Mount Precipice ( he, הר הקפיצה, "''Har HaKfitsa''"; ar, جبل القفزة, "''Jebel al-Qafzeh''", "Mount of the Leap"), also known as Mount of Precipitation, Mount of the Leap of the Lord and Mount Kedumim is located just outside the southern edge of
Nazareth, 2.0 km southwest of the modern city center.
It is believed by some to be the site of the
Rejection of Jesus described in the
Gospel of Luke
The Gospel of Luke), or simply Luke (which is also its most common form of abbreviation). tells of the origins, Nativity of Jesus, birth, Ministry of Jesus, ministry, Crucifixion of Jesus, death, Resurrection of Jesus, resurrection, and Ascensi ...
(). According to the story, the people of Nazareth, not accepting Jesus as Messiah tried to push him from the mountain, but "he passed through the midst of them and went away."
Archaeological excavations in the
Qafzeh Cave in the mountain
found human remains, whose estimated age is 100,000 years old. The human skeletons were associated with red ochre which was found only alongside the bones, suggesting that the burials were symbolic in nature. Previous to this discovery, scientists believed that human symbolic reasoning evolved much later, about 50,000 years ago.
During the 20th century the mountain was used as a quarry, now abandoned.
Highway 60 goes through a tunnel dug in the mountain in the site of the old quarry, connecting
Afula and
Jezreel Valley (Arabic - Marj Ibn Amer) directly to Nazareth.
On 14 May 2009,
Pope Benedict XVI
Pope Benedict XVI ( la, Benedictus XVI; it, Benedetto XVI; german: link=no, Benedikt XVI.; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, , on 16 April 1927) is a retired prelate of the Catholic church who served as the head of the Church and the sovereig ...
celebrated a
Mass
Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different ele ...
on this mountain, during his
visit to the Holy Land. 40,000 people participated.
See also
*
Skhul and Qafzeh hominids
The Skhul/Qafzeh hominins or Qafzeh–Skhul early modern humans are hominin fossils discovered in Es-Skhul and Qafzeh caves in Israel. They are today classified as ''Homo sapiens'', among the earliest of their species in Eurasia. Skhul Cave i ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Precipice
New Testament mountains