Jerusalem: Profile

Jerusalem has been called many things: the Golden City, the Holy City, the City of David, the City of Peace. Sadly, it is also a city of strife. To Jews, it is their national and spiritual epicenter: the incarnation of ancient Israel; the place where Abraham went to sacrifice Isaac; the site of David’s glory and Solomon’s Temple; the eternal capital of the Jewish people. To Christians, it is the city where Jesus spent his last days on earth: the site of the Last Supper, the Crucifixion and Resurrection. To Muslims, it is Al Quds (“The Holy”), the place where Mohammed is said to have ascended to heaven on his steed; indeed, it is Islam’s third-holiest city after Mecca and Medina.

Visiting Jerusalem

From its enduring power as a spiritual symbol, to the quality of the light, Jerusalem is unique. And today, more than 3,000 years after David made the city his capital, Jerusalem still has the ability to stir emotions and fire the imagination like no other city on earth. The marketplaces, shrines, ruins, hotels, temples, churches, and mosques are all readily accessible, and the city’s tourist board is more than willing to provide directions. Yet the soul of the city is more elusive. The rhythm of daily life here is governed by prayer, usually channeled through tightly knit religious communities, and the visitor who merely barters for trinkets in the Old City between hops to famous churches or museums is missing the source and substance of the place. However as the seat of government for the state and a major academic and high-tech center, Jerusalem has an important secular profile too.

The Israeli victory over Jordan in 1967 not only rolled away the wall but also fulfilled the 2,000-year-old Jewish dream of returning to the Western Wall and the Old City. Israel officially annexed the Old City and East Jerusalem in 1967, though the world still looks upon these areas as occupied territory. Ehud Barak, Israel’s former prime minister, proposed keeping the Jewish and Armenian Quarters and giving the Christian and Muslim Quarters to the Palestinians.

Jerusalem, David’s capital

In ancient times it was said that the world had 10 measures of beauty, of which nine belonged to Jerusalem. The city’s acclaim (or immodesty) only served to make it attractive to conquerors, and it has been the object of repeated siege and conquest. In part, this was due to its strategic situation on a vital trade route, at the crossroads between East and West. Ironically, however, it was later the very holiness of the city that inspired its would-be champions’ relentless ferocity.

Jerusalem first crops up in biblical narrative during Abraham’s migrations from Ur to Canaan. Here he was greeted warmly by Melchizedek, King of Salem, “Priest of the most high God.” The Israelites were already well-ensconced in the hills of Judea when David captured the city from the Jebusites around 1000 BC. Building an altar for the Ark of the Covenant on the crown of Mount Moriah, he made the city his capital, renaming it Jerusalem “the Dwelling of Peace.”

The 35 years under David’s rule, and the subsequent 40 under Solomon, brought splendor to the once modest fortress town. The site of David’s altar saw the rise of Solomon’s magnificent Temple, incorporating the much-sought-after cedar wood from Lebanon, copper from the mines at Timna, and a wide variety of rich metals and carved figures. The city was embellished with the wealth of an expansive empire, its walls reaching in an oblong shape to include David’s city on the slopes of Ha-Ofel and down to the pool of Silwan below.

Around 926 BC King Solomon died, and in the absence of his authority the kingdom was split in two by his successors. Jerusalem remained the capital of the southern Kingdom of Judah, as the following centuries saw the city and its kingdom succumb to the expanding control of the Assyrians. In 586 BC Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia plundered the city, sending its inhabitants into exile. They returned in 539 BC under the policy of the new king, Cyrus the Great of Persia, and set at once to the task of building a Second Temple.

Christianity takes over

The great Christianization of Jerusalem was inaugurated in the 4th century by the Byzantine Emperor Constantine; in the 7th century the city fell to Muslim rule, and in 1099 to the bloody grip of the Crusaders for some 80 years. It once more came into its own under the Ottoman Emperor Suleiman, who rebuilt its walls from 1537 to 1541. After his death, until modern times, it fell into decline.

To this day, Suleiman’s walls remain the most impressive monument to the city’s multi-layered history. From stone stairways at various points in its span you can mount the restored Ramparts Walk, which follows every circuit but that by the Temple Mount. A “green belt” of lawns surrounds much of the circumference, adding to the view. The seven gates of the city are a source of fascination in themselves. Just inside the Jaffa Gate, which serves as the main entrance to the Old City from West Jerusalem, is the famous Citadel, or Tower of David. In reality the structure doesn’t have much to do with David; it was built by Herod, who named its three towers after his wife Mariamne, his brother Phaesal, and his friend Hippicus, and was so impressive that Titus let it stand after burning the city. The Mamelukes and later Suleiman reinforced it, adding its minaret.

Exploring Jerusalem

Visitors should follow their instincts in exploring this city and take detours to the less obvious sites. For any guidebook to attempt to describe Jerusalem in a few chapters is rather like asking a rabbi to describe the entire Talmud while standing on one foot, for no amount of explanation can hope to capture the spirit of this complex place: the patina of gold on the Dome of the Rock, the view from the Mount of Olives at sunset, the shifting moods of its houses and hills, the thoughtfulness and pride in the eyes of its citizens, and the bizarre but beautiful echo of interwoven prayers – of all religions – that envelop the city walls, blowing in the wind, night and day. 

Greeks and Romans

Alexander the Great’s conquest of Jerusalem in 332 BC initiated a brief Hellenization of Jewish culture in the city, and then in 198 BC the Seleucids took control. Deprived of religious rights, the Maccabees spearheaded a Jewish uprising, leading to the re-consecration of the destroyed Temple in 165 BC.

Hasmonean rule gave way in 63 BC to Rome, with the conquering armies of the Roman general Pompey. In 40 BC the Roman Senate conferred the rule on Herod the Great and sent him to Judea; during his reign his psychopathic behavior was matched only by his extensive architectural endeavors, most notably the Second Temple which, according to the historian Josephus, was built by 10,000 workmen and 1,000 priests. It took eight years to complete the courtyard and another couple of years to finish the Temple itself.

When it was completed, it was widely regarded as one of the wonders of the world. Jerusalem was still a Jewish city under Roman rule when Jesus’s crucifixion was ordered by the procurator Pontius Pilate around AD 30.

The increasingly insensitive Roman administration was challenged by the Jewish Revolt of 66, crushed four years later by Titus, who razed Jerusalem and plundered the Second Temple. A second rebellion was instigated by Emperor Hadrian’s decree to lay the city out anew on a Roman plan and call it Aelia Capitolina; but the Bar-Kochba revolt of 132 was stamped out, and in 135 Hadrian initiated the reconstruction of the city, banning any Jew from entering its boundaries.