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Four Holy Cities


The Four Holy Cities (Hebrew: ארבע ערי הקודש‎‎, Yiddish: פיר רוס שטעט‎) is the collective term in Jewish tradition applied to the cities of Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed and, later, Tiberias, the four main centers of Jewish life after the Ottoman conquest of Israel. The "holy cities" concept dates to the 1640s, with Tiberias joining in 1740, resulting from the creation of an association between the cities for the collection of halukka (funds for the needy).

According to the 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia: "Since the sixteenth century the Holiness of Palestine, especially for burial, has been almost wholly transferred to four cities—Jerusalem, Hebron, Tiberias, and Safed."


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