Image Details

The mosaic from the fourth-century C.E. Samaritan synagogue at El-Khirbe depicts, from left, an entrance with a gabled pediment decorated with a stylized shell, a table bearing loaves of bread (called the shewbread), an incense shovel, and two trumpets framing a menorah. The facade, vessels and shewbread table probably recall the desert Tabernacle (Exodus 25–27), rather than the Samaritan Temple. The mosaic lacks the lulav and etrog, perhaps reflecting a distinction—as yet undetermined—in Samaritan worship.