{"id":12065,"date":"2026-01-21T15:01:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T21:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/?p=12065"},"modified":"2026-01-21T16:54:29","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T22:54:29","slug":"%e4%bc%af%e7%89%b9%e5%88%a9","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/bible-faith\/devotional-notes\/2026\/01\/%e4%bc%af%e7%89%b9%e5%88%a9\/","title":{"rendered":"Bethel"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Bethel<\/strong>, translated into English as Beth El<\/strong>, Beth-El<\/strong>, or Beit El<\/strong>. Beth<\/strong> means “house” or “temple”; El<\/strong> means “God.” Therefore, the meaning is “House of God” (general term) or “House of Yahweh” (in specific contexts).Bethel was a city in ancient Israel, located approximately 16 kilometers north of Jerusalem. The modern-day Palestinian village of Beitin<\/strong> is generally considered to be the location of Bethel in the West Bank. However, the site of the biblical Bethel (Joshua 8:17) was replaced ten years after the Six-Day War by a nearby new Israeli settlement also named Beit El<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Joshua 12:7-24, within the record of the 31 cities allotted to Judah, the name Bethel is mentioned twice. This gives the impression that there may have been another Bethel located in the southern part of Judah (1 Samuel 30:27). Some scholars believe this southern Bethel is actually Bethuel<\/strong> (1 Chronicles 4:30), which was part of the territory given to the tribe of Simeon within the inheritance of Judah, and suggest it may be the same place as Bethul<\/strong> (Joshua 19:4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bethel<\/strong> is mentioned many times in the Book of Genesis. The first mention is in Genesis 12:8, where Abram built an altar to the east of this place. However, the most famous example is likely in Genesis 28, when Jacob was traveling to Haran to escape his brother Esau\u2019s threat to kill him. Reaching a certain place as the sun set, he stayed there for the night. He took one of the stones from that place, put it under his head, and fell asleep. In a dream, he saw a ladder resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. There above it stood the Lord, who said: “I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying.” Jacob rose early the next morning, took the stone he had placed under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it. He called that place Bethel (which means “House of God”).
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Another mention of Bethel in the Bible is in Genesis 35. This chapter recounts the covenant between God and Jacob and the origin of the naming of Bethel once again. It states that Jacob built an altar there and called the place El-Bethel<\/strong>, which means “God of Bethel.” The original name of the city was Luz<\/strong>, given by the Canaanites (Genesis 28:19).
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Above image: Legend has it that this place, Beit El, is where “Jacob dreamed of the ladder” (Photo by Lu Rong-hui).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

(Source: Compiled and translated by Zhang Bailu \/ Proofread by Professor Lu Rong-hui, 2015 Holy Land Study Tour Manual\u2014Israel, page 54)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Above image: Sign in Bethel pointing toward the site of “Jacob\u2019s Ladder Dream” (Source: Photo by C.Y. Tang, 2012).
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Above image: Panorama of the “Jacob\u2019s Ladder Dream” site built by ancient Arabs (Source: Photo by Dilys Tsai, 2012).
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Above image:\u00a0Exterior view of the ancient architectural ruins at Bethel’s “Jacob\u2019s Ladder Dream” site (Source: Photo by C.Y. Tang, 2012).
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Above image:\u00a0Interior view of the ancient architectural ruins at Bethel’s “Jacob\u2019s Ladder Dream” site (Source: Photo by Guo Huaien, 2012).
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The above information is used with authorization from the Holy Light Bible Geography Information Network.
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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bethel, translated into English as Beth El, Beth-El, or Beit El. Beth means “house” or “temple”; El means “God.” Therefore, the meaning is “House of God” (general term) or “House of Yahweh” (in specific contexts).Bethel was a city in ancient Israel, located approximately 16 kilometers north of Jerusalem. The modern-day Palestinian village of Beitin is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12071,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12065","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bible-quick-pulse","category-devotional-notes"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12065","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12065"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12065\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12078,"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12065\/revisions\/12078"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12071"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12065"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12065"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccic-iowa.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12065"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}