Category: Jerusalem

Islamic Destruction of the Temple Mount report

By Anshel Pfeffer, August 12, 2010


Tons of rubble was removed from under Temple Mount by the Muslim authority that oversees the site

An investigation into the failure of law enforcement agencies to prevent what is alleged to have been an attempt to wipe out Jewish history on Temple Mount 11 years ago looks set to cause widespread controversy.

The publication of the report into the removal, by night, of 6,000 cubic metres of mud from beneath the Al Aqsa Mosque by the Muslim Wakf authority that oversees the management of the mosque compound, has been suppressed for months by the government.

The dirt was dug out to make way for a new underground mosque, but Israeli archaeologists and politicians claim that another motive of the Wakf and the Islamic Movement – which financed the work – was to remove evidence of Jewish history from the site where the two temples of Jerusalem stood.

The excavation and building was carried out without any official permit from the planning authorities. Belated intervention by the Justice Ministry, spurred on by a rare petition signed by politicians, writers and archaeologists from the right and the left, brought the digging to an end, but it was too late.

Thousands of volunteers have been sifting ever since through the hundreds of tons of dirt, dumped in a valley east of Jerusalem, unearthing rare remnants of the Temple Mounts from all ancient periods of Jerusalem, going back to the Bronze Age. Among them were fragments and coins from the First and Second Temples, and relics of the Persian, Babylonia, Maccabean, Herodean, Roman, early Christian and Byzantine eras. The work is of questionable historic value as the rules of archaeology mandate that findings should be recorded in their original location, but is still ongoing.

Meanwhile, for the last three years, the Comptroller’s Office has been conducting an investigation into the way the Israeli government, the police and Jerusalem City Hall have relinquished control of the sacred site.

“The conclusions are clear,” says one source who has seen the report, “Israeli law ends at the gates to the Temple Mount.”

The reason for this is the same motive that has caused the government to try and suppress the report for the past few months, previous attempts to enforce Israeli sovereignty over the Temple Mount have provoked widespread Palestinian violence, as did the visit of the opposition leader, Ariel Sharon, in September 2000, which sparked the second intifada.

“On the one hand, no government wants to be seen as impotent,” said a security official in Jerusalem, “but they prefer keeping the status quo on the Temple Mount to another intifada with all that entails. Even when the report finally gets out, the government will do everything in its power to play it down.”

HT: Joe Lauer

Jerusalem in the time of Christ – New CD-Rom

Conveniently timed to coincide with the beginning of the academic year, our new CD-Rom is now available. We promised to bring out our immensely popular slide set, “Jerusalem in 30 A.D.”, in digital format and we hope you will be pleased with the result. Re-named “Jerusalem in the time of Christ”, this CD has a bumper 85 pictures, as compared to the original slide set’s 36.

Volume 2: Jerusalem in the time of Christ

The advances of the digital age allowed us to focus much more on the city that Jesus knew. New drawings have been specially made in order to assist the viewer in opening a door to this historical world. One of our favourite new drawings shows a reconstruction of a small aedicule depicting the snake god of healing, Asclepius, found at the Pools of Bethesda. This find movingly reminds us how appropriate it was for Jesus to heal the paralytic man at this pagan healing centre, decisively refuting the claims of the serpent god.

The classic reconstruction drawing “Jerusalem in 30 A.D.,” which originally took 3 weeks to make, has been used as a base on which to create a ground-breaking series of slides showing The Way to Golgotha. Each of these five slides shows a stage in Christ’s last journey, beginning at Gethsemane and culminating at either of the two sites identified as the place of the empty tomb.

Other locations depicted include the Pool of Siloam (including the latest discoveries), the Essenes Gate, the Praetorium and Solomon’s Porch on the Temple Mount. Each picture is accompanied by a fully descriptive caption, with Bible references, allowing you to resurrect the place and period and to see for yourself how firmly the Gospels are rooted in the actuality of Jerusalem.

For those of you who may be wondering, the new cover illustration shows a reconstruction of the sumptuous mansion identified as having belonged to the High Priest Annas and the likely site of Peter’s betrayal of his master.

Virtual Model of the Temple Mount in the Time of Jesus

From Justin Taylor’s blog:

For several years UCLA’s Urban Simulation Team has been working on a virtual reconstruction of Jerusalem and the Temple Mount prior to the destruction of A.D. 70. In collaboration with the Israel Antiquities Authority they have put together a display at the Ethan and Marla Davidson Exhibition and Virtual Reconstruction Center in Jerusalem.

Below is a video clip—the model was created by Dr. Lisa M. Synder—showing what the Temple Mount and Herod’s Temple would have looked like in the time of Jesus.

This video is not new, but always worth watching. The UCLA’s Urban Simulation Team are the ones who developed the Temple Mount animation at the Davidson’s Visitors Centre at the entrance to the Temple Mount Excavations in Jerusalem.

I got to know Justin Taylor when he was Project Director and Managing Editor of the ESV Study Bible.

This site allows you to download the trailer of another Temple video, which I worked on a few years ago. These videos are really useful if you want to imagine what the Temple looked like in the time of Jesus.

Here is the video itself:

New RAD Web Design

Thanks to our web designer we have been able to revamp our website and we hope you like the new design. A reconstruction drawing of the Eastern Wall of the Herodian Temple Mount with the Temple appears in the header, which we plan to eventually rotate with other designs.

The upgrade is not meant to be a pretty face only, but we hope to put more information on the site. We have started with our new Showcase, giving you an idea of the projects we have been involved in over the last few years. Please have a look …

We also plan to list reviews of books, movies and software which we have found particularly helpful for students of Biblical Archaeology.

We are even more excited about putting up an archive with photographs of archaeological sites and reconstruction models and also, of course, reconstruction drawings. Thumbnails of the illustrations will be available for all to see, with an option to buy low resolution pictures for Powerpoint presentations and high resolution ones for publishers.

Many of you have asked why Vols. 2 and 3 are missing from the list of available CD-ROMs. Well, you won’t have to wonder much longer, as we are about to release these volumes. Volume 2 is called Jerusalem in the time of Christ:

Cover for Volume 2: Jerusalem in the time of Christ

Volume 3 is called The Ark of the Covenant – Its Journey from Sinai to Jerusalem, and we will let you know as soon as they are available.

Cover for Volume 3: The Ark of the Covenant - Its Journey from Sinai to Jerusalem

Many years ago, we produced slide sets on these subjects and now the time has come to go digital. Whereas the two slide sets contained only 36 slides, the new CD-ROMs will have many more, with new digital or digitally enhanced pictures.

Another presentation on the Seven Churches of Revelation is also in the works.

Jerusalem and the Turks

It is a well-known fact that most British people are unaware that they no longer control an empire. Perhaps they can be excused because, although most colonies separated from Britain after the Second World War, the last colony of Hong Kong was lost only 13 years ago.

The Turks seem to suffer from a similar delusion. The Turkish Empire came to an end officially in 1923, but in practical terms, towards the end of the First World War. However, the Turks apparently still believe that Jerusalem belongs to Turkey. Why otherwise, according to this and this report, would they be building a 10 m. high wall around the Muslim Cemetery next to the Lions Gate?

The cemetery next to the Lions Gate

A couple of years ago the TIKA (Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency) opened an office for the Committee for the Protection of Muslim Cemeteries in Jerusalem. This office is responsible for the maintenance of Turkish cemeteries in Jerusalem.

When Israel builds a 10m. high wall to keep suicide bombers out, the world is up in arms, but when the Turks build a 10 m. high wall in Jerusalem, nobody seems to care. What is the purpose of this wall – to keep suicide bombers out or the ghosts in?

Source: Joe Lauer

Report on the Destruction of the Temple Mount

Government ‘tried to bury’ report on Temple Mount excavations

This funny pun introduces an article about the suppression by the Government of Israel of a report on the illegal Temple Mount excavations.

We had earlier reported here, here, here, here, here and here on these illegal excavations and registered our protest.

The newspaper article goes on to say:

The report has not yet been published but Knesset sources who have seen it say it contents are so sensitive that they could spark riots once revealed.

It doesn’t take much to spark a riot in Jerusalem, but we are interested to hear more about this report than seeing people injured.

First Temple period wall found in Jerusalem – revisited

One of my blog readers, Arthur Chrysler, made the following comments on a previous post, which I would like to share with other blog readers:

The Large Tower, explored by Warren and one hundred years later by Dame Kenyon, is constructed of stones of the character identified as Phoenician at Samaria. The header-and-stretcher construction is also identified as Phoenician at Samaria. Kenyon stated, “The date of these earliest walls, on the basis of the deposits against them, is, on the field estimate of the pottery, eighth century B.C. OR EARLIER (Digging up Jerusalem p.115). She also states in the caption under pl. 38, “Wall in Site S II on eastern crest of eastern ridge, which can be STRATIGRAPHICALLY dated to 8th century B.C….”. This area of Jerusalem is not a Tel! You cannot stratigraphically date anything here. This unique topography, consisting of a steep slope with exposed bedrock demands unique methodology. Kenyon states that, “Close at hand, there was a wall of the time of Solomon, from which the builders of the eighth century B.C. derived their stones”. King Hezekiah had a unique style of construction as seen in the Broad Wall, the Outer Wall, and his section of wall cutting across the Jebusite angle above the Gihon Spring. None of these examples give a hint of header-and-stretcher characteristics. Why would Hezekiah go through the trouble of re-stacking Solomon’s massive stones to move the tower only a few meters? Kenyon used the dating method that she was familiar with but it led her to the wrong conclusion regarding the tower here. The tower is certainly Solomonic and the connected wall and the Golden Gate, all of which display Identical characteristics.

If it is true that nothing can be dated stratigraphically in this part of Jerusalem, how can you then insist on a Solomonic date for the wall in Kenyon’s site SII and Benjamin Mazar’s Field 23? Kathleen Kenyon excavated down to the bedrock in this area and indeed concluded that:

“Beneath … the Byzantine wall … is a wall which probably belonged to a projecting tower. The date of these earliest walls, on the basis of the deposits against them, is … eighth century B.C. or earlier.” “… these walls were constructed of re-used stones … with irregular projecting bosses having margins on one, two or three sides.”

If these stones are indeed in secondary use, which I am not convinced of, it is possible that these are rejects or surplus masonry from Hezekiah’s square Temple Mount construction.

If you would examine the elevation, section and Isometric drawing of the Ophel Wall on Warren’s Plans, Elevations, Sections, etc., (1884), Plate 40, then it is clear that this L-shaped wall is built against an earlier wall and one can still see today that two different First Temple period building phases are represented in this area. That is why Warren called this wall section the “Extra Tower” or “Corner Turret”, i.e. it is a tower that was later added to strengthen an earlier fortification or part of the city wall. If the L-shaped wall, as you insist, is Solomonic, does that make the wall against which it is built Canaanite? If there are two construction phases in a building, that is called stratigraphy, showing that one wall is earlier than another. This stratigraphy is not different from that on a tell. This picture shows that the stratigraphically four building constructions can be identified:

1. The Byzantine Tower
2. Excavating inside and below the Byz. tower, a Herodian mikveh was found that was built against the inside wall of the “Extra Tower” (not visible in the picture)
3. The 8th century L-shaped “Extra Tower”
4. The pre-8th century wall against which the “Extra Tower” was built, which may be Solomonic if that can be proved conclusively.

Kenyon dated this L-shaped corner construction to the eighth century B.C. or earlier, but that does not necessarily mean that it is Solomonic. You compared it with the Phoenician masonry in Samaria, but that dates to the 9th century and is not Solomonic. A similar style masonry has been found in the sanctuary walls in Tel Dan, which is also post-Solomonic. I had suggested that there is an historical link between the “Extra Tower” and the masonry near the Golden Gate, but neither of these two constructions can be Solomonic.

Has King Herod lost his claim to the Hippicus Tower?

Joe Lauer alerted me to two recent reports, one that announces that “King Herod has lost his claim to being the original contractor of certain ancient structures in the area” and another that reports about “Revelations of an ever-changing past”.

From these reports I understand that archaeologists found an underground wall and intersecting aqueduct, both built by the Roman 10th Legion a little east of the Jaffa Gate, and drew the conclusion that the Tower of David was not the Hippicus Tower built by Herod the Great:

“The archaeologists’ discoveries had major implications. For one thing, they determined that the current Tower of David was not an extension of Hippicus, but rather of the Phasael tower.”

According to Josephus, these towers were built in the First Wall and not in the Second Wall. They stood at the northwest corner of Jerusalem and protected the city and Herod’s Palace that was built to the immediate south. Hillel Geva has shown conclusively that the Herodian Tower in the Citadel Museum is the Hippicus Tower.

“You have to understand that a 150-year mistake has finally been corrected,” explains Sion, referring to the Hippicus hypothesis. Second, it seems that countless maps and drawings of the so-called second wall suddenly became irrelevant.”

The Second Wall, according to Josephus, began at the Gennath Gate, which had been excavated by Avigad some 400 meters to the east of the Jaffa Gate, and ended at the Antonia Fortress at the northwest corner of the Temple Mount. Some maps still show the Second Wall going north from somewhere near the Citadel (David’s Tower) and then turning east to keep Golgotha outside the city and then going north again in the direction of the Damascus Gate. It will be good to get this “kink” out of the line of the Second Wall, but I am not too optimistic about this as it takes a long time for publishers to catch up with the latest archaeological discoveries. This plan of Jerusalem published in Dan Bahat’s Atlas of Jerusalem still has the kink in it (see red arrow):

The “conceptual revolution about life in the city at the end of the Second Temple and Roman period (63 B.C.E.-324 C.E.)”, which the excavators claim to have made suddenly, however, had already been made by Avigad in the 1980’s, when he discovered the Gennath Gate and the beginning of the Second Wall in the area of the Cardo in the Jewish Quarter. The maps I have drawn for him and all subsequent maps of Jerusalem always showed that the Second Wall began at the Gennath Gate, which is located halfway between the presentday Jaffa Gate and the Temple Mount. The Second wall has been shown correctly, for example, in the New Encyclopedia of Archaeological Excavations in the Holy Land (1993):

I don’t quite understand their claim about the Hippicus Tower, which is a solid tower built on the bedrock. The masonry is Herodian and the 10th Legion’s aqueduct and wall in question does not come near the base of this tower. The fact that they acknowledge that an Herodian aqueduct may be located below the Roman aqueduct they found, proves that their claim about the Hippicus Tower still needs to be substantiated.

The Destruction of the Temple Mount continues

It is feared that the destruction of the Temple Mount by Muslims continues. It has been observed that work is taking place to the east of the Dome of the Rock, where the Court of the Priests and the Altar were located. According to this report:

“The Waqf works are constant, we see tractors going to and fro carrying earth. The work is taking place near the Dome of the Rock, exactly in the place between where our Holy Temple’s courtyard and the Altar used to stand. The Waqf claims they are doing pavement work there, or so they advertise in the news sites, but in practice they surrounded themselves in white burlap and we see there is scaffolding. I suppose that for paving works there should be no need for scaffolding.”

The bedrock is only a few feet below the pavement and the layers between it and the pavement could easily be destroyed. On a visit to the Temple Mount last year, we observed repairs to pavement north of the Dome of the Rock and it was clear that no digging with tractors was involved:

Hopefully some more information will become available soon.

Bible Lands Expedition (BLE) tour


Another BLE Bible Lands Expedition study tour is planned for October 2010, God willing. Dr. Steve Collins and myself will be leading the tour. This is an exciting adventure travelling through Jordan and Israel with the likely outcome that you’ll never read your Bible in the same way again! We do not take more than one bus full, so you really get to know each other well. There are a few places left, so have a look at the website and tour overview!