Umm Qays (Gadara)
Jesus Casting The Demons.
Umm Qays (Gadara) was a fort city set on a hill and the ruins are still surrounded by the ancient walls, crumbled and part submerged in places.
It is a hilltop site with grand views over Lake Tiberias, the Yarmouk River and the Golan Heights. It is mainly associated with the story of Jesus casting out demons and sending them into a herd of pigs which rushed down a steep slope and drowned in the lake.
Segments of a temple and basilica, two amphitheatres, a bathhouse, a hippodrome and other important buildings have survived along with a section of paved road, complete with chariot wheel grooves.
Gadara was noted for its rich intellectual life and as the birthplace of several famous philosophers and poets of the ancient world like the Cynic philosopher Menippus. It was the home of several classical poets and philosophers, including Theodorus, founder of a rhetorical school in Rome, and was once called “a new Athens” by a poet.
It is a hilltop site with grand views over Lake Tiberias, the Yarmouk River and the Golan Heights. It is mainly associated with the story of Jesus casting out demons and sending them into a herd of pigs which rushed down a steep slope and drowned in the lake.
Segments of a temple and basilica, two amphitheatres, a bathhouse, a hippodrome and other important buildings have survived along with a section of paved road, complete with chariot wheel grooves.
Gadara was noted for its rich intellectual life and as the birthplace of several famous philosophers and poets of the ancient world like the Cynic philosopher Menippus. It was the home of several classical poets and philosophers, including Theodorus, founder of a rhetorical school in Rome, and was once called “a new Athens” by a poet.
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