West Bank

Today started with our pre-booked tour to the Western Wall tunnels (Kotel)- but this time it was a new tour - the Great Bridge Route.
This is a newly excavated section adjacent to the Western wall, revealing a large reception area that pilgrims from around the world during New Testament times were most likely received in before making their way up into the Temple itself. There are ceremonial mikveh and also beautiful examples of the pilasters that would have adorned the entire temple walls but of course were all destroyed in A.D. 70.
It was a grand and beautifully designed room.
The Bridge area is an extension of Wilson’s arch and bridge (the covered section at the far left that of the Western Wall Plaza) and the large reception room is immediately adjacent to this.
The audio visuals and diagrams were very helpful in piecing together more elements of the Temple that Jesus and his disciples would have known and the magnificence of this room is a further example of why the disciples would have exclaimed to Jesus

Mark 13:1
“And as he went out of the temple, one of his disciples saith unto him, Master, see what manner of stones and what buildings are here!”

This grand reception room would have been one of such buildings that they admired.

After finishing our tour we emerged into the bright sunlight and warmth of early summer. We made our way up into the Jewish quarter, stopping for a falafel at Loss’ favourite place just near the Burnt House.
We then continued up towards the Hurvah synagogue and called into the bookstore (Sharashim - The Biblical Store) just there on the right side at the open square. We saw that they sold quite a bit of the Ritmeyer’s materials. Loss wanted to buy some cards which we duly did and as we got chatting to the proprietor, we mentioned that we happened to know the Ritmeyers.
“Ah, so you must be Christadelphians ….. I also know the Billingtons who have been in here from time to time and ……”

As Loss had never been to the Burnt House (first time she came it was all booked out, last time it was closed) we went back to see if we could get in for a show.
We were ushered in almost immediately - and apart from an Orthodox couple who left a few minutes after it started, we were the only ones in there!
At the Burnt House we had purchased a ‘multi-pass’ which gave us access to a couple of places we had never visited (The Hurvah Synagogue and the Plugat Hakotel), as well as the Davidson Centre which we intended to visit anyway.
Upon leaving the Burnt House, we found the Plugat Hakotel just up and around the corner near the ‘Broad Wall’ and went in.
It was a surprisingly interesting audiovisual presentation about a feature of modern Israel of which we both had little knowledge - the Beitar movement and the Western Wall.
This was a movement founded by Ze’ev Jabotisnky in Poland and involved pushing back against the strict British sanctions against the Jews in the Old City and the Western wall. The blowing of the Shofar was illegal but the Beitar movement did this at the end of every Yom Kippur. This came to a head in 1938 and the museum is based around this incident. Check out https://www.itraveljerusalem.com/attraction/the…
if you want to follow this up further.

Next up was a bit of a wander through the Cardo after which we thought we would try our luck at gaining admission to the Tower Of David again, to finish the parts we hadn’t covered yesterday. Our friend from yesterday was not on duty and it took a little bit of discussion before we were eventually given fresh tickets to go back in. We spent another 2 hours covering all of the rest of what this excellent site now has to offer.
We climbed right to the top of the Phasael tower for magnificent views over all of Jerusalem.
It was now approaching closing time again and were just about to exit when we stumbled on the Kishle part of the site - the excavations of sections of Herod’s palace.
It was now well after closing time and we just kept getting deeper and deeper into the site. No one else was around and no one had asked us to leave.
We fully expected that the electronic security door through which we had entered the Kishle would be firmly shut by now. As I was climbing the stairs back up to it I was genuinely thinking ‘Well, we have an apple, 1 packet of chips and a bottle of water - that should keep us alive until opening time tomorrow morning’.
I must say I was genuinely / happily surprised when the door opened without issue and we continued on outside again.
Due to the recency of the renovations to this area, the Ramparts Walk also joined the stairs now in front of us as we headed towards the exit- so without anyone to advise us to the contrary off we went along the Southern Ramparts, picking out on the exterior the sections of the Herodian Palace we had seen on the interior in the Kishle. We kept heading south on the ramparts, snapped photos of the area we believe to be where Jesus was examined by Pilate at the ‘Gate of the Essenes’ (see Shimon Gibson - ‘The Final Days of Jesus’ pgs 81-106), continued around the corner to the Zion Gate where we exited the Ramparts at the Zion Gate

It was now a longish walk back to the apartment, but with three diversions. The first of these was a visit to the Nespresso shop in the Mamilla arcade to get one more sleeve of capsules (and enjoy a complimentary iced coffee at the same time). The second diversion was to ‘The Time Elevator’ which is now also in the Mamilla Centre - but they had just had their last session for today so we will hopefully go back sometime in the next few days. The third diversion was to view the so-called ‘Finger of Og’ which is an area of excavation in the Russian quarter. Here, a large pillar for Herod’s Temple was being quarried but was never finished as it had a fault in the stone. It is still a attached to bedrock and is interesting in its own right. Quaries in this higher part of Jerusalem meant that the stones / pillars could be rolled down to the Temple site itself (with engineering help of course).
The final diversion was to try to pick up some better quality groceries - Loss had found a likely Supermarket but didn’t realise it was in Mea Shearim - so off we went grocery shopping amongst all the Orthodox Jews that inhabit this part of Jerusalem, with wives shielding their husbands’ eyes from Loss dressed in her shorts and short sleeved top.

The groceries weren’t that great, but better than what we had available at the mini-market nearby so we walked back ‘home’ to start dinner at about 8.15pm.Les mer