The Judean Wilderness
Scripture first
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Jesus is led by the Spirit into to be tested by the devil.
East of the watershed the land falls away into the rain-shadow: chalk hills, deep canyons, no rain, the Dead Sea haze at the bottom. David hid in it from Saul; John preached in it; Jesus was tested in it for forty days.
The barren rain-shadow east of Judah's ridge falling to the Dead Sea: David's refuge, John's preaching ground, and the place of Jesus' testing.
- the wilderness of Judah, the wilderness of Judea
- The Judean desert · Palestine, Israel
begins within a day's walk of Jerusalem. When Psalm 63 sings of a dry and weary land without water, David is describing the actual ground under his feet, an hour from the city.
Jesus' testing there places the new Israel in the old Israel's classroom, but within sight of the city he would finally enter.
- Matthew 4:1 Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tested by the devil.
- 1 Samuel 24:1-2 Saul hunts David in the wilderness of En Gedi
- Psalm 63:1 A psalm of David in the wilderness of Judah: my soul thirsts for you
- Matthew 3:1 John the Baptist preaches in the wilderness of Judea
What we know
Certain
- The wilderness east of the ridge down to the Dead Sea matches every biblical description.