What was the geography and climate like in the Middle East during the time of Jesus?
December 28th, 2009 | 
Author: What was the geography and climate like in the Middle East during the time of Jesus? Did there use to be alot of vegetation?
What was the geography and climate like in the Middle East during the time of Jesus? Did there use to be alot of vegetation?
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check this out – (not that much different that today)
The period was called the Roman climate optimum and it was about 4C hotter than our current climate optimum. In fact our current optimum is so much colder than all the preceding Holocene optimums most real geologists and climate specialists believe we are just in a warm part of the little ice age and not a true optimum because we still have floating ocean ice in the arctic ocean when in previous optimums it has been mostly ice free.
2000 years ago is not such a long time, considering, so it was like it is now.
The climate in Palestine has two distinct seasons. The wet or rainy season is from the middle of October to the middle of April. The dry or summer season lasts from the middle of June until the middle of September. The climate also varies from north to south and east to west. Generally there is more rain on the eastern part of Palestine and it gets hotter the further south you travel. The mountainous regions have more rain on the west side then the east side. The hottest days of the year are during the transition of the two seasons.
Jews avoided Samaria but on occasion Jesus did travel through Samaria and he first reveled who he was to the woman at the well. Around the Sea of Galilee, crops were plentiful and fish were abundant. It was about two miles wide by about twenty miles long. Judea, south of Samaria, has a gradual change in landscape. The Sea of Galilee is a fresh water sea that is about 13 miles long and 8 miles wide. The typical crops grown were grain, olives and vineyards. The coast did not have any natural harbors or ports. The eastern slope is much dryer and had little vegetation. And there are some cities that we have not been located or we are unable to determine exactly where they were located. It is beneficial to understand the world that Jesus lived in and what his challenges were in life and in travel. Lower Galilee is where Jesus lived as a child in Nazareth. The most distinct change is the decreased rainfall. An area between Galilee and Samaria is called the Valley of Jezreel. Another notable city is Tiberias, and the author writes about it:
It was probably the most important city on Lake Galilee, but there is no record of Jesus ever having gone there. One was via the Mediterranean shipping lanes.