Locating the Second Temple

By Tzippe Barrow

CBN News - Jerusalem Bureau

February 9, 2007

CBNNews.com - JERUSALEM - Hebrew University professor and archaeologist Joseph Patrich announced this week that he has calculated a more precise location of the Second Temple.

His research, soon to be published, shows that the Second Temple stood further to the southeast than had been thought.

Patrich based his conclusions by studying the location of a large underground cistern and comparing his calculations with passages in the Mishna.

Using an 1866 map of the 15 x 175-foot underground water source, drawn by Sir Charles Wilson, a British engineer, on behalf of the Palestine Exploration Fund, Patrich compared the cistern's statistics with the Mishna's description of daily rituals performed by the Temple priests.

He was particularly interested in the Mishna's description of purification rites and duties pertaining to the sacrifices.

Calculating the way in which a waterwheel drew water from the cistern for the large basin used for ritual washing, Patrich determined the basin's location.

Then, by locating the laver, waterwheel and altar, he concluded that the Second Temple stood further to the east and south.

This location shows that the rock over which the Islamic shrine, the Dome of the Rock, was built in the seventh century A.D., would have been outside the Temple itself.

Because the First and Second Temples stood on the Temple Mount, it is Judaism's holiest site.

The Wakf forbids Jews to pray on the Temple Mount. Instead, Jews pray at the Kotel below, an outer retaining wall of the Temple compound.

Jews believe that the rock under the Moslem shrine is the place where Abraham bound Isaac to offer to the Lord.

Islamic tradition says Mohammed descended to heaven from this same rock, so Moslems designate the Temple Mount as Islam's third holiest site, after Mecca and Medina.

Source: The Jerusalem Post

Translate Page