in a
the town remained Jewish for centu- How can this be explained? The latest
ries until some time between the early theory is the buildings are put together tomb in the National Park near the syn-
agogue. On Purim in 1949, Jews from
Muslim conquest in the seventh century from stones in secondary use, mean- Tzfat read the Megillah there, reviving
and the Ayyubids in the late 12th/early ing they were carved earlier for other
13th century when it was abandoned buildings elsewhere and reused in these a Middle Ages tradition to celebrate
and occupied by Muslims. Maronite new sites. It’s clear, for example, that Shushan Purim at the site. We have
Christians lived there till 1948, and in the lintel of the Bar’am synagogue is evidence from as early as 1215 of trav-
ellers and explorers writing that Queen
1949 the secular Hashomer HaTzair not the original. What possible reason
established Kibbutz Bar’am on the land would there be for this taking apart and Esther had instructed ‘her son Cyrus’
where they now cultivate orchards of rebuilding? to bury her there and it soon became
plums, nectarines, apples and pears. a site of pilgrimage. It’s unclear though
what the source of the tradition is and
After the destruction of Bayit Sheini the more accepted version is that they
(70 CE) and the demolishing of Judean are buried in Hamadan, Iran, possibly
towns as punishment for the Bar Kochba ancient Shushan. But still…
Revolt (132-135/6 CE), the Galilee and
Golan became the center of Jewish life In another Tzfat-Bar’am connection,
in Israel under the Roman and Byzan- there’s a tradition that the facade of the
tine Empires. Many synagogues in the Tiferet Yisrael synagogue in the Old City
area were built from the third century of Jerusalem was inspired by the arches
and are mentioned in Mishnaic and of the ancient synagogue of… Bar’am.
Talmudic literature. There are a few in As the story goes, after the devastat-
the southern Chevron Hills (Eshtamoa, ing earthquake of 1837, survivors from
Sussya, Maon, Carmel) and some in the Remember that quarrying, carving and Tzfat came to live in Jerusalem and in a
Jordan Valley Rift (Ein Gedi, Jericho) moving stones in the ancient world was desire to remember their beloved Gali-
but the vast majority are in the eastern an expensive, time-consuming and dif- lee, designed the synagogue to look like
Galilee and Golan. These are some of ficult endeavor, so there was much sec- the one in Bar’am.
the earliest synagogues we know and ondary and even tertiary use of stones. Traditions, conjecture, history, holi-
there has been much debate about It’s likely the Romans didn’t allow the days. We may never know the ‘truth,’
the time of their building. Of the two Jews to have monumental buildings for but we’ve come home and can once
synagogues in Kfar Bar’am, one has worship and they could only do it at a again celebrate, in the Land of Israel,
been preserved and restored and is the later time. Perhaps they weren’t allowed the Purim miracle that happened in the
subject of scholarly investigation. The to carve anything new and could just galut.
synagogue itself has been dated to the recycle what had already been built. It’s
third century based on a relief and other also more than possible that the very
evidence, however the archaeological early original synagogues mentioned Eve Harow is a licensed tour guide, pod-
caster and public speaker.
survey of the area around it has remains by the Sages were very simple affairs,
only from the fifth century. Much has more like a beit midrash, and these eveharow.com • eve.harow@gmail.com
been discussed about this discrepancy impressive buildings were constructed A member of the Mizrachi Tour Guides Bureau
between the building and the grounds later, perhaps commensurate with the ` mizrachi.org/tour-guides

| 29