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“As Solid as the Rock of Gibraltar”

Rising steeply from the warm, blue Mediterranean waters to a height of 1,396 feet [426 m], the Rock of Gibraltar certainly looks solid. On a clear day, from miles around in southern Spain and from Morocco, across the Mediterranean, one can easily see the sharp pinnacle of Gibraltar.

Gibraltar’s history goes back to those misty periods when ancient mariners, believing the earth was flat, thought that to go through the Strait of Gibraltar would lead them to the edge of the world and the abyss of destruction. It was also viewed as one of the Pillars of Hercules, the other being Jebel Musa at Ceuta, on the African coast across the strait. Myth said that the Greek hero Hercules had split the mountains apart.

The city of Gibraltar owes its existence to the Arabs who came from North Africa in the eighth century C.E. and later founded the city in 1160. The name Gibraltar comes from the Arabic name Djabal-​Tarik, or Mountain of Tarik. Ṭāriq ibn Ziyād was an Arab leader who defeated the last Gothic king in 711 C.E.

The Spanish conquered Gibraltar in 1462, only to lose it to the British in 1704. To this day, it remains as one of the last outposts of the former British Empire. But the Rock of Gibraltar continues to be a symbol of something solid and permanent.

Two congregations (English and Spanish) of some 120 Jehovah’s Witnesses in Gibraltar are offering the promise of God’s Kingdom rule to the Gibraltarians, a promise even more solid than the Rock!​—Titus 1:1, 2; Hebrews 6:17-19.