On Tuesday, I took a tour of the Temple Mount Antiquities Salvage Operation, located in the Zurim Valley between Mount Scopus and the Mount of Olives. The project is only a decade or so old. In the late 1990s, the Muslim authorities decided to expand the area around and under Al Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount in order to accommodate more worshipers. The construction was done hurriedly and in secret (the Israeli Antiquities Authority was never informed) over the course of 48 hours. The Muslims used bulldozers to remove hundreds of cubic feet of material from the southern corner of the Temple Mount, which they discarded into the Hinnom Valley. The Temple Mount is perhaps the center of the tension between Arabs and Jews. The Muslims didn't just discard a bunch of earth--they bulldozed their way through two (maybe even three) millenniums of history. Many Muslim extremists have responded to accusations by claiming that there was nothing on the Temple Mount before the Muslims conquered Jerusalem. (Normally I feel that the Israelis portray Muslims in an unfairly negative light most of the time; this is an example where I wholeheartedly agree that what the Muslims did was BS.)
After several years of political struggle, Israeli archaeologists were given control over the huge deposits of earth which had been left in the Hinnom Valley. The archaeologists are about halfway done sifting through the remains, and they have made incredible finds dating from every historical period beginning with the Second Temple era. As part of the tour, I got to "dig for a day" through the Temple Mount remains. I discovered tons of pieces of pottery, glass, and marble, but my major find was a brass button, pictured below. The button was unidentifiable due to the rust and dirt it has accumulated over the years, but we suspect it probably dates to the Crusader or Muslim periods (it will be sent to a lab to be cleaned and dated). Another tourist found a piece of gold tile that once covered the Dome of the Rock.
The next day, I journeyed to Herodion, the palace-fortress located in the West Bank near Bethlehem. As the name implies, Herodion was constructed by Herod the Great, to serve (like Masada) as both a private getaway and a fortress in case of attack. The complex is built into a giant volcano-like hill, and contains the remains of a Roman-style bathhouse, a synagogue, and a mikveh (Jewish ritual bath), among other finds. Underneath the complex is a series of tunnels, originally part of the water system, which were expanded by the rebels of the Bar Kokhba Rebellion (132-136 CE) to use as a headquarters. Herod and some of his family members were buried at Herodion; unfortunately, however, when I tried to visit the tombs, this area of the complex was closed.
After Herodion, I returned to the Old City to explore the much-neglected Armenian Quarter. Here, I stumbled across two amazing churches: the Syrian Orthodox Church of St. Mark, and the Armenian Orthodox Cathedral of St. James.
The Syrian Church of St. Mark purports to be the first Christian church in hisotry, built over St. Mark's original home. It was here (not on Mt. Zion), according to the Syrian Orthodox Christians, that Jesus celebrated the Last Supper and the disciples received the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. The church was small but incredibly beautiful; no photography was allowed. The church's caretaker, an old woman, told me a little bit about the church's history--the Syrian Orthodox Church is the only Christian rite that uses the Aramaic language (the spoken language of Jesus' day) in its liturgy. The woman showed me an ancient icon housed in the church, an image of Mary holding the child Jesus, which was supposedly painted by St. Mark himself after Jesus' ascension to heaven. She reported that she has witnessed a number of miracles that have taken place in the presence of this icon.
The Armenian Cathedral of St. James was, by contrast, huge and ornate. I happened to walk in during the middle of afternoon prayers, which were beautifully chanted by a huge choir of seminarians. Two pictures and a video are below (I had to stop recording the video when the priest scolded me).
For dinner, I ate at Hummus Abu Shukri, another restaurant which claims to serve Jerusalem's best hummus. I admit, it was pretty delicious, but still no Chummus Lina.
After dinner, I explored the Church of St. Anne in the Muslim Quarter, a Crusader-era church built in honor of Anne, the mother of Mary, upon the site at which Mary was supposedly born. The church itself was typically Crusader--high, arched ceilings and impressive stonework--but the real draw of the site was the excavated Second Temple Period water system beside the church. This system of cisterns is connected the one beneath the Ecce Homo convent, which supplied water to the Temple Mount.
I exited the Old City through the Lion's Gate (first picture below), and walked back to the bus station past Herod's Gate (second picture below). Now, this blog should contain pictures of all seven Old City gates.
The next day, I returned to the Old City to visit the Burnt House, a museum in the Jewish Quarter. As a result of the bombing and subsequent reconstruction of the Jewish Quarter during and after the War of Independence, many important archaeological finds were unearthed in this area. The Jewish Quarter today stands atop the Herodian Quarter of Second Temple Jerusalem, which was home to the wealthy aristocrats and Temple priests. The Burnt House is the excavated remains of the home of a priestly family (as evidenced by the presence of stone vessels, which unlike earthen vessels, do not carry impurity). Discovered in the Burnt House was an iron spear; this led the museum curators to create a laughably ridiculous (but therefore enjoyable) film re-creating the last days of the Burnt House... in the movie, the eldest son of the family is a Zealot who rebels against the Romans (the dagger was involved in the final quarrel before the Romans set the house on fire).
I also visited the Jerusalem Archaeological Park at the foot of the southwest corning of the Temple Mount. The park preserves a number of Second Temple Period ruins. Visitors can see the famous Robinson's Arch (first picture below), the remains of a massive staircase and its supporting arches which was the main access to the Temple Mount during the time of Herod the Great. A number of huge rocks at the foot of the wall were originally part of this arch and the Temple Mount, but fell into the Herodian street below. One rock (second picture below) sports a Hebrew inscription indicating that it was part of the tower where trumpeters were perched. The remains of Crusader buildings on the Temple mount are visible at the southern wall (fourth picture below); note that the dome is Al Aqsa mosque.
Lastly, I visited the Church of St. Peter in Gallicantu, just outside the Old City. The church is built upon the spot where Jesus was supposedly imprisoned on Thursday of Passion Week; in the courtyard, Peter denied Jesus three times. The beautiful church is extremely modern. In the crypt, a water cistern and a serious of caves is believed the be the site of Christ's prison (it was quite creepy to visit alone!). The final picture demonstrates how the church was built on top of the remains of an earlier Byzantine church, complete with mosaic floors (not pictured).
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