Bethsaida by Accumulation: What El-Araj’s 2026 Excavation Season Actually Added
Archaeology rarely identifies an ancient city through one spectacular object. More often, the argument is built slowly—one wall, coin, lamp and layer at a time. That is exactly what is happening at El-Araj, a site on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee that has become a leading candidate for biblical Bethsaida.
The tenth excavation season at El-Araj has added new Roman-period architecture, coins, pottery, Jewish stone vessels and fishing equipment to an already substantial body of evidence. None of these objects bears the name “Bethsaida.” Together, however, they strengthen the case that El-Araj was a Jewish fishing settlement undergoing Roman urban development during the period described in the New Testament.
Why Bethsaida Matters
Bethsaida occupies an unusually important place in the Gospel narratives. John identifies it as the hometown of Peter, Andrew and Philip. Mark places the healing of a blind man there, while Luke connects the surrounding region with the feeding of the five thousand.
The first-century historian Josephus adds another piece to the puzzle. He reports that Philip the tetrarch elevated Bethsaida into a polis and renamed it Julias. Any convincing candidate should therefore preserve evidence of both worlds: a Jewish lakeside community associated with fishing and a settlement developing Roman civic characteristics.
For years, the debate has largely centered on two locations: et-Tell, farther inland, and El-Araj, close to the present shoreline. The 2026 results do not end that debate, but they make the archaeological profile of El-Araj more difficult to dismiss.
What the 2026 Season Found
A September 17 field report from the Lanier Center for Archaeology described work conducted with excavation directors Mordechai Aviam and R. Steven Notley. Excavators reached Roman-period remains despite later Crusader disturbances and uncovered additional walls, in-situ pottery, Roman city coins, lamps, glassware, a spindle whorl and a semi-precious gem.
Reports from the full season also identify three intact Herodian-style lamps, fragments of chalkstone vessels, numerous fishing weights, a well-preserved taboon oven and more than 150 coins. Half of a Doric capital may point toward a public or monumental building, although its original architectural setting has not yet been established.
Each category answers a different historical question. The lamps help place activity at the site in the early Roman period. Chalkstone vessels are closely associated with Jewish purity practices. Fishing weights fit the economy expected at a lakeside settlement. Roman walls, city coins and architectural decoration speak to urban development rather than an isolated village.
Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John (disciples of Jesus) all left their fishing trades to follow Jesus and become "fishers of men" (Matthew 4).
The Case Is Cumulative—not Conclusive
The most responsible way to describe El-Araj is not “Bethsaida discovered,” but “the leading identification has gained additional evidence.” Archaeologists have not found an inscription naming the settlement Bethsaida or Julias. That absence matters because the competing identification at et-Tell remains part of the scholarly discussion.
At the same time, the convergence at El-Araj is striking: first-century occupation, Jewish material culture, a fishing economy, signs of Roman urbanization and a later Byzantine church preserving a tradition associated with Peter. The 2026 season adds weight to every part of that profile without supplying the single decisive inscription scholars would most like to see.
Excavation director Steven Notley has expressed complete confidence that El-Araj is Bethsaida. That is the conclusion of a principal investigator, not a universal scholarly consensus. The newest results are preliminary field reports rather than a completed, peer-reviewed final excavation publication. Coin identifications, stratigraphic relationships and architectural interpretations may become clearer as specialist analysis continues.
Potential Episode for The Buried Word?
The best story here is not a sensational “lost biblical city found” headline. It is the tension between how the public imagines discovery and how archaeology actually works.
Imagine the Gospel depiction of fishermen on the Sea of Galilee. What material artifacts would a nearby settlement leave behind? Each discovery becomes a witness: fishing weights for the economy, stone vessels for Jewish identity (and ritual purity), Roman coins and architecture for Philip’s transformation of Bethsaida into Julias, and the later basilica for Christian memory of Peter and Andrew.
That structure also preserves the uncertainty. Evidence should always reflect the truth, whether it gives an obvious explanation or not. El-Araj offers a vivid example of biblical archaeology at its best: texts and artifacts brought into conversation, allowing you to distinguish what the evidence tells you.
Worth Reading in Full
The Lanier Center for Archaeology’s September 17 field report is the closest source to participating excavators and is worth reading in full for photographs and first-hand season details:
A September 27 synthesis of the completed 2026 season usefully gathers the wider set of discoveries and explains how they bear on the Bethsaida question:
https://conference.hebrew.edu.rs/el-araj-2026-discoveries/
For the older scholarly disagreement over El-Araj and et-Tell, this detailed historical overview remains valuable:
The Bottom Line
El-Araj’s tenth season did not produce a nameplate reading “Bethsaida.” What it produced may be more archaeologically meaningful: another coherent layer of evidence for the right kind of settlement, in the right place, at the right time. The case is becoming stronger by accumulation—and the excavation is not finished.
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