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Published: October 5th 2013
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Today we visit the Mount of Olives, Garden of Gethsemane, the Kidron Valley, Garden Tomb, Golgotha, the City of David, the Source of Gihon, Hezekiah's Tunnel, the Siloam Pool, the Valley of Hinnom, Temple Mount and see a model of Jerusalem as it was during the 1st century.
We associate the Mount of Olives with the ministry of Jesus, but there are many much older references in the Hebrew Scriptures. King David ascended the Mount of Olives when he fled from his son Absalom (2 Samuel 15:14,30). 1 Kings 11:7 refers to it as "the mountain that was in front of Jerusalem". It was on the Mount of Olives that Jesus revealed to his disciples what the sign of he presence would be (Matthew 24).
Jesus often met with his disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane. It was here that Judas betrayed Jesus and he was seized by an armed mob (Mark 14:32-52). The exact location of the garden is impossible to determine, but it was on, or near, the Mount of Olives.
The Kidron Valley is situated on the eastern side of Jerusalem, separating the Temple Mount from the Mount of Olives. The Bible refers to it
as "the Valley of Jehoshaphat". The area beside the valley, on the Mount of Olives, holds the largest Jewish graveyard in the world, as well as a series of monuments, including Absalom's Pillar. In reality, the pillar has nothing to do with Absalom, but represents a first-century funeral monument from the time of the Second Temple.
The Garden Tomb was discovered in 1867 and is considered by some to be the actual burial place of Jesus, as opposed to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre site. Both sites are speculative.
Golgotha (Skull Place), located outside of Jerusalem, was where Jesus was impaled. In the fourth century C.E. Emperor Constantine commissioned Bishop Macarius to determine the site of Golgotha, who decided it was the site upon which the temple of Aphrodite had been built. So Constantine ordered the demolition of the temple and the construction of a basilica that later became the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Though the site is now within the walls of Jerusalem it is believed to have been outside the city walls in Jesus' day. This is pertinent because the Bible states that Jesus was buried outside the walls (Hebrews 13:12).
The City
of David is the site that King David captured from the Jebusites in 1004 B.C.E. (2 Samuel 5:6-9) The ark of the covenant was brought here from the house of Obed-edom (2 Samuel 6:10-16). It is also the site of the First Temple built by King Solomon.
The City of David contains Hezekiah's Tunnel, or the Tunnel of Shiloh, a 533-meter long tunnel built to divert the waters of the Gihon spring, bringing them to the west side of the City of David (2 Chronicles 33:14). The tunnel is barely wide enough for a normal-sized adult to walk through, and in many sections a tall person like myself must stoop or bang one's head on rock. My height proved to be a plus, however, when the water came up to my waist....nearly engulfing the very petite Asian woman behind me.
The Valley of Hinnom is closely associated with pagan worship. King Ahaz of Judah burned his sons in the fire in this valley (2 Chronicles 28:1-3). His grandson Manasseh was also said to have made "his sons pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom" (2 Chronicles 33:1-9). In the Christian Greek Scriptures it
is referred to by the Greek term Ge'en-na (Matthew 5:22). Today the valley is known as the Wadi er-Rababi (Ge Ben Hinnom).
Temple Mount is one of the most contested religious sites in the world, at various points in history having been associated with Judaism, Christianity, Roman religion and Islam. It is believed, by some scholars, to have been the site of Mount Moriah, where Abraham prepared to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice (Genesis 22). On this site the two Jewish temples were built. Even today, many Jews refuse to walk on the site, lest they inadvertently enter the area that contained the Holy of Holies, the part of the temple that only the High Priest was allowed to enter. After the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem in 634 C.E. Umayyad Caliphs commissioned the construction of the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque on the site. The site has been controlled by Israel since 1967, and both Israel and Palestine authorities claim sovereignty over the site.
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