Hillah, Iraq
Babylon
The empire of the exile, and the city of the prophets' laments.
Biblical significance
Nebuchadnezzar's Babylon took Judah into captivity and gave the Old Testament some of its fiercest poetry and strangest visions — the fiery furnace, the writing on the wall, the psalm sung by the rivers. The ruins near Hillah include the Processional Way, the Ishtar Gate foundations and reconstructions built in the 1980s. It is a place to read Daniel, Jeremiah and Psalm 137 where they were set.
Scripture
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Open in YouVersion →Excerpts from the World English Bible. Full text opens in the YouVersion Bible app.
Best time to go
November to March.
Visitor notes
About 90 minutes south of Baghdad by road. The archaeological park is open daily; the original Ishtar Gate panels are in Berlin's Pergamon Museum.
Coordinates
32.5423, 44.4210
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