Let me suggest an experiment for you. Go to Google Earth if you don’t have the application installed on your computer. Give it a moment to load. When the earth is visible on your screen, spin it around to the Middle East. Scroll your mouse (or spread your fingers on a touch screen) to zoom in on the Dead Sea. Hit the “3D” button down in the lower right corner so it changes the perspective. If you zero in on the upland region NW of the Dead Sea, you’ll see a yellow-brown wilderness, almost white in places.
In general, it slopes down from the highlands, where there are trees and towns and so forth, dropping gently down to the cliffs above the Dead Sea. Up close, you’ll see it’s riven with many gullies, so that it’s hilly with a few big gorges running across it. There are a couple of times each year when this greens up just a bit from rain. The rest of the time it’s just rocks with thin layers of dirt here and there.
This is where John the Baptist hung out most of the time until he sensed his mission calling. He hiked across this hilly shelf above the Dead Sea, and began preaching, most likely near Jericho and some of the shore towns. At some point he got enough attention to take his work out away from town and to the Jordan River. He began proclaiming baptism as the appropriate ritual to prepare for the coming Messiah.
We know that the lower Jordan Valley has changed a good bit from the time of Jesus, but all we know about it is that water conservation measures weren’t in place back then. Thus, the flow was entirely seasonal. The valley floor was wide and flat, and most of the year the water level wasn’t that high. In the dry season, we know that John favored areas where the river slowed and was a little deeper. Still, it seems his ministry remained tied to the Jordan River during the whole time he was free, which wasn’t all that long.
Sometime during Jesus’ ministry, John was arrested for criticizing one of the successors of Herod the Great. It wasn’t long before he was beheaded.
I had forgotten about Google earth. Thanks for the reminder.
The southern part of (what I assume is) the Dead Sea, with all the bulkhead looking lines, I had to look up, since it’s not labelled on Earth or Maps. It’s part of the Dead Sea proper but used for evaporating the water for minerals. Huh. At first glance I thought it was entirely a man-made “addition” after the evaporation kind of disconnected that bottom part. Interesting.