The Temple Mount gates

Tonight, Friday the 1st of August, is also the beginning of the Hebrew month Ab. On the 9th of this month the Jews remember the destruction of the two temples that stood on Mount Moriah, but tonight, they march around the gates of the Temple Mount to express their desire is to build a new Temple.

The ceremony is called “Sivuv She’arim” – going round the gates – and this is the seventh year that they have marched round the gates of the Temple Mount. You can read the Jerusalem Post report here.

The founder of Sivuv She’arim, Rabbi Tzvi Rogin, used to visit our home, when we lived in Yorkshire, and we had many animated discussions about the Temple Mount. Our family once participated in this ceremony and it was an exhilarating experience.

For those of you who don’t know all the Temple Mount gates, here is a drawing showing their location:

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The original names of the gates of the Herodian Temple Mount walls are not known. They possibly never had names.

Today we refer to the gates in the Western Wall (from north to south) as Warren’s Gate, Wilson’s Arch (which was part of a bridge and led to a gate which was built into the western portico), Barclay’s Gate and Robinson’s Arch – which supported a stairway leading to a gate, which was also built into the western portico. Warren, Wilson, Barclay and Robinson were explorers, who worked in Jerusalem in the late 1800’s.

There are two Herodian gates in the Southern Wall, the Double Gate and the Triple Gate. These gates are sometimes erroneously called the Huldah Gates, for these were located on the Temple Mount and were not part of the Herodian retaining walls.

There were two gates in the Eastern Wall, a small gate near the south-east corner, which led into what is now called the Solomon’s Stables and the main eastern gate, which was located where the Golden Gate now stands. Inside this gate are two monolithic gate posts which belonged to the earlier Shushan Gate.

There may have been another Herodian gate in the northern wall, but no remains have been found and it is only once mentioned by Josephus.

The earlier square Temple Mount, which was originally constructed by King Hezekiah, had five gates and their names are known. In the west was the Coponius Gate, the two gates in the southern wall were called the Huldah Gates. We have already mentioned the Shushan Gate in the eastern wall and the gate in the northern wall was called the Tadi Gate. This gate may have been buried underground by the Herodian expansion to the north.

Golgotha and the Tomb of Christ

Over the last 9 months, I have been working as archaeological and architectural editor for the new ESV Study Bible, which will be available from 15 October 2008. Most of my contacts have been with Justin Taylor, who was the Project Director and Managing Editor. Recently, he interviewed me concerning two drawings, which I had been asked to prepare for the Study Bible.

The two-part interview concerning Calvary and the Tomb of Christ can be viewed on his blog here and here.

Israel in June

Before our visit recedes into memory, we must put down some of the impressions that readers have asked for. June was a good time to visit the Land from the point of view of not having to compete with other groups for space on site visits – on some sites such as Kursi and Gamla in the Galilee, we had the place totally to ourselves. And, our northern base of Ein Gev was pure rest and rejuvenation (when we returned from our days out!), as the place had not yet been transformed into a hive of family activity for the school holidays. However, the light is harsher for photography than earlier in the year and this is perhaps the downside to going in early summer, which is otherwise so good, being the prime time for digging and, of course, great for swimming in the Dead, the Med and the Red. We did get some great pics however. Here is our group at the Ophir Observation Point, high above the Sea of Galilee:

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Below is the Tel Gezer dig we visited and where we met up with archaeologist Daniel Warner (in green shirt) among others:

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Jerusalem was even more chaotic than we remembered, with honking, hooting and sirens 24/7. We were very thankful to have an oasis of calm in the midst of it with a jumbo-sized balcony offering panoramic, golden, views of Mount Zion and the Old City. On the left is the night view from our balcony and on the right the view from the arched entrance to our guesthouse:

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From the perspective of an archaeological architect, the thing that made the most impression on me was the much greater prevalence of reconstruction drawings on sites than in times past. Knowing how much these enhance any visit to an archaeological site, this was deeply satisfying.

We saw good reconstructions at the City of David, the Temple Mount Excavations, Masada, Tel Gezer, Bethsaida, etc, but the sparkler in the crown was definitely the new Time Trek at the Caesarea Harbor Experience, which so enthralled the young folk in our party. You have to pay extra on top of the normal site fees in order to visit this, but the NIS17 is definitely worth it. Here, with funds from a trust set up by Baron Edmond de Rothschild in the early twentieth century, a new, whiz-bang, multi-media experience, takes you through episodes of the city’s dramatic history.

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Reconstructions showing things like a horse race in Herod’s hippodrome and ships entering his magnificent harbour create an unforgettable evocation of another time. (The site’s website seems to only work in Hebrew <www.caesarea.org.il>). Hopefully, other sites in the country will benefit from such an injection of funds and vision.

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The Temple Mount – new discoveries from the time of King Hezekiah (cont.)

The drawing below explains the location of the stones I blogged about yesterday. The drawing shows the eastern wall of the Temple Mount as it existed in the time of King Herod. The black line at the bottom of the drawing shows the suggested ground level at that time. The green line indicates the ground level of today and the colored parts show the existing remains. The northern and southern parts (yellow) of the eastern wall are Herodian, the red section dates to the Hasmonean period and the central (blue) section is the oldest part of the wall.

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On either side of the Golden Gate, two stones courses can be seen, which, according to my analysis of the Temple Mount, date to the time of King Hezekiah, who expanded not only the city, but the Temple Mount as well. The two newly identified stones in the southern part are only 4 stone courses lower than those near the Golden Gate. The stone courses below must therefore belong to that period as well, if not earlier.
This drawing also shows that the general level of preservation dips from north to south and that the preserved remains of the central and oldest section of the eastern wall are most likely located just below ground level.

The Temple Mount – new discoveries from the time of King Hezekiah

A couple of weeks ago, we spent some time in Israel with our family, visiting places which are dear to us. Following up on a lead, I used some of that time to investigate a particular section in the eastern wall of the Temple Mount. In the picture below, you can see me photographing two massive stones, which are located 77m (253 feet) north of the south east corner. These stones are similar in size and shape to the ones that can be seen on either side of the Golden Gate. I have dated this masonry to the time of King Hezekiah’s expansion of the Temple Mount in about 700 B.C. (See The Quest, p. 174-178; 191-193). King Hezekiah had built massive retaining walls round the courtyards of King Solomon’s Temple to create a square platform of 500 cubits.

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We were being watched from above by a policeman, who was not too happy as he thought that we might be desecrating some tombs.

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On the first stone, in the picture below left, you can clearly see the margin and the rough bulging boss which is typical of Iron Age Temple Mount masonry. The two stones are resting on other similar stones, as far as one can see. The stones are located 4 m (13 feet) north of the so-called Mohammed’s Pillar, where I had placed the south east corner of King Hezekiah’s square Temple platform (see picture below right). It is exciting to be so close to the original south east corner and yet so far away. If one only could excavate a few meters down at that point, I’m sure that the south east corner of the square Temple Mount will be found!

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The diagram below shows all the accumulated archaeological evidence for the outer walls of the 500 cubit square Temple Mount:

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The discovery of this new section of ancient stones in the eastern wall of the Temple Mount confirms the location of the pre-Herodian Temple Mount and is an exciting addition to the many new discoveries being made these days to show that the Temple Mount, as we know it today, is indeed the place where the Temples of Solomon, Hezekiah, Zerubbabel and Herod once stood.

Temple Mount quarry found

It was reported today that another quarry has been found in Jerusalem, whose stones may have been used in the construction of Herod’s Temple Mount. The largest stone is said to measure 0.69 x 0.94 x 1.65 m. It has been suggested that these stones may have been used to build the Western Wall, but that is doubtful. The measurements given are of an unfinished stone. These quarry blocks needed trimming to make them suitable for building and that would make them smaller. The average height of the stone courses in the Temple Mount walls is 104-112 cm and the unfinished stone is only 94 cm high. It is possible, however, that stones coming from this quarry may have been used for the buildings and porticoes that stood on top of the Temple Mount and that is very exciting.

Last year, a quarry was found which produced much larger stones and these may indeed have been used in the construction of the Temple Mount walls. Although archaeologists are quick to claim that these stones were used in the Western Wall, we need to realize that identical stones were built in the southern, eastern and northern walls of the Temple Mount as well. There is no way of knowing where the stones of these quarries have been placed.

How were stones quarried? I have written extensively about the quarrying and transportation of these large stones in The Quest, pp. 132-137 and also in Secrets of Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, pp. 53-58.

The two illustrations below show how it was done.

Quarrying was done by digging channels in the rock, which were later filled with dry wooden beams. Once these were wedged into place, water was poured over the dry wood, causing it to swell. The expanding wood caused the stone to split off the quarry bed.

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Projections were left on either side of the stones, which were used to lift the stones sufficiently high to put a roller underneath. Using oxen and replacing the rollers, the stones were brought to the building site.

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One can see how much work was involved in the quarrying and transportation of one stone! It is amazing to realize that it took only eight years to build all the retaining walls of the Temple Mount. Truly, whatever one might say about Herod’s character, he was a master builder!

The Temple of Jerusalem: From Moses to Messiah

The Temple of Jerusalem: From Moses to Messiah
Conference at the Yeshiva University, Centre for Israel Studies, New York
May 11-12, 2008

Needless to say, I was delighted to see my “babies” (the models of the Tabernacle, Solomon’s Temple, Herod’s Temple and Herod’s Temple Mount) again, after a separation of 12 years! I was also pleased that Steven Fine organised a conference around this exhibition of models commissioned by the late Ben Adelman of Silver Spring, M.D. Mr Adelman’s estate had bequeathed the models to the Yeshiva University.

Mr. Ben Adelman and myself in 1996

Mr. Ben Adelman (right) and myself in 1996

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Exhibition of models at Yeshiva University Museum, New York

My personal highlights from the two-day conference were:

• Meeting Professor Louis Feldman, who contributed to the Loeb translation of Josephus, that I use almost every day. The conference was held in his honour. He has worked at the Yeshiva University for the last 55 years.

• Hearing Lawrence Schiffman speak on the Temple Scroll. He put forward the idea that the temple design of the Temple Scroll was based on the layout of the Camp of Israel in the wilderness. The inner square court represented the Divine Presence, the middle court the Levites and the outer court all of Israel. I was particularly interested in this as I was asked by the late Professor Yigael Yadin to make a reconstruction drawing of this temple – see his book: Y. Yadin (1985), The Temple Scroll, (London).

• Discussing with Joshua Schwartz, the many problems – textual and architectural – which had to be considered in the reconstruction of the Herodian Temple and its courtyards for the UCLA virtual temple model.

• Seeing over 250 people from totally different backgrounds, ranging from Orthodox Jewish scholars and Israeli academics to Christian theologians, mingling around the Temple models and talking together when normally they would have little in common.

The exhibition, IMAGINING THE TEMPLE: THE MODELS OF LEEN RITMEYER, continues until August 31, this year. The next project of the Center for Israel Studies is the publication of the lectures in volume form.

The Ark of the Covenant – on the trail again!

My Google Alert to Jerusalem Archaeology brought it all back: “The lost Ark: are the Germans on its trail?” Of course, the content of the article which reported that a researcher from the University of Hamburg claimed to have found the remains of the palace of the Queen of Sheba in Axum, Ethiopia and an altar that may have held the Ark, made me file it away in my file called “Weird.” Here, I tuck away some of the more outrageous snippets on Biblical Archaeology that come my way, together with some of the wackier emails I receive. The Ark of the Covenant is overwhelmingly the subject of most of these enquiries. Since my first involvement in the Temple Mount Excavations in 1973, not a week has gone by without some enquiry into its location. Invariably the writer has an idea of his/her own – one of the wackiest suggestions was that the Ark was hidden inside the Black Stone of Mecca!

As readers of this blog will know, my research into the Temple Mount over the years has led to the finding of the location of where the Ark stood in Solomon’s Temple. I believe that this is as close as we may ever come to the finding of the lost Ark. Now, with the latest Indiana Jones movie due out next week, after a gap of 19 years, people’s minds go back to the original Raiders of the Lost Ark movie made in 1981. This, together with the latest claim in a long line of claims of finding the Ark, reminds me of the links (many inadvertently!) we have had to this search.

Thought that readers might find some of these links interesting or at at least a bit of light relief!

My wife, Kathleen was brought up from age 1 to 8 near the Hill of Tara, in County Meath, Ireland where certain believe the Ark to have been buried by the prophet Jeremiah after the fall of Jerusalem. Here is a picture of her, taken on a visit in 1997, on the hill of Tara next to the illegal excavations carried out by a group searching for the Ark of the Covenant:

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• We lived for 4 years in the Ethiopian Quarter in Jerusalem where the devout Ethiopian Orthodox residents took it for a fact that the artefact so carefully guarded by the monks at Axum was indeed the Ark of the Covenant. “Did we not know that a group of Israeli soldiers had twice tried to wrest it from the Ethiopians and recover it to Israel?”

• During the eighties, we worked on a design project with Vendyl Jones, the Texan self-styled archaeologist who claimed to be the inspiration for Indiana Jones. His claim has been debunked, with the honour going to the dog of George Lucas (co-producer of the film), who was with him when he wrote the story.

• The original opportunity for me to measure and draw up Warren’s Gate in 1981, came from a group of rabbis’ illegal excavation of this gate for the purpose of finding the Ark deep beneath the Temple Mount.

(Now they get a bit more ridiculous!)

• When we were recently leaving Australia for the UK, I tried to leave behind my battered fedora, veteran of many Israeli digs and Aussie bush expeditions, but my son Joel would not let me, even though I had a new Akubra!

• Finally, I can’t stop some wags from playing the theme tune from “Raiders of the Lost Ark” when I walk in to give a lecture!

BTW, for an overview of the story of the journeyings of the Ark see our book: “From Sinai to Jerusalem”.

Illustrating the Bible

I recently had an interesting contact with Graham Kennedy, cartoonist and animator and now full-time Bible Illustrator. After chatting back and forth, he suggested interviewing me on his blog, asking some searching questions, see The Bible Illustration Blog.

The Israel Museum’s Archaeology Wing is closed

The Israel Museum’s Archaeology Wing is currently closed for comprehensive renewal and will reopen to the public in 2009-2010. This is done with the support of the Bronfman family, after whom the wing is named.

Their website gives an overview of some of the most important finds that were exhibited in the Archaeology Wing. One of the finds shown here is the partially broken “Trumpeting Stone” which was found near the southwest corner of the Temple Mount during the 1968-78 excavations, led by the late Prof. Benjamin Mazar. Here is a reconstruction drawing of the “Trumpeting Stone”, which was placed at the top of this corner of the Temple Mount.

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The Hebrew inscription, which was found on the stone, reads “l’bet hatqia l’hakh…” The most likely translation of this incomplete inscription is “to the place of trumpeting to announce”. This stone was originally located some 42m or 138 feet above street level and from that elevated position a trumpet call could be heard all over the city.
I have reason to believe that the stone was broken, not by the Romans in 70AD, but some 140 years ago. If you want to know ‘whodunit’, read my book The Quest, pp. 57-60.