Mount Carmel

Mount Carmel is a coastal mountain range in Israel overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. Its name is derived from the Hebrew "Karem El" which means 'vineyards of God'. In ancient times it was covered by vineyards and was at all times famous for its fertility.

A Syrian Philosopher of the 4th century B.C., called Iamblichus, wrote that Mount Carmel was "the most holy of all mountains and forbidden of access to many."

Geography

Mount Carmel is 16 miles long by 4-5 miles wide and 1,800 feet high. The city of Haifa is partially on Mount Carmel, and so are a few smaller towns such as Nesher, Tirat Hakarmel, Yokneam and Zikhron Ya'aqov.

History

Mount Carmel is mentioned in the Bible. On Mount Carmel transpired the miracles attending the competition between Baal and the Israelite God, after which the priests of Baal were put to death by the order of the prophet Elijah.

A Catholic religious order, the Carmelites, was founded on Mount Carmel in the 12th century by a certain Berthold (d. after 1185) who was either a pilgrim or crusader. The order grew to be one of the major Catholic religious orders worldwide. Prefixed to the 1281 Carmelite Constitution was this statement: "From the times when the prophet Elias (Elijah) and Eliseus dwelt devoutly on Mount Carmel, holy fathers both of the old and new Testament....lived praiseworthy lives in holy penitence by the fountain of Elias in a holy succession uninterruptedly maintained."
Carmelite tradition suggests that a community of Jewish hermits lived on Mount Carmel from the time of Elijah, although no documentary evidence of such a community exists.

During World War I, Mount Carmel played a significant strategic role. The Battle of Megiddo took place at the head of a pass through the Carmel Ridge, which overlooks the Valley of Jezreel from the south. General Allenby led the British in the battle, which was the turning point in the war against the Ottoman Empire. Megiddo is the site mentioned in the Book of Revelation as the Battle of Armageddon.

The Shrine of the Báb, completed in the 1950s, is on the side of Mount Carmel in the middle of the Bahá'í owned terraces. Also located on Mount Carmel are a set of Bahá'í administrative buildings referred to as the Arc. The location was designated by the Faith's founder in the Tablet of Carmel. The mountain remains a sacred place for Bahá'ís around the world.

Modern Essene groups point that Mount Carmel was the spiritual stronghold, B'nai-Amen Temple, of the northern Essene movement - the "Nazareans" - described by the Church Father Epiphanius in his Panarion (1:18) and briefly noted by the historian Josephus in his War of the Jews. Excavations on Mount Carmel in 1958 uncovered what is seen as Elijah's altar, the cave where he lived, the fountain of Elijah, and the remains of an ancient monastery.

Tabun

From 1930 to 1932, at Mount Carmel, Israel, Dorothy Garrod excavated Neanderthal and early modern human remains in the Carmel Caves of el-Wad, el-Tabun, and es- Skhul."^*

"Photographs and diaries document the 1932 discovery at Mount Carmel, Palestine, of the Neanderthal female skeleton, Tabun I, one of the most important human fossils ever found (Christopher Stringer, custodian of Tabun I, Natural History Museum, quoted in the Exhibition in Honour of D.A.E. Garrod, Callander and Smith, 1998). The excavation of Tabun produced the longest stratigraphic record in the region, spanning 600,000 or more years of human activity."^*

"The long cultural sequence exposed in the four caves and rock-shelters that make up the Nahal Me'arot site, Tabun, Jamal, el-Wad and Skhul, extends from the Lower Palaeolithic to the present day, thus representing nearly a million years of human evolution. In addition to evidence for numerous palaeo-environmental fluctuations, there are also several well-preserved burials of two Middle Paleolithic human types (Neanderthals and Early Anatomically Modern Humans) and passage from nomadic hunter-gatherer groups to complex, sedentary agricultural societies is extensively documented at the site. Taken together, these emphasize the paramount significance of the Mount Carmel caves for the study of human cultural and biological evolution within the framework of palaeo-ecological changes."^*

Other uses of the name

Mount Carmel is widely recognized as a Sacred mountain directly related, in its origins, to Judaism and Christianity religions, the ancient Essene Brotherhood, and a place which historically influenced other place names, religious movements - eg. Bahá'í Faith - and literature around the world till today, meaning that it works in practice as a World heritage.

Many other mountains and places around the world have been named Carmel after the biblical mountain. See the disambiguation articles Mount Carmel (disambiguation) and Carmel for a list of them.

External links

Mount Carmel - BiblePlaces.com, pictures and text illuminating the biblical site of Mount Carmel
The Nazarenes of Mount Carmel, an esoteric Essene group with teachings devoted to Mount Carmel
Ancient Essene Life, archeological ruins at Wadi 'ain es-Siah on Mt Carmel
From Mount Carmel to Mount Ecclesia, a Rosicrucian perspective on the most Sacred mountain
Sacred Scrolls of the Essene Church, pictures of the Carmelite Church and of the ancient Essene Nazorean Monastery
Mount Carmel Area Reviews, texts and photos

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Geography

History

Tabun

Other uses of the name

External links