Sunday, May 13: The Old City

No wake-up call. So no breakfast, no morning toilet, no shower. Out and off to the Old City!

Jerusalem, at least the Old City, is a place where past and present meet. Every place is literally on top of some other place. There are a few locations, like the Cardo and one part of the Broad Wall, where archaeological excavations have been left open so people can see this for themselves.

The Cardo: layers of history

Another history lesson. Jerusalem was founded by King David, hence its appellation, "The City of David". Except that the current Old City doesn't include the original City of David—see, the walls have been rebuilt a few times, most recently by the Crusaders. Anyway, David's son King Solomon built a temple in Jerusalem, finishing in the year 957 BCE, and that temple stood until 586 BCE when it was destroyed by the Babylonians. You know that Boney M song, "By the rivers of Babylon"? This is when those lyrics were written. Not in English of course. Anyway, the Babylonians were overthrown by the Persians, who in 515 BCE allowed the Jews to return, build a second Temple, and live in semi-autonomy. This edifice was operational through several changes of government, until 19 BCE, when the Roman King Herod (yup, same guy as at Caesarea) managed to obtain the Jews' permission to rebuild it, bigger and better than ever. This included expanding the Temple Mount and curtaining it with a retaining wall. So there have really been three Temples, but because sacrifices continued during the renovations, Herod's Temple is still called the Second Temple.

Unfortunately, relations were pretty bad between the Romans and the Jews in that period. For instance, the Jews had this thing about graven images, and therefore they wouldn't use the Roman coins, which had the emperor's face on them. And they wouldn't allow statues to be put up in the Temple, and they kept sending delegations to Rome to complain about the excessive taxes. (You think it's bad in Canada? These guys had a flat tax of 80%.) So there were constant rebellions, and awful strife, and by the year 70 the Romans decided to siege Jerusalem. Things might actually have worked out anyway, except for a group of Jewish hotheads called the Sicarii who decided things would be better if they murdered a few of the leaders who wanted to make peace and also set fire to the city's food stores. It's all documented in the Talmud.

One of the places we visited was the Burnt House, a burnt house dating back to that period that may have housed a family where one of the kids was in the Sicarii. Whether it did or whether it didn't, the folks running the place now have this really good video presentation, the best we'd seen. It really brought home the awfulness of what happened. I cried here too.

Right. So what was it that happened? Well, the Sicarii got what they wanted. The city began to starve, and time was running out, and there was no choice, now that they were all starving, but to try to fight off the Roman army. Yeahright. They lost, of course, and the Romans burned down the Temple and the rest of the city and did all those nasty things that vanquishing armies still do. There were still a lot of Jews left alive, though, and they kept rebelling for another sixty-odd years, culminating in the Bar Kochba Rebellion in 132, at which time the Romans razed Jerusalem to the ground and built their own city on top of it. And that was pretty much the end of Jerusalem for a while.

So you may be wondering how it is the Romans could have burned down a solid stone Temple. Stone doesn't burn! Well, first of all there was lots of flammable material stored in the Temple, and all of that burned. But second of all, the stone in question was limestone, and contained water. When the limestone was heated, the water turned to steam, and when the pressure got high enough the stones exploded. You can figure out the rest.

In Jerusalem they pray: the Kotel

End of lesson. So after passing through a kosher-for-Shabbat metal detector, we found ourselves next to the Kotel, the Western Wall of the Temple Mount. For millennia, this was the only remaining above-ground section of the Temple complex. It's not part of the Temple itself, just a section of the retaining wall I mentioned earlier, but it has a lot of significance because it does date back to that period. There's a big plaza in front of it these days, and separate areas for men and women to pray at the Wall itself. I didn't bother, because it seems goofy to me to specifically pray at a retaining wall surrounding a platform upon which stood a Temple that isn't even there any more. Not that I'm knocking people who do, but it doesn't crank my personal monkey.

Then to the good stuff. The Southern Wall, and the other excavations in the Jerusalem Archaeological Park. Here's where we could see the remnants of some really impressive structures. Robinson's Arch, the first known overpass—a huge stone arch that provided access to the Temple Mount from the west without also blocking the street below. The holes in that street, made by huge blocks of stone falling from the Temple building above. The Hulda Gates—the Triple Gate for entry and the Double Gate for exit, except for mourners, who did it the other way round. The erratic staircase, designed by Herod to increase safety by slowing down the crowd.

Western Wall Plaza

And then free time. Some people went shopping, some headed back to the hotel for a rest. I had a tuna salad sandwich at one of the restaurants in the Old City, and then explored more of the place with Brenda. Fascinating place, this Old City! You know, people actually live there, in ancient apartments, some just gorgeous, tucked into nooks and crannies. And it's so three-dimensional: the streets wind up and down and around, and in places there are two streets on top of each other.

When I say "street", by the way, I don't mean a 20-metre-wide strip of asphalt with lane markings and traffic lights. Streets in Jerusalem (and Tsfat, and Akko, and Yafo) are mainly made of the same stone as everything else, can be less than two metres wide, and often include stairways. And some are just full of street vendors selling all manner of trinkets. I made the mistake of asking one of the vendors about a mezuzah, and was offered one with a counterfeit scroll that the guy promised me was genuine. Uh, no, sorry guy but it really wasn't.

Brenda was expected back at Daniel and Batya's, so we made our way back there together. Had to backtrack at one point, but the cool thing there was that we bumped into some more Birthright kids. I tell you, they're everywhere! Anyway, Daniel invited me in, but as it was Brenda who was expected and not I, I went back to the hotel instead. Got there in time for dinner: didn't feel like eating, but it was free so did anyway. And to bed.

Next: Monday, May 14, Sick in Jerusalem