One other person, place or group in the registry answers to the name Bethel. Every Bethel in the Bible
place · also Aven · Bochim · Luz · El-bethel
Bethel
בֵּֽיתְ־אֵל
- verses
- 69
- first named
- Genesis 12:8
- last named
- Zechariah 7:2
- feature
- settlement
- coordinates
- 31.92°N · 35.24°E
Beitin (OpenBible)
Scholarship offers 3 identifications for this place. The leading one is shown; the others are recorded in the gazetteer.
Description
Bethel in the text
Bethel, meaning "house of God" in Hebrew, was an important city in ancient Israel, located about 10 miles north of Jerusalem. It is mentioned numerous times throughout the Old Testament and is closely associated with the patriarchs Abraham and Israel (or 'Jacob').
The city was originally called Luz (Genesis 28:19; 35:6; 48:3; Judges 1:23) and was renamed Bethel by Jacob after his vision of a ladder reaching to heaven (Genesis 28:10-22). In this vision, God confirmed the covenant He had made with Abraham and promised to be with Jacob wherever he went. Jacob set up a stone pillar at the site, anointed it with oil, and made a vow to God.
Abraham had previously built an altar between Bethel and Ai (Genesis 12:8; 13:3), and Jacob later returned to Bethel, where he built an altar and received a renewed promise from God (Genesis 35:1-15). The place was also called El-bethel, meaning "God of Bethel" (Genesis 35:7).
During the period of the judges, Deborah held court under a palm tree between Ramah and Bethel (Judges 4:5), and the Israelites went up to Bethel to seek guidance from God (Judges 20:18, 26; 21:2). The Ark of the Covenant was temporarily located at Bethel (Judges 20:27).
After the division of the kingdom, Jeroboam I set up a golden calf at Bethel to prevent the people from going to Jerusalem to worship (1Ki.12.28-33). This act led to Bethel becoming a major center of idolatry, and the prophets Amos and Hosea condemned the worship there (Amo.3.14; 4:4; 5:5-6; 7:10, 13; Hosea 10:5, 8, 15).
The city was called Aven, meaning "wickedness," by Hosea (Hosea 10:8) and Beth-aven, meaning "house of wickedness," in other passages (Joshua 7:2; 18:12; 1Sa.13.5; 14:23), likely referring to its association with idolatry.
Bethel was destroyed by King Josiah during his religious reforms (2Ki.23.4, 15-19) but was later resettled after the Babylonian exile (Ezra 2:28; Nehemiah 7:32; 11:31).
The city was also known as Bochim, meaning "weepers," in Judges 2:1, 5, where an angel of the Lord rebuked the Israelites for their disobedience.
Bethel played a significant role in Israel's history, serving as a place of worship, a center of idolatry, and a symbol of God's presence and promises to His people.
Relations
Direct connections
Every entity the graph places in a stated relation with this one, grouped by the kind of link. Each relation is authored once and its inverse derived, so both ends always agree. Rows marked “registry” come from the identity spine rather than from a verse, and a row marked “which bearer is the source’s decision” is one where the name could have meant more than one person. The last group is not a relation at all — it counts the events two entities stand in together.
The pattern
Where Bethel is named
Every book of the corpus in the order it is read, each as wide as the chapters it holds. A bar is the verses of that book which write the name, and the flat stretches are as much of the answer as the bars.
69 verses across 14 of 66 books; 52 write the name nowhere. Named in Genesis (12), Joshua (10), Judges (10), 1 Samuel (3), 1 Kings (9), 2 Kings (9), 1 Chronicles (1), 2 Chronicles (1), Ezra (1), Nehemiah (2), Jeremiah (1), Hosea (3), Amos (6) and Zechariah (1).
Read it
Where to read it
Every verse of the text carried here that names this entity — 69, across 14 books. The name is written 82 times in them.
Onward
Where this page goes
Nothing in the graph stands one hop from this entity yet. These are the best-connected entities of the same type, so the page still ends somewhere. Descriptions by STEPBible TIPNR.
Where they appear
What happened here
Atlas's reading of each chapter this place appears in, in canonical order. One line per chapter, and each leads to the whole of it.
- Genesis 13Bethel was where Abram had formerly pitched his tent and built an altar.
- Genesis 31Bethel was remembered as the place where Jacob had anointed the pillar and made his solemn vow.
- Genesis 35At Bethel, Jacob built an altar, received a blessing and a new name, and later set out toward Ephrath.
- Joshua 8Bethel was left empty when its men went out after Israel, while an ambush waited between it and Ai.
- Joshua 16Bethel lies along the opening course of Joseph’s allotment and is also called Luz.
- Judges 20Bethel was where Israel sought the LORD before battle, wept, fasted, and presented offerings.
- Judges 21Bethel received Israel’s bitter weeping and the altar raised the next morning.
- 1 Samuel 10Bethel is the destination of three men who meet Saul on the way and give him two loaves of bread.
12 more chapters, from 1 Kings 12 to Zechariah 7
- 1 Kings 12At Bethel, Jeroboam set up a golden calf, appointed priests, offered sacrifices, and burned incense.
- 1 Kings 13Bethel received the man of God, the split altar, the spilled ashes, and the old prophet’s misleading hospitality.
- 2 Kings 2Bethel was visited by Elijah and Elisha, and later saw Elisha cursed by boys before two female bears came out of the woods.
- 2 Kings 23Bethel lost Jeroboam’s altar and high place, while the tomb of the man of God remained undisturbed.
- 2 Chronicles 13Bethel was captured by Abijah along with its villages.
- Hosea 10Bethel was condemned for its great wickedness, with the king of Israel to be cut off when the day dawned.
- Hosea 12Jacob found the LORD at Bethel and spoke with Him there.
- Amos 3Bethel's altars were marked for destruction, with their horns cut off and falling to the ground.
- Amos 4Bethel is named as a place where transgression is urged on.
- Amos 5Bethel is named among the places not to seek, and it is promised to come to nothing.
- Amos 7Bethel is called the sanctuary of the king and the temple of the kingdom, where Amaziah tells Amos not to prophesy.
- Zechariah 7Bethel sent Sharezer and Regem-melech with their men to plead before the LORD.
Sources