Mount Gerizim

Mountain (modern Jebel et-Tor) from which the blessings were to be pronounced, just as the cursings were to come from Mt Ebal (Dt 11:29). The two mountains designated by God were opposite each other, and the setting was a memorable one with six tribes positioned on Mt Gerizim and six on Mt Ebal, the Levites standing in the valley between—reciting the blessings and the cursings (Dt 27:11–28:68; Jos 8:33–35). The mountain is near Shechem, about 10 miles (16.1 kilometers) southeast of the city of Samaria, and it is referred to by the woman of Samaria in John 4:20–23 as the mountain where “our fathers worshiped.” Abraham, indeed, had built an altar in this area (Gn 12:6–7; 33:18–20), and it had been the revered site for Samaritan worship for centuries. Jesus responds to the woman by pointing out that the physical locality of worship (whether Gerizim or Jerusalem) is not important—the spirtual reality is. One must worship in spirit and in truth.

It was in this area that the bones of Joseph were buried (Jos 24:32) and that Joshua called upon the people to renew their allegiance to the God of their fathers (vv 25–27). Josephus records in his Antiquities (11.8.2–4) Sanballat’s promise to Manasseh to preserve for him the honor of the priesthood and also to build a temple on Mt Gerizim like that at Jerusalem. It was apparently destroyed later by the Maccabean forces under Hyrcanus (Antiquities 13.9.1). The Samaritans still worship at Nablus, which lies at the foot of Mt Gerizim, but are a diminishing community precariously held together.