Biblical places
Aphek
Where Israel was defeated by the Philistines and lost the ark of the covenant (1 Samuel 4). Identified with Tel Afek on the Sharon Plain (later rebuilt by Herod as Antipatris), now within a national park near Rosh HaAyin.
Sources and location confidence
- Location confidence
- Very High
- Tel Afek (Rosh HaAyin)
- 32.1050, 34.9306
Multiple sources agree on the same coordinates for Tel Aphek (Antipatris). Note that there is also a place called Tel Aphek on the northern coast (near Mount Carmel) with the same name, so care should be taken not to confuse them.
Related Bible passages
These are selected indexed references, not an exhaustive list of every mention in the Bible.
Joshua 12:18
The king of Aphek, one; the king of Lasharon, one;
1 Samuel 4:1
And the word of Samuel came to all Israel. Now Israel went out against the Philistines to battle, and pitched beside Ebenezer: and the Philistines pitched in Aphek.
1 Kings 20:26
And it came to pass at the return of the year, that Benhadad numbered the Syrians, and went up to Aphek, to fight against Israel.
2 Kings 13:17
And he said, Open the window eastward. And he opened it. Then Elisha said, Shoot. And he shot. And he said, The arrow of the LORD'S deliverance, and the arrow of deliverance from Syria: for thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek, till thou have consumed them.
Joshua 13:4
From the south, all the land of the Canaanites, and Mearah that is beside the Sidonians, unto Aphek, to the borders of the Amorites:
1 Samuel 29:1
Now the Philistines gathered together all their armies to Aphek: and the Israelites pitched by a fountain which is in Jezreel.
1 Kings 20:30
But the rest fled to Aphek, into the city; and there a wall fell upon twenty and seven thousand of the men that were left. And Benhadad fled, and came into the city, into an inner chamber.
Joshua 19:30
Ummah also, and Aphek, and Rehob: twenty and two cities with their villages.