Caesarea Philippi (Banias), the Cave of Pan and the sources of the Jordan

Bible story

Caesarea Philippi in the Gospels: "Thou art Peter"

Two Gospels name Caesarea Philippi. Matthew speaks of its "coasts" (its district), Mark of its "towns" (Mark 8:27). Neither says that the scene takes place in the city itself, or in front of the cave. Luke tells the same exchange without giving a place (Luke 9:18-21).

"When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?"

Matthew 16:13 (KJV)

Peter's confession

The disciples report the opinions going around: John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah or another prophet. Jesus then puts the question to them directly, and Simon answers: "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matthew 16:16). In Matthew alone, Jesus replies with a play on his nickname, which works in Greek (Petros, petra).

"And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."

Matthew 16:18 (KJV)

The next verse adds the promise of "the keys of the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 16:19). Catholic tradition reads this as the foundation of the primacy of Peter and his successors; Orthodox and Protestant readings interpret it differently. This passage gives the place its importance for pilgrims, following a disciple you also meet at his house in Capernaum and on a rooftop in Jaffa.

The healed woman and the statue Eusebius saw

The Gospels tell of the healing of a woman with a flow of blood without saying where she came from (Mark 5:25-34). In the 4th century, the bishop and historian Eusebius of Caesarea reports a local tradition: she was from Paneas, and a bronze group in front of her house showed a kneeling woman stretching out her hands towards a standing man. Eusebius says he saw it (Church History VII, 18). The historian Sozomen writes that it was destroyed under the emperor Julian (Church History V, 21). What the statue really depicted is unknown.

And the Transfiguration?

Matthew and Mark place the Transfiguration six days after this exchange, on "an high mountain" they do not name (Matthew 17:1; Mark 9:2). Christian tradition sets it on Mount Tabor, further south. Some readers think instead of Hermon, which towers over Banias: this is a hypothesis drawn from proximity, without proof in the text.

Archaeology

The Cave of Pan and the sanctuary of Paneas

After the conquest of Alexander the Great, this place of water and greenery was dedicated to the Greek god Pan, protector of shepherds and wild nature. The sanctuary, the Paneion, gave the city its name: Paneas. Along the cliff, a natural terrace about 80 metres long received temples, courtyards and statue niches over the centuries, some of which still bear Greek inscriptions.

• DeityPan, to whom the cave was dedicated
• RemainsLarge cave, niches cut into the cliff, foundations of temples and courtyards
• ExcavationsZvi Ma'oz for the Israel Antiquities Authority, from 1988
• 2020 discoveryAn altar dedicated to "Pan Heliopolitanos", reused in the wall of a 7th-century church

The cave described by Josephus

The 1st-century Jewish historian describes a dark cavern, a chasm full of still water whose bottom no rope could reach (Jewish War I, 405). He sees it as the source of the Jordan and even tells how the tetrarch Philip supposedly proved this by throwing chaff into a nearby lake, Lake Phiala, and seeing it come out here (Jewish War III, 509-515). The Talmud also says: "the Jordan issues from the Cave of Pamyas" (Bekhorot 55a). Today the water no longer gushes from the cave: it emerges at its foot.

Herod's temple: here or elsewhere?

According to Josephus, Herod the Great built a white marble temple near the springs in honour of Augustus (Jewish War I, 404). The excavators first placed it at the mouth of the cave, but its location is debated: some scholars prefer the nearby site of Omrit. In 2024, Adi Erlich and Ron Lavi proposed, in the journal BASOR, a different reading of the courtyard in front of the cave: it would date from the late 1st century, under Agrippa II, and would have served as a setting for banquets. These conclusions still have to be weighed against those of the earlier excavations.

Tradition and identification

The "gates of hell" at Caesarea Philippi: is the cave in the text?

Many guides present the Cave of Pan as the "gates of hell" of Matthew 16:18. The idea is appealing: a bottomless chasm, linked to a pagan god, at the very spot where Jesus would be speaking of a church these gates will not overcome.

The text itself does not make this link. The Greek speaks of the "gates of Hades", the realm of the dead, and "hell" comes from older translations such as the King James Version. Matthew sets the exchange in the "coasts" of Caesarea, without mentioning the cave. So the connection is a modern reading, possible but impossible to prove. It helps you picture the scene; it does not tell you where the scene took place.

History

From Paneas to Banias: the history of the city

South of the park entrance, the centre of the Roman city, roughly 300 m by 300 m, was excavated from 1988 by Vassilios Tzaferis. His team uncovered the main street (the cardo) and a vast building of about 2,000 m², whose vaulted galleries are still visible. It is generally attributed to the palace of Agrippa II, without certainty. In the Byzantine period it was converted into a bathhouse.

• c. 200 BC: at the Battle of Panium, the Seleucid king Antiochus III defeats the Ptolemaic army and takes control of the region.
• Late 1st century BC: Paneas passes to Herod the Great, who builds a temple to Augustus.
• c. 3-2 BC: his son, the tetrarch Philip, makes it his capital and names it Caesarea, in honour of the emperor. It is called Caesarea Philippi to distinguish it from the city on the coast.
• AD 61: King Agrippa II embellishes it and renames it Neronias, a name dropped a few years later.
• 67-70: during the war against Rome, Vespasian stops here; after the fall of Jerusalem, Titus holds games here at which Jewish captives are thrown to the beasts (Josephus, Jewish War III, 443-444 and VII, 23-24).
• Byzantine period: the cult of Pan dies out, the Christian city has its bishop and the palace becomes a bathhouse.
• 7th century: Muslim conquest in 635. In 2022, the Israel Antiquities Authority found 44 gold coins of this period in the reserve, mostly of the emperor Heraclius.
• 10th century: a Jewish community and Karaites settle in Banias, according to the reserve's leaflet.
• 1129-1164: the Crusaders, who call it Belinas, hold it twice; Nur ad-Din retakes it in 1164. Nimrod Fortress dominates the area.
• 1209: the Jewish traveller Samuel ben Samson takes it for ancient Dan, whereas the biblical mound of Dan lies about 4 km to the west.
• 1967: the Syrian village of Banias comes under Israeli control during the Six-Day War; its inhabitants leave and the village is razed, apart from the mosque, a church and shrines among others.

On the cliff, a small white domed building overlooks the cave: this is the Muslim shrine of Nabi Khadr. An old hypothesis, without proof, also identifies the place with Baal-Gad, "under mount Hermon" (Joshua 11:17). For the period this site illustrates, see the ministry of Jesus in Galilee.