Western Wall Tunnels

Today we started our morning with a guided tour of the Western Wall Tunnels. These tunnels are the excavation of the land underneath the Muslim Quarter of Old Jerusalem, following the course of the 2000+ year old retaining wall for the Temple Mount–which is also the same wall as the Western Wall.

The holiest place for place for the Jewish faith, our guide told us, is the rock upon which Abraham was stopped from sacrificing his son Isaac. Of course, this rock is the same rock that the Muslims revere as well, being the place from which Mohammed ascended to heaven during his Night Vision. This rock is under the Dome of the Rock, and Jews are most decidedly not allowed to worship or pray there.

The closest they can get is the Western Wall, and by excavating under the existing homes, the Jews can get closer to the rock.

Our cute tour guide. She is Israeli, but from her accent is originally from the States. Her voice reminded me of my friend Joey R, so my guess is our guide is originally from either Delaware or close by. 🙂

I especially loved the model at the beginning of the tour. It was super helpful to see the “original” contours of the land, and the way the huge Herodian-build platform modified the area. Herod was a very ambitious builder. It’s hard to imagine how these huge projects were done without the use of heavy machinery! (Or, you know, dynamite or something similar.)

Two thousand year old arch, plus Zee’s head

This synagogue is the closest synagogue to the Temple Mountain. It’s underground and quite beautiful.

Giant–and I do mean HUGE–stone as part of the original retaining wall.

Touching the Temple Mount Wall–so amazing. It is made of limestone, which is a little boring to look at through a hand lens (apologies to all my carbonate geology friends!), but you know that didn’t stop me from looking anyway.

The very traditional Herodian stones–they are finished in such a way as to have an indented border. They are placed stone-on-stone, without mortar, which made me think about the foundation of the Salt Lake Temple. 🙂

When the Romans burned the city of Jerusalem in AD 70, they threw down as many stones as they could. Which wasn’t very many, because they are really big and heavy.

The end of our tour was a little crazy–Gee’s wheelchair, which had navigated so well clear up until the end, and which the tour guides never said a word about, wouldn’t fit through the last bit of the tunnel. We tried everything we could. And Gee was at the front of the line of tour participants, in a VERY narrow tunnel. So that was fun. It was really hard on Gee, because they felt like they were in just totally in the way. The other tour participants, though, were so sweet and kind, and tried to make sure we all knew they were okay with everything. And I have to say I LOVED the way my other kiddos tried to help. Zee in particular, but each one of them did their very best to smooth the way. They are good kids!

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