Magdalgad
Philistine city, near Ashkelon, where pagan rites take place that Jesus interrupts with spectacular miracles[1].
Description
While the Apostles have evangelized Ashkelon with varying success, Jesus sends them ahead."Here, I am going to this small country on the hill. You, continue towards Azotus."[2]When evening comes and they gather, Jesus reports on his day:
"I went to Magdalgad. I burned an idol and its censers. I caused a boy to be born. I preached the True God by performing miracles and I took for Myself the goat intended for an idolatrous rite, as a reward."[3].This is the only passage in the work where this village is mentioned.
Highlights
A pagan procession is organized to avert the fate of Pharaoh's wife who is about to die in childbirth. Jesus then performs a triple miracle[4]:
- Miracle of the healed scapegoat.
- Miracle of the burned idol.
- Miracle of the birth.
Its name
Magdalgad, Migdal Gad, Al Majdal, means The tower of Gad.
Where is it mentioned in the work?
EMV 200.
Learn more about this place
At the time of Maria Valtorta, the location of this village cited only once in the Bible[5], was still disputed. The biblical toponym Migdal-gad (Joshua 15:37) is among the cities of the Shephelah (lowlands of Judah[6]). Its exact location is not certain: dictionaries and encyclopedias generally indicate the site as uncertain. For example, the Catholic Encyclopedia in 1913 suggests two sites with approximate toponymy, at the two ends of the Shephelah [7]:
- El-Mejdel (Majdal), near Ashkelon (about 4 km northeast of Ashkelon),
- or Good El-Mejeleh (Khirbet el-Medjdele / Horvat Migdal-Gad, about 20 km west of Hebron) south of Beit Jibrin.
Maria Valtorta’s text decisively opts for the first hypothesis in full coherence with the environment: Magdalgad, a highly pagan city near Ashkelon, a Philistine city largely pagan.
Explore
- 31° 40’ 10’’ N / 34° 36’ 30’’ E /
- +45m.
Notes and references
- ↑ Article partially written from the Geographical Dictionary of the Gospel, J.-F. LAVÈRE.
- ↑ EMV 220.1.
- ↑ EMV 220.7.
- ↑ EMV 200.4.
- ↑ Joshua 15:37.
- ↑ The Shephelah (Hebrew: ha-Shfelah, "the lowlands") designates in the Bible and historical geography an area of low hills that transition between: the mountainous plateau of Judah to the east (around Hebron, Bethlehem, Jerusalem), and the Philistine coastal plain to the west (Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron).
- ↑ Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913, volume 6, p. 442.