Erected around 1100, this Catholic church was a mosque, a caravanserai and a stable for animals before being rebuilt in 1870 by the Franciscans. One of the few remaining Crusader buildings is the Church of St Peter, hidden down an alley from the lakeside promenade. In accordance with his will, his body was carried overland on the route believed to have been taken by Moses and the Israelites to the Promised Land, for burial in Tiberias (his grave is on Ben Zakkai Street). These include the celebrated philosopher Maimonides, leader of the Jewish community in Cairo in the 12th century. Historic sites include the graves of several distinguished rabbis.
Thanks to successive conquests, modern Tiberias has fewer monuments or ancient ruins than other localities in the Holy Land. St Peter in his boat, at St Peter’s Church, Tiberias (© Custodia Terrae Sanctae) Over the following centuries, it was this powerhouse of Jewish scholarship that compiled almost all of the Jerusalem Talmud - one of the two central texts of Jewish religious teaching and commentary that had previously been transmitted orally - and the fixed Hebrew text of the Jewish Bible. “Preachers, poets, scholars and rabbis abounded,” wrote historian G.
Even the Sanhedrin (the supreme court) moved from Sepphoris. Jews flocked to Tiberias, which became the major centre of Jewish culture and learning, with 13 synagogues. The Second Jewish Revolt had failed, and the Romans had responded by banning Jews from Jerusalem. Ritual purification of the city was carried out in the middle of the second century AD. Though Jesus spent much of his ministry on and around the Sea of Tiberias, its inappropriate siting may explain why there is no record that he ever visited Tiberias. Antipas had to resort to compulsion and financial inducements to populate his city. Because the site lay over ancient burial grounds, observant Jews refused to incur ritual impurity by living there.