Herod built everywhere. While much of it involved his own personal pleasure palaces at Herodium, Massada, Jericho and elsewhere, he lavished Judea with new buildings for public use. Nowhere was this more apparent than Jerusalem. You're looking at a 1/50 scale model of Herod's Temple at the Holyland Hotel's Herodian Jerusalem museum. For all intents and purposes, this was really the Third Temple. The Temple you see is, simply put, a miracle. The Second Temple had stood for five full centuries, since its completion by Zerubbabel and Yeshua in 515 BCE. Herod's proposal to tear it down and build a new Temple and grounds met with understandable resistance from the public and much of the priesthood. What if Herod died, or ran out of money half-way through the project? Although brutal, Herod was smart enough not to play fast and loose with God. To assuage the population, he committed himself to cut as much of the masonry for the new Temple as possible in advance of its construction. Herod hired 10,000 workmen and 1,000 priests, some of whom were trained as masons and carpenters. Although largely complete by the time he died in 4 BCE, public fears that he might not completely finish the task were justified. Ironically, the finishing touches were placed on the Third Temple of Herod less than 10 years before the Romans destroyed it in 70 CE. The new Temple and the massively expanded Temple Mount ranked as one of the engineering marvels of the classical world.

While it is practically impossible to convey the majesty of the Temple, a hint survives in the magnificent retaining walls built by Herod that enclose the Temple Mount (where the Dome of the Rock and El Aqsa Mosque now reside). A portion of that wall on the west is today called The Western or Wailing Wall. Since tradition bans observant Jews from entering the Temple Mount where the Temple once stood, the Western Wall has become the focal point of prayer: prayer for oneself, family, the Jewish people, and for many, the restoration of the Temple.

This brings up a recent and fascinating phenomenon: the movement to restore the Temple. Before you dismiss such a notion as outlandish, consider these items. Every day, Orthodox Jews pray three times for the restoration of the Temple. In 1983, a group of fanatically religious Israeli Army reservists decided to give God a little help in restoring the Temple when they attempted to blow up the Dome of the Rock. In that same year, a survey of Israelis showed that fully 18% would not be averse to restoring the Temple now, even without the advance arrival of the Messiah. In the Jewish Quarter today are a number of organizations devoted to the study of the Temple and its operation. They vary in their belief as to whether God or human intervention will create the next Temple, but most at least hope that a restored Temple and the Messianic Era will be part of our lifetimes. They are working toward that end. Of course, another perplexing issue is the exact location of the original Temples on the Temple Mount. As noted above, most experts believe the Temples were located where the Muslim Dome of the Rock now stands. A minority view holds that the Temples were built just north of the Dome of the Rock in a relatively open area atop the Temple Mount. This open piece of real estate has prompted only a few to suggest that the next Temple and the Dome of the Rock could peacefully stand side by side.

Recent archaeological discoveries have revealed the way of life enjoyed by high ranking priestly families in the time of Herod's Temple. Within the last ten years, two impressive underground museums have opened in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City, not far from the Temple Mount. The 'Herodian Mansions Museum' and the 'Burnt House' were excavated back in the early 70's by Israeli archaeologists undertaking salvage excavations before the Jewish Quarter was restored. Instead of covering over their discoveries as new buildings were erected, the buildings were preserved as the basement level of the new structures. In a matter of seconds, you can time-travel from the gracious walkways of the late 20th century to the impressive homes of the 1st century. [More on these new museums]

A FIRST CENTURY TOMB
(The Garden Tomb, near Damascus Gate)

Jerusalem after Herod's death had achieved world-class status as a major provincial city of the Roman Empire. With a population possibly hovering near 100,000, it had reached a peak that it probably would not exceed until after the turn of our present century. It was a city full of ideas and controversy. In its streets roamed, among others, Syrian traders, Greek philosophers, Egyptian soldiers, and Essene Jews who had to leave town quickly through a special gate at the end of their Sabbath because they refused to engage in the impure act of relieving themselves on this holy day. During Passover sometime around 27 CE, a truly phenomenal Jew visited this city, and, like many others before and after, he complained loudly about religious practices he didn't like.

His name was Yeshua bar-Yosef, but we know him as Jesus of Nazareth. While what he said, and how he died in Jerusalem would act as the catalyst for a new world religion, our interest for the moment is where he was buried, just outside the walls of Jerusalem.

Somewhere on the north end of town, near a tomb looking much like the one you see above, Jesus was executed. The site was close to a cliff face which had circular hollows dug into it, reminding passersby of a skull, or "Golgotha" in the local language, Aramaic. According to the Christian Testament, Jesus was executed there by the Romans because it was located in a heavily trafficked area. The Romans preferred highly public executions in order to deter crimes against the law and/or their authority. The body of Jesus was laid to rest in the nearby tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. While these facts were important to practically no one in 27 CE, they were issues of direct imperial interest almost exactly 300 years later. In 327 CE, the Empress Helena, mother of the newly Christian Emperor Constantine of the newly Christian Roman Empire, may well have been present in Jerusalem when the 'true cross' of Jesus' crucifixion was discovered. Whatever was actually found, an impressive basilica soon rose above the site. This was the first incarnation of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, now located within the Christian Quarter and also within the walls of today's Old City. Both Roman and Christian tradition dictate that the dead may not be buried within the walls of a city, so Jesus' tomb must have been outside the walls surrounding Jerusalem ca. 27 CE. Until recently, scholars engaged in both intense research and debate over whether the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, or the so-called 'Garden Tomb' (located just north of Damascus Gate, outside the current walls) was the genuine location of Jesus' burial. The scholarly consensus now favors the Holy Sepulcher as the most likely location, but a visit to the 'Garden Tomb' is more than worthwhile, since it offers the visitor an intact example of what a rock-cut tomb of Jesus' time really looked like.

Jesus of Nazareth lived in a world seething with both religious and political passions. Fifty years or more before Jesus was born, at least a few zealous Jewish sects fervently preached the coming of the Messianic era, and the expulsion of the hated Romans. We see this outlook in the Dead Sea Scrolls, especially the War Scroll. Other sects within Judaism attempted to live in peace with their Roman overlords. The dynamic of this troubled relationship led to Roman hating Jew, Jew hating Roman, and Jew hating Jew. Inevitably, the delicate balance collapsed. 

ROMAN PROCESION OF TEMPLE BOOTY 
(Arch of Titus, Rome)
In 66 CE, a group of extremist Jews known as the Zealots led Judea into open revolt against Roman power. The Romans sent their best general, Vespasian, to quell the uprising. Soon Vespasian was focusing on the Galilee as one of the key centers of resistance. The Zealots' Revolt would have been far shorter if not for the assassination of Nero in 68 CE. Over little more than a year, the Roman Empire would be shaken to its foundations as three more men would rise to the royal purple, only to be struck down. Finally, in 69 CE, Vespasian himself was named Emperor and returned to Rome, leaving the suppression of the Zealots to his son, Titus. In February of 70 CE, Titus began the final siege of Jerusalem. Jewish defenders held back the Romans for months. Slowly, the Romans broke through each of the walls defending large portions of the city. At the end of August, Titus' forces reached the inner courtyard of the Temple, and proceeded to butcher the last 6,000 defenders of the Temple Mount. When the Temple caught fire, the cause was lost, and Jewish resistance withered. While isolated pockets of resistance would hold out in the Judean desert (especially at Massada), the Romans had won the inevitable, and bloody victory. Titus recognized his destruction of Jerusalem as a crowning moment of his career. Inside a triumphal arch at the edge of the Roman Forum on the way to his father's greatest monument, the Coliseum, Titus' artists portrayed the procession of captured booty (shown above) from the Temple, presumably as it was carried through the streets of Rome.

Jews continued to dream of the restoration of the Temple, and in fact there would be at least two subsequent attempts to rebuild it over the centuries to come. But July-August 70 CE (remembered by Jews worldwide as the 15th day of the month of Av, or Tisha B'Av) would forever stand as a watershed moment in Jewish history. Nearly 2,000 years after the birth moment of the Jewish faith and people in the Age of the Patriarchs, the Third Temple, the Temple of Herod, lay in ruins. Judaism would now continue a process made inevitable by the Diaspora: the faith and its people would move away from a Temple-centered cult of sacrificial rituals toward a universal religion with a heritage of values and belief that would touch the hearts and minds of millions throughout the world.

The smoldering ruins of a great city were the epitaph of the Zealots' Revolt. According to the contemporary writer Flavius Josephus, the Romans left only the three great towers of the Jaffa Gate entryway standing to remind future visitors of the price of rebellion, and of the might of Rome. Behind this awesome excess of Roman fury was a greater Roman fear: that the surviving Jewish radicals would someday revolt again. The Tenth Roman Legion stationed in the Jerusalem area had standing orders to execute any Jew who claimed to be a descendant of King David, and therefore a Messianic rebel.

Jerusalem lay in ruins for 60 years. Then, one of Rome's finest rulers, Hadrian, determined to restore the city as a major Roman provincial town named after his own family. The city would be called Aelia Capitolina. Rumor had it that the Romans would build a great temple to Jupiter where the Temple of Herod had once stood. This, along with Roman edicts banning circumcision and other central Jewish rituals, confirmed to Judea's population as a whole that the Romans were intent on streamlining the Jewish People into the Empire, and streamlining Judaism out of existence. Under the brilliant leadership of a hardened guerrilla warrior, Simon Bar-Koseba, a plan for rebellion was carefully drawn up and executed. Beginning in 132 CE, the Second Jewish Revolt quickly led to the expulsion of Roman forces from Jerusalem. Bar-Koseba was soon given the nickname "Bar-Kokhba", Son of the Star, suggesting the belief that many saw this fighter as the new Messiah. Coins minted by the rebels during this period strongly suggest that Temple rituals may have been restored in Jerusalem. It is conceivable that reconstruction of the Temple actually began as well. It is a testament to the devotion and planning of the rebels that they held out against Rome for three years. In the end, the slaughter of both Jews and Romans was hideous. The Roman historian Dio Cassius reports that the Romans leveled nearly 1000 villages, and that over half a million Jewish soldiers died. After mercilessly smashing two all-out rebellions in the space of barely 60 years, the Jewish dream of a renewed theocracy, independent of Rome, was forever crushed.

HADRIAN'S DAMASCUS GATE
The new Damascus Gate of Hadrian and his successors was part of the Roman restoration of this ravaged city. For years, it would be officially known as Aelia Capitolina, but the old name and what it meant were never forgotten, even though Jews were now banned from both the city and the territory around it. Hadrian's new Damascus Gate tells the story of a new city plan. Just beyond the semi-circular plaza where a statue of Hadrian atop a triumphal pillar overlooked the area, two main roadways connected Damascus Gate in the north with the eastern and southern ends of town. The great north-south road was known as the Cardo. Hebrew University archaeologists led by Professor Nahman Avigad, exposed a portion of this road just beyond the entrance to today's Jewish Quarter. Now partially restored and enhanced with shops and restaurants as it was 1,700 years ago, the Cardo today evokes the imagery and character of Roman Jerusalem, a city without Jews.
 

This sudden shift back to the late 20th century requires a little explanation. These teens are showing off their newest skill: the art of ancient basketweaving, done in the style of artisans who lived on the grounds of an ancient Roman villa built on the outskirts of Jerusalem in the second-third centuries CE. The Roman Villa at Ein Yael is one of Jerusalem's newest museums. While visitors can admire the beautiful mosaics of the villa and its other features, both Israeli and Palestinian high school students have an opportunity to learn how their ancestors lived over 1,500 years ago. From harvesting wheat for breadmaking, to designing your own mosaic tile pattern, Ein Yael offers students a genuine opportunity to touch the past. And perhaps the future as well, for in this truly impressive archaeological laboratory, Israelis and Palestinians of the next generation may be building bridges of future friendship in sharing knowledge of their common past.
 

The pagan Roman Empire became the Christian Roman Empire with the triumph of Constantine the Great over his last rival, Licinius, in 324 CE. Although Constantine was not officially baptized until he lay on his deathbed in 337, he started changing the religious course of the Empire as soon as he captured undisputed rule. This meant that pagan Jerusalem quickly made the transition to Christian Jerusalem. Not long after Constantine captured the throne, his mother, the Empress Helena, made the arduous trek to the Holy Land to seek out Christian pilgrimage sites. Dedicating herself to Christianity some years before her son, Helena explored the length and breadth of the land with a pilgrim's passion. In Jerusalem, she may well have been present at the excavation of the site of the crucifixion and burial of Jesus of Nazareth, as noted above. Here would rise the first Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

Rome's turn to Christianity unquestionably dismayed the Jewish community, which had already suffered for centuries under pagan Rome. It seemed that Constantine's revolution would give leaders of the Church free reign to convert and/or persecute the remaining Jewish population. In 361 CE, a turn of fate brought an extraordinary young man to the Roman throne. Julian had been raised as a Christian, but frankly, his Christian training simply didn't stick. He felt that Rome's decline from greatness was tied to its betrayal of the classical religious traditions of his pagan ancestors. To restore Rome, he had to restore Greco-Roman Paganism. Since he thoroughly detested Christianity, he made it a matter of policy to humiliate and weaken the upstart faith while trying to breathe life into the old religion of Rome.

WESTERN WALL INSCRIPTION
Toward that end, Julian met with Jewish religious leaders in 362, asking them what was needed to fully restore their faith. When he heard the expected reply--restoration of the Jerusalem Temple--he immediately agreed to underwrite its reconstruction. Both amazed and grateful, the Jews of the Jerusalem area immediately began clearing the Temple Mount, which had served for many years as a dumping ground for pagan and Christian Jerusalem.
 
 
 

When Israeli archaeologists cleared the area around the southern portion of the Western Wall (above), they ran into the inscription you see below. Although not a verbatim copy, it comes reasonably close to a vision found in the last chapter of the Book of Isaiah: "When you see this, your bones will become like shoots of green grass." The archaeological context of the discovery dated it to the later Fourth century CE. But when the reign of Julian was taken into account, a more precise date could be found. Not only were Jews now allowed inside the city walls; this pilgrim was free to etch the words of his joy on the golden limestone of the Temple Mount wall. In 362, after nearly 300 years of persecution and mourning over the loss of the Temple of Herod, this Jew was watching a new Temple rise before his eyes. It was a dream come true.

But not quite. In the spring of 363, Julian went on a military expedition against Rome's enemy to the east, Persia. He would die on campaign, and the news of his demise brought an immediate end to what might have been the Fourth Temple. The new emperor, the Christian Jovian, once again expelled the Jews of Jerusalem. Christianity had faced a very close call. Christian leaders would not soon forget how close they had come to losing an Empire.

THE MADEBA MAP
Christian Jerusalem reached its peak under Justinian (527-565), one of the greatest of all Byzantine Roman emperors. Although harsh on both non-Orthodox Christians and all Jews, he regarded Jerusalem as one of his imperial treasures, and lavished it with new buildings. The largest and best know was the Nea Church. It, along with many other key monuments of Sixth century Jerusalem are shown on a mosaic map of Jerusalem discovered at the Madeba Monastery south of Amman in Jordan. The main entry on the left is the Damascus Gate begun in the reign of Hadrian. Beyond the Damascus Gate Plaza two roadways extended southward. The largest road, the Cardo Maximus, traversed the entire north-south axis of the city, passing near the Church of the Holy Sepulcher (shown in the lower center of the field), and ending near the Nea Church at the south end of town (right side of picture). The Cardo was the great pedestrian mall of its time, with many shops facing the main street, shaded from the sun by roofed colonnades on either side. Of course, the Temple is nowhere to be found on this map, but its general location is just right of the Lion's Gate shown just left of center at the top of the field.

The Sixth century was the last Christian century in Jerusalem for many centuries to come. In the early Seventh century, the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius faced the embarrassing loss of Jerusalem to the Persians in 614, only to re-enter the city triumphantly in 629. The Christian restoration was short-lived indeed. In 638, Heraclius again lost Jerusalem. He would never return. This time, he lost the city to Islam. The Christian leadership surrendered the city to the pious and ascetic Caliph Omar. This transfer of power, one of many in Jerusalem's long history, had a nearly unique and blessed quality: it was accomplished without bloodshed.
 

By the end of the Seventh century, Islam had taken deep root in Jerusalem, which came to be known by its Arabic name, Al Quds, the Holy Place. The Caliph Abd al-Malik completed the construction of Jerusalem's most famous shrine today, the Dome of the Rock. Jewish tradition holds that Abraham nearly sacrificed Isaac here; that all of the Temples were built here. Muslims shared in these beliefs. But in building the Dome of the Rock at this site, Abd al-Malik was erecting more than a monument that ultimately remembered Mohammed's ascent into heaven in 632: it proclaimed Islam as the final, triumphant expression of monotheistic faith, the fulfillment of the promise of both Judaism and Christianity.

The Dome of the Rock's design was strongly influenced by contemporary Byzantine architectural trends: it is believed that two of the three construction leaders were Christians. This recalls the circumstances of the building of the First Temple of Solomon, who called on the more sophisticated culture of Hiram of the Phoenician city-state of Tyre to provide the skilled workmen to create the House of the Lord seventeen centuries before. However you interpret the historical significance of the Dome of the Rock, its magnificent marriage of late classical architecture, Arabic calligraphy and decorative motifs make it one of the greatest achievements of the First Millennium of the Common Era. [More on early Islamic monuments in the Temple Mount area]

An amazing century of conquest and creativity for the Islamic world under the Umayyad Caliphate left a magnificent and enduring impression on Jerusalem. Perhaps equally impressive was the willingness of Muslim rulers to allow Jews and Christians to live side-by-side with them in this city which all three faiths claimed as their heritage. The subsequent caliphate of the Abbasids showed generally less interest in Jerusalem. As the city passed through the Eleventh century, a renascent Europe renewed its dream of a Christian Jerusalem. Pope Urban II preached a Holy War to reclaim the Tomb of Jesus from the hated infidel, and the First Crusade was launched. From ragtag serfs to Europe's royalty, they marched through eastern Europe and Asia Minor, until they finally closed a siege around Jerusalem in June of 1099. One month later, the Crusaders broke through the city's weary walls and engaged in acts of carnage unparalleled since the destruction of the Temple of Herod over 1,000 years before. Tens of thousands of Muslims and Jews were slaughtered mercilessly as the Christian knights practiced their own early version of "ethnic cleansing."

CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHER
With the bodies of the slain still rotting in the streets of Jerusalem months later, the Crusaders began their own restoration of the city as a Christian pilgrimage site. They built as if they would lose the city tomorrow. New churches, the conversion of Islamic shrines, hospices for pilgrims: all were part of a building program the likes of which Jerusalem had not seen since the time of Herod. The Crusaders' most challenging and enduring achievement was the complete renovation of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, which was completed on the fiftieth anniversary of the city's conquest in 1149. The bell tower shown here reveals the already anachronistic Norman architectural style as churches in Europe were moving toward the Gothic. The Holy Sepulcher was, and is, a complex and bewildering marriage of architectural styles, from the early medieval, to the Nineteenth century. Part of its complexity rests in its purpose: the Church physically encloses what most Christians believe was the last hours of Jesus of Nazareth's life. On entering the Church, you soon ascend a steep and winding staircase of well-worn steps to both the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic chapels of the Crucifixion. In effect, you are climbing up the hill of Golgotha to the site of Jesus' death. After returning to the main level by the stone slab where Jesus' body was anointed before burial, you proceed to a rotunda surrounding a building within the building. This olive wood structure, known as the edicule, has gone through a number of incarnations, the most recent completed in 1808 after a fire destroyed its predecessor. The edicule encloses what is left of the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, the place of Jesus' burial. Attached to the rear of the edicule is another tiny structure, a kind of kiosk, controlled by the Coptic Church of Egypt. Here, you can expect to encounter a Coptic priest who will enthusiastically sprinkle you with holy water (the writer has had the unique fortune to receive this Coptic 'baptism' twice, but for some reason has chosen to remain a Jew). 

Perhaps the most satisfying part of a visit to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is the journey down the stairs to the Chapel of St. Helena. The chapel offers relatively quiet relief from the cacophony of sounds on the main floor. On the way down the steps, you'll see hundreds of Latin crosses, dug into the stone by medieval Christian pilgrims who often risked both life and fortune for a few moments at this shrine. Just as the Dome of the Rock touches the soul with its classic design and serene beauty, these Crusader crosses proclaim the passionate faith which both butchered and rebuilt Jerusalem. 

The Crusaders would lose Jerusalem to the legendary Muslim general Saladin in 1187. There would be no repeat of the Crusaders' savagery. Saladin allowed the Christians to leave the city in peace and without bloodshed, in the tradition of the Caliph Omar in the Seventh century. Under the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, the Crusaders would return to Jerusalem 1229. For the most part, the city's walls had been leveled, making it an easy target for subsequent attack. Only 15 years later, in 1244, the Crusaders left for good. Christians would not again control Jerusalem until the arrival of General Sir Edmund Allenby's Expeditionary Force in 1917. 

Continue to Part IV of this course

Questions or comments? E-mail the instructor at jgrist@lehrhaus.org