The Banias River in Caesarea Philippi: One of the Sources of the Jordan. Reed
Miller, 2022
“Matthew tells us that this conversation between Jesus and his disciples takes place in the beautiful town of Caesarea Philippi, filled with luxurious palaces, set in a magnificent natural landscape at the foot of Mount Hermon, but also a place of cruel power plays and the scene of betrayals and infidelity.” (Leo XIV, homily, 05.09.2025)
Departing from Capernaum by boat, Jesus and his disciples crossed to the other shore—likely Bethsaida (cf. Mt 16:5). For about 40 km, they walked northward along a path running between the upper Jordan River and the Golan Heights plateau until they came within sight of Mount Hermon. At the foot of this imposing mountain stood Caesarea Philippi.
Tetrarchy of Iturea-Trachonitis in the Time of Jesus. John F. Wilson, Caesarea Philippi (I. B. Tauris: London-New York, 2004, vi
Philip, one of the sons of Herod the Great, had built this city on a site dedicated to the god Pan: hence its ancient name of Paneas or Paneion, literally “sanctuary of Pan.” At the foot of a cliff, in the grotto from which one of the tributary streams of the Jordan River flows, it was customary to sacrifice goats, an animal associated with the god Pan. The same Philip, as Flavius Josephus tells us (BJ 3.10.7) conducted an experiment to identify the origins of the Paneas spring by throwing straw into the volcanic Lake Phiala, located about six kilometers upstream, on the heights of the Golan. The straw reappeared in the grotto of the Paneion.
Paneas first appears in historical sources in the context of the conquest of southern Syria by Antiochus III the Great in 200 B.C. A century later, Paneas and the district of Iturea were integrated into the Hasmonean kingdom. Herod inherited this situation. When Rome divided his kingdom among his three sons, Archelaus, Antipas, and Philip, Paneas and its surroundings became part of Philip’s tetrarchy (cf. Lk 3:1).
Chosen as the capital of his domains and refounded in honor of Caesar Augustus, the new city of Caesarea Philippi developed rapidly: a temple dedicated to Augustus covered the entrance to the sacred grotto, another dedicated to Zeus was erected nearby. Philip, moreover, ordered the construction of his palace according to the latest standards of Roman architecture.
Philip’s Palace. Reed Miller, 2022
Before Jesus and his disciples rose the imposing Mount Hermon. Summer was drawing to a close. At the mountain’s summit, the last snow was melting under the sun. The scene that follows indicates the season of Peter’s confession. “After six days” (Mt 17:1, USCCB), Jesus was transfigured before three of his disciples. In awe, Peter exclaimed: “Let us make three tents!” Some authors saw here a reference to the Jewish feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot), which falls in early October. One week before the feast of Tabernacles is the Day of Atonement—Yom Kippur—the only day of the year when the ineffable name of God was pronounced, as the High Priest entered the Holy of Holies in the Temple of Jerusalem (cf. Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth, chap. 9).
On this same day, far from the Temple of Yahweh in Jerusalem, in the pagan setting of the city of Pan, Peter confessed the divinity of Christ.
“He said to them:
– ‘But who do you say that I am?’
Simon Peter said in reply:
– ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God’.” (Mt 16:15-16)
Before Jesus and his disciples, the imposing cliff dominates the area of the pagan temples.Perhaps this is what inspired in Jesus the metaphor of the rock.
By Henri Gourinard
The Rock of Caesarea and the Pagan Temples. Reed Miller, 2022