This year, the second conference, entitled “Pilgrimage, Travel, and Cult” will be held on 24-26 May 2013 at CITI, Braemor Park, Dublin 14.

Many scholars from different parts of the world, including Israel, will attend. On the Hekhal website there are links that let you download the sessions and abstracts of the different papers.

The sessions that I would find particularly interesting are: “Pools of Jerusalem: Pilgrimage, Purity and the Holy City” by David Gurevich, University of Haifa, Israel, and “The role of the Temple Mount after 70AD” by Shlomit Weksler-Bdolah, Israel Antiquities Authority.

HEKHAL is currently preparing the proceedings of its first annual conference for publication, which will contain our article on “Relating the Temple Scroll from Qumran to the Architecture of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem”.

Dr. Yuval Gadot of Tel Aviv University has initiated a long term excavation to explore several research issues in the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age periods. After two months in the field he welcomed David Willner and Barnea Levi Selavan of Foundation Stone’s LandMinds program to see the excavation taking shape.

On the Foundation Stone’s website you can watch a video of this interview and also listen to three audio segments.

Yuval Gadot explains the latest findings in his trench in the City of David

At this point in time, only pottery remains of the First Century have been found. It will become more interesting when they go down the next layer.

HT: Jack Sasson

The Eastern Gate is an important gate of the Temple Mount, as on Yom Kippur the scapegoat that was chosen by the High Priest in front of the Temple, would have been led through the Court of the Women, down a stairway to and through the Shushan Gate and into the Kedron Valley. From there it was led over the Mount of Olives into the Wilderness of Judea.

Painting of the Scapegoat by William Holman Hunt

Another biblical scene takes us to the top of the Mount of Olives, where a priest would sacrifice a Red Heifer. Numbers 19 stipulated that in order for the people to be purified, a Red Heifer should be sacrificed, its ashes collected and put in a container with water. This was used to sprinkle those in need of purification. The Mishnah said that the priest that was consecrated to burn the Red Heifer would leave the Temple Mount with the Heifer and go through the eastern gate to the Mount of Olives. The problem of the identification of the eastern gate lies in two passages, in Mishnah Parah 3.9 and 4.2.  The first states that the priest that offered the Red Heifer on the Mount of Olives, sprinkled its blood seven times toward the Holy of Holies. According to the second passage, “if the blood was sprinkled not in the direction of the entrance [of the Holy of Holies] it is invalid.” There must therefore have been a direct line of vision between the Mount of Olives and the entrance to the Temple. From the place of this activity, he could look straight through the Nicanor Gate and see the entrance to the Temple.

The Temple Mount viewed from the east. © Leen Ritmeyer

The idea that the Shushan Gate had to be directly opposite the entrance to the Temple comes from a misunderstanding of the passage in Middot 2.4: “All the walls there were high, save only the eastern wall, because the [High] priest that burns the [Red] heifer and stands on top of the Mount of Olives should be able to look directly into the entrance of the Sanctuary when the blood is sprinkled.”  Does that mean that the Eastern Gate of the Temple Mount should be on the same line of vision, drawn between the Temple and the top of the Mount of Olives?

Looking from the top of the Mount of Olives through the Golden Gate one could never see the Temple, wherever one places it on the Temple Mount, as that gate is located far too low down. One cannot expect to look through a lower gate and see something that is higher than that gate. Only the drawing of a section would make that clear. In order to solve architectural problems, one needs to think in three dimensions.

The level of the top of the Mount of Olives (810 m. above sea level) is 75 m. (246 feet) higher than the Temple platform (735 m.). The sill of the Golden Gate is located some 21 m. (70 feet) lower than the Temple platform. How then could one look from the top of the Mount of Olives through the Golden Gate, or any other gate in the Eastern Wall of the Temple Mount, and hope to see the entrance to the Temple? It is totally impossible!

A line of vision from the top of the Mount of Olives through the Golden Gate makes it impossible to see anything on the Temple Mount, let alone the Temple. Looking through the Nicanor gate, however, one can see the entrance to the Temple clearly. Drawing © Leen Ritmeyer

We must conclude that the passage in Middot 2.4 needs to be read differently or that the writer didn’t remember the actual line of vision.  Which walls are referred to by “All the walls …”? Those of the Temple Mount or those of the Temple Courts? The previous passage (Middot 2.3) describes structures “inside the Temple Mount” and it ends with a reference to the Nicanor Gate. This was an extraordinarily beautiful gate with bronze doors made in Alexandria, that stood between the Temple Court and the Court of the Women, right in front of the Herodian Temple .

The Nicanor Gate stood in front of Herod’s Temple. It gave access from the Court of the Women to the Temple Courts. In front of this gate were fifteen semi-circular steps on which Levites sang the fifteen “Psalms of the Steps” (Psalms 120-134 of Degrees or Ascents). The gold-covered Temple towered above all other buildings.

There is a direct line of vision from the top of the Mount of Olives to the entrance to the Temple through the Nicanor Gate, while the walls of the Court of the Women were kept low (see illustration above). If one stands today to the east of the Dome of the Rock one can see the Mount of Olives clearly.  The Nicanor Gate therefore is the only gate that the writer of Middot could have had in mind. The High Priest that offered the Red Heifer on the Mount of Olives would have had to look through this gate in order to see the entrance to the Temple. I believe therefore that the gate mentioned in Middot 2.4 is the Nicanor Gate and not the Shushan Gate.

An archaeological excavation conducted by the Israel Antiquities Authority near a highway construction site in the Kiryat Menachem neighborhood of Jerusalem, unearthed a rare ritual bath (mikve), dating back to the late Second Temple period.

Many mikva’ot – Hebrew for ritual baths, mikveh in the singular, – have been excavated in Jerusalem and elsewhere. These baths were used for purifying oneself by total immersion.

A mikveh is usually a stepped pool carved out of the rock with a small dividing wall built on the upper steps. The purpose for this was to descend on one side and, after immersion, ascend on the other side, thus preventing contact with those who were not yet purified.

Drawing by Leen Ritmeyer ©

In this drawing, a pool has been drawn to the right of the mikveh that in Hebrew is called an otzar. It is a special basin that contains pure rainwater. After the water in the main mikveh is changed, a plug in the small channel that connects the two bodies of water is briefly taken out, thereby purifying the water in the mikveh.

Benyamin Storchan, director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority, explains that the water supply to this mikve is “unique and unusual”.

 “The ritual baths known until now usually consist of a closed cavity that was supplied with rainwater conveyed from a small rock-cut pool, located nearby,” he said. “The complex that was exposed at this time is a more sophisticated and intricate system. The bath was apparently associated with a settlement that was situated there in the Second Temple period.”

Storchan said the ritual bath consists of an underground chamber accessible by stairs, which received rainwater from three collecting basins situated on the roof of the bath. The pure water was then carried inside the chamber through channels.

A digital illustration shows the ancient Plutonium, celebrated as the
portal to the underworld in Greco-Roman mythology.

Italian archaeologist Francesco D’Andria said:

A “gate to hell” has emerged from ruins in southwestern Turkey, Italian archaeologists have announced.

Known as Pluto’s Gate — Ploutonion in Greek, Plutonium in Latin — the cave was celebrated as the portal to the underworld in Greco-Roman mythology and tradition.

Historic sources located the site in the ancient Phrygian city of Hierapolis, now called Pamukkale, and described the opening as filled with lethal mephitic vapors.

Here is a photo of the archaeological remains:

It looks very different from when we visited there a few years ago:

To the immediate south of the Temple of Apollo, is an arched opening that leads to an underground cave.This was the Plutonium, the cult shrine presided over by the Greek god Pluto, from which highly toxic gases emanated. Photo: © Leen Ritmeyer 2010.

Andrea said:

We could see the cave’s lethal properties during the excavation. Several birds died as they tried to get close to the warm opening, instantly killed by the carbon dioxide fumes.

It appears that the stone with the arched opening in the above picture was not in its original location, for when I stuck my head in the opening, I didn’t smell anything and nothing happened:

You can read the full account of the excavations here.

HT: Jack Sasson

The reliefs were scanned by Unocad at night to avoid the interference of sunlight.

Prof. Steven Fine noted that in the first presentation at the upcoming April 4 Kennes Torah Umadda (Congress of Torah and Science) in Jerusalem he will be discussing — for the first time in Israel — the discoveries made by the Arch of Titus Digital Restoration Project last summer and the implications of advances in the study of polychromy for the study of the arch (and of Jewish visual culture in general).

Here is the account that has been  published by the Center for Israel Studies of the Yeshiva Universtity in New York.

The Arch of Titus Project will have important significance for the study of Roman architecture, as no monument of the Flavian period has yet been subjected to pigmentation analysis to reveal its original coloration. It is also projected to be of great importance for the study of the appearance of the sacred vessels of the Second Temple in the first century CE, as well as of the Herodian building projects in ancient Judaea, especially King Herod’s rebuilding of the Second Temple in the first century CE. It will thus expand the reach of the new field of research surrounding polychromy in the ancient world beyond Classics and Classical Archaeology into the fields of Judaic studies and early Christian history.

Steven Fine had asked me earlier this year what I thought about Eilat Mazar’s color reconstruction of Herod’s Temple Mount, whom she had  published in her Complete Guide to the Temple Mount Excavations, p. 43, with this comment:

The colours were chosen on the basis of parallels of painted architectural remains in the Judean Desert at Cypros and Masada.

As far as I remember, paint was only found on plaster in these sites, not on stone. No remains of any paint has been found so far on any excavated Herodian stone remains in the Temple Mount Excavations led by Prof. Benjamin Mazar from 1968-78.

The comment of archaeologist Stephan Zink in the above mentioned article is interesting:

The 2009 study of the remains of the Temple of Apollo on the Palatine by conservator Heinrich Piening, another member of our team, and archaeologist Stephan Zink showed that “most surfaces of the temple were kept uncolored as white marble (probably from Carrara) but a carefully-chosen color palette highlighted strategic elements such as capitals, entablature and doorframe. Although evidence for the original coloring remains fragmentary, sufficient information is available to allow us to consider the design strategies that lie behind the color scheme of the temple…”

So, some paint may have been used, but only sparsely. In his description of the Jerusalem Temple, Josephus (War 5.207-10; 222-23) is quite clear that the facade of the Temple “was covered with gold all over” …  ”with plates of gold of great weight” and that “those parts that were not gilt, were exceeding white.” No color was therefore used in the entablature and columns that decorated the Temple’s facade.

According to Josephus, Herod’s Temple looked like a snow-clad mountain, for all that was not overlaid with gold was of the purest white and it lacked nothing that could astound either mind or eye. When the sun rose in the east, its fiery reflection blinded the people who watched the Temple from the Mount of Olives.
No wonder that some of Jesus’ disciples remarked “how the temple was adorned with beautiful stones and with gifts dedicated to God” (Matthew 24.1; Luke 21.5).

There’s an article in the Italian press (with a Google translation in English here) in which Dan Bahat allegedly claims that he knows the exact place where Jesus taught the rabbis at the age of 12. He identifies an area on the south side of the Temple Mount where he says that excavations have uncovered the scales on which the teachers stood.

This is the paragraph that was translated by Google:

“The paths of Christian pilgrims in Jerusalem could be enriched by a new holy place” the point where Jesus’ amazed the rabbis with his wisdom when he was 12 years old. I think I can show exactly where this and ‘happened.” This is an area in the southern part of the Temple, where excavations have brought to light the scales on which the teachers of the law were standing normally.”

So much for Google translator that wrongly translated “scale” with “scales” instead of “steps”, as mentioned by Ferrell Jenkings in his comment on Todd’s blog. I once saw “out of sight, out of mind” translated as “invisible moron”! So, better get your dictionaries out.

It is difficult to pinpoint exactly where the event described by Luke 2.46 took place:

“After three days they [Mary and Joseph] found him [Jesus] in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions”.

If Bahat was thinking of the monumental stairway leading up to the Double Gate, that would not be “in the temple”, but outside of it, and therefore can be dismissed. But, who were those “teachers” that Jesus questioned? According to the Talmud (see quote below), they were the members of the Temple Sanhedrin that met in special courts, such as the Chamber of Hewn Stone. Normally, non-members of the Sanhedrin couldn’t enter the premises where these teachers and lawyers met in order to question them, let alone a 12-year old. There were, however, occasions when these teachers came out upon the “Terrace” or “Rampart” (Hebrew: hel) of the Temple. This was a walkway in front of the buildings that stood to the south of the Temple and was located on the top of a flight of 12 steps.

An overall view of the Temple Mount from the southeast. The Eastern wall is in the foreground and the Temple with its buildings stands near the centre. The Antonia Fortress at the northwest corner of the Temple Mount is visible to the right of the Temple. The arrow points to the location of the 12 steps.

These 12 steps were most likely the “scale” which Bahat referred to. Although the only source that mentions this location is of a later date, it is still our only authority. It is stated in the Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 88b:

“… they all proceeded to the Hall of Hewn Stones, where they [i.e., the Great Sanhedrin] sat from the morning tamid  until the evening tamid; on Sabbaths and festivals they [the members of the Temple Sanhedrin] sat within the hel”.

Both terrace and steps are mentioned in Middot 2.3:

“Inside this [soreg] was the Rampart (hel), ten cubits broad. And there were twelve steps there; the height of each step was half a cubit and the tread thereof was half a cubit.”

We have illustrated this location in our book ”The Ritual of the Temple in the Time of Christ” and in a corresponding CD.

The 12-year old Jesus on the hel. © Leen Ritmeyer

In the illustration we see  the little figure of Jesus in blue (see arrow) with a few of the teachers (in white) on the hel above the 12 steps during that first visit to the Temple. Jesus was there during the Feast of Passover and it may possibly have been the first time that he would have realized that he was that to be that ultimate Passover sacrifice and that he would have to lay down his life for his friends.

The Temple Institute is dedicated to every aspect of the Holy Temple of Jerusalem, and the central role it fulfilled, and will once again fulfill, in the spiritual wellbeing of both Israel and all the nations of the world. The Institute’s work touches upon the history of the Holy Temple’s past, an understanding of the present day, and the Divine promise of Israel’s future. The Institute’s activities include education, research, and development. The Temple Institute’s ultimate goal is to see Israel rebuild the Holy Temple on Mount Moriah in Jerusalem, in accord with the Biblical commandments.

The Institute announced that early this year they are moving to a new location, a couple of hundred meters from their present location on Misgav Ladach Street. This new site is located directly above the Herodian Quarter that was excavated by the late Prof. Nahman Avigad and which contains the remains of what was possibly the Palace of Annas the High Priest.

The Palatial Mansion. © Leen Ritmeyer

The Temple Institute is delighted to announce that after twenty five years of introducing visitors the world over to the sacred vessels of the Holy Temple and the dream, along with the practical measures being taken for rebuilding the Holy Temple, our headquarters will be moving in early 2013 to a new, expanded facility, which will include a brand new Visitors Center. Just a few hundred meters from our current location the new center will be located just above the Yehudah HaLevy stairs which lead from Jerusalem’s Old City Jewish Quarter down to the Western Wall Plaza facing the Temple Mount. The new exhibition will include a highly advanced, state of the art presentation of the Temple-ready sacred vessels created by the Institute, garments of the High Priest, oil-paintings depicting aspects of the Divine service of the Holy Temple and model of the Holy Temple Complex. Visitors will also be able to see a scaled-down stone altar, made in accordance with Torah law, transportable and completely ready for use on the Temple Mount.

Photo: Temple Institute

In the events section of their website they show a massive Laver being transported to the new premises:

The Laver is unloaded for transportation to the new location. Photo: Temple Institute

This post has many pictures showing how the Laver was made.

The exhibition space available will be three times as large as that at the current site. Below, we see one of the halls being prepared for future use:

Photo: Temple Institute

On the southern side of the Hinnom Valley, several highly decorated tombs were found in a location that is usually associated with Akeldama, the Filed of Blood purchased with Judas’ betrayal money. However, using the description by Josephus of the Roman circumvallation wall around Jerusalem, we identified this tomb complex as belonging to the High Priestly family of Annas, before whom Jesus stood after his arrest in Gethsemane.

The inner burial chamber of the Tomb of Annas was highly decorated and had kokhim burial niches in the walls. The body of Annas was probably placed in the kokh (burial niche) disguised by the fake door in the wall on the right.

An interesting  scientific article has been published with the results of the Molecular Exploration of this tomb:

The Tomb of the Shroud is a first-century C.E. tomb discovered in Akeldama, Jerusalem, Israel that had been illegally entered and looted. The investigation of this tomb by an interdisciplinary team of researchers began in 2000. More than twenty stone ossuaries for collecting human bones were found, along with textiles from a burial shroud, hair and skeletal remains. The research presented here focuses on genetic analysis of the bioarchaeological remains from the tomb using mitochondrial DNA to examine familial relationships of the individuals within the tomb and molecular screening for the presence of disease.

The Tomb of the Shroud is one of very few examples of a preserved shrouded human burial and the only example of a plaster sealed loculus with remains genetically confirmed to have belonged to a shrouded male individual that suffered from tuberculosis and leprosy dating to the first-century C.E. This is the earliest case of leprosy with a confirmed date in which M. leprae DNA was detected.

Historically disfiguring diseases, particularly leprosy and tuberculosis, were commonly categorized together in the Near East and the afflicted individuals were ostracized from their communities. The general Jewish practice in the first century C.E. was for a primary burial to be placed within a loculus until the decomposition of organic remains had taken place, at which point – approximately a year later – the bones were then taken out of the loculus and transferred into a repository (a pit or wall niche) or into a stone ossuary. However this transfer did not occur for the individual buried in Tomb of the Shroud loculus 1 – instead this loculus was sealed with white plaster, a practice which is quite rare in the first century tombs studied around Jerusalem.

In the conclusion the authors note that the disease of leprosy did not distinguish between rich and poor. The prevalence of such a highly contagious disease, particularly for immuno-compromised individuals with leprosy is not unexpected with inadequate sanitation and demonstrates the significant impact social diseases such as tuberculosis had on society from the low socioeconomic groups up to the more affluent families, such as Tomb the Shroud in first-century Jerusalem.

It is interesting to read in the New Testament of a Simon the Leper, who lived in Bethany (Matt. 26.6). He may have been the leper that was healed by Jesus in Matt. 8.2. Leprosy is an ancient disease, as we are told in Luke 4.27: “there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha”, but only Naaman the Syrian was healed.

The above article states that leprosy is a highly contagious disease. This was known already in the time of Moses (Lev. 13,14), where stringent laws were put ion place to contain leprosy by isolating the people who suffered from it. This was reiterated again in Deuteronomy 24.8: “Take care, in a case of leprosy, to be very careful to do according to all that the Levitical priests shall direct you.”

Unfortunately, it did not save this particular individual whose remains were sealed and found some 2,000 years later.

Jerusalem from the south. Photo: nomadicjames

This beautiful photo was taken from the Haas Promenade, also called Abraham’s View, as this must have been the first place from which Abraham viewed Mount Moriah. Makes one realize that Abraham might have seen Jerusalem (Salem) in the snow as well!

View from the Mount of Olives. Photo: nomadicjames

This view from the Mount of Olives is another favourite spot in connection with Jesus’ prophecy over Jerusalem (Matt. 24; Luke 21).

These pics reminded us of another heavy snowfall when we just started to work on the Temple Mount Excavations in 1973:

Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives with the Dome of the Rock barely visible in the center. Photo: Leen Ritmeyer 1973.

It was one of the few days that we could not work, as this picture makes clear:

Temple Mount Excavations in the snow. Photo: Leen Ritmeyer 1973.

The above pictures were taken by people who love Jerusalem. It was sad therefore to see that even snow on the Temple Mount has been politicised by Palestinians: