Transcription of the Video: City of a Great King: Part 1

The ancient land of Israel is a testimony and evidence of the greatness of what God did in that country, a testimony to the truth of the words that we find in the pages of the Bible. 

The city of Jerusalem, some would say the most exciting city anywhere in the world. It's been called the Holy City. It's been the called the center of the earth, a city whose origins date back 1,000 years before the time of Jesus when God gave this piece of land to King David, and he made it the religious and political capital of the people of Israel. 

Even today, Jerusalem is a vibrant, living city. It's a city you can walk in. It's a city you can experience. But sometimes because of all the people who live here and all the things that go on every day, it's very hard to see what it may have looked like during the times of the Bible. 

For that reason, a model of the city of Jerusalem from the time of Jesus has been constructed, using the resources of the Bible, the Mishna (or Mishnah), the Jewish writers (including Josephus), and the discoveries of the archaeologists. This model gives us insight into what Jerusalem looked like, particularly in the Common Era at the time of the Romans, at the time of Herod. And significantly, for us as Christians, at the time of Jesus.

In some of the next few minutes, we'd like to go through this model and begin to show you the life and death, Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus as it can be seen through the eyes of the Bible but particularly the Bible as it's set in this Holy City - the city of David.

By the time of Jesus, the city of Jerusalem had expanded greatly and was composed of several different sections or districts divided by walls or natural features. On the eastern ridge - David's Hill or the Ophel - was the section of the city known as David's City. In the Tyropoeon Valley just to the west of it was the lower city, home to most of the ordinary people at the time of Jesus. 

On the higher western hill was the district known as the Upper City. Here, wealthy Greeks and Romans lived. Here, Herod had his mansion. Just to the north, divided by a wall built by King Herod (sometimes known as the first wall) was the market section or the business district of the city. 

Outside the wall that surrounded the market section, a newer section of Jerusalem was being built. Here, wealthy Greek and Roman people built large villas, expanding the city further to the north. 

The oldest part of the city of Jerusalem in Jesus' time was the city of David. Located on a narrow ridge to the eastern side of the city, this small section enclosed approximately 10 acres. Not many people lived here. And yet, it was a very significant part of the city of Jerusalem. It had been, after all, the home, the capital of the great King David. It was also located immediately south of the Temple Mount. So anyone who chose to come up to the presence of God to go up to the Temple to worship passed through the city of their great king in order to do so.

The most heavily populated section of the city of Jerusalem was known as the lower city. This section of Jerusalem may have been home to as many as 30,000 to 40,000 people. Some scholars believe that Herod's Hippodrome, arena, horse racing track was located in the lower city.

On the southern end, the Pool of Siloam, the main water source for the people of Jerusalem. Water from the Spring of Gihon passed through the tunnel created at the time of King Hezekiah under David's city and entered the pool. 

The highest district of the city of Jerusalem was on the western hill, and it was called the Upper City. It was probably the most beautiful, the most impressive part of the city of Jerusalem. It was home to people who were wealthy - both Jews and Gentiles. Along its western side, Herod had built a magnificent palace, which overlooked the entire city of Jerusalem. 

The most dominant feature of the city of Jerusalem at the time of Jesus was this large Temple Mount here spread out at the highest point on the ridge we know as Mount Moriah. Originally, God had instructed David and then his son Solomon to build the Temple somewhere in this area. It became the central focus of the Jewish religious faith. When Herod came along and decided to reconstruct or remodel - however you want to refer to it (this Temple Mount) - Herod decided that the area that he had to work with wasn't large enough. And Herod expanded it to make it large enough for the volume of pilgrims and for the kinds of activities that he wanted to go on here. 

What you're seeing, then, is a reconstruction of that Temple Mount. What Herod did was to build a series of retaining walls - this one on the eastern side, that one there over on the western side - running along on both sides of that ridge, which you can imagine running down the middle beneath the floor.

On the northern end, he ended the Temple Mount with a retaining wall. And on the southern side, the most massive retaining wall of all, which may have been as high as two hundred plus feet at some points. He then filled that area in, level with his retaining wall. He built a floor, making the whole area flat then continued his wall higher until, at last, he had enclosed this entire area referred to as the Temple Mount. 

The size is staggering. It's just amazing how huge this area is. The Temple Mount itself was more than 1,200 feet long - four football fields plus in length. It was over 800 feet wide. Just an enormous enclosure that would hold literally hundreds of thousands of the pilgrims who came here for Passover and for Pentecost for the fall festivals, including Jesus and the disciples at certain times in history. It's made of that distinctive Herodian style of architecture of construction. 

Just look at the joint. It's almost-- if you take a credit card like this. Look at that. It literally will not go between there. 

There's a row here of stones that are absolutely the most immense building stones that have ever been found. Now, if you look up there, you'll see the height of that stone. What you're seeing here has been broken. It actually goes up all the way 10 feet, six inches high from this level to up under where the beams are there - 10 feet, six inches. They are between 11 and 14 feet thick and 45 feet long. This stone, if it's 11 feet thick would weigh 570 metric tons. We don't really even have equipment without special design today that can lift something that big. And look at the length. And that that was cut and brought to this place and put together so that there's absolutely no joint. It is just a perfect fit. And to take a 570 metric ton stone and put that in place, imagine the technology and the design that that took to be able to do that.

I suspect, in my opinion, that when the disciples were marveling at the stones, this is probably where they were. Somewhere in this area. Standing here. And these stones, do you remember how high they were from the bedrock level. These stones weren't like at ground level. These stones were 40, 50, 60 feet up in the wall. 

Look above your head. Look at the size of the stones in that arch. Some would think that in this Temple Mount behind this wall here, there's a mountain that comes up like this to a point. But there's a lot of open area where the platform stands on the mountain, and the mountain itself has been cut out to have tunnels and cisterns and holes and caves. Who knows what's behind here? 

Some think possibly the remains of Solomon's Temple, Ezra and Nehemiah's Temple - both of which have completely disappeared. Nothing has ever been found. Whatever happened to them, we don't know. Are they buried? We don't know. But imagine what an archaeologist would give to be able to take this fill out of here and to get into that mountain and to begin to discover what's there.

The other comment I would make - this is a typical entrance gate. So far, the gate's you've been seeing are all later. It's very hard to know what they look like. But this is a typical gate. This is only a single gate. Yesterday, we stood by the double gates. But all Turkish or Crusader. Look at the size of the gate that Herod made. 

He then added to that structure by building a colonnade around the outside. And you can see there across from us all of the marble columns that he constructed just inside the wall in order that this floor might be supported on one end by the columns and on the outside in by the wall itself, creating a huge open mall area.

On this southern end, he added even more glory. Above the colonnade, above this floor, Herod added more columns. And above the columns, a roof. And you can see the structure of the roof here with the tiled roof standing on those glorious marble columns with even a second story. And that colonnade on the southern end became known as the Royal Stoa or the Royal Porch - a place where the Bible tells us the early Christians met. Actually, the church, in the Book of Acts, met there for some time. Some would even say the story of Jesus and his discussion with the rabbis and the scribes at the time of his first Passover took place there.

One more feature that I would refer to on the outside of the platform itself would be this gate. Today, we know this particular area as the Beautiful Gate or more commonly called by pilgrims, the Golden Gate. It was the eastern entrance to the Temple Mount, the main ceremonial entrance. Now we need to remember that today's Beautiful Gate is actually above this one because the city has, of course, grown as cities will do. The destruction of the gate of Jesus' time is actually down underground. 

Now on this eastern side, there was a place where there was a lower platform like this and a main gate. And that's the gate the Bible calls the Golden Gate or the Beautiful Gate. You're actually sitting inside of the place where the gate is. So you're seeing the gate from inside. 

Notice that in typical fashion, this gate is a room. Remember how we walked through the gate chambers and I kept telling you it was a room? Here, you can see an example of what that room looked like. 

In the Christian tradition, this is a significant place for two reasons. One is that there's a story in the New Testament of the apostles Peter and John coming to this gate, and as they walked in this gate to got into the courts to pray, there was a man sitting in the gate begging. And he asked for money. And Peter and John said, "We don't have any money, but what we have, we give you in the name of Jesus of Nazareth. Be healed." And you remember, they healed the man and that would be right here at the gate called Beautiful.

We also know that around the outside of this court under the area called the colonnade, the buying and selling went on connected with what was needed for the Temple itself - buying and selling of sacrifices, the inspection of animals, and the changing of money. Now some say the buying and selling went on in the northern end near the gate where the sheep were brought in for slaughtering. Others say it was more on the southern end under the roof of the the Royal Stoa. What we do know is that immediately after his Triumphal Entry, Jesus entered these courts and drove out the buyers and sellers. 

The next thing that he did immediately was to drive out the buyers and sellers, implying at least, it seems to me in the text, that the place where the buying and selling went on was in proximity to the gate that he entered. Now we happen to know that the buying and selling went on primarily in this outer area called the court of the Gentiles. And I think that helps to understand something about what made Jesus so angry. Because you see, in the Jewish rabbi's tradition, they said, "You may buy and sell. You may sell religious things. You may buy and sell animals and incense and things to offer," and so on, "as long as we do it in the Gentile court." 

"Let's not do it in the court where the Jewish people go up to pray. Let's not interfere with the Jewish people praying. Let's do it in the Gentile court." Now I think that's the primary source of Jesus' anger. I don't think Jesus was angry because they were buying and selling. I think Jesus was angry because they had the nerve to suggest that it was okay to disrupt what went on among the Gentiles.

Let me show you why I think that. Here's the passage. "On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the Temple area. He began driving out those who were buying and selling. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the Temple courts. And as he taught them, he said, 'Is it not written, 'My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations.' And you have made it a den of robbers."(Mark 11:15-17)

And it seems to me that the focus of that passage was Jesus' reference, "My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations." In fact, the quotation that he's making there comes from Isaiah 56. And in that chapter, Isaiah says, "Foreigners who bind themselves to the Lord to serve him, to love the name of the Lord, and to worship him, these I will bring to my holy mountain and give them joy in my house of prayer. For my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations." (Isaiah 56:6-7)

So the focus would be that Jesus came here and said, "How do you dare disrupt these folks from their opportunity to worship God with that kind of attitude? It's the house of prayer for all nations, not just for Jews."

The second thing I'd like to note. It's important to me that we understand that the opposition to Jesus came not from the average person, probably not even from the Pharisee class of people with few exceptions. But it came primarily from the Temple authorities. This was an area under the control of the Sadducee group of people. They had been given their place of power at that point, supported by the Romans. And they were comfortable, in most senses, with life as it was. 

And Jesus coming here was very much a confrontation with the authority that ran this Temple. And coming to those columns and driving out the buyers and sellers and hitting at the very economic base of the Temple itself and of the Temple authorities would have been a direct challenge to those people. We know then it was the chief priest and his assistants who became responsible for plotting the death of Jesus.

Now between the court of the Gentiles and the next court is a small, low wall called Soreg or the Balustrade. The function of that wall was to create a clear division between those who were Gentile, those who were out here, and those who belonged to the covenant with God's people who could pass through the openings in the Balustrade, in the fence, and could climb the steps and go into the inner courts to participate in the Temple itself. 

It may very well be that when Paul writes that Jesus Christ has broken down the middle wall of partition between Jew and Gentile, he may have been referring to exactly this structure. 

So if we go from the Gentile court and we go past that Balustrade, past that fence and climb these steps, we enter into the next court. You'll notice that court has four smaller courts in the corner. The larger area just at the top of the steps is called the Court of the Women. That name did not refer to the fact that only women could go there. The name referred to the fact that that's as far as the women went in their participation in the Temple function. 

In that court, the main worship services of the Temple took place. And the priest would officiate in those worship services at the top of those semicircular steps that you see just on the far side of the women's court right in front of the gate. In the case of the early Christians, the Christians worshiped daily in the courts of the Temple, probably referring them to the Court of the Women. 

Now the four inner courts also had a special function. The one on the lower left is called the Nazarite Court. And that was a court set aside for people who were living examples of separation. All of us are supposed to be separated from sin. So in order to keep that separation theme alive, the Temple itself had a court for those who had taken a vow of separation.

On the right is the chamber of the Court of the Wood where wood was kept for the sacrificial fires and for producing the coals that were used on the incense offering. And the left side here is the Court of the Oils where various kinds of materials were kept for incense offerings and such. And on the right, the Court of the Lepers where lepers could go and participate in Temple function without mixing with the crowd because of their uncleanness. Or where they could go to find a priest who could pronounce them clean in the case of leprosy having been cured or healed.

To the west side of the Court of the Women, you see a beautiful gate called the Nicanor Gate. To the left of that gate, you see the ramp of what was the holy altar - that huge, sacrificial area just inside. And that court where that altar stands was known as the Court of the Israelites. And that would be the place to which Jewish men who were of age to be religiously responsible could go to participate in the sacrificial system that went on here. 

The altar was made of stones that had not been cut by tools according to God's commandments in the Book of Exodus. And all of the sacrificial offerings that went on here went on at the top of that altar daily - day and night - for all those who came to find fulfillment of God's promise that he would forgive sins.

Just beyond the Court of the Israelites is the Temple itself built of the best marble Herod could find of three different types of marble, built as one of the most glorious buildings probably in the whole world at the time, certainly in all of Herod's construction - that center of the faith of the Jewish people.

You notice in front of that Temple two large columns - actually half columns against the face of the Temple itself - made of a different colored marble. Those columns were a copy of the columns God had told Solomon to put in the Temple in the Old Testament. They were named Jachin and Boaz. It stood out in front of Solomon's Temple, and Herod replicated them with those marble half columns against the face of his Temple. 

It's very likely that in the Jewish understanding, they represented the feet of God. The Bible talks about God's throne being in Heaven and the earth being his footstool. And to their minds, those columns represented the place where his feet came down and actually rested on this earth. Because, after all, that Temple represented the place where God himself lived.

If you went in through that huge entrance, you would come to the first court or the first inner room called the Holy Place. In it, the table of showbread (or shewbread), the altar of incense where Zechariah had been told that the birth of his son would be the birth of the one who would prepare for the coming of the Messiah. And then, beyond the huge veil that hung down from the ceiling, the holiest place of all, the Holy of Holies, the place that represented the very presence of God.

And the symbol there, the profound symbol that at the moment of the death of Jesus, that veil separating that most inner court accessible only to the highest of the priests suddenly ripped or was torn. And now there was access to the very presence of God and making even more incredible our understanding as Christians the fact that God comes and lives inside of us. And we have become his Temple.