Beth-phage

Beth-phage (meaning: house of the unripe fig or house of early figs) was a village on the Mount of Olives, on the road between Jerusalem and Jericho, close to Bethany. It appears in all three Synoptic Gospels in connection with the Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem: it was near Beth-phage that Jesus sent two disciples ahead to find the donkey and colt on which he would ride into the city.

The precise location of Beth-phage is uncertain, but it lay between Bethany and Jerusalem on the southeastern slope of the Mount of Olives. A medieval church marks the traditional site. The Triumphal Entry from Beth-phage fulfilled the prophecy of Zechariah 9:9—behold, your king is coming to you, humble and mounted on a donkey—and the crowd's acclamation of Jesus with palm branches and the cry of Hosanna to the Son of David gave the event its popular designation as Palm Sunday in Christian tradition. Beth-phage thus stands at the beginning of Holy Week in the Gospel narrative.