Excavation reveals Bethesda Pool as Jewish ritual bath

The Bethesda Pool in Jerusalem, where the Gospel of John reports Jesus healed a paralytic man, has been identified as a mikveh, or Jewish ritual bath, according to scholar Urban C. von Wahlde. Excavated in the late 19th century, the site puzzled archaeologists for over a century because the Gospel describes it as having five porticoes—a feature most scholars dismissed as unhistorical. When excavated, the pool revealed a rectangular structure with two basins separated by a wall, creating five sides, each with a portico. The southern basin featured broad steps and landings consistent with a mikveh for ritual purification, while the northern basin served as a reservoir to supply fresh water. This identification parallels the Siloam Pool, discovered in 2005 and also identified as a mikveh, where John's Gospel reports Jesus healed a blind man. The evidence suggests Jerusalem's pilgrims visited these public ritual baths for purification and occasionally for healing. In later Byzantine and Crusader periods, Christians built chapels and churches over the Bethesda Pool complex to mark sites associated with Jesus' life and miracles.

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Source: Biblical Archaeology Society — https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-sites-places/jerusalem/the-bethesda-pool-site-of-one-of-jesus-miracles/