the beit-el history

Beit El, the frontier between the Judaic and Israelite kingdoms, is rich with Biblical and winemaking history:

Here, Jacob dreamed of the ladder reaching up to the sky.

After Joshua conquered Jericho, his next objective included Luz, another name for Beit El.

The midrash says that everyone in Luz always told the truth and, as a result, never died. If someone wanted to die, he had to be taken outside the city’s walls.

A nearby town, Gofna, is called Goffina by a mishna which recounts a mass wedding of 80 Cohen couples.

Engaved over the entrance of one nearby burial cave is the name of a Cohen family that had its own shift in the Second Temple.

Archeological evidence testifies to a thriving Jewish community here, including during the Second Temple and Byzantine periods, until the Arab invasion of the seventh century. Beit El was in the territory of the tribe of Benjamin, and throughout the Benjamin region there are hundreds of wine presses hewn in the rock from the Second Temple period. Some also served as oil presses. Many have adjacent ritual baths (mikvahs) so the produce could be made according to Jewish law.

Jews returned to Beit El and founded the modern town in 1975. Today Beit El boats a population of nearly 5000 people, businesses, and many schools, including the Beit-El Yeshiva. Beit El Rabbis Melamed and Aviner are among the most influential in Israel’s religious Zionist camp.