Mount of Temptation

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Mount of Temptation, in Palestinian Arabic Jebel Quruntul, is a mountain over the city of Jericho in the West Bank, Palestine; ancient Christian tradition identifies it as the location of the temptation of Jesus described in the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, in which it is said that, from "a high place", the Devil offered Jesus rule over all the kingdoms of the world. The city of Jericho lies at the feet east of Mount Quruntul, at 258 m (846 ft) below sea level, with the nearby Jordan River and the Dead Sea at even lower elevations, further to the east and southeast. The mount has around 400 m (1, 300 ft) of prominence over Jericho, which translates to an elevation of 138 m (453 ft) above sea level, and offers a commanding view of its fabled surroundings to the east. Quruntul has been the location of a Seleucid and Maccabean fortress known as Dok (also Doq and Dagon). It was the scene of the assassination of Simon Maccabeus and two of his sons in 134 BC. Held by the last Maccabean ruler, Antigonus, during his war with Herod, the latter later improved the fort's water system. Since at least the 4th century, Christian tradition has specifically associated the forty days of Jesus's fasting that preceded his temptation with a cave on Jebel Quruntul. Eventually, it came to be associated with the high mountain in the Gospel's description of tem

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