Bethany (Hebrew: בֵּית עַנְיָה or ביתניה) is recorded in the New Testament as the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus, as well as that of Simon the Leper. Jesus is reported to have lodged there after his entry into Jerusalem, and it was from Bethany that he parted from his disciples at the Ascension. Bethany is commonly identified with the village of al-Eizariya located about 1½ miles to the east ^[1] of Jerusalem on the south-eastern slope of the Mount of Olives.

The oldest house in present-day al-Eizaraya is a 2,000 year old dwelling that has attracted pilgrims who believe it might have been (or at least serves as a reminder of) the House of Martha and Mary, the sisters of Lazarus.^[2]

Etymology

The root meaning and origin of the term Bethany has been the subject or much scholarship and debate. William Hepworth Dixon devotes a multi-page footnote to it in his The Holy Land (1866), largely devoted to debunking the meaning "house of dates," which is attributed to one "Lightfoot" by way of a series of careless interpretative mistakes. Dixon quotes at length a refutation of Lightfoot's thesis by Emanuel Deutsch of the British Museum who notes that neither the name Bethany, nor any of its suggested roots, appear anywhere in the Talmud. Deutsch suggests a non-Hebrew root, a word transcribed in Syriac script whose meaning he gives as "House of Misery" or "Poor-house," as the most likely origin.^[3]

In Jerome's version of Eusebius' Onomasticon, the meaning of Bethany is defined as domus adflictionis or "house of affliction." Brian J. Capper writes that this is a Latin derivation from the Hebrew beth 'ani or more likely the Aramaic beth 'anya, both of which mean "house of the poor" or "house of afflication/poverty." This theory as to Bethany's etymology, which was eventually adopted by Gustav Dalman in 1905, is not without challengers. For example, E. Nestle's Philologica Sacra (1896) suggests that Bethany is derived from the personal name Anaiah, while others have suggested it is a shortened version of Ananiah, a village of Bethel mentioned in the Book of Nehemiah (11:32). Another suggestion, arising from the presence of nearby Bethphage ("house of unripe figs"), is that its name comes from beit hini, meaning "house of figs".^[4]

According to Capper and Deutsch before him, there are linguistic difficulties that arise when the Anaiah/Ananiah, "house of figs" or "house of dates" theses are compared against the bethania form used in Greek versions of the New Testament. Additionally, the Aramaic beit 'anya is the form used for Bethany in Christian Palestinian and Syriac versions of the New Testament. Given this, and Jerome's familiarity with Semitic philology and the immediate region, Capper concludes that the "house of affliction" meaning is correct.^[4]

History

Between 6th century BCE and 14th century CE, Bethany is believed to have been continuously inhabited.^[2]

In 1138 Queen Melisende of Jerusalem, wife of King Fulk of Jerusalem, founded a cloister of nuns at Bethany, ruled by her sister, Ioveta, thenceforward "of Bethany". Sibylla, later Queen of Jerusalem, was raised in the abbey, whose ruins have not been identified. Melisende died there in 1163; her stepdaughter Sibylla of Anjou also died there in 1165.

The word Bethany means "House of Figs" in Hebrew which can also be translated as "House of Flowers" due to the fact that figs are actually clusters of flowers bound together to make an edible bulb.

Other Biblical References

A place called Bethany on the east bank of the Jordan River is mentioned in the Gospel of John 1:28. Its exact location is unclear; in fact, the only mention of this “Bethany” is to be found in that one verse. In the King James Version (following the Textus Receptus of the New Testament) the place where John the Baptist was baptizing in John 1:28 was not called Bethany, but Bethabara. The KJV is the only English version of the New Testament that refers to "Bethany on the east bank of the Jordan River", as "Bethabara". Most other English versions (Douay-Rheims, NIV, NASB, NLT, RSV, IBS, Darby) call it "Bethany".