Dead Sea

Called the Salt Sea and the Sea of the Arabah in the Bible, this brackish lake receives the Jordan River but has no outlet, and it is where the cities of the plain such as Sodom and Gomorrah stood. Jehovah's raining fire on those cities and Lot's wife becoming a pillar of salt are linked with this place; the prophet Ezekiel foresaw living water flowing from the temple that heals the Salt Sea and makes fish abound, while the marshes are left for salt.

In the Hebrew Scriptures the Dead Sea is mostly called the Salt Sea, a landlocked salt lake fed from the north by the Jordan but having no outlet; its water is so salty that fish cannot live, and it is ringed by sun-scorched wilderness. It also served as a natural marker for the southern and eastern borders of Canaan: in Numbers the southern boundary of the Promised Land starts at the end of the Salt Sea on the east, while the eastern boundary goes down to the Jordan and ends at the Salt Sea (Nu 34:3, 12). 1) The destruction of the cities of the plain. As early as Abraham's time, the Valley of Siddim where the Salt Sea lay was the plain of the five kings including Sodom and Gomorrah (Ge 14:3). Because of the grievous sin of those cities, Jehovah rained sulfur and fire from the heavens, demolishing the cities and the entire Plain together with its inhabitants and vegetation (Ge 19:24-25); Lot's wife, who looked back from behind him, became a pillar of salt (Ge 19:26). Looking down early in the morning, Abraham saw the smoke of the land ascending like the smoke of a kiln (Ge 19:28). Later, in Deuteronomy Moses warned Israel that if they broke the covenant the whole land would become, like Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, 'sulfur and salt and a burning,' neither sown nor sprouting, with no vegetation at all (De 29:23). 2) Ezekiel's vision of living water. The prophet Ezekiel saw water flowing out from under the threshold of the temple, running east into the Arabah and into the Salt Sea; wherever this water went the sea was healed and everything lived, with fish as numerous as the fish of the Great Sea, and fishermen standing by it from En-gedi to En-eglaim to spread their nets; yet 'its swamps and its marshy places will not be healed; they will be left for salt' (Eze 47:8-11). The vision foreshadows the restoration and life that Jehovah gives, able to make even the most dead and bitter place fruitful again.