98 Fun Facts About Bible Geography

What does the Hebrew name of Bethlehem, Bet Lehem, literally mean?

House of bread: yet the Book of Ruth opens with a famine that drove Naomi's family out of Bethlehem to Moab.

Which king does the Hebrew Bible identify as having been born in Bethlehem?

David: Samuel turned down Jesse's seven older sons before the youngest was fetched in from the sheep and anointed.

Which Nazareth basilica is built over the grotto Catholics venerate as the Virgin Mary's home?

The Annunciation: Pope Paul VI visited the shrine in 1964 while it was still under construction, five years before its 1969 consecration.

Which biblical 'city of palm trees' was the first the Israelites captured in the Promised Land?

Jericho: when its walls fell, only Rahab and her family were spared, because she had hidden Joshua's two spies.

Which chief tax collector, according to Luke, gave half his goods to the poor after meeting Jesus?

Zacchaeus: too short to see Jesus over the crowd, he climbed a sycamore tree, and Jesus called him down and stayed at his house.

Which Philistine city does the Bible name as the giant Goliath's hometown?

Gath: when the Philistines carried the captured Ark of the Covenant there, the city's men were struck with tumors.

Which two events does the Bible place in the Jordan River?

The Israelites' crossing and Jesus's baptism: Joshua says the river's waters parted so the people could cross on dry ground.

Which lake, called Kinneret in Hebrew, is the lowest freshwater lake on Earth?

The Sea of Galilee: when a storm filled the disciples' boat with waves, Jesus rebuked the wind and the lake fell calm.

Where did Jesus pray on the night Judas betrayed him, according to Matthew and Mark?

Gethsemane: while he prayed, Peter, James and John kept falling asleep, and he told them the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

Which name for the Dead Sea appears in the Hebrew Bible?

Sea of Salt: Ezekiel foretold that its waters would be healed and would teem with fish.

Roughly how much saltier than the ocean is the Dead Sea?

Nearly tenfold: fish swept in by the Jordan die quickly, and the dense brine keeps bathers floating.

On which mountain, known in Arabic as Jabal Musa, is Moses said to have received the Ten Commandments?

Mount Sinai: coming down and finding the Israelites dancing around a golden calf, Moses smashed the stone tablets.

From which mountain in modern Jordan did Moses view the Promised Land before he died?

Mount Nebo: God let Moses see the land from its summit, but had told him he would never enter it.

On which mountain did Elijah challenge 450 prophets of Baal to a contest of fire?

Mount Carmel: Baal's prophets called on their god all day with no answer, but fire fell on the altar Elijah had soaked with water.

According to Acts, from which hill did Jesus ascend to heaven?

The Mount of Olives: two men in white told the watching disciples that Jesus would return the same way they had seen him go.

In 2 Samuel, the name Zion first refers to what?

The Jebusite fortress David captured: he moved into the fort and renamed it the City of David.

In which city did Abraham buy the Cave of the Patriarchs as a burial place for Sarah?

Hebron: Ephron the Hittite offered the cave as a gift, but Abraham insisted on paying the full price for it.

Which lakeside town does Matthew say Jesus made his home after leaving Nazareth?

Capernaum: Jesus later denounced the town because it did not repent despite the miracles he did there.

At which Galilean village did Jesus turn water into wine, according to John's Gospel?

Cana: the steward, not knowing where the wine had come from, praised the groom for saving the best wine until last.

Which town near Jerusalem is the setting for the raising of Lazarus in John's Gospel?

Bethany: told that his friend Lazarus was sick, Jesus deliberately stayed where he was for two more days before setting out.

On the road to which village did two disciples walk with the risen Jesus without recognizing him?

Emmaus: their eyes were opened only when he blessed their evening meal, and then he vanished from their sight.

In which region of Egypt did Pharaoh allow Jacob's family to settle in the time of Joseph?

Goshen: Exodus says the plagues of flies and hail struck Egypt but spared the land where the Israelites lived.

Where does Genesis say Noah's Ark came to rest?

Scholars note that Ararat is the Hebrew name for the kingdom of Urartu, so the text may mean the wider region.

To which land did Moses flee after killing an Egyptian?

Midian: when shepherds drove a priest's daughters from a well, Moses helped them, and he married one of them, Zipporah.

From which city does Genesis say Terah set out with his son Abram and grandson Lot?

Ur of the Chaldees: they were bound for another land but settled in Haran along the way, and Terah died there.

Which prophet cried out that Nineveh would be overthrown in forty days?

Jonah: when the city repented and God spared it, Jonah was not relieved but very angry.

The ruins of ancient Nineveh lie within which modern Iraqi city, on the Tigris's eastern bank?

Mosul: in the 1840s Austen Henry Layard dug there and took thousands of tablets from Ashurbanipal's library back to England.

Genesis 11:9 interprets the name Babel, the Hebrew form of Babylon, to mean what?

Confusion: Genesis links Babel to the Hebrew verb balal, to confuse, because God jumbled the builders' one language and they stopped building.

Which Damascus road, named in Acts 9:11 in Paul's conversion story, was the Roman city's main east-west artery?

Straight Street: blinded on the road, Paul waited in a house there for three days until Ananias came and his sight returned.

At which Jerusalem pool did Jesus heal a man who had been ill for 38 years?

The Pool of Bethesda: the man complained that no one would lower him in when the water stirred, so Jesus told him to take up his bed and walk.

According to the New Testament, in which city were followers of Jesus first called Christians?

Antioch: its church laid hands on Barnabas and Paul and sent them off on their first missionary journey.

Which city in Roman Cilicia was the birthplace of Paul the Apostle?

Tarsus: Cleopatra sailed up its river in a lavish barge to meet Mark Antony there.

Which craftsman stirred up a riot against Paul in Ephesus, according to Acts?

Demetrius: he made religious shrines, and warned fellow craftsmen that Paul's teaching that handmade gods are no gods would ruin their trade.

Which Wonder of the Ancient World stood at Ephesus?

The Temple of Artemis: an arsonist traditionally named Herostratus burned it down, and the people of Ephesus paid to rebuild it.

Which married couple did Paul live and work with as tentmakers in Corinth?

Priscilla and Aquila: they had just come from Italy after Emperor Claudius expelled the Jews.

Corinth sits on the isthmus joining mainland Greece to which peninsula?

The Peloponnese: before the canal, boats were dragged over the isthmus on a paved trackway to avoid sailing the long way around it.

In which Macedonian city is Paul believed to have preached for the first time on European soil?

Philippi: Paul and Silas were jailed there, and at midnight an earthquake threw open the prison doors.

Acts 17 sets Paul's sermon in Athens at which location?

The Areopagus: Paul opened by pointing to an Athenian altar inscribed 'To the unknown god' and said he would declare that god to them.

On which island did John receive the vision recorded in Revelation, per tradition?

Patmos: it served as a place of exile, and John says he was there 'for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ'.

On which island does Acts 28 say Paul was shipwrecked?

Malta: Paul healed the fevered father of Publius, the island's chief man, and then the island's other sick came and were cured.

Where did Peter baptise the Roman centurion Cornelius, according to Acts?

Caesarea: the Holy Spirit fell on Cornelius's household while Peter was still speaking, before any of them had been baptised.

In which port city did Peter raise the disciple Tabitha from the dead, according to Acts?

Joppa: the grieving widows showed Peter the coats and garments Tabitha had made, and then he raised her.

Biblical passages describe Tarshish chiefly as a source of what?

Silver and other metals: Tarshish fleets, sailing alongside Hiram of Tyre's navy, helped bring King Solomon his wealth.

What happened to Lot's wife when the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed?

She became a pillar of salt: she looked back at the burning cities, and Jesus later warned his listeners, 'Remember Lot's wife.'

Which land did God promise to Abraham's descendants, according to Genesis?

Canaan: when Moses sent spies to scout it, they brought back a cluster of grapes so heavy that two men carried it on a pole.

Which city, paired with Dan in a biblical phrase for the whole kingdom, marked Israel's southern limit?

Beersheba: Genesis names the place twice, after oaths sworn with Abimelech, first by Abraham over seven ewe lambs and later by Isaac.

On which mountain do the Books of Samuel place King Saul's last battle and death?

Mount Gilboa: mourning Saul, David cursed the mountain, asking that neither dew nor rain would fall on it.

Which city does the Hebrew Bible describe as the first capital of the northern Kingdom of Israel?

Shechem: the tribes met there to crown Rehoboam, but when he vowed to burden them even more, the ten northern tribes broke away.

Which two foods did God tell Moses at the burning bush that the Promised Land flowed with?

Milk and honey became the land's byword: the spies Moses later sent in repeated the phrase as they showed off the fruit they had carried back.

Among the reeds of which river was the baby Moses hidden in a papyrus basket, according to Exodus?

The Nile's reeds hid the basket until Pharaoh's daughter came to bathe, and the baby's watching sister offered to fetch a Hebrew nurse: his own mother.

In which city does the Book of Acts end, with Paul living under guard in a rented house?

Rome is where Acts leaves Paul, a prisoner who had appealed to Caesar yet spent two whole years preaching freely to everyone who came to see him.

From which kingdom, usually placed in southern Arabia, did a queen come to test Solomon's wisdom?

Sheba's queen reached Jerusalem with camels carrying spices, gold and precious stones, and admitted afterwards that she had not been told even half of it.

From the mountains of which land did King Solomon order cedar wood for the Temple in Jerusalem?

Lebanon's cedar logs were hauled to the coast and floated south as rafts by King Hiram's men, and the tree still sits at the centre of the country's flag.

Which Philistine city's gates did Samson tear out and carry away on his shoulders in Judges?

Gaza is also where Samson's story ends: blinded and set to grinding grain in its prison, he pulled down the temple of Dagon on the Philistine lords.

Which birds brought the prophet Elijah bread and meat at the brook Cherith during a long drought?

Ravens fed Elijah every morning and evening until the brook dried up, a striking choice because the Law of Moses lists them among the unclean birds.

What does Golgotha, the Aramaic name of the site outside Jerusalem where Jesus was crucified, mean?

Place of the skull is how the Gospels translate it, and the Latin word for skull, calvaria, is why English speakers also call the site Calvary.

Along which street in Jerusalem's Old City do pilgrims walk the Stations of the Cross?

Via Dolorosa winds for about 600 metres through the Old City, and its present course dates only from the 18th century, when it replaced several earlier versions.

The seven churches addressed in Revelation, from Smyrna to Sardis, stood in which modern country?

Turkey holds all seven sites, in what was then Greek-speaking Anatolia, and Smyrna lives on as the port city of Izmir.

From which land east of the Dead Sea did Ruth follow her mother-in-law Naomi to Bethlehem?

Moab gave Israel an unlikely ancestor: Ruth, a foreign widow, married Boaz in Bethlehem and became great-grandmother of the nation's most famous king.

At which town, earlier called Luz, did Jacob dream of a stairway reaching up to heaven?

Bethel got its name the next morning, when Jacob stood his stone pillow upright as a pillar, poured oil over it and declared the spot God's own house.

The Book of Esther is set in the royal palace at Susa, a city in which modern country?

Iran is home to Susa's ruins, east of the Tigris, and the same palace city is where Nehemiah served as royal cupbearer before rebuilding Jerusalem's walls.

When Solomon's kingdom split in two, which southern kingdom kept Jerusalem as its capital?

Judah held on under Solomon's son Rehoboam with only the tribe of Benjamin beside it, while ten tribes broke away to form a rival kingdom in the north.

Which tribe of Israel was given no territory in the Promised Land, serving at the sanctuary instead?

Levi was instead given 48 towns scattered through the other tribes' lands, each with pasture around it, and lived on the tithes the rest of the nation paid.

Which empire on the upper Tigris conquered the northern Kingdom of Israel and deported its people?

Assyria scattered the captives as far as the cities of the Medes and settled foreigners in their place, the origin of the so-called ten lost tribes.

The royal treasurer Philip baptised beside a desert road served the queen of which African kingdom?

Ethiopia in Acts means the kingdom of Kush in today's Sudan, whose queens went by the title Candace; the official was reading Isaiah in his chariot.

Which emperor had Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity built after his mother Helena's visit there?

Constantine commissioned it soon after Helena's visit in 325–326, and the grotto beneath is the oldest site in Christianity still in continuous use for worship.

Which Jerusalem shrine is held to enclose both the site of the crucifixion and Jesus's empty tomb?

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is split among six Christian denominations under rules so rigid that a wooden ladder has leaned on its facade since at least the 1720s.

From which town came Joseph, the rich council member who laid Jesus's body in his own new tomb?

Arimathea appears in all four Gospels as Joseph's hometown, yet its location is uncertain: several towns have been proposed and none is agreed.

Which river, the longest in Western Asia, does Genesis name as the fourth river flowing out of Eden?

The Euphrates closes the list after the Pishon, Gihon and Hiddekel, and God later promised Abram's descendants land stretching all the way to its banks.

Which army commander scoffed that Damascus's rivers beat the Jordan before bathing in it cured him?

Naaman stormed off in a rage at so simple a cure, until his servants argued that he would gladly have done something difficult, and seven dips left his skin like a child's.

Which prophet saw visions of God beside the river Chebar while living among the exiles in Babylonia?

Ezekiel was a priest carried off with King Jehoiachin, and his visions in exile include the valley of dry bones that come together and stand up as a vast army.

Which high priest died on Mount Hor after Moses passed the priestly garments to Eleazar?

Aaron was barred from the Promised Land for the rebellion at the waters of Meribah, and the whole nation wept for him for thirty days.

Which hunter, who sold his birthright for red stew, settled in the hill country of Seir?

Esau's nickname Edom, meaning red, is traced in Genesis to that very stew, and it stuck to both the land and the nation his descendants founded there.

Which matriarch died giving birth to Benjamin and was buried beside the road to Bethlehem?

Rachel named the boy Benoni with her last breath, but Jacob renamed him and raised a stone pillar over her grave that Genesis says was still standing in the writer's day.

Which king does the Bible credit with a conduit bringing the Gihon Spring's water inside Jerusalem?

Hezekiah wanted the water safe before a siege, and an inscription found in the rock-cut tunnel records that its diggers began at both ends and met in the middle.

In which land did God tell Abraham to offer his son Isaac on a mountain, according to Genesis 22?

Moriah turns up again centuries later as the hill in Jerusalem where Solomon built the Temple, tying the two stories to a single spot.

In which valley did the armies of Israel and the Philistines face off before the giant Goliath fell?

The Valley of Elah held the brook where a young shepherd chose five smooth stones for his sling, though in the end he needed only one of them.

Which priest-king of Salem blessed Abram and brought out bread and wine after a battle?

Melchizedek received a tenth of everything Abram had won in return, and the Letter to the Hebrews later holds him up as the pattern for an eternal priesthood.

From which direction does Matthew's Gospel say the wise men travelled to reach Jerusalem?

The east is all Matthew reveals about their homeland: he never names or numbers them, and the idea of three visitors grew from their three gifts.

Damascus, the city Saul was nearing when a light blinded him, is now the capital of which country?

Syria's capital is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities on Earth, and the blinded Saul, later called Paul, had to be led into it by the hand.

Near which ruined settlement by the Dead Sea were the Dead Sea Scrolls found hidden in desert caves?

Qumran's caves gave up their first scrolls to Bedouin shepherds in 1946–47, and the hoard includes the oldest surviving copies of whole biblical books.

Near which town did Jesus rest beside Jacob's well and ask a local woman for a drink of water?

Sychar's well can still be visited: it lies inside an Orthodox church near Nablus, and a 1935 measurement put its depth at 41 metres.

Simon, the passer-by forced to carry Jesus's cross, came from which city in modern Libya?

Cyrene was an old Greek colony, and Mark adds that Simon was the father of Alexander and Rufus, as though his first readers knew the family.

Which land at the western end of the Mediterranean did Paul say in a letter he planned to visit?

Spain was the goal Paul named twice in the letter, hoping its readers would help him on his way; whether he ever got there is not recorded in the Bible.

After killing his brother Abel, Cain settled in which land that Genesis places east of Eden?

Nod comes from the Hebrew root for wandering, fitting a man condemned to roam, though Cain promptly built a city there and named it after his son Enoch.

Which region east of the Jordan was famed for a healing balm that the prophet Jeremiah asks after?

Gilead's balm was a prized export: the camel caravan that carried the young Joseph off to slavery was hauling it south along with spices and myrrh.

Two of Paul's letters went to believers in which port, today the second-largest city in Greece?

Thessalonica drove Paul out fast: a mob stormed his host's house, and friends smuggled him away by night to the next town.

Which of the seven churches in Revelation is scolded for being lukewarm, neither hot nor cold?

Laodicea boasted that it was rich and needed nothing, and the letter answers that the church is in fact wretched, poor, blind and naked.

For which two Greek gods did a crowd in Lystra mistake Barnabas and Paul after a lame man walked?

Zeus and Hermes were the crowd's guesses, Paul being cast as the messenger god because he did the talking, and a priest arrived with oxen to sacrifice to them.

In which land, named in the opening verse of the Book of Job, did its long-suffering hero live?

Uz was home to a man with 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels and ten children, every one of them lost in a single day of disasters.

In which village did King Saul visit a medium to summon the spirit of the dead prophet Samuel?

Endor's medium saw through her disguised visitor mid-ritual, and the message was grim: by the next day Saul and his sons would be dead.

At which town did the Tabernacle stand when Hannah prayed for a son and later brought Samuel to Eli?

Shiloh lost its place when the Ark was carried from there into battle and captured by the Philistines; it never went back to the town.

Which dome-shaped mountain in northern Israel does tradition make the site of the Transfiguration?

Tabor is never named in the Gospel accounts, which speak only of a high mountain; long before, Deborah and Barak mustered ten thousand men on its slopes.

At which entrance to the Jerusalem Temple did Peter and John heal a man lame from birth?

The Beautiful Gate is where the man asked for coins and got more than he bargained for: Peter said he had no silver or gold, then pulled him to his feet.

Which town does John's Gospel name as the home of the apostles Philip, Andrew and Peter?

Bethsaida is also where Mark sets a healing in two stages: a blind man's sight came back blurred at first, with people looking like walking trees.

Over which city did Joshua command the sun to stand still during a battle with five Amorite kings?

Gibeon's people had earlier tricked Joshua into a peace treaty with worn-out clothes and mouldy bread, which is why he marched all night to defend them.

In which city did Naboth own the vineyard beside the palace that King Ahab was desperate to buy?

Jezreel is also where the story is avenged: Queen Jezebel, who had Naboth framed and stoned, was later thrown from a window there.

At the ford of which river did Jacob wrestle a stranger until daybreak and gain the name Israel?

The Jabbok crossing left Jacob with a limp as well as a new name, and he called the spot Peniel because he had seen God face to face and lived.