BETHANIA. - Name of two localities in Palestine. 1) A village near Jerusalem on the eastern slope of the Mount of Olives, 15 stadia (about 2,800 m) from Jerusalem (Jn. 11:18), known above all as the village of Martha, Mary and Lazarus, in whose house Jesus loved to stay.
From there He set out for his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, and returned there the same evening (Lk. 19:29; Mk. 11:11; Mt. 21:17), and then on the evenings of the following days before the Passion. In its vicinity by courtesy of the Superior of the House of the Estrelci de Sacro Cuore S. I. - Rome)
BETHANIA - View.
the Ascension took place (Lk. 24, 50). But it is known principally for the resurrection of Lazarus (Jn. 11, 1-44). Christians did not cease to go there to venerate the tomb of Lazarus, over which in the 4th century a church was erected, and from that era the name of B. began to be replaced by that of Lazarium, transformed by the Arabs into el-'Ázarijjeh. This church was the property of the Holy Sepulchre until 1738 and disappeared only in the 16th century. Queen Melisende (12th century) had built, not far from the tomb of Lazarus, a church decorated with beautiful paintings, in honor of Martha and Mary, which has also disappeared.
Present-day el-'Ázarijjeh is a cluster of houses built mostly with material coming from ancient religious buildings; it has a little more than 700 inhabitants, all Muslims, and tends to shift toward the east from the site of ancient B., where a tomb is still shown that a tradition, attested as early as the 4th century, identifies with that of Lazarus.
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2) A locality in Transjordan, where John the Baptist was baptizing when he gave his testimony in favor of Jesus before the envoys of the Sanhedrin. According to Jn. 1, 28 (the only text that mentions it), this B. was situated beyond the Jordan. In 1908 Father Federlin would have identified it with Hirbet or Tell el-Medeš, which is opposite Jericho, about 40 minutes northwest of the modern bridge over the Jordan. This identification, although not yet confirmed by toponymy, is very plausible. From Jn. 1, 28 it does not appear that B. was the place of Jesus' baptism. Textual criticism, moreover, rejects the reading Bethabara (v.).