Untitled article | AdventAI

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · September 3, 1867

FromAdvent Review and Sabbath Herald, Vol. XXX, No. 12

THE JERUSALEM OF TO-DAY.

(Concluded.)

But now we come to further questions connected with the sacrifices and sacrificial arrangements connected with the altar. The prodigious number of sacrifices required by the Jewish ritual rendered a corresponding amplitude of drainage absolutely necessary, and also an abundant water supply for washing the victims and cleansing the ground from blood. Let us take these separately. Is there any arrangement for drainage connected with this sacred rock? Here we come upon ground peculiar to M. Pierotti, whose special qualification it is that he has enjoyed opportunities of subterranean exploration such as no Frank before him has obtained. There are two connected caverns below this particular rock, and the point which strikes us as most interesting in M. Pierotti’s view is, that these caverns serve equally in identifying the rock with Araunah’s threshing-floor, and with Solomon’s altar. On the northeast side of the rocky prominence, and at the upper part of it, there is an opening into a cistern or cavern, and beneath this cavern a second cistern is also found. What can this have to do with the threshing-floor of Araunah? The answer is, that an eastern “threshing-floor” is something very different from any thing which our western notions would lead us to expect. It is usually a rocky plot of ground, leveled so as to allow of the crops being spread out to the air and the sun, ready for the laborers. Within the inclosure, or very near it, are cisterns hewn in the rock, some for water, some for storing the grain. The cisterns for water are usually single; those for grain are usually double, having two chambers, one below the other, communicating “by a hole (about four feet wide) in the middle of the floor of the upper, which (that is, the upper chamber) itself opens to the threshing-floor by a sloping passage (about three and a half feet wide). The lower cavern is deeper and larger than the upper. I have met with very many of these cisterns during my frequent journeys in Palestine, where they are still applied to their ancient uses; they are especially common in those Arab villages which stand upon sites mentioned in the Bible, as at Beth-Shemesh; Ramah, the home of Samuel; at Gibeon, and Beth-Horon, and many other places.” The two connected cisterns of the rock in question are sufficient, in M. Pierotti’s judgment, to prove the existence of a threshing-floor at this spot in ancient times. What is there to mark it as the actual altar of Solomon’s Temple? The Levites flayed the victims on the north side of the altar. Hence there must have been a provision for drainage on the north side; and what more natural than that these ancient caverns should have been used for the receptacle of the blood? From these and other corroborative circumstances, such as the connection of these and other cisterns with the complicated system of vaults and cisterns, by which the whole Temple area seems to be honeycombed, M. Pierotti concludes that we have here the unaltered site of Solomon’s altar, and the actual rock on which David made his great sacrifice on “the threshing-floor of Araunah, the Jebusite.”

We cannot follow M. Pierotti through all the details of his long and often-interrupted subterranean explorations. It must suffice to say in general that his researches beneath the surface of the Temple area bring to light a series of arrangements for the supply of water, for carrying off the blood of sacrifices, and for disposing of the ashes of the victims, which corroborate in most striking manner all that we learn from Scripture and Jewish records of the extraordinary number of sacrifices prescribed in the Jewish law. If any one has felt bewildered by Dr. Colenso’s arithmetical puzzles about the sacrifices in the wilderness, we would advise him to study M. Pierotti’s account of the cisterns and conduits of Mount Moriah. It requires no small patience, text and plans in hand, to read and master the details which his long researches have doubtless made familiar to himself; but we have felt ourselves amply rewarded for the otherwise tedious pains, by the unexpected confirmation of the Scripture account of the Temple sacrifices, which thus comes to light out of these clefts of the rocks. It seems to us a not altogether fortuitous coincidence that such a confirmation should have been brought prominently before the public at a moment like the present; and, however in some particulars we may be disposed to think that M. Pierotti’s conclusions may have to be modified, whenever the investigations can be resumed at the point where he has left them, we can not but regard his actual tracing of the subterranean constructions of the Temple area, so far as he has carried it, as a priceless contribution to our realization of the sacred history.

The detailed account of these two cisterns is as follows: “On entering the northern one (twenty-nine and a half feet deep), I found the floor covered with wet mud to a depth of about one and a half feet. At the first glance, I saw an opening on the south side, three feet wide, and four and a half feet high, half built up with Arab masonry, and after clearing away some of the stones, earth, and mud that blocked it up, I peeped through it into another cistern in the same direction, thirty-two feet deep. These are both very ancient, and are wholly excavated in the rock; and I have no doubt that they belonged to the threshing-floor of Araunah, the Jebusite.” Thus, then, Araunah’s cisterns would receive the altar-drainage, but how would the cisterns themselves be cleared of accumulation? M. Pierotti finds also the passages or conduits by which the builders of the Temple carried away the drainage eastward to the boundary of the Temple rock. Not that he could trace them the whole way, but partially, and in the eastward direction, and then following that direction, he finds outside the eastern wall the openings of conduits which he infers to be the eastern outfalls of those he traced within. And what is also very much to the point, he finds subterranean conduits from known fountains, conveying water into this drainage system, so as to “flush the sewer,” and carry off the accumulations from the sacrificial altar. “The reader may imagine my joy at this result of my labors, so long denied, and so anxiously sought, and the gratitude I felt to God for granting me this boon of ascertaining the position of the altar of burnt-offerings, and the cisterns and conduits for blood belonging to the ancient Temple—an ample recompense for all my toil.”

Closely connected with this subject of Solomon’s enlargement of the city of David by the addition and fortification of Mount Moriah, is the subject of the aqueducts. The nature of the sites, equally of Zion and of Moriah, makes it evident that their water supply must necessarily have been artificial; and the immense demand for water, both for the numerous dwellers on Mount Moriah and for the purposes of the sanctuary, is equally manifest. Moreover, as a place of defense, in a land of little rain, an adequate water supply within the control of the inhabitants was a prime requisite. Accordingly, next to the Temple itself, the most astonishing works of antiquity connected with Jerusalem are its aqueducts, its reservoirs, and its conduits. It is not a little surprising that, while the works themselves are of no great size and importance, we are almost altogether destitute of historical notices of their construction and formation, and are left in a great measure to circumstantial and internal evidence with respect to their date and history. We are compelled to ascribe to them an antiquity at least equal to that of the Temple, because without them the Temple itself would have been useless. But whether Solomon was the original designer and builder of the whole system, or whether he did but extend, and perfect, and complete another series of aqueducts, is a question which, at present, we have no data to determine.

Jerusalem was, in the main, dependent for its water supply upon the pools at Etham, a place two hours and a half distant, in a southerly direction, with a slight inclination to the west, sixty stadia, or about seven miles off. Here again we come upon the traces of the magnificent Solomon. At Etham, not far from Bethlehem, was his summer palace, and we can not help feeling that to him is due the magnificent works which connect this distant valley with his mountain-temple on Moriah. Here, then, in this Etham valley, which slopes rapidly from west to east, are yet three connected reservoirs, fed partly by the rain-water which drains into them from the mountain-sides, and partly by a very copious spring. This fountain M. Pierotti carefully examined. It is now called the “Fons Signatus” by the Christians, because of its proximity to Solomon’s summer residence, and in allusion to his expression in the Canticles (iv, 2): “A garden inclosed is my sister, my spouse, a spring shut up, a fountain sealed,” which may possibly be connected with this very fountain. On descending into the cistern which it contains, M. Pierotti found “the lower part of the walls formed of the great blocks characteristic of the era of Solomon.” Visiting this fountain “at various seasons of the year,” he “found the fountain flowing most copiously in winter, but there is no deficiency in summer; so that if the reservoir and conduits were properly kept up, Jerusalem would never be in want of spring water, and the health and comfort of its inhabitants would be improved by the decrease of fevers and the increase of cleanliness.” In the walls of the three large reservoirs above mentioned, “and especially in their lower parts, very ancient Jewish work is seen, which may be assigned to the reign of Solomon; not the slightest trace of mortar is visible, and where the wall has been wantonly injured, pieces of iron appear with the holes in the stones for clamps.” Besides this fountain, two others, one in the neighborhood of Hebron, contribute their waters to this great conduit, which conveys the water a distance of seven miles and a half from the valley of Etham to Jerusalem, arriving there on the western side opposite to Zion. Here it divides into two portions, the one for the supply of the city of David, the other a magnificent work which doubles round the southern projection of Zion, ascends the valley between Zion and Moriah, and finally entering the Temple area supplies the prodigious number of cisterns which are excavated beneath its surface. “The whole course of this aqueduct still remains, and we can observe that a large portion of it is hewn in the rock, and covered up with large slabs; while in other parts it is formed of earthen pipes, eight inches in diameter, which are skillfully laid with strong cement between stonework in a proper shape, and protected above with solid masonry.” All this M. Pierotti ascribes to Solomon, and he quotes the Talmud as stating that the aqueduct which supplied Moriah delivered its waters at the “Brazen Sea,” and started from a spring twenty-three cubits above the level of the Temple pavement. This altitude he observes to agree exactly with the elevation of the springs at Etham. Besides this, there was an aqueduct supplying Mount Zion with water from a pool called the “Upper Pool,” in the hills on the western side of the city. This pool is so frequently mentioned by this title in the Old Testament, that we must not omit to mention it. It was a pool or reservoir just opposite to Mount Zion, and the aqueduct in question was most probably the work of Hezekiah about the time of the siege of Sennacherib. It was constructed with the view of draining away the waters of the pool, so as both to add to the supply of the city and reduce the supply of the besiegers. (See 2 Chron. xxxii, 3–5, 20.) All this serves to explain the otherwise remarkable fact that while in every siege of Jerusalem the besiegers suffered extremely from the want of water, the defenders were always amply supplied from the distant springs of Etham and Hebron and their neighborhood. From the ancient city of Solomon we must now pass on to the Jerusalem of the days of Herod, of Pontius Pilate, and of the crucifixion of our Lord. In spite of all its vicissitudes, the changes in its general outline are soon stated. The chief alterations, since the old days of Solomon and of Hezekiah, consist in the occupation of the hill (Bezetha) north of Moriah, as a part of the city; and in the second wall, originally constructed by Hezekiah before the siege of Sennacherib, from the northwest of Zion to the northwest of Moriah. At the time of our Lord, then, according to M. Pierotti, the city, roughly speaking, occupied three parts of the total oblong area

which we have endeavored to describe—that is, Mount Zion and Mount Moriah on the south, and Bezetha, or the “new city,” on the northeast. The northwestern corner, that north of Zion and outside the second wall, (that, namely, of Hezekiah’s building,) was still uninclosed by walls in the days of our Lord. Here, according to M. Pierotti, were gardens; here was Calvary; here the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea; and here consequently the scene of the crucifixion and the resurrection of Christ. It is to be observed that here is the traditional site of the Holy Sepulchre, and here the church which was built by the Empress Helena, to commemorate the event of the resurrection. M. Pierotti defends at great length and with much care the ancient opinion as to the scene of the resurrection. The traditional Via Dolorosa he utterly rejects, but as he argues the genuineness of the traditional site of the Holy Sepulchre with all his might, we think it only fair to give his opinions and their grounds at some length.

The arrest of our Lord of course took place in the garden of Gethsemane, on the eastern side of the city. The several trials before the Sanhedrim, the Roman governor, and before Herod, would all be held in the immediate vicinity of the sanctuary. That before the Sanhedrim in a building probably on the site of the present court of justice close to the Temple; that before Pilate in the Castle of Antonia at the northeast angle of Mount Moriah, and within the Temple area; that before Herod at his palace hard by, in the new town on Bezetha, just to the north of Antonia. Now, to bear out M. Pierotti’s view of the position of Calvary and the tomb, it must be remembered (as stated above) that the northwestern portion of the plateau, which the Jerusalem of later times has occupied, was still uninclosed. Two walls only defended it on this side as yet. The third was built by Herod Agrippa, and as his accession does not date before A. D. 42, this portion of the city was as yet open. From the northwest corner of Moriah, where, in the Castle of Antonia, the final sentence was given, it would be but a moderate distance to the present site of the church of the resurrection; and if M. Pierotti has traced the second wall correctly, as we think in the main he has, the distance of the traditional sepulchre is sufficient to comply with the legal requirement that all tombs should be at least fifty cubits from the outside of the wall. Now, the place of our Saviour’s passion, though outside of the city, is distinctly recorded to have been near to it. “This title then read many of the Jews; for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city.” (St. John xix, 20.) Moreover, it is probable that it would not be much beyond the required “distance, as the enraged populace would be likely to place the cross where those in the city could glut their eyes with the spectacle.” Now, the traditional position of the sepulchre agrees with all this, and M. Pierotti is at a loss to understand how the tradition itself should be regarded as untrustworthy unless it obviously disagrees with manifest probability. First. The true sepulchre could not be forgotten during the interval between the resurrection and the destruction of the city by Titus. Next. The sepulchre was not like a building which would be destroyed, but was an excavation in the living rock, and therefore would be most probably unaltered by the general destruction of the edifices of Jerusalem which accompanied and followed the Roman capture. Thirdly. The Christian residents in Jerusalem did not perish in the siege. Had it been so, there might have been some doubt as to the correctness of the original source of the testimony to the site. But the Christians escaped the general wreck. They retired to Pella before the siege began, carrying with them their knowledge of the sites connected with their religion; and since there was an unbroken succession of bishops of the Holy City from the days of James to those of Constantine, it is difficult to understand how or when a wrong site should have come to be accepted in lieu of the true one. It may be said that Titus forbade the rebuilding of Jerusalem, or the inhabiting of its area. But though this was carried out so far as regarded the reconstruction of a “city” and defenses, it was not carried out so as to exclude all dwellers from its site. This is certain, for when it was rebuilt by Hadrian, there were many inhabitants whom he drove away to make room for his Roman colony. Thus then, coupling these facts with the unbroken succession of bishops to the time of Hadrian, we can hardly understand how there should not have been a continuous succession of Christian residents, the descendants of the Pella refugees, who would preserve the memory of a spot so sacred as that of the tomb of Christ. In a word, it is far easier to believe than to reject the ancient tradition. It is altogether different with the street of the Via Dolorosa, for why should a Roman emperor rebuild a street exactly on the course of one destroyed seventy years before?

For these reasons M. Pierotti considers it antecedently probable that the tradition of the Holy Sepulchre would be faithfully preserved, and he regards it as encumbered by no inherent improbability. Moreover, the very form and structure of the tomb agree with the customary arrangements of tombs of that age and date. It has “two chambers; the eastern is called the Chapel of the Angel, the western is the actual tomb in which our Lord’s body was laid. . . . The upper part of the walls of the tomb is masonry, but the lower is formed by the native rock. I have been able to ascertain this for myself at two points, one at the small entrance-door, which is entirely hewn in the rock, and the other . . . where I was able to see the rock at a height of four feet above the ground. . . . It seems, then, impossible to deny that the tomb of Christ still exists upon its traditionary site, and that in all respects it resembles one of those sepulchral chambers, hewn in the rock, which can be seen at the present day in the neighborhood of Jerusalem; in which the corpse is extended upon a shelf, under an arched niche, excavated in one of the side-walls of the tomb, some little distance above the ground. . . . A strong proof . . . is afforded by the shape of the entrance, which has every appearance of the doorway of a sepulchral chamber, and closely corresponds with that leading to the tombs of the kings, which was closed with a large elliptical stone, still to be seen on the spot.”

As may be supposed, M. Pierotti has not much to say on behalf of the traditional site of Calvary itself, but we must congratulate him on what we conceive to be the very complete way in which he has handled the two great questions of the Holy Sepulchre and the Altar of Burnt-offering; and, although we can hardly think his observations completely conclusive, we are disposed to concur, in general, with his tracing of the wall of Hezekiah, and of his limitation of the third or Herodian wall to something very nearly coincident with the present northern wall, and with his complete rejection of the more extended line of other Jerusalem explorers.