Tower of David Museum (Roman Krivochenitser)

Tower of David Museum

13 July 2008, tour leader Barak Zemer
Report submitted by Roman Krivochenitser

We began our journey through the Tower of David Museum by talking about the Return to Zion that took place under the Persian rule a few short decades after the destruction of the First Temple by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. In 526 BCE, Nehemiah and the Jews returned to Jerusalem to reconstruct a the Temple on the site of the First Temple on the Temple Mount, thus commencing the era of the Second Temple. Construction begins in 535 BCE and the Temple is dedicated in 515 BCE. Five centuries later, King Herod (“the Builder”) (73–4 BCE) greatly expands the Temple. (Thus, it is more accurate perhaps to speak of two Second Temples. Herod's popularity within the Jewish population had begun to wane and the construction of the “most beautiful structure in the world” was to help him save face with his people. The Herodian temple compound consisted of a massive vaulted platform with an area equal to twenty-seven American football fields. This Temple is destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE in the wake of the Jewish revolt against their rule. The Roman Caesar who conquered Jerusalem, Titus, issued a coin bearing the words “Iudaea Capta,” “Jerusalem is Captured” to let it be known that the Romans are now in power. Angering the Jews further, the Roman Legion put their symbol, the boar, on top of Temple Mount. This systematic repression of the Jewish population and the calculated denigration of their religion caused wide outrage within the Jewish community, which led to what became known as the Bar Kochba Revolt (132-135 CE). The Romans were once again able to quell the revolt, killing thousands of Jews. They destroyed the last Jewish independent Jewish city, Beitar, in 135 CE on Tisha B’Av, the ninth day of the month of Av. According to tradition, this is same day that both of the Jewish temples were also destroyed.

The early Romans were pagan until 324 CE when Constantine decided to convert to Christianity and make Christianity the official faith of the empire. This change was largely inspired by his mother, Helena, who came to Jerusalem to seek out the path of Jesus and had a series of visions that told her where significant events of Jesus' life and Passion had occured. She found the Holy Cross upon which Jesus was crucified on and erected the Church of the Holy Sepulchre on the Golgotha, the site of the crucifixion. Constantine also moved the capital of the empire east from Rome to Byzantium (later known as Constantinople and now Istanbul). Thus commenced the time period known as the Byzantine Era. According to the last words of Jesus, Temple Mount was not to be rebuilt and it was left in ruins, converted into a garbage dump by the Christians. The only day that Jews could visit there was on Tisha B’Av, the day the holy Temple was destroyed, as a symbol of their humiliation and God's disfavor.

During the sixth and seventh centuries, the Byzantine Empire was engaged in clashes with the other superpower of the time, the Persians--to the diminishment of both. Thus weakened, they were easy prey for the raiding Muslim conquerers exploding out of the Arabian Peninsula beginning in the fourth decade of the seventh century and conquering in the space of a few decades the entire Middle East, North Africa, Spain and the Balkans.

According to the Qur'an, Jerusalem is the third holiest city after Mecca and Medina because the rock upon which the Dome of the Rock sits (the same rock upon which according to Jewish tradition Abram was commanded to sacrifice Isaac and upon which stood both the First and Second Temples) is where Mohammed ascended to the heavens, and tradition maintains that an indentation on the rock is the footprint of the Prophet. Similarly, the Qur'an mentions a "night journey" in which Allah took his servant (Muhammad) "from the holiest mosque (Mecca) to furthest.” Muslim interpreters held that the reference was to Jerusalem. Indeed, initially, attempting to establish his claim as a continuation of the revealed religions of Judaism (and Christianity) Muhammad established Jerusalem as the first qibla, direction of prayer for Muslims. It was only later when his mission to the Jews was largely rejected that he changed the direction of prayer to Mecca. In comparison to the position of Jews under Christianity, Jews fared much better under Islam, and were allowed to return to Jerusalem and worship at the Western Wall and the Mount of Olives.

At the end of the eleventh century, the Pope announces the Crusades to liberate Jerusalem from the heathens (Jews and Muslims) and retake Jerusalem for Christianity. The Crusaders go on a rampage, killing many thousands of Jews on their path through Europe to the and Muslims in their path to take over the city. However, they do not destroy the Dome of the Rock or the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. Instead, they convert the structures into Christian churches, renaming the Dome of the Rock "Templum Domini" and the Al Aqsa mosque "Templum Solomani" (mistakenly identifying it with the site of Solomon's Temple).

In the 1287 the great Muslim leader Saladin defeated the Crusaders at the decisive battle at the Horns of Hittin and drove the last Crusaders out of Jerusalem in the name of Islam. This time period became known as the Mamluke Era. The Mamlukes were slave soldiers, kidnapped by Muslim leaders from Mongolia and raised from childhood as warrors. Eventually they seized power and ruled over the empire. In the early 16th century they were defeated by the Ottoman Turks, continuing Muslim domination of the holy city. Much of the city wall we oberve today was by the Turks.

Europeans began to enter the scene as the Ottoman Empire began to decline. In 1869, the Austro-Hungarian emperor, Franz Josef II, came to Jerusalem and built the first road to the city. A short time later in 1898, the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, came to the city and the part of the wall adjacent to the Jaffa Gate was taken down so his carriages could enter Jerusalem. The same year train tracks were first laid in Jerusalem, connecting it to the port city of Jaffa. This European infiltration went hand in hand with the decline and eventual collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1917 in the wake of World War I. At this time, the empire was carved up among France and England, with the latter being assigned a Mandate over Palestine (including the territory of today's Kingdom of Jordan) by the League of Nations. . At the beginning of the Mandate in 1918, Jerusalem’s population was mostly Arab. Although the British tried to restrict immigration, Zionism was quickly picking up steam and near the end of the Mandate the population was 50% Jews and 50% Arabs. The British were increasing caught in the conflict and turned over responsibility for resolution of the conflict to the UN. In 1947 the UN passed a partition plan calling for the establishment of a Jewish and Arab state in the area west of the Jordan River. The Jewish community in Palestine accepted the terms of the plan, but the Arabs rejected it and began to attack Jewish forces. With the pullout of the British, David Ben-Gurion declared the independence of Israel on May 15, 1948 and the new state was immediately attacked by five invading Arab armies. Our tour of the Tower of David Museum concluded with the British Mandate Period. We did not have the opportunity to learn about the development of the modern state of Israel yet. However, we did see the changes that Jerusalem had gone through over the centuries and the important hold the city has on the adherents of the three Abrahamic faiths.