The Dead Sea and Jericho

A "thick and poisonous" salt water lake, the Dead Sea is an "Inferno" of tar and brimstone located between the steep, lime white mountains of Moab and those of Idumea. The descent is described as hellish, over sharp rock paths. A view of Paradise then opens in the meadows and orchards of Jericho, renowned for its dates and roses. When Jesus and the disciples arrive in Jericho, they collect a meal by asking alms, and while the others sleep, Jesus hears the trumpets that once make its walls crumble at the time of Joshua. Moving on, they reach the lifeless Dead Sea, where pious legend says that one can see on the bottom the rotting corpses of the whores Sodom and Gomorrah embracing. John the Baptist ministers in a calm, reed-surrounded pool on the river above the inlet to the sea.