UNESCO and the Vatican agree present-day Jordan is where Jesus' baptism is believed to have taken place. But across the river, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, there is a rival spot collecting millions of dollars in tourism revenue.
Left: Director General of the Baptism Site Commission Rustom Mkhjian points out a replica of the Madaba mosaic map — the earliest known depiction of a Holy Land map. It shows the baptism site on the east side of the Jordan River in what is now Jordan. Right: A modern mosaic depicting the visit of Pope Francis to the baptism site in 2016 accompanied by members of Jordan's royal family.
have marketed that side of the river as"the site where, according to tradition, Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist." Though, in recent months, both the Jordanian and Israeli-run sites have been empty of visitors due to the coronavirus pandemic. "The dispute isn't essentially about the authenticity of the site," says Jordan's Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad, the chief multifaith religious adviser to King Abdullah II. He says that has already been settled — Jordan's side of the river is the baptism site."This is about where the tourists are going to go."
Prince Ghazi, a first cousin of the king, developed the site of Bethany Beyond the Jordan in the 1990s. As evidence for the location, he cites biblical verses, the UNESCO certification, remains of fourth-century churches, accounts of early religious pilgrims and a sixth-century map. The Madaba mosaic is the oldest known map of the Holy Land, which placesWorkers maintaining the grounds of the baptism site, a major religious pilgrimage tourist destination in Jordan.
Jordan's 1994 peace treaty with Israel, which envisioned negotiations with the Palestinians to decide the West Bank's fate, paved the way for Jordanian excavations and reopening
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