Beth Dagon
בֵּית דָּגוֹן · “Beit Dagan” on the map
Where was biblical Beth Dagon? At Bayt Dajan, beside modern Beit Dagan, southeast of Tel Aviv. I mark it probable.
Joshua lists Beth Dagon among the towns of Judah's lowland. Its name means "house of Dagon," for the god of the Philistines, the same Dagon whose idol fell on its face before the Ark in Ashdod.
By Aaron Shaffier, licensed Israel tour guide and mapmaker · About the mapmaker
- Site today
- Bayt Dajan, beside modern Beit Dagan, southeast of Tel Aviv
- How sure
- Probable The best case we have, with real alternatives.
- Other names
- Beth-dagon, Bit-Daganna, Caphar Dagon, Bayt Dajan, Khirbet Dajun
- Location
- 32.0035° N, 34.8293° E (Google Maps)
How we know where it was
The name stayed on this spot. The Arab village of Bayt Dajan carried it until 1948, and today's Beit Dagan grew up beside it. Dajan is Dagon, with the Hebrew g turned into the Arabic j.
Older witnesses stand behind the village. Sennacherib's annals of 701 BCE name Beth Dagon together with Joppa, Benei Berak and Azor. So a town of that name stood here in the days of Hezekiah. In the 4th century Eusebius placed the Beth Dagon of Judah at a large village between Lod and Yavne. The Madaba mosaic map marks it near Lod. That is a surviving name and three ancient witnesses, all pointing at the same corner of the plain.
The doubt comes from Joshua's own list. It groups Beth Dagon with Makkedah and the towns around Lachish, in a district farther south and inland. So some think Judah's Beth Dagon was a different town, one that has not been found. On that view the village near Jaffa is Sennacherib's Beth Dagon, and Joshua's is still lost. The name did repeat. Asher had its own Beth Dagon in the north.
One more proposal puts the older town at Khirbet Dajun, a ruin a little to the southwest, with the village moving later. The map stays with the surviving name and the ancient witnesses, and I mark it probable.
Visiting today
There is nothing ancient to see. The site lies in today's Beit Dagan, by the Beit Dagan junction near Rishon LeZion.
Read it in the Bible
Verse numbers follow the Hebrew Bible. In a handful of chapters English Bibles count one verse off.
See Beit Dagan on the interactive map →
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Get the print + free ebookNearby places
- Bene Berak 4 km north
- Joppa (Jaffa) 9 km northwest
- Gath Rimmon 10 km north
- Aphek 15 km northeast
- Gezer 18 km southeast
- Shaalbim 21 km southeast