"Biblical Scholar James Tabor Looks From the Gospels to Wadi el-Yabis... This article was originally published on Dr. James Tabor’s popular Taborblog, a site that discusses and reports on “‘All things biblical’ from the Hebrew Bible to Early Christianity in the Roman World and Beyond.” Bible History Daily republished the article with consent of the author."
Biblical Archaeology presents, "A "Jesus Hideout" in Jordan, by James Tabor.
(illustrations and text are from the article, linked above)
"...It is interesting that Mark provides a few “hooks” into John’s framework. The most obvious is the sequence of events with Jesus feeding a crowd, walking on the Sea of Galilee, and teaching in the area of Capernaum, found in Mark 6 and John 6. According to John’s account this is around the time of a 2nd Passover, which would be the spring of the year 29 CE. The most interesting and intriguing of these “hooks,” however, is the short statement in Mark 10:1:
“And he left there (Capernaum) and went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan, and crowds gathered to him again; and again, as his custom was, he taught them.”
Until the last week of Jesus’ life when Jesus goes to Jerusalem, Mark sets his entire rapid-paced narrative around the Sea of Galilee, but here he seems to at least be aware of the tradition that we find elaborated in John, that Jesus made these excursion-like forays south to Judea and east beyond the Jordan. Jesus’ move across the Jordan River during the final months of his life is something that really caught my attention in the spring of 1992. I was teaching my standard New Testament/Christian Origins class and we were working through the ending of the gospel of John when these words jumped off the page at me:
“He went away again across the Jordan to the place where John at first baptized, and there he remained. And many came to him…” (John 10:40)"
"James Tabor describes Wadi el-Yabis as "incredibly rugged with water falls, pools, and surrounding high cliffs on both sides, dotted with abundant caves." Tabor believes Jesus took refuge in this wadi during his excursions east of the Jordan.
"Artist Balage Balogh portrays Jesus and his small band of followers living in this Wadi that last winter of Jesus’ life."
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