asada is one of the most important archaeological sites in Israel, and an awesome physical structure. A massive fortress hewn into the high hills of the Judean desert, its steep cliffs rise 1,300 feet above the Dead Sea. The only access is via cable car or the narrow, twisting “Snake Path” on the eastern slope. One of King Herod’s most impressive building projects (ca. 30 BCE), it’s also a UNESCO World Heritage Site, attracting more tourists each year than almost any other site in Israel. Excavating Masada remains a rite of passage for Israeli archaeology students.
But Masada is not just a significant site for the history of Second Temple Judaism. Its story also exerts a powerful hold on both the modern state of Israel and the contemporary Jewish-Israeli imagination. The key historical question surrounding Masada—the unanswerable question—is the so-called “Masada myth,” the story of the mass suicide of 967 Jewish men, women, and children who chose to die at the site rather than submit to enslavement or murder at the hands of the Roman army (ca. 73 BCE).
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