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| Illustrated reconstruction of Shiloah Pool in the time of Jesus |
In recent years, excavations at the City of David have unearthed a great deal of thrilling evidence related to stories from the Biblical era, the Roman era, the time of Jesus and the Byzantine era. A new tour itinerary offers visitors close-hand acquaintance with the story of Jesus healing a blind man at Shiloah Pool (John 9:7), with the Shiloah church established by Byzantine empress Eudocia, with the impressive findings from the reign of Emperor Heraclius - who returned the True Cross to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.
The tour begins at Shiloah Pool, which lies at the southern end of the City of David hill. The hills that lie on both our sides form a deep valley whose ancient name is the Tyropoeon Valley, meaning valley of the cheese-makers in Greek. The lower part of this valley was suited for storing water. A large pool was thus constructed on this spot to store water from the Gihon Spring, as well as rainwater drained from the surrounding hills. It is probably here where King Hezekiah built the pool to which the waters of the Gihon flowed through the famous tunnel that was carved on the eve of the Assyrian siege. The remains of these ancient pools were cleared by the builders of the magnificent pool that was built anew on this site by King Herod in the time of Jesus.
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"Bulla" (minting stamp) from the 8th century BC bearing the name Bethlehem, the city where King David and Jesus were born.
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At the entrance to the site, we see steps leading to a large square pool (which, in the period of the Second Temple, extended over 3,000 sq. meters or 0.75 acres), only part of which has been excavated.
This is the celebrated pool which was the site of one the two miracles carried out by Jesus in Jer
usalem. Shiloah Pool is mentioned in the New Testament (John 9:7) when Jesus blessed a blind man and told him to wash in the pool of Shiloah and he was healed from his blindness. The second miracle carried out by Jesus in Jerusalem was the healing of a lame man at the pool of Bethesda (John 5 1-13). Thus, according to the New Testament, Jesus carried out just two miracles in the city of Jerusalem itself. It is thrilling to see the connection between the conquest of Jerusalem by King David and the entrance of Jesus, a descendant of the House of David, one thousand years later.
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Illustrated reconstruction of the Shiloah church built by Empress Eudocia
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Here, at Shiloah Pool, we remember the words spoken by the King of the Jebusite city to the young King David as he prepared to conquer the city - "Except thou take away the blind and the lame, thou shalt not come in hither thinking David cannot come in hither" (Samuel II, 5:6). David had to pave the way to conquering the city by removing the blind and the lame by force. 1,000 years later, Jesus, a descendant of the House of David, would enter Jerusalem and encounter the same problem faced by his ancestor. But Jesus resolved the problem in his own special way - through kindness and mercy, healing and recovery.
Close to Shiloah Pool, Frederick Bliss and Archibald Dickey, of the Palestine Exploration Fund,
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Remains of the Byzantine Shiloah Pool at the City of David
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uncovered in the 1890s the ruins of the Shiloah church built by Empress Eudocia in the middle of the fifth century AD. Due to the sacred nature and importance of the pool to Christian pilgrims, Empress Eudocia built a large church which extended over the pool and encompassed it on all sides.
During the period of the Second Temple the waters of Shiloah Pool were used in Temple services. During Simhat bet hashoeva, the water drawing ceremony celebrated during the festival of Succoth, "waters were drawn with joy from the well of salvation." In an impressive ceremony, the high priests descended from the Temple, with a fanfare of trumpets, to the pool and re-ascended to pour the water over the altar. From the pool, well-carved stone steps lead westward toward the Temple Mount. The route passes along a beautifully built stepped street that dates from the second Temple period. The well-preserved paving testifies to a high standard of construction.
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The Herodian drainage tunne
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The route continues northward crossing the ancient Tyropoeon Valley through an impressive drainage tunnel with a ceiling of stone slabs and walls of carved stone rising 2.5 meters high most of the way. The drainage tunnel, which was built during the reign of King Herod, leads northward to the Givati parking lot site, which was excavated entirely in the Tyropoeon Valley. Here, next to the entrance to the City of David National Park, spectacular remains were found from the Byzantine era, including a large public edifice where an impressive hoard of Byzantine coins was found, under one of its walls, during an excavation a few years ago, consisting of 264 coins in pure gold. All the coins bear the portrait of Emperor Heraclius and were minted during his rule over the Byzantine empire, at the beginning of the 7th century AD. In 614 AD, Sassanid Persians invaded the Holy land from the east, killing thousands of Christian clergy and nuns and causing wide-scale destruction (according to contemporary Christian sources).
The coins which commemorate Heraclius tell a moving story. The Sassanid Persians stormed the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and returned home with the True Cross which, according to Christian tradition, was found by Queen Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, at the beginning of the fourth century AD. Heraclius did not rest until, after fifteen years of preparations and fighting, he defeated the Sassanids in 629 and returned the True Cross to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. The magnificent hoard was undoubtedly of huge importance to the Byzantine kingdom and it apparently remained hidden at the site when the man who hid them was murdered or killed in the fighting.
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| Portrait of Emperor Heraclius Hoard of Byzantine gold coins (610-613 AD) |
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All images and text courtesy of Shahar Shilo
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After the Givati parking lot, we continue underground, through the tunnel, towards the Temple Mount and the Western Wall. The exit from the tunnel leads visitors to the foot of the Western Wall which rises high above the heads of the visitors and where remains can be seen of the enormous arch (Robinson's Arch) which enabled pilgrims to enter the Temple Mount complex. At the foot of the arch lie store entrances from the time of the Second Temple, where pilgrims would purchase sacrificial animals and exchange money before entering the Temple itself. The New Testament recounts that Jesus scolded the money changers and overturned their tables because they engaged in commerce and thieving next to the Temple. The ruins of these stores and the street itself are moving reminders of this important story.
