There are two incredibly interesting articles in Popular Archaeology using both biblical and reliable extra-biblical sources to show that both the first and second temples were actually located just south of the Dome of the Rock traditional temple mount, in the oldest part of Jerusalem, the City of David. The first article deals with what actually was on the traditional temple mount, the Roman Fortress of Antonia, built by Herod "the Great" and named for his ally, Marc Antony. Just prior to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE, the fort was occupied by the Roman 10th Legion, legions elsewhere requiring about 40 acres for their encampments, which is what the "temple site" is, being approximately 36 acres. But, like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole, advocates of the traditional temple mount site, insist Antonia was actually on the northwest corner of the site, which is incredibly just over an acre. The evidence against that is overwhelming, and locating the Temple over the Spring of Gihon makes a perfect fit.
Given that the traditional site is so contentious, and even violent, if this becomes the accepted site, it could remove at least one major bone of contention between Jews and Muslims (yeah right). At least, it would smooth the road toward building a Third Temple, the impetus for which appears to be building.
There are two incredibly interesting articles in Popular Archaeology using both biblical and reliable extra-biblical sources to show that both the first and second temples were actually located just south of the Dome of the Rock traditional temple mount, in the oldest part of Jerusalem, the City of David. The first article deals with what actually was on the traditional temple mount, the Roman Fortress of Antonia, built by Herod "the Great" and named for his ally, Marc Antony. Just prior to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE, the fort was occupied by the Roman 10th Legion, legions elsewhere requiring about 40 acres for their encampments, which is what the "temple site" is, being approximately 36 acres. But, like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole, advocates of the traditional temple mount site, insist Antonia was actually on the northwest corner of the site, which is incredibly just over an acre. The evidence against that is overwhelming, and locating the Temple over the Spring of Gihon makes a perfect fit.
Given that the traditional site is so contentious, and even violent, if this becomes the accepted site, it could remove at least one major bone of contention between Jews and Muslims (yeah right). At least, it would smooth the road toward building a Third Temple, the impetus for which appears to be building.
Except of course that ancient sources kinda disagree. But who cares.
Out of curiosity, ever been to the Spring of Gihon? Ever seen the surrounding area? You realise its even below the old Palace structures? And far lower than the actual Temple mount?
But don't worry, Muslims far and wide will come to your support. And at the end of it all you will have concluded that the Temple once stood in the Antarctic.
I've been looking for serious contrary views. What do you have? So far only Leen Reitmeyer is the only one against it that I've heard about, and he's very professionally invested in the traditional location. And I haven't heard any specific disagreement from him or anyone.
Out of curiosity, ever been to the Spring of Gihon? Ever seen the surrounding area? You realise its even below the old Palace structures? And far lower than the actual Temple mount?
As a matter of fact I was just there a month ago, but that was (regrettably) before I'd read either of these articles. According to Josephus, the walls of the temple mount were 450 high going all the way down to the bottom of the Kidron Valley, with a 50' wall on top of that. Add the height of the temple itself and it would have been a similar height. There's a lot more--a LOT more.
BTW, I'm not religious. My interest and support for Israel is political, historical and follows a sense of justice for a persecuted and slaughtered people. Please, read the articles.
ThePainefulTruth, something you may find interesting...I've been reading the memoirs of the Emperor Hadrian (117-138 CE), and he records a couple of visits to Jerusalem. In the first, he says,' We made a stop at Jerusalem. There I took occasion to study the plan for a new capital which I proposed to construct on the site of the Jewish city ruined by Titus. Good administration in Judea and greater commerce with the Orient showed the need for developing a great metropolis at this intersection of routes. I had in mind the usual Roman capital: Aelia Capitolina would have its temples, its markets, its public baths, and its sanctuary of the Roman Venus. My recent absorption in passionate and tender cults led me to choose a grotto on Mount Moriah where the rites of Adonis would be celebrated. These projects aroused indignation in the Jewish masses: the wretched creatures actually preferred their ruins to a great city which would afford them the chance to gain, of knowledge, and of pleasure. The first workmen to touch those crumbling walls with pickaxes were attacked by the mob. I went ahead; Fidus Aquila, who was later to employ his genius for planning in the construction of Antino-opolis, took up the work at Jerusalem. I refused to see in those heaps of rubble the rapid growth of hatred.'
Following the bar Kokhba uprising he says, 'There is no denying it, that war in Judea was one of my defeats. The crimes of Simon and the madness of Akiba were not of my making, but I reproached myself for having been blind in Jerusalem, heedless in Alexandria, impatient in Rome. I had not known how to find words which would have prevented, or at least retarded, this outburst of rage in a nation.'
Following the defeat of Simon at Betar, Hadrian writes, 'An inscription placed on the site of Jerusalem forbade the Jews, under pain of death, to re-establish themselves anew upon the heap of rubble; it reproduced word for word the sentence formerly inscribed on the Temple door, forbidding entrance to the uncircumcised. On one day a year, on the ninth of the month of Ab, the Jews have the right to come to weep in front of the ruined wall.'
As an aside, I too have visited the site in Jerusalem. My most interesting experience, however, came whilst walking up the Kidron Valley looking at the tombs. A young Palestinian invited me, for a small fee, to be guided up Hezekiah's tunnel. I took the chance and waded all the way up to the pool. The conduit is mentioned in 2 Kings 20:20.
ThePainefulTruth, something you may find interesting...I've been reading the memoirs of the Emperor Hadrian (117-138 CE), and he records a couple of visits to Jerusalem. In the first, he says,' We made a stop at Jerusalem. There I took occasion to study the plan for a new capital which I proposed to construct on the site of the Jewish city ruined by Titus. Good administration in Judea and greater commerce with the Orient showed the need for developing a great metropolis at this intersection of routes. I had in mind the usual Roman capital: Aelia Capitolina would have its temples, its markets, its public baths, and its sanctuary of the Roman Venus. My recent absorption in passionate and tender cults led me to choose a grotto on Mount Moriah where the rites of Adonis would be celebrated. These projects aroused indignation in the Jewish masses: the wretched creatures actually preferred their ruins to a great city which would afford them the chance to gain, of knowledge, and of pleasure. The first workmen to touch those crumbling walls with pickaxes were attacked by the mob. I went ahead; Fidus Aquila, who was later to employ his genius for planning in the construction of Antino-opolis, took up the work at Jerusalem. I refused to see in those heaps of rubble the rapid growth of hatred.'
Following the bar Kokhba uprising he says, 'There is no denying it, that war in Judea was one of my defeats. The crimes of Simon and the madness of Akiba were not of my making, but I reproached myself for having been blind in Jerusalem, heedless in Alexandria, impatient in Rome. I had not known how to find words which would have prevented, or at least retarded, this outburst of rage in a nation.'
Following the defeat of Simon at Betar, Hadrian writes, 'An inscription placed on the site of Jerusalem forbade the Jews, under pain of death, to re-establish themselves anew upon the heap of rubble; it reproduced word for word the sentence formerly inscribed on the Temple door, forbidding entrance to the uncircumcised. On one day a year, on the ninth of the month of Ab, the Jews have the right to come to weep in front of the ruined wall.'
As an aside, I too have visited the site in Jerusalem. My most interesting experience, however, came whilst walking up the Kidron Valley looking at the tombs. A young Palestinian invited me, for a small fee, to be guided up Hezekiah's tunnel. I took the chance and waded all the way up to the pool. The conduit is mentioned in 2 Kings 20:20.
Thanks for the info, but if the book you're referring is is by Marguerite Yourcenar, that's a novel, although I hear, an excellent one. Does she use any footnotes or offer any references or research in an historical notes conclusion or something?
The following is a site for the book the author has written about the subject, which gives a 64 point itemized list of the evidence for the temple being in the City of David and not on the so-called temple mount. Going over this, I learned (perhaps relearned) that the Jews had attempted to rebuild the temple twice--once each during the reigns of emperors Constantine and Julian, in the southern City of David.
Meanwhile in reality the Dome of the Rock was build on the ruins of the would have been 3rd Temple that was destroyed during construction at the end of the brief Jewish autonomous state in the Sassanid Empire, which was then turned into a dump after the Eastern Roman Empire retook the city.
The following is a site for the book the author has written about the subject, which gives a 64 point itemized list of the evidence for the temple being in the City of David and not on the so-called temple mount. Going over this, I learned (perhaps relearned) that the Jews had attempted to rebuild the temple twice--once each during the reigns of emperors Constantine and Julian, in the southern City of David.
Meanwhile in reality the Dome of the Rock was build on the ruins of the would have been 3rd Temple that was destroyed during construction at the end of the brief Jewish autonomous state in the Sassanid Empire, which was then turned into a dump after the Eastern Roman Empire retook the city.
"Why did historians say the temple mount was plowed as a farm and became a site for quarrying and dumping garbage, when none of these conditions have been noted on the alleged temple mount, while they have been on the southeastern hill?"
"Why did Eutychius say the Christians had never built a church over the temple ruins, when they had built the Church of St. Sophia over ElSakrah in the Praetorium, the church which was destroyed by Caliph abd al-Malik in order to build the Dome of the Rock?"
"Why did the Jews stop praying at the western wall of the Constantine/Julian temple (beginning of a third temple reconstruction) ruins on the southeastern hill, then prayed at a synagogue on the Mount of Olives, then at the east gate of the alleged temple mount, and finally, in the 16th century, started praying at the western wall of the alleged temple mount, actually Fort Antonia?"
"Why do the Cairo Geniza documents explain that when Omar (the Second Caliph) granted permission to seventy households of Jews to return (from Tiberius!) to the city, they requested to be near the site of the temple and the water of Shiloah, in the southern part of the city?" Why indeed if it was a quarry and garbage dump?
Little of this is settled science, if you will, but there's this and much more that needs to be examined with an open mind. Would you rather rebuild the Temple on the traditional site, only to discover later that it was where Herod built a fort for the Romans who destroyed the temple, to be followed by the Christian Church of St. Sophia, and then by an Islamic mosque covering an outcropping of bedrock neighboring a mosque employing a holy rock discovered in the rubble of the City of David--but where the Temple, it is becoming obvious, never stood?
"Why did Eutychius say the Christians had never built a church over the temple ruins, when they had built the Church of St. Sophia over ElSakrah in the Praetorium, the church which was destroyed by Caliph abd al-Malik in order to build the Dome of the Rock?"
Good question, one which I've asked myself, although it wouldn't be a fatal flaw in the argument. Those are all from the 64 questions in the link given above that are supposed to be answered in her book--which is next in my quay. If any of them aren't answered to my satisfaction, I'll be asking the author herself. But as you've seen if you read the two articles, the primary sources she uses there are plentiful and credible. In any case we'll see.
I couldn't concentrate on the book I'm currently reading for thinking about this question. So I went ahead and opened it to look for the source. There are thirty something, mostly Byzantine, references to the Church of St. Sophia, but the most salient one is this: Gil, M. (1997) A History of Palestine, 634-1099. That reference (p. 92) "cites a passage originally found in the Annals (Vol. II), written by Eutychius, which was later shorted by Ibn Kaldun in the Kitab al-'Ibar (Vol.III) to state: 'He [Caliph Abd al-Malik] built the Dome of the Rock on the site of a Christian Church which he destroyed.' "
I keep finding interesting stuff. The rock over which the Church of St. Sophia was built supposedly has the footprints of Jesus impressed in them from when he was being tried. The Muslims later declared those footprints to be those of Mohamed. Also al-Malik built the Dome of the Rock to compete with and be ascendant over the Church of the Holy Sepulchre on a hill to the west in old Jerusalem. It also, at the time, faced a Byzantine Christian basilica to the east in the Garden of Gethsemane across the Kidron Valley at the foot of the Mt. of Olives.
It's surprising that the motivation for building the Dome of the Rock was mostly anti-Christian rather than anti-Jewish.
Meanwhile in reality the Dome of the Rock was build on the ruins of the would have been 3rd Temple that was destroyed during construction at the end of the brief Jewish autonomous state in the Sassanid Empire, which was then turned into a dump after the Eastern Roman Empire retook the city.
I am trying to understand the reason for the responses I have read from you so far. ThePainfulTruth presented an intriguing look at the possibility...note that word please...for an alternative place for these religious temples. He did not place any particular emphasis on one faith over the other. Yet, your rancorous replies seem out of place in this. I can appreciate that you feel you (as in the Jewish race) have had to fight tooth and nail for these religious places, all of which can and are a part or parts of all three faiths, which include Judaism, Muslim and Christianity. What is most interesting to me, however, is that most Christians don't seem to have any bone to pick over this. Why is that I wonder? I am by no means trying to insult you or diminish the fight that the Jewish people have had over these lands. I am merely trying to understand why you are so angry over an interesting archeological POV.
I couldn't concentrate on the book I'm currently reading for thinking about this question. So I went ahead and opened it to look for the source. There are thirty something, mostly Byzantine, references to the Church of St. Sophia, but the most salient one is this: Gil, M. (1997) A History of Palestine, 634-1099. That reference (p. 92) "cites a passage originally found in the Annals (Vol. II), written by Eutychius, which was later shorted by Ibn Kaldun in the Kitab al-'Ibar (Vol.III) to state: 'He [Caliph Abd al-Malik] built the Dome of the Rock on the site of a Christian Church which he destroyed.' "
It seems to me that ibn Kaldun is mistaken though.
The Dome of the Rock is located on an artificial platform, roughly but not exactly in the centre of the Ḥaram al-S̲h̲arīf [q.v.] in Jerusalem. The shape and emplacement of the platform were probably determined by the ruined state of the old Jewish Temple area, together with whatever Roman constructions may have been left; it is also possible that there were pious and historical or legendary associations with parts of this area of the Ḥaram, but these are difficult to demonstrate (Encyclopedia of Islam vol 2)
The following are all very early sources that explain the construction of "Umar's Mosque" on the same site: (from R. Hoyland - Seeing Islam as others saw it)
"[the Jews] after gaining help from the Hagarenes for a brief while, decided to rebuild the temple of Solomon. Finding the spot called Holy of Holies, they rebuilt it with base and construction as a place for their prayers. But the Ismaelites, being envious of them, expelled them from that place and called the same house of prayer their own. Then the former built in another spot, right at the base of the temple, another place for their prayer.” (Sebeos c.661)
"the godless Saracens entered the holy city of Christ our Lord, Jerusalem, with the permission of God and in punishment for our negligence, which is considerable, and immediately proceeded in haste to the place which is called the Capitol. They took with them men, some by force, others by their own will, in order to clean that place and to build that cursed thing, intended for their prayer and which they call a mosque" (John Moschus c 670)
"In that famous place where once stood the magnificently constructed Temple, near the eastern wall, the Saracens now frequent a rectangular house of prayer which they have built in a crude manner, constructing it from raised planks and large beams over some remains of ruins. This house can, as it is said, accommodate at least 3000 people." (Arculf c.670)
Seems as if the Church there had long gone (if it was even there in the first place), possibly after the Sassanian invasion as many churches were destroyed then.
It's quite a common view due to the inscriptions being perceived to be denying the Divinity of Jesus.
There are several perspectives on the purpose of building the Dome
The many explanations which exist can be divided into three broad groups. The first one is the traditional pious Muslim view, which interprets the Rock as the place whence the Prophet went on his celebrated Journey into Heaven ( miʿrād̲j̲ [q.v.]). That such became eventually the holy meaning of the Dome of the Rock is undisputable, since the whole Ḥaram became the Masd̲j̲id al-Aḳṣā of Ḳurʾān, XVII, 1. But, while the association between the Rock and the Prophet’s Journey may have been made quite early, there is no trace of it in the most authentic document about the monument, sc. its long inscription.
The second explanation is concretely historical, and goes back to a passage from al-Yaʿḳūbī. This explanation holds that, during the struggle of the Umayyads with Ibn al-Zubayr, ʿAbd al-Malik attempted to create in Jerusalem a shrine which would compete with the Kaʿba and the pilgrimage to Mecca. Recently, W. Caskel revived the theory by pointing out that the Umayyads as a dynasty did seek a cultic center in Syria or Palestine, and that Jerusalem was the only one which fulfilled the necessary conditions. The main objection to this theory is that, even though there are several literary indications of a special Umayyad attachment to Palestine, there is some doubt as to whether such a basic Islamic requirement as the pilgrimage to Mecca could be altered. Furthermore, al-Yaʿḳūbī was a violently anti-Umayyad polemicist, whose interpretations are open to criticism.
The third explanation is cultural-historical. Starting with the evidence of the inscriptions and of the mosaics, it proposes to see in the Dome of the Rock a monument proclaiming the new faith and empire in the city of the older two religions. It sanctified anew a Jewish sanctuary and slowly incorporated within itself the memories of Abraham and Joseph, among others. It set up the crowns of Byzantine and Persian kings like an offering around the centre of the monuments, and put up its own Christology above the crowns. It was a missionary monument of victory, built at a time when ʿAbd al-Malik was concerned with Christian enmity, but especially when he sought to proclaim Islamic uniqueness within a common religious tradition, as, for instance, in his coinage. As the specific need of maintaining the cohesion of the community of faithful waned, pious associations grew up and eventually transformed the Dome of the Rock into the unique sanctuary it is today.
