The tomb of Rachel Bethlehem as it looks. From the editor. In Holy Scripture

The first information about the burial place of the foremother Rachel is given in the Torah:

"And Rachel died, and was buried on the road to Ephrath, that is, Bethlehem." - Gen.35:19

In the book of the prophet Jeremiah, when describing from the land of Israel to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar, it is said how Rachel escorts her descendants who are taken away into captivity along the road passing near her grave. She cries and asks God to have mercy on them:

“Thus says the Lord: a voice is heard in Rama, a cry and a bitter sob; Rachel weeps for her children and does not want to be comforted by her children, for they are not. Thus says the Lord: keep your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, says the Lord, and they will return from the land of the enemy. And there is hope for your future, says the Lord, and your sons will return to their borders. - Jer.31:15-17

These words, spoken 2500 years ago, turned the tomb of Rachel into a symbol of hope for the return of the Jewish people to their land.

Rachel's tomb is also mentioned in the First Book of Kings (1 Sam. 10:2), where it is said that Rachel was buried on the border of the allotment. There, on the territory of the tribe of Benjamin, was Rama, which is mentioned in the book of Jeremiah. At the same time, it is known that Bethlehem was in the territory. Therefore, scientists cannot agree on whether the "Tomb of Rachel" is indeed the burial place of Rachel's foremother.

In historical sources

For two millennia, historians and travelers who visited the land of Israel described the tomb located near Bethlehem.

first millennium

Among them are the father of Christian church history (c. 263-340) - a Roman historian who lived in, a traveler from Bordeaux - who made a trip to Palestine in 333-334, - a church writer who lived in Bethlehem at the beginning of the 5th century. and many others.

The largest number of visitors is celebrated on Cheshvan 11 - this date is traditionally regarded as the day of the death of the foremother Rachel.

Photo gallery

Helpful information

Opening hours

• 24/7, but due to security reasons, temporarily closed Sun-Thu: 22:30-1:30, Saturday and holidays

Address and contacts

Entrance to Bethlehem, Hebron Road, in front of the checkpoint on the border between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

Traditions

From generation to generation, the tomb of the foremother Rachel was a place of prayer, to which Jews came from all over the world. Veniamin Tudelsky tells about the custom of pilgrims to leave their name on the tombstone. There were special prayers read near this place.

A traveler from Prague, who visited the land of Israel in the 17th century, talks about the custom of coming to the grave of Rachel on semi-holidays and praying there, listening to sermons, eating, drinking and dancing.

Other sources mention the custom of praying at the grave of Rachel on mourning days before Tisha B'Av, in the month of Elul and on the days of Awe between and.

The day of the most massive pilgrimage from generation to generation was the 11th of Cheshvan.

Ivan Bunin (1870–1953)

And she died, and Jacob buried
She is on the way ... "And there is no
No name, no inscriptions, no signs.

At night, a faint light shines in it,
And the dome of the coffin, whitewashed with chalk,
Dressed in mysterious pallor,

I approach in the dusk timidly
And with trepidation I kiss the chalk and dust
On this stone, convex and white...

The sweetest of earthly words! Rachel!

For many centuries it has been a place of pilgrimage for Jews, as well as a holy place for Christians and Muslims. The tomb is under Israeli control and is surrounded by concrete walls. The building houses a synagogue.

Encyclopedic YouTube

In Holy Scripture

The first information about the burial place of the foremother Rachel is given in the Old Testament: “And Rachel died, and was buried on the road to Ephrath, that is, Bethlehem. Jacob placed her monument over the tomb. This is Rachel's tombstone to this day" (Gen.).

In the book of the prophet Jeremiah (31:14-16), when describing the expulsion of the Jews from the land of Israel to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar, it is said that Rachel escorts her descendants who are taken into captivity along the road passing near her grave. She cries and asks God to have mercy on them: “ Thus says the Lord: a voice is heard in Rama, a cry and a bitter sob; Rachel weeps for her children and does not want to be consoled for her children, for they are not. Thus says the Lord: keep your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, says the Lord, and they will return from the land of the enemy. And there is hope for your future, says the Lord, and your sons will return to their borders". These words, spoken two and a half thousand years ago, turned the tomb of Rachel into a symbol of hope for the return of the Jewish people to their land.

Rachel's tomb is also mentioned in First Kings (10:2), where it is said that Rachel was buried on the border of the tribe of Benjamin. There, on the territory of the tribe of Benjamin, is Rama, which is mentioned in the book of Jeremiah. At the same time, it is known that Bethlehem is located on the territory of the tribe of Judah. Therefore, scientists cannot agree on whether the "Tomb of Rachel" is indeed the burial place of Rachel's foremother.

In historical sources

For two millennia, historians and travelers who visited the land of Israel described the tomb located near Bethlehem.

First millennium A.D. e.

Among them are the father of Christian church history, Eusebius Caesarea (c. 263-340) - a Roman historian who lived in Caesarea, a traveler from Bordeaux - who made a trip to Palestine in 333-334, Jerome Stridonsky - a church writer who lived in Bethlehem at the beginning of V century and many more. On the “map from Madaba” of the 6th century near Efrat and Beit Lehem there is a symbolic image with the inscription “a voice is heard in Ramah” - part of a quote from the book of the prophet Jeremiah (31:14) describing the tomb of Rachel. The French priest Arculf, who visited the land of Israel in 670, describes an unadorned stone tombstone. Numerous notes of travelers from the Middle Ages have been preserved, according to which one can judge how the tomb of Rachel looked and changed.

Middle Ages

Benjamin of Tudelsky, a Spanish rabbi who undertook a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1165-1173, and other travelers of the 12th century describe a tombstone of 11 stones, and above them a dome standing on four pillars. In the 13th century, the dome and pillars were destroyed, and restored in the 15th century. Meshulam from Veltra, who visited Palestine in 1481, again reports a tombstone surrounded by four pillars and a dome above them. In the 16th century, in addition to the main dome, two secondary ones were added, and individual stones were combined into a single monument. In 1621-1622, the Muslim ruler of Jerusalem allowed the Jews to build walls around the four pillars surrounding the tomb, and it turned into an enclosed space.

In the new time

File:Tomb of Rachel 1.jpg

Concrete fence around Rachel's Tomb 2012

In the XVIII-XIX centuries, near the tomb of Rachel, the Bedouins began to bury their dead and, gradually, a Muslim cemetery was formed around the tomb.

In 1839, the famous Jewish philanthropist Moshe Montefiore and his wife visited Rachel's tomb. They decided to allocate money to renovate and expand the old building. The building permit was obtained from the Turkish Sultan. A room was added to the premises of the 17th century, the use of which was divided by hours between Jews and Muslims. The building built by Montefiore has survived to this day.

At the beginning of the 21st century, the building was surrounded by a high concrete fence, necessary for the safety of visitors and their protection from hostile Arab residents of the surrounding territories. Currently, numerous tourists from all over the world come to the tomb of Rachel. Inside the building operates

In her youth, Rachel herded the cattle of her father Laban in Padan Aram. She is described in the Pentateuch as "beautiful and slender". At the age of 15, she met Yaakov, who fled to Padan Aram on the advice of his mother to escape the wrath of his brother Esav. The Pentateuch tells that Yaakov helped Rachel water the cattle by rolling a huge stone from the mouth of the well with superhuman effort.

After a month in the house of his uncle Laban, Yaakov asked him for the hand of his daughter Rachel. Since in those days it was customary to pay the bride's father a bride price, and Yaakov had nothing for his soul, he offered to work for Laban as a bride price for seven years for free. Laban agreed to this deal, and Yaakov set to work as a shepherd.

But seven years passed, the longed-for day finally came, and Laban invited all the villagers to the wedding celebration. Everyone had fun and rejoiced at this wedding - everyone except Rachel's older sister, Leah. Now that her younger sister was marrying Jacob, she was destined to be the wife of his villainous older brother, Esau.

Jacob did not trust the cunning Laban and therefore agreed with his beloved about conventional signs by which he could recognize her even in complete darkness. Now Yaakov was sure that Laban would not give him someone else instead of his own daughter.

So, Jacob stands under the chuppah, waiting for the bride to appear. Here she appears, her face is hidden by a veil. No one guesses that under the veil is not Rachel, but her own sister Leah. Leah enters under the chuppah and gives Yaakov a conventional sign, which he agreed with her sister. This is Rachel, realizing that her sister would be disgraced if Laban's cunning was revealed, she chose to give her her lover, whom she had been waiting for seven years.

To eventually marry Rachel, Jacob had to work for Laban for another seven years.

The Torah says that Yaakov loved Rachel more than Leah, but Leah gave birth to sons, while Rachel was childless. This led to jealousy and rivalry between the sisters.

Once Reuven, the eldest son of Leah, found and brought to his mother a rare plant, mandrake, which, according to legend, helps childless women become pregnant. Upon learning of this, Rachel begged Leah to give her the mandrake in exchange for a night with Yaakov. Leia agreed and as a result gave birth to another son.

In order to have at least adopted children, Rachel gave Jacob her slave Bila, and she gave birth to two sons - Dan and Naftali.

After years of suffering and despair, Rachel finally gave birth to her first child, Yosef.

After twenty years in his father-in-law's house, Yaakov decides to return to his homeland. Secretly, under the cover of night, he sets out on his journey with his wives and children. Leaving her father's house, Rachel steals idols from the family shrine.

Having discovered the flight of Yaakov with his family and the loss of idols, Laban sets off in pursuit. Having caught up with Yaakov, Laban accuses him of stealing idols and demands a search of his belongings. Rachel, having heard about the search, calmly sits down on the stolen idols and apologizes that she cannot stand before her father because of a woman's ailment. A stormy meeting between Laban and Yaakov ends with the conclusion of a peace treaty.

Yaakov and his family reach Canaan, and here, on the road from Beit Lehem to Efrat, Rachel dies of childbirth at the age of 36. Jacob names the newborn son Benjamin.

That's the whole short story of the life of the foremother Rachel.

Two sisters, Rachel and Leah, seem to have switched roles after death. Leah, a happy mother who has suffered all her life from her husband's cold attitude, lies next to Yaakov in the family tomb. And the beloved wife Rachel, who for many years prayed to the Almighty for a child, became in the minds of the people the main of the foremothers.

The prophet Ermiyahu raises Rachel to the level of a national symbol, makes him the main of the four foremothers, the patroness of all the sons of Israel. The Midrash considers Rachel a symbol of motherhood.

The unique love story of Jacob and Rachel, her dream of having children, her tragic death make Rachel's image heroic, and her grave in Beit Lehem a center of pilgrimage for childless women and unmarried girls. All of them pray at the grave of the foremother Rachel for the creation of a family and the birth of children.

The Midrash states that Rachel voluntarily chose an untimely death on the road so that she would not be buried in the family tomb in Hebron, next to her husband, but in Beit Lehem, by which the first exiles would go to Babylon. Jacob also foresaw that his descendants would go into exile past the grave of Rachel, and she would pray for their deliverance and, in general, for the complete and final Redemption of the Jewish people.

And there is also a story in the Midrash about how the Almighty was angry with the Jewish people and decided to destroy the Temple forever because a pagan idol was installed in it. And then the souls of the forefathers and foremothers stood up and began to pray to the Almighty to forgive the Jews and not condemn them to eternal exile. They mentioned their merits in the hope that the price for them would be the forgiveness of the Jewish people. Abraham mentioned that he first began to spread monotheism in the world. Yitzhak - that he agreed to be sacrificed. But neither these nor other merits of the forefathers and foremothers forced the Almighty to change his mind. And then Rachel spoke. “Lord of the world,” she said, “for seven long years I have been waiting for the day when I can become the wife of my beloved. But when that day came, I gave it up and gave the symbol to my sister Leah so as not to put her to shame. I did not know then that I was bringing a rival into my house, that You would give her children, but not me. And if I was able to endure all this, the more You, the Almighty, can restrain Your anger at the opponent - the pagan idol brought into the Temple. It was then that the Almighty said: “Do not cry and do not shed tears, for there is a payment for your deeds, and the sons will return to their borders.”

RACHEL

RACHIL (רָחֵל , Rachel) - one of the four foremothers of the Jewish people, the youngest daughter of Laban, sister of Leah, second wife of Jacob, mother of Joseph and Benjamin.

According to the biblical account, Jacob met Rachel when he arrived in Haran, fleeing the wrath of his brother Esau; Jacob fell in love with her at first sight and agreed to work for her for Laban seven years. When the term expired, Laban went to the trick and replaced Rachel with Leah on their wedding night.

Maurice Gottlieb. Rachel

Tomb of Julius II, Rachel and Leah, 1515,

Church of San Pietro in Vicoli.

Jacob and Rachel at the Well
Oil on canvas, 230 x 190 cm, 2006

When the next morning, Jacob discovered the substitution, Laban explained that he was obliged to marry the eldest daughter before the youngest, and agreed to give Rachel to him if Jacob agreed to work for him for another seven years.

Giacomo d'Antonio de Nigretti Palma Vecchio.

Date of Rachel and Jacob.

According to the Bible, Rachel was "beautiful in shape and beautiful in face," and Jacob loved her more than "weak eyes." However, Rachel remained barren and envious of Leah's fertility. Desperate, she, as before Sarah, gave her servant Bilh u as a concubine to her husband; born Bilkh oy Dana and Naftali Rachel considered her own sons.

Foremother Rachel and forefather Jacob.

Cathedral of the Nativity of the Virgin

In the end, Rachel became pregnant and gave birth to a son, saying: “God removed (asaf) my shame. And she called his name Joseph, saying, the Lord will give (Joseph) me and another son.

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo. Rachel Hiding the Idols. 1726

The tomb of the foremother Rachel - this is how it was in the 18th century.

According to the Haggadah, Jacob buried Rachel on the road near Bethlehem because he foresaw that the exiles to Babylonia would pass here, and Rachel would pray to God to have mercy on them. Jewish travelers, beginning with Benjamin of Tudela (circa 1170), speak of a monument consisting of twelve stones, eleven of which were laid by the sons of Jacob, and on them a large stone laid by Jacob himself. A dome on four columns was built over the grave.

Tomb Rachel. Late 19th century

At the end of the 18th century a building was erected around the grave, which was repaired in 1841 with funds provided by M. Montefiore. During the Jordanian occupation (1948-67), the area around Rachel's grave was turned into a Muslim cemetery. After the Six Day War, the building was restored by the Israeli Ministry of Religious Affairs and serves as a place of mass pilgrimage and tourism.

The largest number of Jewish pilgrims visit the grave of Rachel on the new moon, throughout the month of Nisan and the 14th day of the month of Cheshvan - the traditional date of the death of "our mother Rachel."

Abel Pann (1883-1963). Rachel

Anna Akhmatova

Bible Verses: Rachel

And Jacob served for Rachel seven years; and they appeared to him in a few days, because he loved her. Book of Genesis And Jacob met in the valley of Rachel, He bowed down to her like a homeless wanderer. Herds raised hot dust, The source was littered with a huge stone. He rolled away the stone with his hand And gave the sheep water to drink. But his heart began to feel sad in his chest, It hurts like an open wound, And he agreed to serve as a maiden for seven years as a shepherd at Laban. Rachel! For the one who is in your power, Seven years are like seven dazzling days. But the lover of money Laban is very wise, And pity is unfamiliar to him. He thinks: everyone will be forgiven deceit For the glory of Laban's house. And with a firm hand Leads blind Leah to Jacob in the bridal chamber. High night flows over the desert, Drops cool dews, And Lavan's youngest daughter groans, Tormenting her fluffy braids, Curses her sister and blasphemes God, And orders the Angel of Death to appear. And Jacob dreams of the sweet hour: The transparent spring of the valley, The merry glances of Rachel's eyes And her dove-like voice: Jacob, didn't you kiss me And call me your black dove? December 25, 1921 M. Chagall. Rachel hides her father's teraphim***

O Book of Books! Who has not experienced

in your changing fate,

how do you heal the one who betrayed

your weary spirit to you?

In a series of visions unchanged

how perfect and pure

your pages are penetrating

unfading beauty.

All the abysses of years have not drowned out

divinely simple motif.

The image of the feminine Rachel is alive,

Israel the God-fighter is alive...

You are forever new century after century,

year after year, moment after moment

you get up - an altar before a man,

O Bible! O Book of Books!

Valery Bryusov

OUR MAIN FOREMOTHER

AND HER TOMB:

In our mercantile time, such concepts as national dignity, religious shrines and historical memory are used by the Jewish side mainly in the internal political struggle, for demagogic argumentation. And for the Arab side, these concepts are the main motives for an uncompromising war. In the eyes of the Arabs, the struggle for the right to own the holy places of the Jewish people is one of the most reliable ways to resolve the issue of Jewish statehood "in the lands of Islam."

The efforts of the secular leaders of Israel, and the Jewish establishment in the Western world, to obscure the religious aspects of the confrontation are bearing fruit: they talk less and less about shrines - more and more about the amounts of compensation, loans and appropriations. Meanwhile, for any unbiased person, the rights of the Jewish people to holy places for Judaism are obvious and indisputable, not only from the position of faith, but also from the position of jurisprudence. As an example, consider the story of Rachel's tomb at Beit Lehem.

In the Jewish calendar, the month of Cheshvan is strongly associated with the name of the foremother Rachel. On the eleventh day of this month, she died in the arms of her inconsolable husband Jacob: “And while there was still some distance of land from Euphrates, Rachel gave birth, and her birth was difficult. When she suffered in childbirth, the midwife said to her: do not be afraid, for this is your son. And when her soul was leaving her, for she was dying, she called his name: Benoni. But his father called him Benjamin" (Genesis 35:16-18).

The life of Rachel is told in several weekly chapters of the Torah, as well as in numerous midrashim. However, today we want to talk about the posthumous fate of the foremother. Rachel died already in the Land of Israel, shortly after Yaakov, returning from Syria, reconciled with his brother Esau and settled in Canaan. Nevertheless, Yaakov did not bury his wife in the ancestral tomb in the Hebron cave of Machpelah, but interred her in the ground not far from the road leading to Beit Lehem, southeast of Jerusalem. Since at least the 10th century, this grave has become an object of Jewish pilgrimage.

The fact that Rachel's grave is located near Beit Lehem is reported, for example, by Abbot Daniel, who visited Palestine in the 12th century. True, Daniel, it seems, was not at the grave itself and only reported that it was two versts from the city (see: “The Life and Walking of Daniel, Abbot of the Russian Land”). We find a more detailed description of this place in the writings of two Jewish travelers who visited Palestine several decades later than the Russian abbot.

From Jerusalem, two parazangs to Bethlehem of Judea, not far from it, half a mile away, is the tomb of Rachel, at the crossroads of the road. This monument is composed of eleven stones, according to the number of the children of Jacob; above it is a dome on four columns, and all the Jews passing by write their names on the stones of the monument.

("Journey of Rabbi Benjamin of Tudela")

On this grave a structure was made of eleven stones, according to the number of the eleven tribes of Israel; since Benjamin was born only at the death of his mother, there is no special stone for him. All these stones are of marble, and the stone of Jacob, also of marble, which covers all the others, is so large and heavy that it would take many people to carry it.

("Round the World Journey of Rabbi Petahia of Regensburg")

Most often, Jewish women went on a pilgrimage to the grave of Rachel's foremother: since Rachel could not give birth for a long time, visiting her grave was considered a patent remedy for infertility (we find the first mention of this in the message of a Christian pilgrim from Mainz, who visited Beit Lehem in 1483 ). However, men also did not neglect the shrine.

After the Crusaders were expelled from Palestine, Rachel's tomb came under Muslim control and a mosque was erected in its place. This is evidenced by the deacon of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery Zosima, who visited Beit-Lehem in 1420: “Her coffin<Рахели>stands between Bethlehem and Jerusalem, on the Egyptian road. There was Jacob from Shechem, who is called Pharaoh, and he was with the father of Abraham, and went to Palestine and to the city of Ramla. Here was Jacob's dwelling, and here he died on the road. Above his coffin stands a Muslim mosque" (see: "Zosima's Journey to Constantinople, Athos and Palestine").

For a long time, non-Muslims were denied access to Rachel's tomb. The situation changed only in 1615, when the Turkish ruler of Jerusalem, Mohammed Pasha, handed over this shrine to the Jews. Subsequently, their rights to the grave were confirmed by the Sultan's decree issued at the beginning of the 19th century.

In 1788 the grave was surrounded by a wall. A European traveler who visited Beit Lehem in 1824 left the following description of the tomb of the foremother: “This is a stone building, undoubtedly of Turkish design, topped with a dome. There is a tombstone inside the building... The inside walls of the building are covered with Jewish names carved by Jews.”

In the 19th century, the famous Jewish philanthropist Sir Moses Montefiore visited Rachel's grave. Shortly before his visit, there was an earthquake, and the tomb was badly damaged. Montefiore gave money for repairs, and in addition, ordered the construction of an exact copy of the tomb on his estate in Ramsgate, next to his home synagogue. Later, this mausoleum became the tomb of Sir Moses.

After power in Palestine passed to the British, Rachel's grave became one of the epicenters of the Arab-Jewish confrontation. True, shortly after the expulsion of the Turks, the Jews cleaned and repaired the shrine without any protest from the Muslims. But already in 1921, when the rabbinate applied to the city authorities of Beit Lehem for permission to carry out additional repairs, a protest followed from the Arabs. And after the pogroms of 1929, the pilgrimage of Jews to the grave of the foremother practically ceased, the Muslims demanded that the building be transferred under their sole control.

After the War of Independence, Rachel's tomb, along with many other Jewish shrines (the Wailing Wall, the Temple Mount, the tomb of the forefathers in Hebron, the tomb of Yosef in Nablus, etc.) ended up in Jordan. Access to this shrine was opened to Jews only in 1967, when, after the Six Day War, Judea and Samaria came under Israeli control. However, in the early 1990s, the grave of the foremother was almost lost - according to the initial plans of the Rabin government, it was supposed to remain in the territory controlled by the Palestinian Authority. However, this did not happen: two orthodox deputies - Menachem Porush from Torah Jewry and Hanan Porat from the National Religious Party - managed to get a meeting with the prime minister and convinced him not to give up the shrine. As a result, the agreement was amended and Rachel's grave remained under Israeli control. Today, tens of thousands of Jews visit it every year. According to tradition, pilgrimage and prayer at the grave of the foremother contribute to healing from various diseases, including infertility, and can also help lonely people find their other half.

However, Rachel owes her place in the traditional Jewish consciousness not only to the Torah and the revered grave, but also to the colorful image used by the prophet Irmeyau, the image of a mother mourning her children going into exile: “A voice is heard in Rama, a cry and bitter sobbing; Rachel weeps for her children and does not want to be comforted by her children, for they are not there” (Yermeyau, 31:15).

The image of a mother mourning for her missing children has firmly entered the Jewish consciousness. Therefore, over time, Rachel turned into a kind of heavenly intercessor of the Jewish people, able to beg the Almighty to mitigate the harsh sentence on the sons of Israel.

According to the well-known Midrash Eicha Rabbah, after the destruction of the Temple, the forefathers and prophets unanimously begged the Almighty to forgive the Jews for their sins and allow them to return to their homeland. G‑d, however, was adamant. And then Rachel said: “Lord, Lord! You know how great was the love of your servant Yaakov for me. For seven years he served my father for me, and when the time came to become his wife, my father decided to replace me with my sister, and I was not jealous of him for my sister. I, created from flesh and blood, dust and ashes, did not become jealous of my rival; But you, the living, living and merciful King, should you be jealous of idols, dead and worthless, and cast out my children for them?

At that moment, God's mercy returned, and the Lord said: “For your sake, Rachel, I will return the people of Israel to their borders, as it is written: “Thus says the Lord: keep your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears, For there is a reward for your work, says the Lord, and they will return from the land of the enemy. And there is hope for your future, says the Lord, and your sons will return to their borders ”(Yermeyau, 15: 16-17).

For a long time this prophecy remained only a hope for the Jews. Today we have been honored to see the beginning of its execution. However, the foremother Rachel continues to pray for her sons today - and will not calm down until the prophecy of Yirmeyau is fully fulfilled and all the exiles scattered around the world return to their homes.