All Fired Up

As we move to a lookout over the area, we notice that Tzippori is very clearly perched, like a tzippor (a bird), on top of a hill. It’s obvious from the view that this was a strategic city for the Romans — from here one can overlook all of the small settlements and farms that lie below in the valleys of the lower Galil. About 70 years before the Churban, in the chaos that followed the death of Herod the Great, in what was known as the Varus revolts, the city had rebelled against the Roman governors of Eretz Yisrael, only to be destroyed and rebuilt again. In the Great Revolt that led to the Churban, it seems the town learned its lesson and surrendered to the legions of Vespasian and Titus and was spared.

Looking out at the view makes us appreciate another story in the Gemara. A hill in the distance, currently the archeological site of Tel Hanaton, was in the times of the Mishnah a village called Shichin. The Gemara (Shabbos 121a) tells of how a fire once broke out in the fields of Yosi ben Simai in Shichin and the Roman garrison in Tzippori saw the fire and sent firefighters to put it out. The simple Jewish villagers, however, sent the Romans away, claiming that out of kavod Shabbos it was prohibited for them to put the fire out. Hashem then made a miracle and it started to rain, which extinguished the fire. Even so, after Shabbos the people of the city sent some money to thank the firefighters for the efforts, as it’s always a good idea to keep your Roman neighbors happy. The chachamim, however, were very upset, as the halachah is that if a non-Jew comes to put out a fire for you, you don’t have to tell him not to put it out. So this view in the distance is really the source for the original “Shabbos goy” law!

Keeping the Hope Alive

Making our way down to the city, our first stop is at an ancient shul on the outskirts of the lower city, where we can also see the remains of an ancient mikveh right outside. The Gemara tells us that when Rabi Yehudah Hanasi was niftar, he was taken to 18 shuls in Tzippori and they were maspid him in each of them. Yet this is the only shul with much of it having remained intact. This shul had undergone various rebuilding campaigns back in its day, the latest being from the fifth century. Originally the batei knesset were built with the entrance in the front of the shul, which meant that if you came late, everyone knew. Later on, they decided to switch the entrance to the back, from where we now enter.

This shul, like many shuls from the Mishnah and Talmud period, has an elaborate mosaic floor that has endured to this day. The person who donated it, Yosef ben Yudan, certainly got his money’s worth as his dedication plaque, with a brachah for him and his daughter thanking them for their contribution, is still here 1,700 years later. The motifs on the floor of the shul are elaborate. There are incredible pictures of the avodah in the Beis Hamikdash, many of the keilim, and even a lulav and esrog. There’s a large zodiac with pictures of all of the mazalos — many of them spelled wrong, which tells us a bit about of the lack of literacy in an era long before the printing press and the availability of siddurim and Chumashim for the average layman. We also find some historical Tanach images, such as the Akeidah and Sarah Imeinu welcoming in the malachim. It’s incredible to think of the holy people who davened here in this shul, listening to the shmuessen Rabi Yehudah Hanasi might have given on this very floor, and establishing the many takanos of Tzippori quoted in the Gemara.

From the shul, we make our way up the hill to the Jewish Quarter. Archaeologists discovered that there was a mikveh in almost every house, a quite unusual find, considering that private mikvaos generally only existed in Jerusalem near the Beis Hamikdash, where the Kohanim lived. Researchers believe that perhaps a large contingent of Kohanim who served in the Beis Hamikdash before the Churban took up residence in Tzippori, keeping themselves and their progeny in ritual purity in anticipation of a rebuilt Beis Hamikdash. In fact, the Yerushalmi tells us that the family members of the mishmeres (work shift) of Yedayah, who returned from Bavel with Ezra, were exiled here.

That’s Entertainment

On the slope of the hill in the primarily Jewish upper city stands the remains of a large theater, which is estimated to have seated about 4,500 people. The theaters were an ongoing source of diversion for the masses, in order to keep them constantly entertained. In the Roman Empire, theaters were perhaps the most critical component to remaining in power for so long. How do you keep a population of millions, including psychopaths, barbarians, and murderers spread out in countries all over the empire, under control? The answer is pretty much the same way they keep people sane on a 12-hour flight to Israel: Put a little screen in front of them with entertainment playing the entire time, and they forget they’re cooped up in a 200,000-pound of hunk of metal tens of thousands of miles in the air. (They do the same in the prisons to keep inmates under control: Give them cable TV and no rebellions or revolts.) That’s one thing the Roman theaters were for: to keep everyone distracted enough so they didn’t think about rebelling.

Chazal speak out repeatedly about the prohibition of going to theaters, and in Tzippori it was no different. One can imagine the pashkivilim that went up on the walls of the communities decrying them. Perhaps it was that very fact of assimilation that pushed Rabi Yehudah Hanasi to relocate to Tzippori and compile in writing the Torah sheba’al peh in the form of the Mishnah so that it wouldn’t be forgotten. This way the Jews would have Torah to learn and occupy their time, instead of morally decadent forms of entertainment.

The fact that the theater was located in the Jewish section of the city might have been a purely topographical issue, as it’s easier to build a theater on the slope of a mountain. Yet perhaps it indicates just how important Rabi Yehudah Hanasi felt his move to Tzippori from Beit She’arim in the last years of his life was: It is suggested that the Sanhedrin would gather in the theater, demonstrating to their kehillah the ultimate use for such an honorable edifice. Seems that our Siyumei HaShas in sports stadiums and entertainment arenas may have an ancient mesorah.

See You Everywhere

To the right of the theater are the remains of the impressive governor’s mansion, and we notice that someone has already recreated the floorplan. The hallway is called the prozdor, and the main room is called the triclinium, or traklin. The Mishnah in Avos tells us that this is a mashal for Olam Hazeh and Olam Haba. We have to prepare ourselves in the prozdor before we enter into the main room.

As we look at this elaborately designed mosaic floor with over a million tiny naturally colored stones, we notice that the three other sides of the room have no designs at all. This is because this is where the couches would be placed for the Romans aristocrats to sit and dine. No point in expending the money and labor on mosaics that would be covered up anyway. The word traklin in fact is made up of two words: “tri” (“three”) and “cline” (“to recline”). At the Pesach Seder we have a mitzvah to recline, but one look at how the Romans did it and you’ll get that it doesn’t mean taking a pillow and leaning awkwardly on the side of your chair with it. (If you want to do it the right “Roman” way, come on over to the Schwartz Pesach Seder, where we put our couches up on bricks to raise them up to the table, and then lean back the way they did it. The first time I tried this I was out cold before the Mah Nishtanah — as soon as I hit the couch, the game’s over.)

Perhaps the most fascinating picture on this mosaic floor — filled with images of Greek gods and pagan feasts — is an image known as “The Mona Lisa of the Galil.” Like Leonardo Da Vinci’s most famous picture, painted 1,500 years later, no matter where you stand in the room, you feel her eyes are looking directly at you. What makes this even more incredible is a midrash on the pasuk in Devarim telling that Hashem spoke to us face to face. How is it possible to speak face to face to the millions of people standing around Har Sinai?

Says the midrash, “It is like the face of that icon, that thousands are looking at her and each one says that she is looking at them. So too, Hakadosh Baruch Hu was looking at each and every one of Bnei Yisrael as He said Anochi Hashem Elokecha.”

Was this the icon that the midrash was talking about? I don’t know, but the author of that maamar was none other than the great Rabi Yochanan, who lived in this very city.

Now, if that wasn’t enough to bring maamarei Chazal to life, we turn the corner right next to this traklin and find a small ornate seat on the floor in the adjacent room, with what seems to be little channels for water to flow through it. The writing on the mosaic says in Greek: “To your health!” If you haven’t yet figured out this bit of indoor plumbing, it’s an indoor bathroom, a true rarity in homes during this time. In fact, this bit of indoor plumbing is the only one of its type found in Eretz Yisrael from this period. But what makes it even more awesome is the Gemara in Shabbos that tells us “Eizeh hu ashir — who is a rich man?” I’m sure most of us would answer that question with the classic teaching that it is someone who is satisfied with his portion. Yet, the Gemara mentions the opinion of Rabi Yosi, who tells us that a wealthy man is someone who has a bathroom near his table.

Is this the bathroom that Rabi Yosi was talking about? One thing we do know, is that Chazal tell us that after the incident in which Rabi Shimon bar Yochai spoke negatively about the Romans and was forced to flee for his life, Rabi Yosi — who was at the same discussion and remained silent— was taken to the city of Tzippori where he lived out his days under administrative watch.

As we leave the upper city, we note a large tower, built by the Ottamans in the 18th century on the remains of a Crusader tower that was built on top of the original Roman tower. This well-fortified city is in fact mentioned as one of the walled cities all the way back from the time of Yehoshua, and I’ve heard that there are those who come here to read the Megillah on the same day as in Jerusalem, the halachah for cities that were walled in the time of Yehoshua.

Floored

We descend to the lower Roman part of the city, and as we walk along the ancient Roman Cardo, we spot a reconstructed wagon and notice the ruts in these ancient stones, indicating the wheel span of those wagons. An interesting factoid: The span is 4 feet, 8.5 inches (1.4 meters) — the space for two horses between the wheels to pull the Roman wagons — and was adopted as the standard measure over 1,800 years later when they built the train tracks in England.

We come to the remains of a bath house, and although there’s not much left of it, we do see the small pillars that were used to hold up an elevated floor that had little fires underneath it to heat the water. It actually helps us understand a Gemara about Rabi Avahu, a talmid of Rabi Yochanan, who was in a bathhouse when the floor collapsed and how he stood on the pillars and saved his students by grabbing on to them. Looking at these pillars, we can actually envision Rabi Avahu holding on to his students for dear life.

Again, in this Roman part of the city, we’re taken by the elaborate mosaics — mythological creatures, a castle in Alexandria, the Nile river with violent scenes of animals attacking one another. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, the Roman caesar who was close with Rabi Yehudah Hanasi, had ties to Egypt and it seems that their culture made it here to the Roman shuk in Tzippori as well. In fact, the Gemara tells us that Antoninus had tunnels built from Rome to the house of Rebbi through which he would come to secretly visit him. Rome, however, is quite a distance from here across the sea. But not far from Tzippori, next to the town of Beit Rimon, there’s an Arab village called Rumanah where there are the Churbat Roma ruins — a Roman city from the period of the Mishnah. There they uncovered some tunnels that may have led in the direction of Tzippori. Perhaps this was the “city of Rome” in Eretz Yisrael that the Gemara is referring to. (If modern Israel can have a Jorge Vashington street, an Avraham Linkolin boulevard, and even the newest “Ramat Trump” in the Golan Heights, why not a Rome in Israel as well?)

Living Waters

Our last stop brings us to an elaborate water system, constructed to provide enough water for the thousands of residents and many travelers who passed through this central city of international commerce. Tzippori was strategically located above the Jezreel valley, and was the main highway in ancient times for those coming from Egypt, or for those traveling from the coast going east to Bavel, Persia, Jordan, or Syria. Yet taking the city to the next level would require bringing enough water to provide for everyone — and collecting rainfall in cisterns the three months a year it rains (in a good year) was not going to be enough. The problem was that Tzippori is a high hill about 250 meters above sea level and water doesn’t usually travel uphill. And so, the ancient Roman engineers came up with a complex channel system that would transport water from the various springs around 15 kilometers away along the slopes of the surrounding higher mountains and down into the city.

We walk down about 70 steps into immense manmade caverns that were dug and plastered to retain the water that was brought here. These engineering wonders are about 650 feet long, 30 feet high, and 10 feet wide, and could hold over a million gallons of water — enough to provide for a city of 15,000 people for two weeks. And the water would be continuously flowing all year from these natural springs. Now the cisterns are dry, although in the winter months they’ll be full with water.

As we emerge back into sunlight and I look out at the breathtaking landscape, I can’t help but feel that the story of Tzippori is the story of Klal Yisrael after the devastating Churban. It’s the ability to reestablish and flourish once again in Eretz Yisrael, even amid a backdrop of destruction, decrees, and in a time of galus haShechinah. Yet, facing assimilation under a foreign occupying force, our leaders then revealed that, like a tzippor, we have the wings of Torah that can uplift us even in the most dismal of times. May this be the year we merit to see Divine revelation and Geulah sheleimah. —

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 827)