^LIBRARY 
 
 's- &
 
 I"" 7 ** 
 
 r^- CC 

 
 OR 
 
 HISTORICAL AND TOPOGRAPHICAL NOTICES 
 
 OF 
 
 JERUSALEM; 
 
 WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF ITS ANTIQUITIES AND OF ITS 
 PRESENT CONDITION. 
 
 BY THE 
 
 KEY. GEOKGE WILLIAMS, M,A. 
 
 FELLOW OF KINO'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE ; 
 
 AND LATE CHAPLAIN TO BISHOP ALEXANDER, 
 
 AT JERUSALEM. 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 
 FROM SKETCHES BY THE REV. W. F. WITTS, B.A., 
 
 FELLOW OF KING'S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
 
 View of the Dead Sea from the W. of Ht. of Olives. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 JOHN W. PARKER, WEST STRAND. 
 CAMBRIDGE : T. STEVENSON. 
 
 M.DCCC.XLV.
 
 09 
 W72h 
 
 TO THE 
 
 PROVOSTS, FELLOWS, AND SCHOLARS 
 
 TWO ROYAL AND RELIGIOUS FOUNDATIONS 
 
 KING HENRY THE SIXTH: 
 
 AS A TRIBUTE OF GRATITUDE 
 
 FOR BENEFITS RECEIVED IN THOSE COLLEGES, 
 
 THIS VOLUME IS RESPECTFULLY 
 
 DEDICATED. 
 
 a 2 
 
 -1 rrx^/
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 To attempt a full and connected narrative of the various 
 events which have befallen the most ancient City of the world 
 from its foundation to the present day, would require volumes, 
 and was not contemplated in the present work ; the design 
 of which is, simply to gather together into one view such 
 notices of Jerusalem as are not easily within the reach of the 
 English reader. I have already far exceeded the limits 
 which I originally proposed to myself. In the prosecution of 
 my main object, it was necessary to avoid extraneous discus- 
 sions, however strong the temptation to enter on them, and 
 to pass very lightly over much ground on which I would fain 
 have lingered. Where I have entered into details in the 
 historical part, I had generally some definite purpose in view, 
 though it may not always be apparent to the reader, and did 
 not seem necessary or desirable to declare it. The topography 
 and antiquities were kept always in view in composing the 
 historical chapters; and I was careful to note all the passages 
 which would throw light on what I hope may prove the most 
 valuable and successful part of my undertaking. This will 
 explain the minute detail of the progress of the siege under 
 Titus, and again, by the Crusaders. The earlier part of the 
 Christian period has been fully dwelt on, with a view to re- 
 move the common, but most erroneous supposition, that the 
 ancient records of the Church of JElia have hopelessly perished, 
 and that Eusebius is its earliest historian, instead of a mere 
 transcriber of contemporaneous testimony. Where later writers
 
 VI PREFACE. 
 
 have been full and explicit it was unnecessary to enlarge ; and 
 I have satisfied myself with a bare outline, leaving it to be 
 filled up from other quarters, to which I have referred. 
 
 It was impossible to write on the subject of Jerusalem 
 without recording, at almost every page, the remarkable fulfil- 
 ment of numerous prophecies, relating to that city and its 
 inhabitants; but as it would have been no kindness to the 
 reader to deprive him of the satisfaction of gathering flowers 
 in this interesting and important field, with his own hand, and 
 the subject was foreign to my purpose, I have passed them in 
 silence. 
 
 And now, should it be asked, what occasion there was to 
 inflict upon the patient public another volume, on a subject 
 with which the press has been teeming for several seasons, I 
 confess that it requires explanation, and I will offer the best 
 apology I can. A work of much research has now been for 
 some years before the world, one unavowed but ill-disguised 
 object of which is to bring discredit on the early local tra- 
 ditions of Palestine, so as ultimately to involve the venerable 
 Fathers of the Church in the charge of dishonesty or unac- 
 countable ignorance. The affectation of candour and impar- 
 tiality with which the inquiry into the value of ecclesiastical 
 traditions is there conducted, has given an additional weight 
 to the observations in the minds of those who have neither 
 the means nor the opportunity of testing their accuracy for 
 themselves ; so that much higher value has been set upon the 
 arguments than they deserved. I do not hesitate to declare 
 that one object of the present volume is to expose the fallacy 
 of many conclusions, argued out very often on insufficient 
 premises, or in contravention of historical or topographical 
 phenomena, by the author of the "Biblical Researches in
 
 PREFACE. Vll 
 
 Palestine," in the hope that the consideration of facts, which 
 he has either overlooked or neglected, may prove, what some 
 might imagine requires no demonstration, that the evidence 
 of a partial witness of the nineteenth century is insufficient 
 against the voice of catholic antiquity. My motive I need not 
 be ashamed to avow. 
 
 Whatever opinion may be entertained of the ecclesiastical 
 writers of the fourth century by that author, or others, the 
 slightest knowledge of the formularies of the Church of Eng- 
 land, or of the writings of her more eminent divines, convinc- 
 ingly proves, that they who remodelled our Church in the 
 sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, proposed to themselves 
 for a pattern of pure and primitive Christianity that very age 
 which is now represented as sunk in the lowest depth of 
 superstition or vice; and, consequently, one who values our 
 existing institutions must needs feel that the imputation deeply 
 affects the character of those great men, if not for honesty, 
 at least for sound judgment and discretion, or he must feel 
 too deeply indebted to the Nicene age to hear its most dis- 
 tinguished doctors calumniated, and feel no interest in the 
 quarrel. 
 
 A longer residence in Jerusalem than falls to the lot of 
 common travellers, the diligent investigation of its antiquities 
 on the spot, with the use of a carefully chosen library, have at 
 least afforded me opportunities of arriving at a right decision 
 on many points ; and may, I trust, excuse my presumption in 
 pleading for a hearing in behalf of antiquity, whose cause 
 seems to have been entirely given up before the champion 
 of novelty, whom many subsequent travellers, without inves- 
 tigating for themselves, have followed with marvellous sub- 
 serviency. And it may add somewhat to the value of my
 
 Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 remarks to acknowledge that several of his theories are so 
 very plausible, and appear at first sight to be so strongly 
 supported, that I was myself for some time inclined to adopt 
 many of them, until further consideration and study con- 
 vinced me that they were wholly untenable. I may specify 
 particularly the interesting subject of the Temple-area and 
 the Antonia, as points on which I expected that I should 
 wholly coincide with his views ; but on which I venture to 
 hope that he himself will acknowledge he was mistaken. 
 For as no ecclesiastical tradition is involved in this question, 
 there can be no temptation to either party to persist in a 
 mistake ; inasmuch as the argument for or against their 
 general credibility cannot be at all affected by the conces- 
 sion ; nor will any reasonable person imagine that a writer's 
 credit is injured by the demonstration or acknowledgment 
 of error on a point of so much obscurity. 
 
 I learn from a number of a magazine, of which Dr Ko- 
 binson is editor, that so long ago as November 1843, he had 
 received instructions from various quarters " that some of his 
 statements and positions in respect to the topography of Jeru- 
 salem, and some other places, were likely to be assailed, in 
 carrying on a crusade in favour of the reputed site of the 
 Holy Sepulchre." Who may be the " wandering hermit," 
 prepared to " wake the storm of war' 1 in this good cause, I 
 cannot imagine, but I sincerely hope that I may not be 
 interfering with the task of one better qualified than myself 
 to perform it. My only desire is to act as a humble " man- 
 at-arms" in the attempt " to tear from the unbelievers the 
 precious Tomb of the Captain of our Salvation ;" and in com- 
 mon with all engaged in the " Holy War," I must feel very 
 grateful to a generous adversary for placing me under such
 
 PREFACE. IX 
 
 a glorious banner, thereby, I trust unwittingly, arraying him- 
 self with the disciples of the Koran and the Crescent, the 
 avowed enemies not of the Sepulchre alone, but of the Holy 
 Church Catholic. 
 
 Should it be thought that the constant reference to one 
 author has invested the controversy with a private and per- 
 sonal character, I can truly say that the result was felt to be 
 as inevitable as it is undesirable. The " Biblical Researches" 
 have obtained, and on many accounts have deserved, so much 
 celebrity in England and in Germany, and so much attention 
 has been devoted by the writer to this particular subject, 
 that he stands forth necessarily in the first ranks as Chief- 
 tain of the wwbelieving array, and as such must bear the 
 brunt of the battle. And may I be permitted to express 
 a hope, that while fighting under our respective colours, we 
 shall all remember, that the only cause worth contending 
 for is Truth, and that we may imitate not only the zeal 
 but the courtesy of Christian and Saracenic warfare ? 
 
 It remains only that I express my obligations to those 
 who have in any way aided me in my undertaking. The 
 services of some have been acknowledged in the notes, but 
 I must here mention two dear friends, my companions in 
 Jerusalem, and fellow-travellers at different times in Palestine, 
 The Reverend W. F. Witts of my own College, to whom I 
 am indebted for the illustrations, and who has further under- 
 taken the labour of editorship during my absence from Eng- 
 land, and the Reverend J. Rowlands of Queens' College, in 
 the same University, whose early suggestions at Jerusalem 
 have exercised a greater influence over this work than either
 
 X PREFACE. 
 
 of us are aware of. But for the solicitation of the former 
 the work would not have been undertaken ; the intelligent 
 sympathy and diligent research of the latter have done much 
 towards qualifying me to perform it. 
 
 Lastly, I would tender my thanks to his Excellency the 
 Director of the Imperial Library at St Petersburg, and to 
 two of the Librarians, for their great courtesy to a stranger. 
 The attentions of Dr Gottwald and Dr Dorn, to whose kind- 
 ness I was indebted for materials for my work at a distance 
 from my own library, will not readily be forgotten. May 
 their interest in Asiatic research derive some gratification 
 from this volume, as a small compensation for the trouble 
 which it has occasioned them. 
 
 ST PETERSBURG, 
 
 j 
 
 Feast of the Epiphany, 1845.
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS, 
 
 PART I. 
 
 HISTORY. 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 I. Jerusalem from its Foundation to its Destruction by 
 
 Nebuchadnezzar 1 48 
 
 II. From the Restoration under Cyrus, to its Destruction 
 
 by Titus 49120 
 
 III. From the Rebuilding of " JElist Capitolina," under 
 
 Adrian, to its Destruction by Chosroes 121 195 
 
 IV. Jerusalem under the Christian and Mahommedan Do- 
 
 mination... 196249 
 
 PART II. 
 TOPOGRAPHY, ANTIQUITIES, &c. 
 
 I. Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and Dr Robinson's 
 
 Topography 253314 
 
 II. The Jewish Temple, and the Fortress Antonia 315 362 
 
 III. Antiquities without the City 363 428 
 
 IV. Modem Jerusalem, and its Inhabitants 429 486
 
 EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 
 
 As the illustrations have been introduced with a view to the topography, 
 it has been thought that the following remarks may add to their value. By 
 right and left in the description, the reader is to understand that position with 
 reference to himself. 
 
 1. FRONTISPIECE. 
 JERUSALEM, FROM THE MOUNT OF OLIVES. 
 
 The spectator is looking west, over the deep Valley of Jehoshaphat, or the 
 Valley of the Kedron : the pile of buildings on the left, outside the walls, is 
 now known as Neby Daoud ; it comprehends the Tomb of David and the Co3- 
 naculum, (see p. 417), and is situated on the part of Mount Zion now excluded 
 from the city, (p. 415). On the right, within the city, the lofty dome marks the 
 Armenian Convent of St James, (p. 455). Beneath this, is a long building, 
 with a dome, this is the Church of the Purification, built by Justinian, (p. 331), 
 afterwards converted into the Mosk el-Aksa, (p. 334). The dark ridge sloping 
 down to the left is Ophel, (p. 330). Beneath the church is seen the top of 
 the Pillar of Absalom, standing in the valley, (p. 374). The three towers to 
 the right of the Armenian Convent compose the modern citadel, and the one 
 distinguished by the flag (which only flies on Fridays) is the Castle of David, 
 or the Tower of the Pisans, the probable site of the ancient Hippie tower, (p. 105). 
 The Mosk of Omar, with its courts, cannot be mistaken, (p. 205). Beneath 
 this, in the wall, is the Golden Gate, (p. 328). The two domes, above this, 
 belong to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre ; the hinder one covers the Sacred 
 Cave itself, (p. 298), the other belongs to the Greek Church, (p. 299). To the 
 extreme right of the view is the Gate of St Stephen, (p. 364). 
 
 2. JERUSALEM, FROM THE NORTH. 
 
 On the extreme left is the Mount of Olives, once crowned by the Church 
 of the Ascension, (p. 365). Below this the Valley of the Kedron, from which 
 rises Bezetha, obscuring the Mosk of Omar, whose dome is visible above it, 
 (p. 282). Over the mosk is seen the Hill of Evil Council, (p. 410). To the 
 right of Bezetha the ridge of Acra is visible crossed by the city walls, (p. 283). 
 The cupola of the Armenian Convent, the two domes of the Church of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, and the Castle of David will be easily found by consulting the 
 description of the frontispiece. The road to the city passes the Tombs of 
 the Kings (p. 424), through an extensive olive-grove.
 
 XIV DESCRIPTION OF THE PLATES. 
 
 3. WEST VIEW OF MOUNT ZION. 
 
 This is taken from the head of the Valley of Hinnom (406, 431 ), the course 
 of which is seen, bending to the right, round Mount Zion, part of which is 
 without the city-walls, (p. 218). Without the walls, on the right, is seen the 
 Tomb of David, &c. (p. 415), and within the large Armenian Convent of St 
 James, (p. 455), with its garden in front ; to the left of which is the fortress, with 
 the Hippie Tower, &c. (pp. 105, 217, 225), and below is the Jaffa Gate. 
 
 4. ENTRANCE TO THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE. 
 
 The tower on the left is an ancient belfry; it has suffered severely from 
 earthquakes at various times. The date of this and of the windows and doors is 
 disputed (2989). 
 
 5. ACRA, BEZETHA, AND THE SCOPUS. 
 
 The view looks east, along the northern line of wall, the scene of the opera- 
 tions of the Crusaders and of Saladin, (p. 217). It is taken from the north-west 
 angle of the present walls, within which are the remains of Tancred's Tower, 
 (p. 217). It looks over the Tyropaeon, (p. 273), to the hill Acra, (p. 277), and 
 shews on the left an ancient stone quarry, called the Cave of Jeremiah, probably 
 included in the second wall of Josephus, (p. 283). Beyond this is seen another 
 hill, with olive-trees. This is Bezetha, (p. 282), and the high ground behind is 
 the Scopus where Titus first encamped, (p. 110). 
 
 6. THE DAMASCUS GATE. 
 
 This gate, which stands at the head of the Valley of the Tyropaeon, in the 
 north wall, probably occupies the site of the Gate of Ephraim, (p. 391). It was 
 called the St Stephen's Gate, in the time of the Crusaders, (p. 364). It is 
 now known as Bab-es-Sham (the Damascus Gate), or Bab-el-Amud (the Gate 
 of the Column). It is the handsomest gate now existing, and the new Pashas 
 make their entrance through it. It is sometimes called, by the Moslems, 
 "The Gate of Power." Immediately within this gate, on either hand, are two 
 ruined chambers of cyclopean architecture, of an unknown date, (p. 262). The 
 two domes of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre are seen over the wall. 
 
 7. CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE FROM NORTH OF 
 MOUNT ZION. 
 
 This is looking north, from the terrace of her Britannic Majesty's consul, 
 situated on the steep brow of Mount Zion. The rums of the extensive Hospital 
 of the Knights of St John (p. 431) occupy the open space before the front of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, whose features may be recognized by the two domes and tower. 
 To the right you look down upon the principal street in Jerusalem, usually 
 known as " Christian Street," or " Patriarch Street," from which is the principal 
 entrance to the court of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
 
 DESCRIPTION OF THE PLATES. XV 
 
 8. INTERIOR OF THE CAVE OF ST JAMES. 
 
 This ancient tomb is situated in the Valley of Jehoshaphat, near the Pillar 
 of Absalom, (p. 373), and is entirely excavated in the rock. On the opposite 
 side of the valley is shewn the south-east angle of what is commonly called the 
 Temple Enclosure, i. e. the wall of the present haram, or court of the Mosk 
 of Omar. The cyclopean stones may possibly have belonged to an angle in the 
 first wall of Josephus, and be of Jewish masonry, (p. 330). 
 
 9. THE MOUNT OF OLIVES, 
 
 The view is taken from the terrace of the house occupied by the author during 
 his sojourn at Jerusalem, and afterwards tenanted by his Prussian Majesty's 
 consul. It should be mentioned, that in this view only artistic liberties have been 
 taken with the foreground, but the representation of Mount Olivet is very faith- 
 ful. Its three summits, the centre of which was occupied by the Church of the 
 Ascension, (p. 365), now by a mosk and small village, may be clearly dis- 
 tinguished. 
 
 10. TOWER OF DAVID AND RESIDENCE OF THE ANGLICAN 
 BISHOP, &c. 
 
 The artist is standing immediately within the Jaffa Gate, (p. 430), with the 
 Hippie Tower, now the Castle of David, on his right. To the left is the house 
 occupied by Bishop Alexander, (1843). Through the opening, formed by the 
 street which leads down to the Bazaars and the Mosk of Omar (p. 268), is seen 
 the summit of the Mount of Olives. 
 
 11. BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 This view is supposed to be taken from a point in the air directly above the 
 Hill of Evil Council, to the south of the city. By comparing it with the Map 
 of Jerusalem, and the different views, it will not be difficult to identify each 
 particular object and feature.
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 PAGE LINE FOR READ 
 
 5 note 4, dele "not." 
 
 8 15 mainly vainly. 
 
 11 note 5, V 
 and . .uj^/yj 
 
 97 26 Prophyry Porphyry. 
 
 125 note 1 and 2, Valerius Valesius. 
 
 158 16 county country. 
 
 266 10 rubbrish rubbish. 
 
 275 note 7, Eyout Eyoub.
 
 Pillar of Absalom. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE early history of that city which was destined to 
 occupy so conspicuous a place in the annals of the world, is 
 so involved in obscurity, owing to the remote antiquity to 
 which it belongs, that not only is nothing certain known of 
 its origin, but writers are not agreed as to where it is first 
 mentioned in Holy Scripture. The testimony of Josephus, 
 representing as is probable the tradition of the Jewish church, 
 has not been enough to satisfy either ancients or moderns 
 that the Salem of Melchizedek is identical with the Jerusa- 
 lem of which David was the second founder ; but as this 
 opinion rests on very high authority 1 , and has nothing in 
 
 1 Lightfoot* quotes the Rabbles for 
 this tradition (Chorograph. Cent. cap. 
 1 
 
 xxi.). St Jerome speaks of "Josephus 
 et noslri omnes" of whom he mentions
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 it inconsistent with the sacred narrative, we may be allowed 
 to adopt a theory which will give additional interest to the 
 Holy City, by identifying the scene of the offering of the 
 king of Salem with that of the sacramental institution of 
 the Prince of Peace which was therein typified. 
 
 The Jewish historian without any hesitation ascribes its 
 foundation to Melchizedek, who, he says, . " was there the 
 first priest of God, and first built a temple there 1 ;" and if 
 this mysterious personage were identical with Shem, the son 
 of Noah, as ancient tradition with singular consistency has 
 delivered 2 , then may the Holy City boast an antiquity greater 
 than any city in the world, and a founder every way worthy 
 of its future celebrity. 
 
 But whatever uncertainty may attach to these questions, 
 there can be little doubt that the spot selected by God for 
 the offering up of Isaac " in the land of Moriah," was one 
 
 Hippolytus, Irenjeus, Eusebius of Cae- 
 sarea and Emesa, Apollinarius, and 
 Eustathius, as favouring this opinion, 
 which he, however, did not adopt. He 
 places the Salem of Melchizedek near 
 Scythopolis, and identifies it with that 
 in Gen. xxxiii. 18 (the same probably 
 as in John iii. 23), where he says that 
 extensive ruins of the palace of Mel- 
 chizedek were shewn in his day, Epist. 
 Crit. Vol. ii. pp. 571, 573, B. Ed. 
 This father was mostly followed by the 
 writers of the middle ages. Of modern 
 writers, Wells, Bossuet, Hales, Gese- 
 nius, Raumer, and others, follow Jose- 
 phun ; the learned Reland, and, after 
 him, Rosenmuller, Bleek, and others, 
 follow St Jerome. A living French 
 author flatters himself that he has set 
 the question at rest for ever, in two 
 words. He takes for granted that the 
 
 Salem of Melchizedek was the "city 
 of Shechem," Gen. xxxiii. 18; and then 
 shews that this must have been north 
 of Jerusalem, which, however, he allows 
 was also originally called Salem. His- 
 loire de Jerusalem, par M. Poujoulat, 
 Vol. i. p. 53. 
 
 1 Jewish War, B.vi. cap. x. comp. 
 Antiquities i. x. 2. 
 
 2 Lightfoot says that "all acknow- 
 ledge Melchizedek for Shem." Cho- 
 rograph. Decad. cap. x. sect. i. He 
 adduces the Chaldeans, Jews, and many 
 Christians (Miscell. xxviii.), and com- 
 putes that Shem lived 75 years after 
 Abraham came into Canaan. (Chron. 
 in (Jen. xv.). St Jerome mentions this 
 tradition, and shews from the Bible 
 chronology that Shem outlived Abra- 
 ham 35 years, (Epist. Crit. Vol. 11. 
 p. 673. B. Ed.)
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 3 
 
 of the hills of Jerusalem, where, in this type, designed not 
 only for the trial of his faith, but for the confirmation of 
 his hope, transacted amid the scenes thereafter to be conse- 
 crated by the expiatory sacrifice of the Son of God, the 
 patriarch Abraham in an especial manner " rejoiced to see 
 the day of Christ, and he saw it, and was glad 3 ." 
 
 It is interesting, whatever be the value of the tradition, 
 to find a record of these events still existing in Jerusalem ; 
 to be shewn the tomb of Melchizedek, the place where 
 Abraham offered up Isaac, and the tree which occupies the 
 spot where the ram was caught in a thicket by its horns : it 
 serves at least to bring these transactions most vividly before 
 the mind, and to give a vitality to the Sacred History, which 
 will incline those who profit by it more readily to pardon the 
 credulity of the Greeks, in whose chapel of the Forerunner the 
 venerable tomb is preserved, as is the place of sacrifice in the 
 monastery of Abraham, on the hill of Calvary ; or the super- 
 stition of the Copts, who regard with veneration a tree, as- 
 sociated in their minds with an event of Scripture interest, 
 which they reckon among the few treasures of their convent. 
 
 We have no further mention of Jerusalem until after an 
 interval of more than five centuries, when, the iniquity of 
 the Amorites being full, and the time appointed for the 
 fulfilment of the promise to Abraham having arrived 4 , the 
 Israelites, under the command of Joshua, entered upon the 
 possession of their inheritance 5 . 
 
 3 Genesis xxii. ; John viii. 56 : 
 comp. Hebrews xi. 19 ; and see War- 
 burton's Divine Legation, Lib. vi. 
 sect. v. Works, Vol. HI. p. 383, &c. 
 Ed. 1788. 
 
 occurs hi the Sacred narrative, and even 
 here it seems to be used by anticipation 
 while the city retained it ancient name 
 of Jebus, (see Joshua xv. 8 ; xviii. 28 ; 
 and Judges xix.10). Joseph us informs 
 
 4 Genesis xv. 13, 16. j us that Melchizedek first called it 
 
 5 Joshua x. This is the first pas- j Jerusalem (J. W. vi. v. 1); but 
 sage in which the name of Jerusalem his account of the origin of this name 
 
 12
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 The name of the king of Jerusalem at this time, com- 
 pared with that of its former king in the time of Abraham, 
 would seem to intimate that this city had already a religious 
 character among the Canaanites which entitled its ruler to 
 the honourable appellation of the " Righteous King," or 
 the "Righteous Lord 1 ." It would appear, too, that Adoni- 
 zedec was in a position to exercise some kind of authority 
 over the petty princes of the neighbouring cities, Hebron, 
 Jarmuth, Lachish, and Eglon, who obeyed his summons 
 " to come up to him and help him, that they might smite 
 
 is very obscure, (Ant. vn. iii. 2, a 
 passage which has much perplexed the 
 learned). St Jerome and others under- 
 stood him to make it a compound of 
 the Greek 'iepov, and the Hebrew D/t^> 
 but Isaac Vossius defends him from 
 this imputation. Lightfoot, after the 
 Rabbies, derives it from the latter part 
 of the name " Jehovah-jireA," (see 
 Genesis xxii. 8, 14), and Shalem or 
 Salem, (Genesis xiv. 18), by which 
 name it is certainly called in Psalm 
 
 ixxvi. 2, thus njnHEkBK&tfrft 
 
 and he gives a curious reason for this 
 compound, which need not be repeated, 
 (Cent. Chorog. Matt. Praemissa, cap. 
 xxi.). Whiston, who adopts this deri- 
 vation, supposes the place to have been 
 so called prophetically, after Abraham 
 had received that oracle "Jehovah- 
 jireh." " Since that expression, ' God 
 will see,' or rather, ' God will provide 
 himself a lamb for a burnt-offering,' is 
 said to have been proverbial till the 
 days of Moses," he thinks it probable 
 that the word may denote "that God 
 would provide peace, by that Lamb of 
 God which was to take away the sins 
 of the world." Note on Josephus, Ant. 
 vii. iii. 2. It is not unlikely that, 
 
 after the event referred to, the two 
 patriarchs Melchizedek and Abraham 
 would adopt this name with its pro- 
 phetical signification, which was lost 
 among the ungodly Canaanites, but 
 retained and restored by the posterity 
 of the patriarch. Reland adopts ttHT 1 
 
 U)VJ " hereditas, or pcssessio heredi- 
 laria pads," (accounting for the loss 
 of the t7 by assimilation) which gives 
 a very good meaning, but wants the 
 authority of the former. He is follow- 
 ed by Raumer, Palestina, p. 333. The 
 least satisfactory is that of Dr Wells, 
 who supposes it to be composed of its 
 two ancient names Jebus and Salem 
 the 3 being changed into "1 euphoni 
 gratia (Geog. of O.T. Pt.m. cap.ii.) 
 or, as Professor Lee, who adopts the 
 same theory, imagines, on account 
 of the unsuitableness of the name, 
 
 D^ty^ 1 * ("which would signify the 
 ^trampling or treading down of peace") 
 to the city which God himself had 
 chosen for his own. Lexicon, sub 
 voce. 
 
 1 The union of the kingly and 
 priestly offices in one person would be 
 no unusual thing in those times.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 5 
 
 Gibeon, because it had made peace with Joshua and with 
 the children of Israel." 
 
 The site of Gibeon is still marked by the modern village 
 of Geeb, distant about an hour from Jerusalem on the road 
 to Jaffa, by Bethoron and Lydda ; and the plain " before" 
 it (i. e. to the east of it) is well adapted for the encamp- 
 ment of a large army. It was here that Joshua gained 
 that decisive victory over the combined army, when the day 
 was lengthened to complete it so that " the sun stood still 
 in the midst of the heaven, and hasted not to go down about 
 a whole day. 1 " The king of Jerusalem with his four allies 
 was taken and put to death; but we do not read that his 
 city, like theirs, fell into the hands of the conquerors at this 
 time : indeed, it is difficult to determine the period of its cap- 
 ture by the Israelites, or to which tribe it was allotted in the 
 division of the land 2 ; since we read in one passage, " As for 
 the Jebusites, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the children of 
 Judah could not drive them out, but the Jebusites dwell 
 with the children of Judah at Jerusalem unto this day 3 ;" 
 while the same is elsewhere said of the children of Ben- 
 jamin, in the same chapter in which we find that " the 
 children of Judah had fought against Jerusalem and taken 
 it, and smitten it with the edge of the sword, and set the 
 city on fire 4 ." The most satisfactory explanation of these 
 apparent discrepancies is, that this city, being situated in the 
 borders of the two tribes, was considered common to both ; 
 and that during the long contest with the people of the land 
 it experienced various fortunes, according to the strength of 
 the contending parties : for while it would appear certain 
 
 2 Joshua xviii. 28, compared with 
 xv. 8, would, without doubt, place it 
 within the tribe of Benjamin ; but 
 other passages as clearly assign it to 
 
 3 Joshua xv. 63. 
 
 * Judges i. 21-8. The language of 
 Josephus, note 3 in the next page, will 
 not enable us to reconcile the passages 
 
 Judah. See e. g. Psalm Ixxviii. 68. here referred to.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 at least that soon after the death of Joshua it was in pos- 
 session of the Israelites, it is no less clear that before the 
 time of the Judges it was so completely in the power of 
 Jebusites, as to have passed among the Israelites for "the 
 city of a stranger," which would scarcely have afforded a 
 secure shelter to one of their nation 1 . It was reserved for 
 David to bring it under complete subjection. 
 
 No sooner had he come into the undisputed sovereignty 
 of the whole land, by the violent death of Ishbosheth the son 
 of Saul, than he went to Jerusalem, and took the " castle" 
 or " strong hold of Zion" out of the hands of the Jebusites 2 . 
 It would appear that this fortress, which came now to be 
 called "the City of David," was distinct from what we had 
 before read of as Jebus, the latter being identical with that 
 which Josephus designates as Acra, or the lower city, the 
 former with that which he invariably speaks of as the upper 
 market, of which the Jebusites had held undisputed possession 
 until this time 3 . It occupied a very strong natural position, 
 aided, no doubt, by artificial defences, and the garrison were 
 so confident in its strength, that they contemptuously exposed 
 the bund and the lame on their walls, as if such defenders 
 would suffice to repel the attacks of the assailants 4 . This 
 taunt served but to exasperate the besiegers, and the re- 
 ward of the first command, offered by David to him who 
 should first cross the natural fosse which surrounded the hill 5 
 
 1 Judges i. 7 ; xix. 10 12. 
 
 8 2 Sam. v. 6, &c. and 1 Chron. 
 xi. 48. 
 
 3 Josephus says of the Israelites 
 after the death of Joshua, " They be- 
 sieged Jerusalem ; and when they had 
 taken the lower city, which was not 
 under a considerable time, they slew 
 all the inhabitants ; but the upper city 
 was not to be taken without great dif- 
 
 ficulty, through the strength of its 
 walls, and the nature of the place." 
 Ant. Lib. v. ii. 2. He draws the same 
 distinction between the lower city and 
 the castle in vn. iii. 1. 
 
 4 So Josephus explains 2 Sam.v. 6. 
 See Antiquities, vn. iii. 1. 
 
 8 T(S Sid Ttov inroKeifUfvaiv Q?apdy- 
 ytav firi TIJV dxpav dvafldvri. K. \. 
 
 Ibid.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 7 
 
 and smite the Jebusites, called forth all the energies of 
 the captains, so that the position was speedily carried and 
 secured. David now took up his abode in the castle, and 
 enlarged the city to a size worthy of the dignity of a royal 
 city, and the seat of government. To effect this he united 
 the fortress of Zion to the city of Jehus, by taking in the 
 valley which had formerly divided them, and surrounding 
 the whole with a wall 6 . The incorporated city would, thus 
 consist of two hills, and an intermediate valley, which con- 
 tinued to be called " the suburbs," as originally distinct from 
 either part of the city. 
 
 No sooner was David thus settled in his new capital, 
 than he proposed to bring up the ark of God to Jerusalem, 
 that it might thus become the religious as well as the civil 
 head of his kingdom 7 . 
 
 Ever since the time of the entrance of the children of 
 Israel under Joshua, the ark had been without any fixed 
 resting-place. It was parted from the tabernacle of the 
 congregation soon after their miraculous passage of the 
 Jordan, the latter abiding in the camp at Gilgal, while the 
 former went before the army to their battles 8 . When the 
 land was settled, the tabernacle was removed to Shiloh 9 , in 
 the tribe of Ephraim, and the ark was deposited in it, and 
 remained there until the time of Eli the priest, except that 
 it was occasionally carried to the national assemblies of the 
 children of Israel, to add solemnity to their meetings 10 . 
 
 6 1 Chron. xi. 8: "Aaiu<5?js Se 
 Ti']v-re KOLTto iro\iv Tre/nXajSwv /cat Ttjv 
 aKpav <rwd\{/as ai/Trj eTroiijcrev ev crtafia' 
 Kal Trepi-rei*xi(Ta.<i, K.\. Ant. VII. 3,2. 
 Many important questions relating to 
 the topography of ancient Jerusalem 
 are reserved for discussion in a subse- 
 
 remark how consistently, throughout 
 his history, from the earliest period, 
 Josephus distinguishes between the 
 Upper and Lower City. 
 
 7 2 Sam. vi. 1, &c. 
 
 8 Joshua ix. 6, 15; x. 43; vi. 12; 
 viii. 43. 9 Ib. xviii. 1. 
 
 quent chapter ; but it is important to I 10 Ib. xxiv. 1, 25, 26.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 The site of Shiloh is still preserved under the name of 
 Siloon 1 , a ruinous heap on a remarkable hill, about two miles 
 to the east of the road between Jerusalem and Nablouse 
 eight hours from the former, and four from the latter, at the 
 S.E. extremity of a valley known as " Wady Lebban." There 
 is now little left to mark the spot which was once the centre 
 of the true worship of God : for the judgment on the house 
 of Eli would seem to have extended to the very city where 
 he dwelt ; and God not only " forsook the tabernacle of 
 Shiloh," but reduced the city itself to complete desolation, 
 so that it became a proverb in Israel 2 . 
 
 The circumstances attending the removal of the ark 
 from that place were indeed most disastrous 3 . Instead of 
 redeeming the fortunes of the rebellious Israelites in their 
 contest with the Philistines, as they mainly hoped and their 
 adversaries feared, it fell into their enemies 1 hands, and 
 remained seven months in their possession a troublesome 
 trophy indeed, dealing destruction and misery among their 
 people, their princes and their gods, so that they were glad 
 to be quit of its awful presence. By the advice of their 
 priests and diviners it was placed on a new cart with a 
 trespass-offering, and committed to the direction of two 
 milch-kine, who were guided, contrary to natural instinct, to 
 the priestly city of Beth-shemesh, where the presumption of 
 those who assembled to welcome its return occasioned the 
 death of more than fifty thousand men 4 . Awed by this 
 
 1 See a full description in Dr Ro- 
 binson ' Bib. Researches under June 14, 
 183R, Vol. in. p. 86. Its position is 
 exactly given in Judges xxi. 19. The 
 nearest point to it on the high road is 
 Khan Lebban, which takes its name, 
 as does the valley, from a village so 
 called, situated on the west side of the 
 
 valley. This is most probably the 
 Lebonah mentioned in Judges. 
 
 2 Psal. Ixxviii. 60, 67; Jer. vii. 12, 
 14, and xxvi. 6, 9. 
 
 3 1 Sam. iv. 3, &c. 
 
 4 1 Sam. vi. 19. Josephus states 
 the number at 70 ; but as the Hebrew 
 and Septuagint agree in the much
 
 CH. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 event, the Beth-shemites besought the inhabitants of Kirjath- 
 jearim to relieve them of the guardianship, and it was 
 accordingly transferred to that city, and deposited in the 
 house of Abinadab 5 , under the custody of his son Eleazar, 
 where it remained, with occasional interruptions, for the 
 period of twenty years 6 . 
 
 The language of the sacred narrative would lead us to 
 conclude that this border-city of Judah, originally called 
 Baalah 7 , was not far distant from Beth-shemesh ; but as 
 all traces of its name have perished, it is difficult to fix its 
 precise situation with certainty. 
 
 A modern traveller 8 has conjectured that the village of 
 Kuryet-el-'Anub 9 , on the road from Jaffa to Jerusalem, 
 
 larger number given in the text, we 
 cannot be warranted in rejecting it on 
 this authority ; yet it is only on the 
 supposition of an unusual concourse 
 that the number can be at all accounted 
 for. A number equal to the popula- 
 tion of a large city was slain, to say 
 nothing of those who escaped : it was 
 about the time of the feast of taber- 
 nacles, ver. 13. 
 
 & A Levite, according to Josephus. 
 Ant. vi. 1. 
 
 6 1 Sam. vii. 2. Once in this in- 
 terval it was with Saul in Gibeah of 
 Benjamin, xiv. 18. 
 
 7 Josh. xv. 9 ; 1 Chron. xiii. 6, &c. 
 
 8 Dr Robinson, Biblical Researches 
 in Palestine, Vol. 11. pp. 334, 335. 
 
 9 Commonly known as the village 
 of Abu-ghoosh, about two hours from 
 Jerusalem. There can be little doubt 
 that this village represents the Em- 
 maus of St Luke, according to an 
 ancient tradition of the Greek Church. 
 It is exactly the distance required 
 
 viz. 60 stadia. Luke xxiv. 13. St 
 Jerome most unaccountably identi6es 
 the Emmaus of St Luke with the city 
 of that name afterwards called Nico- 
 polis, and now 'Amwas, distant 176 
 stadia from Jerusalem, (according to 
 the Jerusalem Itinerary), a little to 
 the right of the road to Jaffa. See St 
 Jerome, Epist. Ixxxvi. ad Eusto- 
 chium Virginem. Vol. iv. part ii. 
 p. 673. Ed. Bened. Reland with his 
 usual acumen solves the difficulty. 
 Palestina, Lib. n. cap. vi. p. 427, 
 &c., and Lib. m. p. 758. The old 
 Christian church now in ruins at 
 Kuryet-el-'Anub, would appear, from 
 the paintings still to be traced on 
 the walls, to have belonged to the 
 Greeks, not to the Latins, as Dr Ro- 
 binson says, Bibl. Res. Vol. 11. p. 
 336. The Latin church and monastery 
 mentioned by Quaresmius occupied a 
 hill on the opposite side of the road, 
 where extensive ruins are still shewn 
 among the olive plantations. It was
 
 10 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 occupies this ancient site; but there are several weighty 
 objections to this hypothesis, besides those which he has 
 noticed and attempted to remove. 
 
 In the description of the borders of Benjamin, the wes- 
 tern line is drawn from a hill south of the lower Bethoron 
 to Kirjath-jearim, whence the south border is drawn by the 
 waters of the well Nephtoah to the valley of Hinnom, and 
 so following 1 : thus placing Kirjath-jearim in the south-west 
 corner of Benjamin. 
 
 The site of the lower Bethoron is preserved by the 
 modern village of the same name, and the fountain of Neph- 
 toah is conjectured by the author in question to be the 
 present Ain Yalo in Wady-el-Werd : or, as this fountain 
 appears to lie too far south to continue the line determined 
 by the valley of Hinnom, it might perhaps with more pro- 
 priety be assigned to Ain Karim, which however is not far 
 distant to the north of Ain Yalo. Now if the village of 
 Kuryet-el-'Anub does represent Kirjath-jearim, it would be 
 about the middle of the western border of Benjamin 2 , not 
 in the southern extremity of it, as the scripture narrative 
 intimates. But there is an insuperable objection, based on 
 the language of holy scripture, to that position which all 
 the later maps, on the authority of this writer, assume for 
 this city. Mahaneh .Dan is said to be "in" or "behind" 
 Kirjath-jearim 3 . But Mahaneh Dan was "between Zorah 
 
 at this Emmaus, and not at Nicopolis, 
 that the Roman colony of 800 soldiers 
 was planted by Vespasian. Jewish 
 War, vn. vi. 6. The modern village 
 of Kul'onieh, between this and Jeru- 
 salem, may retain in its name a memo- 
 rial of this event. This might have 
 been the Roman capital. Josephus 
 merely says that the district of Em- 
 
 maus was allotted to them. 
 
 1 Josh, xviii. 14, 15. Compare xv. 
 810. 
 
 2 A line drawn from Bethoron the 
 nether to Ain Yalo, would pass through 
 Kuryet-el-'Anub, which is equally dis- 
 tant from both points. See Dr Robin- 
 son's map. 
 
 3 Judg. xviii. 12.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 11 
 
 and Eshtaol 4 , two cities of that part of Judah which was 
 afterwards allotted to Dan, and which are elsewhere asso- 
 ciated with Beth-shemesh, in a manner which appears to 
 intimate a proximity to it 5 . Now two of these sites are 
 still preserved in the modern villages of Surah and Ain 
 Shems 6 , while Eshtaol must have been not far distant, some- 
 what to the south of Beth-shemesh, as Beth-shemesh was 
 south of Zorah 7 . But if such was the relative position of 
 Zorah and Eshtaol, it could not with any propriety be said 
 that Kirjath-jearim was between them, if Kuryet-el-'Anub 
 be the true site : for these considerations will necessarily 
 determine its position near Beth-shemesh, as scripture in- 
 timates, and Josephus expressly affirms 8 , somewhere to the 
 south-east of Surah ; south, that it may be in some way " be- 
 tween Zorah and Eshtaol," and east, that it may be without 
 the boundaries of the tribe of Dan. Now there is an ancient 
 site exactly in this locality occupied by the modern village 
 of Deir-el-Howa, on a remarkable hill above Ain Shems, 
 where the mountain-region begins to descend towards the 
 
 4 Judg. xiii. 25. 
 
 5 Josh. xix. 41, called here "1^ 
 
 no doubt identical with "".TQ 
 now . lujtilj j^c. Ain Shems. 
 
 Reland, however, thinks otherwise. 
 Palestina, p. 656. They are considered 
 identical by Dr Robinson, Bib. Res. 
 Vol. in. p. 19. n. 6. 
 
 8 See Bib. Res. Vol. 11. p. 339, 
 343; Vol. in. 17, 18. 
 
 7 Eshtaol was in the plain. Josh. 
 xv. 33. It is placed by Eusebius and 
 St Jerome between Eleutheropolis and 
 Nicopolis, ten miles from the former ; 
 and the same is said of Beth-shemesh 
 and Zorah. Vid. Onomast. sub voc. 
 
 But that Eshtaol was most to the 
 south may be inferred from what they 
 write of Jarmuth, that it was/owr miles 
 from Eleutheropolis, and adjacent to 
 Eshtaol. Vid. Onomast. sub voc. 
 The testimony of these writers to the 
 position of Kirjath-jearim is very in- 
 consistent. In one place they make it 
 ten miles from Jerusalem, on the road 
 to Diospolis yet they say it was near 
 Massepha, which they place " in fini- 
 bus Eleutheropolis, ad septentrionem 
 pergentibus yEliam." (Vid. Onomast. 
 sub voc.) They also place Timnath 
 (now Tibneh) on the road between 
 ./Elia and Diospolis. 
 8 Ant. vi. i. 4.
 
 12 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 plain. The situation is such as would be well suited for a 
 large city, and the traces of ancient masonry in the modern 
 hovels attest the existence of extensive buildings in former 
 times. Several coincident circumstances unite to identify 
 this site with that of Kirjath-jearim 1 . 
 
 From this point a distinct line of hills runs up to the 
 lower Bethoron, presenting a natural boundary for Benjamin 
 on the west ; while the southern line would be marked by 
 the deep valley of Ismail, which, commencing below Deir- 
 el-Howa, is continued under another name to Ain Karim 
 (the waters of Nephtoah), from whence it would pass nearly 
 along the road which joins that village to Jerusalem, and 
 across the high rocky ground between the city and the Con- 
 vent of the Cross, to the head of the valley of Hinnom 2 . 
 
 About half way between Deir-el-Howa and Ain Karim, 
 on the north side of the valley near the village Sataf, is 
 a Wely called by the natives Khirbet-el-TJz, a name which 
 suggests the possibility of the identity of this site with 
 Perez Uzzah, the place where David^s first attempt to bring 
 up the ark from Kirjath-jearim was defeated 3 , and where 
 it remained for three months in the house of Obed-Edom; 
 at the end of which period it was brought to Jerusalem, and 
 
 deposited in the tabernacle prepared for it on Mount Zion. 
 
 i 
 
 This tabernacle however was not its proper resting-place. 
 The tabernacle of the congregation and the altar of burnt- 
 
 1 Among other old sites pointed out 
 to me from Deir-el-Howa by a native of 
 the place, unprompted, was Beit Ma- 
 hanem, bearing N.N.E. on the hill 
 situated on the opposite side of Wady 
 Ismail. Might not this be a relic of 
 the name Mahaneh Dan ? 
 
 * Josh, xviii. 15. Compare xv. fl, 
 
 9. ..." the border went up to the 
 (op of the mountain that lieth before 
 the valley of Hinnom westward, which 
 is at the end of the valley of the giants 
 northward, and the border was drawn 
 from the top of the hill unto the foun- 
 tain of the water of Nephtoah." 
 3 2 Sam. vi.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 13 
 
 offering were now at Gibeon 4 . It had been removed to Nob 
 after the loss of the ark in the battle of Aphek, probably 
 by Divine direction, and on the destruction of that city 5 had 
 been transferred to Gibeon, and David had no warrant to 
 remove it to Jerusalem. Although therefore we find him 
 sacrificing before the ark when he brought it up, this was, 
 so to speak, a special service for an extraordinary occasion, 
 and did not supersede the established custom ; and while 
 he provided a ministry of Levites for continual attendance 
 upon the ark at Jerusalem, he appointed a service of priests 
 by course for the tabernacle at Gibeon, and for the perpetual 
 burnt-offering 6 ; and here it was that Solomon offered up his 
 sacrifice at his inauguration, and was favoured with divine 
 revelations 7 . The tent on Mount Zion was designed only 
 for a temporary arrangement by David himself, who had 
 it in his heart to erect a more durable monument of his zeal 
 for the service of God, thinking it a shame that he should 
 dwell in a house of cedar, while the ark of God dwelt within 
 curtains 8 . This purpose met with the divine approval; and 
 although he was not permitted to carry his design into 
 execution, yet with the faith of a prophet, and the muni- 
 ficence of a king, he devoted himself during the remainder 
 of his days to provide materials for the building, which he 
 knew that he should not be permitted to behold. His pre- 
 parations were conducted on a scale of liberality worthy of 
 a house which was to be "exceeding magnificent, of fame 
 and of glory throughout all countries." And in the spirit 
 he saw it all, for the pattern of the whole building and of 
 all the courts was his, "by the hand of God upon him 9 : 
 
 < 1 Chron. xxi. 29. 
 
 5 1 Sam. xxii. 19. 
 
 6 1 Chron. xvi. 1, 3740. 
 
 7 2 Chron. i. 36, &c. Comp. 
 
 1 Chron. xxi. 29. 
 
 8 1 Chron. xvii. 1, &c. 
 
 9 1 Chron. xxviii. 19.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 and the distributions of the Levites in their offices, the orders 
 of the sons of Aaron in their courses, the divisions of the 
 singers, and of the porters, and the very allotment of the 
 gates to each, was his care; and the site was assigned by 
 him 1 . 
 
 The traveller in Palestine in the time of harvest will 
 witness in the immediate vicinity of every town or village 
 a busy scene of no small interest as a scripture-illustration. 
 It is the threshing out of the grain which has just been 
 brought in from the fields. The process is as follows : a 
 space of ground is chosen of sufficient size for the purpose, 
 and mostly in a quarter exposed to the wind; the rock, 
 which is generally near the surface, is cleared of the super- 
 incumbent soil or sand, levelled where necessary, and thus 
 prepared for the treading of the cattle who are then turned 
 in to trample over the sheaves until the straw is reduced 
 to chaff, and the grain completely separated from the husks. 
 Sometimes, but rarely, a " threshing instrument having 
 teeth," and drawn by the hand or by oxen, is used in 
 addition. The corn is then tossed into the air with shovels, 
 and winnowed with the wind, which carries away the lighter 
 particles, the grain only falling back to the threshing-floor 
 by its own weight 2 . 
 
 The customs of the orientals in agriculture are not sub- 
 ject to change, and as are their threshing-floors at this day, 
 such we may conclude them to have been in the days of 
 David. And such would be the threshing-floor of Araunah 
 the Jebusite, which was selected by divine appointment for 
 the erection of the temple, having been signalized before 
 
 1 I Chron. xxii.; 2 Chron. viii. 14. 
 
 2 Isaiah xli. 15. There are constant 
 allusions to this process in holy scrip- 
 ture, e. g. to the threshing in Isaiah 
 
 vii. 25; xli. 15; to the winnowing, 
 Job xxi. 18; Psal. i. 4, xxxv. 5; 
 Isaiah xxx. 24; Daniel ii. 35; Hosea 
 xiii.3.
 
 OH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 15 
 
 by an act of mercy, as the spot where the hand of the 
 destroying angel who smote Jerusalem was stayed 3 . 
 
 This site has the singular good fortune to be the only 
 one of all the sacred localities in Jerusalem whose identity 
 has not been disputed in modern times. It is universally 
 agreed that the hill now occupied by the mosque of Omar 
 and its surrounding courts, is " the Mountain of the Lord's 
 house," though the ingenuity of travellers has been exercised 
 in attempts to lay out the ground, and determine the exact 
 position of the temple. The site is described by Josephus 
 as a strong hill, the level summit of which was at first 
 hardly sufficient for the holy house and the altar ; but 
 Solomon first, and then succeeding monarchs, raised banks 
 of enormous stones from the deep valleys beneath, so as 
 to form a larger plain 4 . And its present aspect very well 
 agrees with this account; the courts of the mosque pre- 
 sent the appearance of artificial platforms raised one above 
 another ; the rock being cut into form, and its defects 
 supplied by solid masonry. Nor is it improbable that the 
 large stones at the exterior of the eastern wall of the 
 inclosure above the valley of Jehoshaphat, noticed by all 
 travellers, form part of one of those stupendous foundations 
 mentioned with so much admiration by the Jewish historian. 
 
 Here then the temple designed and planned by David, 
 under the immediate inspiration of God, silently developed 
 its fair proportions, rising from the rock, as by an enchanter's 
 wand, without the sound of axes or hammers 5 ; constructed 
 with such materials as the wealthiest of kings could provide, 
 and furnished with such ornaments as the highest wisdom, 
 aided by the most excellent skill of the best artificers, could 
 devise and execute. 
 
 3 1 Chron. xxi. 15 ; 2 Chron. iii. 1. | * Jew. War, V. v. 1 . s 1 Kings vi. 7-
 
 16 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PAET I. 
 
 The matrimonial alliance which Solomon had formed 
 with the king of Egypt 1 , the mother or nurse of human 
 sciences, and the friendly understanding which had subsisted, 
 even during his father's reign, with Hiram of Tyre 2 , then 
 and for many ages the great mart for the commerce of the 
 western world 3 , secured to him all the aid which the arts 
 'could supply in the construction of the temple. The latter, 
 in particular, not only provided for the work timber of cedar 
 and fir from the forests of Lebanon 4 , but all the ornamental 
 furniture for the exterior and internal decoration was pre- 
 pared under the superintendence of his artificers ; and the 
 skill of the Tyrians was so well seconded by the labourers of 
 Solomon, raised by levies from among all the tribes, that at 
 the end of seven years this temple of unrivalled magnificence 5 
 was completed and dedicated to the worship of the God of 
 Israel, under circumstances of awful solemnity, amidst evident 
 tokens of the Divine presence 6 ; and here the ark and the 
 tabernacle once more met together 7 , never again to be se- 
 parated until the destruction of the temple by Nebuchad- 
 nezzar, king of Babylon. 
 
 The almost incredible quantity of gold employed in this 
 structure was furnished by the commerce which had been 
 
 1 1 Kings iii. 1. One of the last 
 kings of the 21st dynasty, named Oso- 
 chor. Hisloire de Jerusalem, par M. 
 Ponjoulat, i. 135. 
 
 * 2 Sam. v. 11; 1 Kings v. 1. 
 
 3 See Isaiah xxiii. ; Ezek. xxvii. 
 xxviii. 
 
 4 1 Kings v. ; 2 Chron. ii. 
 
 5 Justinian's exclamation of " de- 
 vout vanity," as the infidel calls it, 
 must be taken with some qualification : 
 " Glory be to God, who hath thought 
 me worthy to accomplish so great a 
 work. I have vanquished thee, O Solo- 
 
 mon," said that emperor, on contem- 
 plating the church of St Sophia, at 
 Constantinople, the estimated expense 
 of which is about a million sterling ; 
 while the temple of Solomon, though 
 equalling in size only a small parish- 
 church (according to Dean Prideaux's 
 estimate. Connexion, Vol. i. p. 144, 
 folio), might be valued at four or five 
 millions sterling. Gibbon's Decline 
 and Fall, chap. xl. 
 
 8 1 Kings viii. 
 
 7 1 Kings viii. 4, &c. ; 2 Chron. iii. 
 2,5.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 17 
 
 lately opened through the Red Sea, which deserves particular 
 notice. The conquest of Edom by David 8 having put him 
 into possession of the two naval stations, Ezion-Geber and 
 Elath 9 , he had commenced the trade 10 , which was much en- 
 larged by his son and successor 11 , who himself visited these 
 ports 12 , and established, by the aid of his Tyrian ally, a 
 regular communication with the gold country of Ophir, and 
 with the celebrated mart of Tarshish 13 . 
 
 The former of these has been lately satisfactorily proved 
 by a learned writer 14 to be situated in the south eastern parts 
 of the great peninsula of Arabia, upon the shores of the 
 Indian ocean, near the entrance into the Persian gulf, still 
 bearing the name of Ofer; but there is less certainty with 
 regard to the latter 15 , while the difficulties attending its 
 position are augmented by the fact of " ships of Tarshish" 
 being found in the ports both of the Mediterranean and of 
 the Red Sea. This difficulty might be removed by adopting 
 the theory of this being a general name for merchant- 
 
 8 2 Sam. viii. 14 ; 1 Kings xi. 15, 16. 
 
 9 First mentioned by Moses, Numb. 
 xxxii. 35, 36 ; Deut. ii. 8. The mo- 
 dern town of Akaba represents the 
 ancient Elath ; all traces of Ezion- 
 geber have perished. See Robinson's 
 Biblical Researches in Palestine, Vol. 
 i. p. 250, &c. 
 
 10 Eupolemus apud Euseb. Praep. 
 Evang. Lib. ix. See 1 Chron. xxix. 4. 
 
 1 Kings ix. 26, &c.; x. 11, 12. 
 This commerce was afterwards renewed 
 by Jehoshaphat, 1 Kings xxii. 49, in- 
 terrupted by the successful rebellion 
 of the Edomites, under Jehoram, 2 
 Kings viii. 20, 22 ; re-opened by Uz- 
 ziah's conquest, xiv. 22 ; finally brought 
 to an end by Rezin, king of Syria, in 
 the time of Aha/, xvi. 6. 
 
 2 
 
 12 2 Chron. viii. 17. 
 
 13 1 Kings ix. 26, &c. ; x. 22. 
 
 14 Rev. Chas. Forster, in his Histo- 
 rical Geography of Arabia, Vol. i. p. 
 165. It is called Ofor in D'Anville's 
 Map, and lies in the territory of Oman, 
 the gold- coast of Pliny, or his "littus 
 HammEEum ubi auri metalla." 
 
 15 Josephus and St Jerome place 
 Tarsus in India, as do many modern 
 writers; but Dr Wells is positive 
 against this (Pt. i. cap. iii. sect. 2, 33), 
 and adopts the theory mentioned in the 
 text to account for Jehoshaphat's ships 
 of Tarshish being broken at Ezion- 
 geber, 1 Kings xxii. 43; but he had 
 lost sight of the passage referred to in 
 the next note.
 
 18 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PAKT I. 
 
 vessels of a certain class, which need not necessarily imply 
 the destination of the vessels, were it not plain, from scrip- 
 ture, that the ships of Tarshish, constructed at Ezion-geber, 
 did actually carry on trade with that place 1 , as did also those 
 in the ports of Phoenicia 2 . Or again, we might resort to the 
 usual hypothesis of another Tarshish to the south or east of 
 the Red Sea, but that there is nothing in antiquity to war- 
 rant such a supposition. The native city of St Paul, in 
 Cilicia, which was founded at a very early period 3 , may have 
 sent out to the pillars of Hercules, even prior to the time of 
 Solomon, that colony, which afterwards attained considerable 
 celebrity 4 . But we have no clear mention in any ancient 
 author of any such port on the eastern coast of Africa, or in 
 the Indies. In this uncertainty and perplexity, it may be 
 allowed to hazard a conjecture, which may perhaps gain cre- 
 dibility from several remarkable coincidences between the 
 scripture narrative, of Solomon's naval expedition, and the 
 account given by Herodotus, of the circumnavigation of 
 Africa by Pharaoh-necho, king of Egypt, who was, as far 
 as he knew, the first to discover the passage 5 . 
 
 Three years the exact period consumed by the Egyptian 
 expedition in their voyage round Africa was the usual time 
 occupied by the voyage from Ezion-geber to Tarshish and 
 back 6 , which would appear too long for any port to the south 
 or east of the Red Sea ; whereas if the sailors of Solomon 
 
 1 2 Chron. xx. 3f5, 3?. 
 
 2 Jonah i. 3. This was probably 
 Tarsus in Cilicia. But Tartessus, in 
 Spain, must be referred to, in Ezek. 
 xxvii. 12, as furnishing to the fairs of 
 Tyre, " silver, iron, tin, and lead." 
 
 3 Josephus says that this city, and 
 the country about it, was so called from 
 Tarshish, the grandson of Japheth. 
 (Gen. x. 4.) See Wells, Geo. of the 
 
 O. T. Pt. i. cap. iii. sect. 2, 20, and 
 Lightfoot, Miscel. cap. v. Tarsus still 
 retains its ancient name, and something 
 of its celebrity among the Syrians. It 
 is now a great emporium for Turkey 
 carpets and rugs. 
 
 4 Wells, G. O. T. Pt. i. cap. iii. 
 11, 32. 
 
 6 See the account, Lib. iv. cap. 42. 
 
 6 1 Kings x. 22.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 19 
 
 were engaged in the same undertaking with those of Necho 
 some centuries later, and were, like them, in the habit of 
 sowing and reaping during the voyage, a practice which 
 might be common to the Phoanician sailors, who conducted 
 both expeditions the length of time would easily be ac- 
 counted for, since the vessels which had set sail from the 
 Red Sea, having passed round the African continent, would 
 then enter the Mediterranean, and accomplish their voyage 
 in the period above specified, either at Joppa, or the harbour 
 of the Phoenician capital, where they would discharge their 
 cargoes 7 , freighted on the coast of Africa, and at Tartessus, 
 in Spain, the common emporium for the commerce of the 
 contiguous continents. 
 
 King Solomon does not appear to have extended his 
 dominions far beyond the limits assigned them by his father, 
 whose conquests had secured to him the peaceable possession 
 of a kingdom, larger than was ever afterwards embraced by 
 the divided powers of Judah and Israel. Indeed, it is to 
 this reign that we must look for the widest literal fulfilment, 
 which the promises made to Abraham and his seed have 
 hitherto met with ; and even were we not to look for a 
 future accomplishment of these prophecies relating to the 
 glory and greatness of the Israelitish kingdom, the strictness 
 of scripture language would be fully satisfied by the extent 
 of the dominions of the son of David. 
 
 The question of the restoration of the Jews, and a future 
 literal verification of such predictions, is not, of course, affected 
 by this fact : however that may be decided from other pas- 
 sages of holy scripture, it is not surely reverent or safe to 
 suspend the truth of God upon a question of topography, 
 or to argue, that because the territorial limits of the Jewish 
 
 7 Consisting of "gold, and silver, and ivory, and apes, and peacocks." 
 1 Kings x. 22. 
 
 22
 
 20 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 kingdom have never hitherto reached the limits assigned 
 them by promise, therefore the Jews must be hereafter re- 
 stored to a wider inheritance than that which their sins have 
 forfeited l : for not now to insist on the condition of obedience 
 expressed or implied in every such promise 2 , or on the ac- 
 knowledged difficulty of ascertaining precisely the boundaries 
 of the promised and possessed land, as described in holy 
 scripture ; the dominions of Solomon do appear, in fact, to 
 have embraced all that was ever promised to the children 
 of Abraham, and their limits are described almost in the 
 language of the prophecies, as if to call attention to the fact 
 of their literal accomplishment. Did the covenant made with 
 Abraham declare, " Unto thy seed have I given this land, 
 from the river of Egypt, unto the great river, the river 
 Euphrates ?" It is remarked of Solomon, that " he reigned 
 over all kingdoms, from the river unto the land of the Philis- 
 tines, and unto the borders of Egypt." Was the wilderness 
 of Zin on the south, and the entrance of Hamath on the 
 north, affixed as the limits of the land of promise ? We read 
 that Joshua subjugated the whole country within these limits, 
 and that David and his son reigned over the whole land, 
 " from the entering in of Hamath, to the river of Egypt 3 ." 
 
 The eastern and western landmarks, determined by the 
 river Euphrates on the one side, and the Mediterranean on 
 
 1 Such seems to be the argument 
 of Dr Keith, in his work, entitled, 
 "The Land of Israel." 
 
 2 ITaJseirayyeiXd/uei/oyo Qcoi f*.e)(pi 
 TOV Ev(ppaTou TTOTajuoD Trapaoioaciv 
 air-rois Ttjv yijv oiiK eir\iipui<re -TI]V 
 iiiroayeaiv, asks Theodoret. His re- 
 ply is : Aia 'lepifiia TOU irpo<priTov 
 TOVTO <ra<t>c<rTtpov TreiroiijKe o Geos. 
 Ili'/mv yap (prta-t XaXijcru) t-rri e0i/o 
 M(i l J Ktni\( iim, TIKI nii.iii.iifii iii Kal i.it- 
 
 TCHfiewrevetv, KCLI ecr-rai edit trTpa<pu TO 
 tOvos fKelvo Troitjtrri Trovqpd, OV/MI eiri- 
 ydyto eir' avTta irdv-ra rd dyaSa o<ra 
 e\d\ricra Kai rd e^ijs. Jerem. xviii. 9. 
 Theod. Quaest. 59 in Exodum. See 
 again, Quasi. 1 in Joshuam, and 
 Quwst. 6 in Lib. Judicum. 
 
 8 Gen. xv. 18; 1 Kings iv. 21, 24; 
 Numb, xxxiv. 3, 8; Joshua xii. 7; 
 xiii. 3, 5; 1 Chron. xiii. 5; 1 Kings 
 viii. 65.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 21 
 
 the other, are not likely to be obliterated ; but with regard 
 to the northern and southern boundaries, there is considerable 
 difficulty ; which the observations of modern travellers have 
 served rather to augment than to diminish, until the recent 
 recovery of an important site, frequently mentioned in the 
 southern border, has furnished data whereby to determine 
 the limits of the promised land in that direction, while the 
 question relating to the northern boundary is perhaps capable 
 of being decided by data which we already possess*. 
 
 That the possessions of the Israelites were never co- 
 extensive with these limits is undoubtedly true, the southern 
 coast being occupied by the Amalekites, the western by the 
 Philistines, the northern and eastern by the Syrians, and 
 various Arab families ; but while this may be ascribed in 
 part to their own neglect, and in part to the divine judgment 
 consequent upon it 5 , it admits of a question, whether it was 
 intended that they should inhabit the whole of this extensive 
 territory, or whether rather a distinction is not to be drawn 
 between the country given for possession, and that granted 
 for dominion 6 . It would eyen appear, from some passages, 
 that the land of their possession was to have been confined 
 between the Jordan and the Red Sea 7 , while it is certain, 
 that in the reign of Solomon, all the nations within the widest 
 
 4 In order not to interrupt the thread 
 of the narrative, I have reserved for an 
 Appendix the very interesting particu- 
 lars of the discovery of Kadesh, hy my 
 friend, a fellow-traveller, the Rev. John 
 Rowlands, Fellow of Queens' College, 
 Cambridge. 
 
 5 See Judges, i. ii. 
 
 6 In Genesis xii. 7, and xiii. 14, 17. 
 The land of Canaan (whose limits are 
 described in x. 19) is promised to Abra- 
 ham; but in xv. 18, &c., Dr Wells 
 supposes, that " God not only repeated 
 
 his promise of giving the land of Ca- 
 naan for an inheritance to the seed of 
 Abraham, but withal further promised 
 to give unto his seed the dominion of 
 a much larger track." Iviii. 44. He 
 finds this distinction " nicely observed 
 in the sacred writings themselves." 
 e.g. Gen. xvii. 8, xlviii. 4; Levit. xiv. 
 34 ; Deut, xi. 24, 25 ; Numbers xxxiv. 
 15. 
 
 7 Numbers xxxii. 7, &c., xxxiii. 
 51, &c. ; Deut. ix. 1, xi. 31, xii. 9, 10, 
 &c.
 
 22 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 borders were reduced to submission, so that " he had do- 
 minion from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends 
 of the earth, and they that dwell in the wilderness knelt 
 before him, and his enemies licked the dust," as a type of 
 that Son of David, to whom " the kings of Tarshish and of 
 the isles should bring presents ; the kings of Sheba and Seba 
 offer gifts. Yea, all kings shall fall down before him ; all 
 nations shall serve him 1 ." 
 
 Having finished the building of the temple in the eleventh 
 year of his reign, Solomon next proceeded to the erection of 
 a palace, and other buildings, suitable to his magnificence, for 
 the accommodation of his queen, and for the administration 
 of justice. He then brought the hill, now occupied by the 
 temple, within the circuit of the city, which he further 
 strengthened and adorned ; and because the hill of Zion, 
 on which the royal palace was situated, was separated from 
 the Mountain of the House by a valley of considerable depth, 
 he facilitated his approach to the latter by a causeway, the 
 traces of which remain to this day, a work of such magni- 
 tude as to excite the admiration of the queen of Sheba 2 ; 
 which will demand a fuller notice in another connexion. 
 
 1 Psalm Ixxii. 811. See 1 Kings 
 iv. 21. 
 
 2 1 Kings x. 5. The various build- 
 ings of Solomon mentioned by the in- 
 spired historian are : " The house of 
 the Lord" "his own house" "The 
 house of the forest of Lebanon" " the 
 porch of pillars" " the porch of judg- 
 ment," and "an house for Pharaoh's 
 daughter." 1 Kings vi. 1; viii. 1, 2, 6, 
 7, 8. The porches, however, were pro- 
 bably attached to his palace, and the 
 house for Pharaoh's daughter would 
 appear to have been part of the same. 
 See I Kings iii. 1 ; compare ix. 24, 
 and 2 Chron. viii. 11, where we learn 
 
 incidentally that by "the city of Da- 
 vid," is meant the house of David, 
 where the ark had been. Besides these 
 works, it is said that "he built 
 Millo, and the wall of Jerusalem, and 
 repaired the breaches of the city of 
 David." 1 Kings ix. 1524 ; xi. 27. 
 This Millo has much perplexed com- 
 mentators. All agree in deriving it 
 
 from NbD to fill, (whence tfhfo and 
 
 fulness,) but account for its 
 
 name by various conjectures. It is 
 first mentioned after the taking of the 
 fortress, 2 Sam. v. 9, and Chron. xi. 8. 
 The LXX. render it by dicpa in three
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 23 
 
 Thus then the city which had been in a manner founded 
 by David, attained the zenith of its glory in the reign of 
 his son, and its renown spread to the ends of the earth for 
 the wisdom and wealth of its highly-gifted monarch 3 . Its 
 decline must date from the death, or rather from the apos- 
 tacy of Solomon; yet it was gradual, like the decay of all 
 great empires, and from time to time displayed fresh vigour, 
 as though it would vindicate to itself its former greatness ; 
 but the seeds of dissolution had taken firm root, and the 
 consummation was slowly, but surely approaching. 
 
 It is singular, that the first recorded act of that king 
 for whose instruction primarily the book of Proverbs was 
 composed, that store-house of all wisdom, human and divine, 
 should have exhibited indiscretion and folly almost without a 
 parallel in the annals of the world. It is not to be supposed 
 
 places, (as Josephus seems to do in his 
 version of this passage,) sometimes dv- 
 aXX.tj|U/xa. Rabbi Kimchi, according 
 to Buxtorf, imagines it a large build- 
 ing for public meetings ; others, (as 
 Jarchi and R. Jeshaiah) following the 
 Chaldee,which gives NJTvD a mound, 
 make it a mound of earth inside the 
 wall ; others, as R. Levi, a trench 
 filled with water. 'Kennicott supposes 
 it the same with the Castle of Zion or 
 the fortress of the city of David, and 
 quotes Lightfoot, who does not bear 
 him out ; for Lightfoot, as we shall 
 see in a subsequent chapter, makes 
 it part (a complement or filling up) 
 of the city, and identical with the 
 suburbs, or the valley of the Tyro- 
 pceon, that separated the upper from 
 the lower city. I am disposed to think 
 that four of these solutions may be 
 more easily reconciled than would at 
 first sight appear, (I except R. Levi 
 
 and Kennicott.) There was probably 
 a public building called Millo, giving 
 its name to, or deriving its name from, 
 the part of the city where it stood; 
 which was crossed by the mound, (dv- 
 a\\j/ia) erected by Solomon for the 
 purpose mentioned in the text. Beth- 
 Millo, where Joash was slain, 2 Kings 
 xii. 20, would be this house of as- 
 sembly; which was "at the going 
 down to Silla ;" ^?D is taken to be 
 
 equivalent to ^?DQ (aggestum iter) 
 a causeway. Now it is worthy to re- 
 mark, that the north wall of Zion, 
 which probably crossed Solomon's 
 causeway over the Tyropason, was, 
 according to Josephus, joined, as it 
 approached the temple, to the council- 
 chamber (/SouXrj), Jewish War, V. 
 iv. 2, called otherwise povXevTi'jpiov. 
 VI. vi. 3, a large public building, 
 where the archives, &c. were kept. 
 3 1 Kings iv. 2934; x. 24.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 that the magnificence of Solomon could be otherwise than 
 burdensome to his subjects, and his levies and taxes must 
 have produced much disaffection and dissatisfaction. The 
 latter period of his own reign had not been free from in- 
 dications of a disposition to revolt 1 , which manifested itself 
 openly immediately on the accession of Rehoboam 2 , and was 
 ripened at once to rebellion by his uncompromising reply 
 to the petition of his people to lighten somewhat of their 
 grievous yoke ; a reply prompted by an infatuation which 
 can only be accounted for by the declaration of the inspired 
 historian, that "the cause was from the Lord, that he might 
 perform his saying, which the Lord spake by Ahijah the 
 Shilonite unto Jeroboam the son of JSTebat." 
 
 The immediate consequence of this act of folly was the 
 defection of the ten tribes, breaking out in the murder of 
 Adoram the collector of the tribute, who had been sent to 
 levy the government dues for the king of Judah. Reho- 
 boam's design of reducing the revolters to obedience by the 
 sword being abandoned in consequence of a divine pro- 
 hibition, Jeroboam was permitted quietly to assume the 
 government of the new kingdom, and forthwith took such 
 measures as human policy dictated to secure its continuance. 
 He had acuteness enough to perceive the connexion between 
 loyalty and religion between the fear of God and the 
 honour of the king; and dreading lest Jerusalem should 
 exercise a political, as well as a religious influence over his 
 people, and draw them away from their allegiance, he de- 
 vised the expedient of setting up a new church within his 
 own dominions, to counteract as far as possible their pre- 
 
 1 1 Kings xi. 14, &c. 
 
 3 Ib. xii. The political division 
 between Israel and Judah, however 
 it may have originated, seems to have 
 
 been already fully recognized, even in 
 David's time. See 2 Sam. xix. 11, 40 
 43, and xxiv. 9.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 25 
 
 dilections for the old capital. Ambition was the motive, but 
 the convenience of his people was the plea: and the popu- 
 larity of the measure was secured by the adoption of the 
 favourite idols, and by admitting the lowest of the people 
 to a participation in the priesthood, contrary to the exclusive 
 rule of the Levitical law, which confined the office to the 
 family of Aaron. These measures, persisted in as they 
 were in contempt of the plainest denunciations of the divine 
 displeasure 3 , could not but serve to disgust the better dis- 
 posed classes of his subjects ; and the priests and Levites, 
 with many of the people, voluntarily abandoned their tem- 
 poral possessions, to obtain part in the spiritual privileges 
 of the temple-worship at Jerusalem 4 . 
 
 But the profession of the true religion did not secure 
 its practice ; and within three years the apostacy of Judah 
 appears to have become general, and brought upon that 
 kingdom an invasion of Shishak, king of Egypt, with a 
 numerous army 5 . The timely repentance of the king and 
 princes averted the extremity of the Divine wrath, but the 
 fenced cities of Judah, and Jerusalem itself, were taken, and 
 the temple was spoiled of its treasures. The substitution of 
 brazen shields for the shields of gold which Solomon had 
 dedicated, and which Shishak now carried away, represented 
 but too faithfully the deterioration of national piety, and the 
 consequent decline of the national prosperity. The king of 
 Judah appears to have continued for some time in a state 
 of vassalage to the Egyptian conqueror, but we have no in- 
 timation of the time or manner in which he released himself 
 from his yoke. The remainder of his reign too clearly 
 indicated the insincerity of his former repentance ; and here 
 we see the consequences of the father's sin perpetuated in 
 
 3 1 Kings xiii. 5 1 Kings xiv. 25 ; 2 Chron. xii. 
 
 4 2 Chron. xi. 13, 14, 16, 17, &c.
 
 26 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 the son ; for the record of his wickedness is connected with 
 his descent from an Ammonitess mother, in a manner which 
 seems clearly to ultimate that her evil influence had cor- 
 rupted his heart in his early youth 1 . 
 
 After a reign of seventeen years he left the kingdom 
 to his son Abijah, whose short reign was occupied in the 
 successful prosecution of the war with Israel which had con- 
 tinued during the whole period that had elapsed since the 
 division 2 . His expostulation with the apostate Israelites, his 
 profession of adherence to the true worship of God, and 
 above all, the decisive victory vouchsafed to Judah on this 
 occasion, "because they relied upon the Lord God of their 
 fathers 3 ," would bespeak a favourable opinion for this king, 
 but that we are informed that "he walked in the sins of 
 his fathers, and his heart was not perfect with the Lord 
 his God." But David's piety, which was still had in remem- 
 brance in the sight of God, proved the safeguard of his 
 kingdom 4 , until it was revived in the person of Asa, the 
 son and successor of Abijah. 
 
 This king immediately on his accession commenced a 
 thorough reformation, in a spirit which allowed no com- 
 promise with natural aifection or expediency. His , own 
 mother, who had encouraged idolatry by her example, was 
 deposed from the station of influence which she had occupied, 
 and her idol was destroyed and publicly burnt by the brook 
 Kidron 5 . Peace and prosperity was the consequence of this 
 reformation, and he availed himself of this opportunity of 
 strengthening the defences of the land by the erection of 
 walled cities. His victory over the mighty host of Zcrah 
 the Ethiopian, and the promise of the Divine favour, by the 
 
 1 2 Chron. xii. 13. 
 
 2 2 Kings xiv. 30. 
 
 3 2 Chron. xiii. 
 
 4 1 Kings xv. 4. 
 
 5 1 Kings xv. 13.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 27 
 
 mouth of the prophet Oded, encouraged him in the course 
 which he had begun, and brought over to him a large 
 accession of the subjects of the king of Israel 6 . But the 
 solemn covenant by which they now bound themselves to 
 the service of God, was not long observed; his signal de- 
 liverance from the Ethiopians was soon forgotten ; and his 
 trust in the king of Syria, on occasion of the invasion of 
 Baasha, incurred the displeasure of God, and was the first 
 act of a series of persecutions, oppressions, and distresses, 
 which cast a dark shadow over the later period of a reign 
 which had given such fair promise at its commencement. 
 
 Very different was it with his son and successor Jeho- 
 shaphat 7 , whose consistent course of rectitude is placed in 
 so striking a contrast to the impiety and gross idolatry of a 
 contemporaneous king of Israel, that a review of the two 
 reigns would form an instructive exemplification of the pro- 
 gress of virtue and vice ; the former tending more and more 
 to glory and honour here, no less than to immortality here- 
 after, the latter sinking continually to a lower depth of 
 debasement. 
 
 The reformation of Jehoshaphat proceeded further than 
 that of his father, or of other succeeding kings ; for he 
 " took away the high places and groves 8 ;" he appointed 
 princes and Levites and priests to teach throughout the land, 
 and to expound the law of the Lord, copies of which they 
 carried with them ; and he himself became a teacher and 
 preacher of righteousness to the judges and the priests, to 
 remind them of their responsibility, and of the sin of wresting 
 judgment, and to encourage them in the discharge of their 
 
 6 2 Chron. xv. 1, &c. 
 
 7 2 Chron. xvii xx. 
 
 8 2 Chron. xvii. 6. Yet in 1 Kings 
 xxii. 43, and 2 Chron. xx. 33, we read 
 
 that " the high places were not taken 
 away," &c. Perhaps this may refer 
 to an earlier period of his reign.
 
 28 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 important duties, the nature of which he so excellently de- 
 clared to them. The complete system of organization under 
 which the kingdom was brought during his reign, must much 
 have facilitated the administration of its affairs, and proves 
 that his religious zeal was not inconsistent with the due dis- 
 charge of his functions as a civil magistrate. But he had 
 the wisdom to see that his political improvements would be 
 vain without the religious instruction of his people, so he 
 made this his first care, and by so doing secured to himself 
 the favour of God, the ready allegiance of his subjects, and 
 the submission of all surrounding nations. 
 
 The Philistines and Arabians, those hereditary enemies 
 of Judah, submitted themselves to him, and voluntarily offered 
 tribute ; and " the fear of the Lord fell upon all the king- 
 doms of the lands that were round about Judah, so that they 
 made no war against him." And if the invasion of his 
 country by the combined armies of the Moabites and Am- 
 monites, with the inhabitants of mount Seir, or the Edomites, 
 interrupted for a short time the tranquillity of his reign, it 
 was only to afford occasion for the exhibition of new virtues. 
 Renouncing all confidence in his numerous and well disci- 
 plined army, and trusting simply in the protection of the 
 Almighty, he sought to propitiate His favour by a solemn 
 fast, and extraordinary religious services in the temple at 
 Jerusalem. The preparation and conduct of the war gave it 
 throughout a religious character, and issued in the complete 
 overthrow of the mighty host, which proved an effectual 
 check to aggression from any other quarter. 
 
 There was however one act of his reign which became a 
 fruitful source of evil to his posterity, though ther strength 
 and sincerity of his own principles prevented it from becoming 
 disastrous to himself personally. 
 
 A state of hostility with idolatrous Israel was Judah's
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 29 
 
 best security against apostacy, and the ill-advised alliance 
 which he formed with Ahab, who had succeeded to the 
 throne of Israel, after a long period of intestine commotion, 
 brought on him a denunciation of the Divine wrath by the 
 mouth of Jehu the son of Hanani. And even without this, 
 his religious principles, which could not but be put to a 
 severe trial in the court of his idolatrous ally, amid the as- 
 semblies of the prophets of Baal 1 , and the ill success of the 
 expedition against Ramoth-gilead, undertaken under their 
 auspices and in defiance of the true prophet, issuing as it did 
 in the death of Ahab, might have served to convince him of 
 his error. Yet he afterwards joined himself with the sons 
 and successors of Ahab, Ahaziah and Joram ; with the 
 former in a mercantile undertaking in which his works were 
 broken, and his projects defeated, according to the prophecy 
 of Eliezer the son of Dodavah ; with the latter in an expedi- 
 tion against the revolted Moabites, in which his presence 
 procured for his ally the countenance of the prophet Elisha, 
 with a miraculous deliverance from drought, and a complete 
 victory over the enemy 2 . The repetition of conduct which 
 had been so plainly condemned, would make it appear that 
 he had implicated himself with the royal family of Israel in a 
 manner which bound him to forward their measures, and 
 may be accounted for by the matrimonial connexion which he 
 had allowed his eldest son to form with the house of Omri. 
 
 Such an alliance, as might have been expected, was in 
 the last degree detrimental to the welfare of the nation. It 
 was nothing strange that the son-in-law of the house of 
 Ahab should walk in the way of the kings of Israel 3 . The 
 first act of the reign of Jehoram, was the murder of all his 
 brethren, and of many of the princes of Israel, and the 
 
 1 1 Kings xxii. ' 2 Kings jjj 3 2 Kings viii 18 2 Chron. xxi.
 
 30 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 remainder of his reign was answerable to this beginning ; for, 
 as though his own iniquity were a small matter, "he caused 
 the inhabitants of Jerusalem to commit fornication, and com- 
 pelled Judah thereto." The revolt of the Edomites, who had 
 been subject to Judah from the days of David until this 
 period, while it was a fulfilment of ancient prophecy 1 , was 
 a warning and a chastisement to him, but neglected and de- 
 spised. And a voice which came to him, as it were, from 
 another world, affected him no more; so hardened was he, 
 and insensible. It was a letter from Elijah, indited by the 
 spirit of prophecy, and written before his translation 2 , re- 
 proving him for his sins, and denouncing the Divine vengeance ; 
 yet he remained impenitent ; and the threatened punishments 
 immediately came to pass. The Philistines and Arabians 
 invaded the land, and sacked the city, and carried into cap- 
 tivity his children, and his wives ; and left him the prey of 
 a loathsome and incurable disease, under which, at the end 
 of two years, he died miserably, unlamented, and "without 
 being desired." He was succeeded, both in his government, 
 and in his impiety, by his youngest son, Jehoahaz or Aha- 
 ziah 3 , who alone had escaped captivity, and "He also walked 
 in the ways of the house of Ahab ; for his mother was his 
 counsellor to do wickedly." His sympathy with the king of 
 Israel led to his destruction, in the revolt of Jehu, after a 
 reign of one year ; and many of the royal family of Judah 
 shared the fate of the king. 
 
 Athaliah, the queen-mother, all but completed the exter- 
 mination of those who survived, and usurped the kingdom 
 for six years, when the rightful heir was restored under 
 
 1 Gen. xxvii. 40. 
 
 * I adopt the most probable ac- 
 count, which is found also in the mar- 
 gin of the authorized version, 2 Chron. 
 xxi. 12. The rapture of Elijah oc- 
 
 curred during the life of Jehoshaphat, 
 2 Kings ii. 3; xi. 3. 
 
 8 2 Kings viii. 2429; ix. 10. 
 2 Chron. xxi. 1J.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 circumstances which promised the extirpation of idolatry, and 
 a revival of the national religion 4 . For the important ser- 
 vices rendered to Jehoash by Jehoiada the high priest, gave 
 the latter much influence over the mind of the youthful 
 monarch ; his proposal to repair the temple, which had been 
 broken up, that its spoils might be bestowed on Baalim, called 
 forth the religious zeal and devotion of the people ; but the 
 death of the high priest, in an extreme old age, clouded the 
 bright prospect; and the murder of Zechariah the prophet, 
 the son of his preserver, "between the porch and the altar 6 ," 
 proved the strength of his attachment to the idolatry into 
 which he had lapsed, and from which the Spirit of God in 
 the prophet would have recalled him. A disastrous invasion 
 of the Syrians, and a grievous malady, terminating in a 
 violent death, by the hands of conspirators, was the fruit 
 of this defection. 
 
 His son Amaziah met with a similar fate after a long 
 reign, the latter part of which was too nearly conformed to 
 the pattern of his fathers 7 . He had at first run well and 
 prospered, but on his return from a successful expedition 
 against the Edomites, he set up their gods to be his gods, 
 
 4 2 Kings xi. 12. 
 
 5 2 Chron. xxiv. 2022. 
 
 e Matt, xxiii. 35. St Jerome's ac- 
 count of the substitution of Barachiah 
 for Jehoiada in this difficult passage, 
 is scarcely satisfactory ; viz., that Ba- 
 rachiah means "beloved of God," and 
 Jehoiada was a just man, and therefore 
 beloved ; but he adds, that the version 
 of the gospel, in use among the Naza- 
 renes, had Jehoiada for Barachiah. He 
 says, that the " simpliciores fratres" in 
 his day, still showed the stones red 
 with his blood, in the temple inclosure 
 at Jerusalem, (see also the Bordeaux 
 
 Pilgrim, who adds, the "vestigia cla- 
 vorum, militum, qui eum occiderunt.") 
 St Jerome's indulgence for this credu- 
 lity would not be considered very cha- 
 ritable in these days. " Non condem- 
 namus errorem, qui de odio Judaeorum, 
 et fidei pietate descendit." Vid. Com- 
 ment, in loc. Vol. iv. Pt. i. pp. 112, 
 113, Ed. Bened; St Chrysostom, and 
 many others, understand the allusion 
 of the son of Barachiah, (Zech. i. 1). 
 But this explanation appears inadmis- 
 sible. See Poole's Synop. in loc. 
 7 2 Kings xiv ; 2 Chron. xxv.
 
 32 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 and being reproved for his folly, in "seeking after the gods 
 of the people, which could not deliver their people out of his 
 hand," he not only despised the admonition, but threatened 
 the prophet, and was given over to an infatuation, the pre- 
 cursor of his ruin, which was brought about by means of a 
 power which he himself had provoked to the contest. His 
 wanton challenge of the king of Israel, prompted, as it would 
 seem, by pride and self-sufficiency grounded on his former 
 conquest, and persisted in against the remonstrance of his 
 rival, involved both himself and his country in misery ; for 
 being defeated in a battle at Beth-shemesh, the conqueror 
 brought him as a prisoner to Jerusalem, which he sacked, 
 and pillaged, not even sparing the sacred vessels of the 
 temple ; and having broken down four hundred cubits of the 
 wall, he returned to Samaria, leaving the king to repair his 
 shattered fortunes as he could, and soon after to become 
 the victim of the well-earned disaffection of his subjects. 
 
 The long and prosperous reign of Uzziah 1 , who succeeded 
 to his father's throne, at the early age of sixteen, served to 
 place the affairs of Judah on a better footing. Having 
 strengthened the defences of the capital, and of the country 
 generally, he secured a period of peace by the terror with 
 which he had inspired his troublesome neighbours in his 
 wars against the Philistines and Arabians, by the establish- 
 ment of a formidable standing army, and by the invention 
 of military engines. He then devoted himself to agricultural 
 pursuits, and might have come to his grave in peace but for 
 an act of unexampled presumption, which none of his prede- 
 cessors, however abandoned, had yet dared to venture on. 
 It was an attempt at a sacrilegious invasion of the priestly 
 office ; successfully resisted by the sons of Aaron ; and sig- 
 nally visited by God himself, furnishing an example to suc- 
 
 1 2 Chron. xxvi.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 33 
 
 ceeding generations of the danger of intruding into the 
 sacred ministry an example which will be no less eloquent 
 under the new dispensation to those who look to the Old 
 Testament for a rule of life, and for intimations of the 
 Divine will: regarding the gospel as a continuation or ex- 
 tension a fulfilment rather than an abrogation of the law ; 
 and, as such, not requiring the repetition of the principles 
 there laid down, but none the less both sanctioning and de- 
 manding the observance of those principles. 
 
 Uzziah was succeeded by his son Jotham, who is men- 
 tioned with commendation, though the corruption of the 
 people was becoming deeper year by year 2 , and the voices 
 of the prophets who were raised up about this period, gave 
 warning of approaching judgments. Joel and Amos, Hosea 
 and Isaiah, were now uttering denunciations of wrath ; and 
 earthquake, and famine, and drought, with their attend- 
 ant train of misery and distress, speedly ensued 3 ; insomuch 
 that there was not corn and wine sufficient for a meat-offering 
 and a drink-offering in the house of the Lord : and when 
 the religious king, who must always be a check to the pro- 
 gress of vice even in an age of profligacy, was removed, and 
 the succession of Ahaz 4 secured countenance for iniquity and 
 idolatry in the highest quarters, then sin indeed ran riot in 
 the land, and, according to the strong expression of the 
 prophet, " they drew iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin 
 as it were with a cart-rope." And judgment followed judg- 
 ment, until they were almost exhausted, and there was no 
 room to smite any more with the rod of chastisement 5 ; the 
 whole head was sick, and the whole heart faint, and from 
 the sole of the foot even unto the head there was no sound- 
 
 2 2 Chron. xxvii. 2. 
 
 3 Amos i. 1. Joel i. 2, 3, 7, 19. 
 Amos vii. 1. Hosea iv. 3. Isaiah i. 
 
 3 
 
 4 2 Chron. xxviii. 
 
 5 So Lowth translates Isaiah i. 5. 
 " Where should ye be smitten."
 
 34 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 ness in it, but wounds, and bruises, and putrifying sores. The 
 country desolate, the cities burned with fire, the land de- 
 voured by the enemies ; the daughter of Zion desolate ; a 
 small remnant its only security against the fate of Sodom 
 and Gomorrah, which it had equalled, or exceeded, in its sin. 
 Such is the picture of Judah's condition during the reign of 
 this most profligate and abandoned of all her princes. 
 
 The confederacy of Pekah, king of Israel, with Rezin, 
 king of Syria, resulted in their carrying off a large cap- 
 tivity, though Jerusalem itself escaped 1 , and the last extre- 
 mity of misery was averted by the intervention of the 
 prophet Oded, and the interference of the princes of the 
 tribe of Ephraim 2 . The Edomites and the Philistines also 
 invaded the land, possessed themselves of several cities, and 
 carried away their inhabitants captives; so that Judah was 
 brought very low. And the Assyrian, in whom they vainly 
 trusted, was so far from helping, that he distressed and im- 
 poverished them still more ; and this unholy alliance became 
 the occasion of fresh sin, in which king and priests and 
 people were all involved. To turn to the worship of the 
 gods of Damascus, on the plea, " Because the gods of the 
 kings of Syria help them, therefore will I sacrifice to them, 
 that they may help me," was a more specious error than 
 that of Amaziah but his idolatry was the ruin of him and 
 of all Israel. 
 
 There are few things more remarkable in the history of 
 the kings of Judah than the frequent alternation of virtuous 
 and wicked princes, contrary, it would seem, to the rule of 
 the divine economy in the government of the world. One 
 of the most striking instances of this apparent reversion of 
 the order of Providence, is that of Hezekiah, of whom it 
 
 1 Compare Isaiah vii. 1, 4, 8, and 2 Kings xvi. 5, with 2 Chron. xxviii. 5 8. 
 
 2 2 Chron. xxviii.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 35 
 
 is recorded that "after him was none like him among all 
 the kings of Judah, nor any that were before him." He 
 found the church and state in a most deplorable condition, 
 owing to the impiety of his predecessors. The high priest 
 had been so far forgetful of his duty, as to lend himself 
 to the idolatrous practices of Ahaz : the sacred vessels had 
 been desecrated or destroyed, and the doors of the house 
 of the Lord shut up 3 , to the entire suspension of all the 
 prescribed services. The daily burnt-offering, indeed, was 
 still offered, but not on the brazen altar, which had been 
 removed from its place, and superseded by that which had 
 been built after the fashion of the idol-altar at Damascus 4 ; 
 and the streets of Jerusalem were polluted with like me- 
 morials of the idolatrous excesses of the late reign. Heze- 
 kiah lost no time in commencing the purification of the 
 temple from these abominations 5 . " In the first year of 
 his reign, in the first month he opened the doors of the 
 house of the Lord, and repaired them," and charged the 
 priests and Levites, whom he assembled at Jerusalem, to 
 prosecute the work of purification with vigour. In sixteen 
 days it was accomplished, and a solemn dedication of the 
 temple, rendered necessary by the late abuses, and a con- 
 secration of the priests and Levites to their several offices, 
 proclaimed the re-establishment of the national religion. 
 
 His next care was the due observance of the Passover, 
 which he proclaimed not only throughout his own dominions, 
 but through the tribes of apostate Israel. His religious 
 zeal, as was natural, excited the ridicule and contempt, and 
 opposition of many ; but on the whole, the revival was more 
 general than could have been expected after so long a de- 
 fection from the true worship of God, and a very great 
 
 3 2 Chron. xxviii. 24. 
 
 4 2 Kings xvi. 1016. 
 
 20. 
 
 s 2 Chron. xxix.32. 2 Kings xviii. 
 32
 
 36 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 congregation was assembled. It was a most joyful occasion, 
 for " since the time of Solomon there was not the like in 
 Jerusalem." In a short time all the symbols and insignia of 
 idolatry were swept away : the high places, and the images, 
 and the groves, were removed ; and the brazen serpent that 
 Moses had made an object not only innocent in itself, but 
 venerable from its associations was destroyed, as having 
 been abused to idolatrous practices. Neither was the re- 
 formation confined to the capital. The spirit of religious 
 zeal descended from the prince to the people, and the whole 
 land cleared of its abominations. The willing offering of the 
 firstfruits and tithes, which were brought in so plentifully, 
 that there was enough and to spare for all sacred purposes, 
 bore witness to the sincerity of the offerers ; and of the king 
 it is said, that " in every work that he began in the service 
 of the house of God, and in the law, and in the command- 
 ments, to seek his God, he did it with all his heart, and 
 prospered." 
 
 While these things were being transacted in Judah, the 
 iniquity of the ten tribes had become full, and the long 
 threatened judgment at last overtook them. The appointed 
 minister of vengeance was Shalmaneser, king of Assyria. In 
 his first invasion he reduced Hoshea, king of Israel, to a state 
 of vassalage, but was content to leave him in possession of 
 the throne, in consideration of an annual tribute ; but when 
 after an interval the tribute was withheld, and the vassal- 
 monarch manifested a disposition to exchange the yoke of 
 Assyria for that of Egypt 1 , he again invaded the country, 
 and laid siege to Samaria. At the end of three years he took 
 the city, and carrying away the ten tribes to Media, peopled 
 the desolated country with captives from other conquered 
 
 1 2 Kings xvii. 3, 4.
 
 OH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 cities, whose small remnant at this day attests the truth of 
 the sacred history 2 . 
 
 The ruin of Israel would doubtless inspire the pious king 
 of Judah with fresh zeal in the prosecution of the work in 
 which he was engaged, if by any means he might avert 
 the like calamities from his own country. Yet he took a 
 course which human policy would have pronounced most 
 likely to hasten that which he sought to prevent. The 
 services of the Assyrian army had been purchased by 
 Ahaz at the price of an annual tribute, the continued 
 payment of which implied a dependence on its aid incon- 
 sistent with that simple reliance on God, which had ever 
 been the best protection of the Jewish nation. Hezekiah 
 therefore withdrew his fealty, and an invasion was the im- 
 mediate consequence 3 : daunted for a time by the approach 
 of his powerful enemy, he sought to escape the impending 
 storm by a tardy submission ; but, when at a later period 
 he resumed his opposition, and again provoked the resent- 
 ment of the great king, he was delivered, by a wonderful 
 intervention of providence, from the threatened destruction. 
 He had put the city in a state of complete defence, and 
 taken all necessary precautions against the emergency of a 
 blockade ; but his trust was placed in something stronger 
 than walls and bulwarks even in Him who compasseth His 
 people, as the hills stand around Jerusalem and as he re- 
 lied not on an arm of flesh, spiritual succour was vouchsafed 
 
 2 2 Kings xvii. 24, &c. and com- 
 pare xviii. 24. The Samaritans are 
 found only at Nablouse : in 1842, the 
 community consisted of 39 taxable 
 men, with their families ; they are 
 distinguished from all other denomi- 
 nations, by their somewhat Jewish 
 physiognomy, the red turban, peculiar 
 
 to them, and their deep-seated hatred 
 of the Jews. They receive only the 
 Pentateuch, are rigid observers of the 
 law, and sacrifice three times in the 
 year on mount Gerizim. 
 
 3 Comp. 2 Kings xv. 2, 7, &c. and 
 xviii. 7, 1316.
 
 38 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 to him before the invader had so much as cast a bank 
 or shot an arrow against the city. Once, while at Lachish, 
 he had detached three of his captains with a great host 
 for this service, and they had come to Jerusalem and sat 
 down before it ; but the siege was raised, and the forces 
 reunited at Libnah, from whence Sennacherib soon after 
 marched to meet Tirhakah king of Ethiopia 1 , having first 
 sent an insulting message to king Hezekiah, threatening, on 
 his return, to proceed in person to the subjugation of Jeru- 
 salem. It was during this expedition that the miraculous 
 destruction of his numerous army forced him to a precipitous 
 retreat to his own country, where he met with a violent 
 death from the hands of his own children ; yet so memorable 
 was this invasion, that the camp of the Assyrians, on the 
 north of Jerusalem, was ever afterwards had in remem- 
 brance, and was occupied by Titus himself during the block- 
 ade of the city by the Romans 2 . The prosperous reign of 
 Hezekiah, which was almost blameless, was miraculously pro- 
 longed for fifteen years, and his death left the throne vacant 
 for a son who had nothing in common with him. 
 
 1 The Taraco of Manetho, of the 
 Ethiopian dynasty, called Sethon, 
 priest of Vulcan, by .Herodotus, Book 
 ii. c. 141. See Heeren's Historical 
 Researches, Vol. u. p. 383. Milman 
 observes from Horapollo, that "total 
 destruction was represented in Egyp- 
 tian hieroglyphics by the symbol of a 
 mouse." This, if correct, will throw 
 great light on the version of this story 
 given by Herodotus, who very possibly 
 derived it " from the misinterpretation 
 of an hieroglyphic, in which the shield, 
 the quiver and the bow, the usual sym- 
 bols by which, as in Hebrew poetry, 
 the might of a great anny is represent- 
 
 ed, were destroyed by some secret and 
 unseen, or insignificant instrument of 
 the divine power, typified by the field- 
 mouse." History of the Jews, Vol. i. 
 p. 307, 8. This writer, with others, at- 
 tributes the catastrophe to the Simoom, 
 which seems a very arbitrary and un- 
 authorised method of interpretation. 
 The same may be said of the substitu- 
 tion of Pelusium for Libnah in this 
 history ; for he could scarcely imagine 
 them to be identical. Joshua xii. 7, 
 Ift. 
 
 8 Josephus, Jewish War, Lib. xn. 
 cap. 2.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 39 
 
 The long reign of Manasseh 3 , who equalled, if he did 
 not exceed, the worst kings of Israel in the enormity of 
 his wickedness, reduced the kingdom to such a state, that 
 when in his later years, under the discipline of affliction, 
 he had learnt true wisdom in his dungeon at Babylon, his 
 most strenuous efforts to extirpate the idolatry which he 
 had planted were unavailing 4 , and he had to reap the bitter 
 fruits of those iniquities of which he had deeply repented, 
 and which his whole soul abhorred. And as he could not 
 stop the torrent of depravity to which he had opened the 
 flood-gates, so neither could he avert the after-consequences 
 of his transgressions, which are ever mentioned as the chief 
 moving cause of the Babylonish captivity 5 : a solemn warning 
 indeed, that repentance, however sincere, however availing 
 through God's mercy to the salvation of the individual peni- 
 tent, cannot cancel the past, or reverse the righteous decree 
 which has connected sin and misery together by an inse- 
 parable tie. Something however was effected; the people 
 were induced, by the example and admonition of their king, 
 to abandon the worship of the false gods, but the continuance 
 of the high places, to which they clung with fond idolatry, 
 left open the door to defection from the true object of 
 worship : and evil principles had become too deeply seated 
 in his son Amon to be eradicated by the late repentance 
 of his father, whose early impiety he imitated during the 
 two years of his reign 6 . 
 
 His violent death placed the young Josiah on the 
 throne 7 , a prince whose devoted loyalty to the King of 
 kings would have redeemed his land from destruction, had 
 not the iniquity of his predecessors opposed an insuperable 
 
 3 2 Kings xxi. 
 
 4 2 Chron. xxxiii. 1117. 
 
 5 See 2 Kings xxi. 11, 12; xxiii. 2tl, 
 
 xxiv. 3 ; and Jerem. xv. 4. 
 
 6 2 Kings xxi. 23, &c. 
 
 7 2 Kings xxii. xxiii.
 
 40 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 obstacle to pardoning mercy. He had come to the throne 
 at the early age of eight years, when youth and inexperience 
 would disqualify him to take a decided line, even if his 
 principles had disposed him to run counter to the first lessons 
 which his childhood had received under the tuition of an 
 idolatrous father. But although he laboured under such 
 disadvantages, and had to grope his way from darkness to 
 light, while the lamp of divine truth lay buried in oblivion, 
 yet he made marvellous progress. " In the eighth year 
 of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek 
 God," and in "the twelfth year he began to purge Judah 
 and Jerusalem from the high places, and the groves, and 
 the carved images, and the molten images." The earlier 
 part of this reformation was conducted on such principles 
 of pure religion as tradition had preserved; for such had 
 been the abandonment of its precepts, since the time of 
 Hezekiah, that the written depository of the Mosaic law had 
 been lost and almost forgotten. It was recovered by Hil- 
 kiah the priest, while repairing the temple ; but the clearer 
 understanding of its requirements created amazement and 
 dismay in the tender heart of the young prince. He rent 
 his clothes and wept at the remembrance of the contempt 
 which had been poured upon the law, and from dread of 
 the impending wrath which its transgression had provoked, 
 and sent to enquire of the Lord concerning it. The answer 
 which he received from Huldah the prophetess was discou- 
 raging in the extreme. For the nation, a threat of speedy 
 recompense for their aggravated sins fiery indignation 
 shortly to be poured upon Jerusalem ; for Josiah himself, 
 a promise that he should be taken away from the evil to 
 come removed by death from a participation in those judg- 
 ments which might not now be averted, and only for a brief 
 season delayed. Never did reformer prosecute his task under
 
 1. 1.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 41 
 
 such gloomy forebodings, but never any with more fervent 
 zeal than he. He built as for eternity, though he knew 
 that a few years would lay all his labours in the dust, when 
 the destroyer should come up with axes and hammers 
 to break down the carved work which he was setting up, 
 to set fire upon the holy places which he wag renewing, 
 and to carry away the living stones of the spiritual church 
 to captivity in a heathen land. 
 
 The busy sounds of the workmen who were engaged in 
 the repairs of the temple, or in the demolition of the high 
 places and idol-altars from Geba to Beersheba, were but a 
 prelude to the sounds which should accompany the devas- 
 tation of the invading army ; and the joyful acclamations 
 of the assembled multitude at the feast of the Passover in 
 his 18th' year, were strangely contrasted with the swan-like 
 strains of the Prophet Jeremiah, singing the dirge of the 
 parting glory of Judah ! Its doom was speedily consum- 
 mated ! The situation of Judea between two powerful rival 
 sovereignties has frequently exposed it to the horrors of war, 
 and it now became the scene of the conflict between Pharaoh- 
 Necho, king of Egypt, and the formidable founder of the 
 new Assyrian dynasty in Babylon 1 . The king of Judah 
 was probably bound by his oath of vassalage to the Assy- 
 rians, to guard their frontier against the aggressor, whom 
 he encountered in the plain of Esdraelon 2 , which has been 
 
 1 Necho was the son and successor 
 of Psammeticus, who had restored the 
 fallen throne of the Pharaohs, by 
 founding the 26th dynasty. Josephus 
 says, that this expedition was "against 
 the Medes and Babylonians, who had 
 overthrown the dominion of the As- 
 syrians." Ant. x. v. 1. The combined 
 forces of Nabopollasar, king of Baby- 
 lon, (father of the great Nebuchad- 
 
 nezzar), and Astyages, the eldest son 
 of Cyaxares, king of Media, had taken 
 Nineveh two years before this (i. e. in 
 612 B.C.) See Prideaux's Connexion 
 at this year. 
 
 2 There is no necessity to suppose, 
 with Milman( Hist Jews, Vol.i. p.313), 
 that " the Jewish copyists may have 
 substituted the more familiar name 
 Megiddo for the remote Magdolum." 
 
 It
 
 42 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 the battle-field of the world in ancient and modern times. 
 In this engagement Josiah was mortally wounded, and died 
 shortly after. Well might the prophet lament the death 
 of this pious prince, since his death was the knell of Jeru- 
 salem 1 : for as the destruction of Sodom was delayed until 
 just Lot had effected his escape, so with the spiritual Sodom, 
 its judgments commenced as soon as Josiah had been re- 
 moved. It would appear that after a successful campaign 
 in Syria, Necho led his victorious army against Jerusalem 2 , 
 where having deposed JehQahaz, whom the people had made 
 king in his father's stead, he carried him to Egypt 3 , and 
 
 It is much more probable that Hero- 
 dotus was mistaken by the similarity 
 of the name. Zechariah xii. 11 
 which is commonly taken to refer to 
 this disastrous defeat seems to fix it 
 to Megiddo, in the tribe of Manasseh. 
 See St Jerome, Comment, in Zech. loc. 
 cit. ; and for a satisfactory answer to 
 the common objections, see Reland's 
 Palestine, sub voc. Megiddo. This 
 city is now represented by Leggun. 
 In the account given of these events by 
 Josephus, all the extant Greek copies 
 have Mev&iv ir6\iv, but there can be 
 little doubt that he wrote Me'yfiijv, for 
 he expressly says that it was in the 
 kingdom of Josiah, and we nowhere 
 read of such a city as Mendes within 
 these limits. Ant. Lib. x. cap. v. 
 
 1 2 Chron. xxxv. 25, and Lam. iv. 
 20. 
 
 2 The taking of Jerusalem by Pha- 
 raoh-Necho is not expressly mentioned 
 in scripture, but it is implied. Hero- 
 dotus no doubt alludes to these events, 
 n. 159 : " Supotcri T$JJ o Neicais 
 trufj.fia\iav, ev MayiSoXw eviKijtre, fieTa 
 Se TJI> fnd%t)v KdSvTiv iroXiv Trje 2u- 
 /otas eovaav jueyaXtji/ eTXe." What- 
 
 ever difficulty or ambiguity there may 
 be in this historian's reference to Cady- 
 tis in in. 5, it can be hardly doubted 
 that in this passage by Cadytis is in- 
 tended Jerusalem. It must have been 
 early called by a name correspond- 
 ing to that by which alone it is now 
 known among the Arabs" el-Kuds," 
 or " The Holy." See Neh. xi. 118 ; 
 Isai. xlviii. 2 ; lii. 1 ; Matt. iv. 5 ; xx vii. 
 53. The passages from Isaiah prove 
 that it was known to the Hebrews by 
 
 the appellation of t^Tpn T}7 before 
 
 the time of Josiah, the Arabic pro- 
 nunciation of which would come nearer 
 to the form which it assumes in Hero- 
 dotus. Reland, Palestina, p. 668, &c., 
 states the arguments against this view. 
 See on the other side Raumer's Pales- 
 tine, under the article " Jerusalem." 
 A memorial of the 'Jtji/u<rios iroXts, in 
 the passage of Herodotus last referred 
 to, is still found in "Khan Yunas," 
 about fifteen miles south of Gaza. 
 
 3 Called Shall urn in Jer. xxii. 11. 
 He was youngest son of Josiah. See 
 1 Chron. iii. 15, and compare 2 Kings 
 xxiii. 31 and 36. Josiah's children
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 placing Jehoiakim, his brother, on the throne, condemned 
 the land in a heavy tribute. The defeat of the Egyptian 
 army at the Euphrates, a few years later 4 , followed by 
 their evacuation of all Syria and Palestine 5 , brought another 
 reverse of fortune. Jerusalem was now taken by the Chal- 
 deans ; the king and some of the royal princes were brought 
 to Babylon 6 , with part of the sacred vessels of the temple : 
 but Jehoiakim was subsequently restored and confirmed in 
 the kingdom, until a vain attempt to renew his independence 
 resulted in his ruin, when, according to the testimony of 
 Josephus, he met with the fate which Jeremiah the pro- 
 phet had denounced 7 ; being put to death by the command 
 of the conqueror, and thrown unburied before the walls of 
 Jerusalem. Jehoiachin 8 , his son, succeeded for three months, 
 at the end of which time Nebuchadnezzar again came up 
 and besieged the city, when the king, with all the members 
 of the royal family, and the principal officers of state, 
 delivered themselves up to him, and were carried into cap- 
 tivity, and Zedekiah, his uncle, was appointed by the king 
 
 were, 1. Johanan, 2. Jehoiakim, 3. 
 Zedekiah, 4. Shallum. 
 
 4 Jer. xlvi. 2, &c. Pharaoh-Necho 
 heldCarchemish about three years, from 
 610 to 607, B.C. 
 
 5 2 Kings xxiv. 7- The events re- 
 ferred to in this verse must belong to 
 the 4th year of Jehoiakim, B. c. 607. 
 
 6 2 Chron. xxxvi. 6, 7- It was on 
 this occasion that Daniel and his com- 
 panions were carried captive. Dan. i. 
 7- And from this year the 70 years' 
 captivity are to be dated to the first 
 decree of Cyrus. Jer. xxvi. ; 2 Chron. 
 xxxvi. 20, &c. See Prideaux's Con- 
 nexion, ann. 518 and 515, B.C., for 
 three ingenious computations of this 
 period. It is singular that Josephus 
 
 passes over this first capture of Jerusa- 
 lem by Nebuchadnezzar, in his first 
 year. Indeed he says, that after he had 
 vanquished Pharaoh-Necho at Carche- 
 mish, " he passed over Euphrates, and 
 took all Syria as far as Pelusium, ex- 
 cepting Judcea, which he did not in- 
 vade until four years after." Ant. x. 
 vi. 1. 
 
 7 Ant. x. sect. 3. Comp. Jer. xxii. 
 18, 19. Josephus says, that it was on 
 this occasion that Ezekiel was carried 
 captive with 3000 of his countrymen of 
 the chief dignity. 
 
 8 2 Kings xxiv. 616. Called Je- 
 coniah, 1 Chron. iii. 16 ; Jer. xxiv. 1 ; 
 and Coniah, Jer. xxii. 24, 28.
 
 44 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 of Babylon to the throne of Judah 1 . It was now little 
 better than an empty title, the domination of the foreign 
 monarch, and the insolence of the native princes, had robbed 
 it of all its real dignity 2 . 
 
 Zedekiah was scarcely seated on his throne, when he was 
 solicited to enter into a confederacy with the petty princes 
 of the neighbouring nations, with a view to throw off the 
 yoke of the king of Babylon 3 ; and although for a time 
 he declined to join the league, yet when it was strengthened 
 by the accession of the king of Egypt, he was induced 
 to do so, notwithstanding the repeated remonstrances of 
 Jeremiah and Ezekiel, the effects of whose inspired denun- 
 ciations were counteracted by a multitude of false prophets, 
 whose only care was to assimilate their predictions to the 
 wishes of the powerful. 
 
 At length, the conspiracy having become formidable, 
 Nebuchadnezzar again marched at the head of his army 
 towards the devoted city, which was selected by lot to 
 become the first example of his vengeance 4 . 
 
 In the tenth month of the ninth year of the reign of 
 Zedekiah, on the tenth day of the month, the city was 
 besieged ; and on the self-same day the prophet Ezekiel, in 
 the land of his captivity, was informed of the irrevocable 
 destruction determined upon it 5 . 
 
 Yet the delusive hopes of the rebellious princes were 
 again revived by the approach of the Egyptian army under 
 Pharaoh Hophra, who had lately succeeded his father Psam- 
 mis, the son of Necho, on the throne of that country 6 . The 
 
 1 2 Kings xxiv. 17, &c. His ori- 
 ginal name was Mattaniah. 
 
 8 See Jer. xxxviii. 5, 2426. 
 
 3 Jer. xxvii.; where, in the first 
 verse, it is evident that " Zedekiah" 
 must be read instead of " Jehoiakim." 
 
 4 Ezek. xxi. 20, &c. 
 
 8 2 Kings xxv. 1, &c. ; Ezek. xxiv. 
 1, &c. 
 
 6 The Pharaoh Hophra of scripture 
 is the Apries of Herodotus. The suc- 
 cession according to this writer was as
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 45 
 
 siege was indeed raised for a time by this movement; but 
 the predictions of the prophet Jeremiah were soon verified, 
 when, on the retreat of the Egyptians, the Chaldeans again 
 invested the fated city 7 . One only refuge now remained, 
 and submission might still have saved the kingdom, but the 
 king dared not have recourse to this measure 8 , and accord- 
 ingly in the eleventh year of his reign, the city being 
 reduced to the last extremity, its defence was abandoned, 
 and the conqueror, provoked by the obstinate defence of the 
 besieged, and wearied out by the frequent rebellion of these 
 vassal kings of his own creation, determined to crush the 
 spirit of revolt for ever. 
 
 Zedekiah, who had attempted to escape, was pursued 
 and taken ; his children were put to death before his eyes 
 at Kiblah; the principal officers, ecclesiastical and civil, shared 
 the same fate, and he was sent blinded and hi fetters to 
 Babylon 9 . The temple, with all the buildings of Jerusalem, 
 was destroyed by fire, and the wall completely demolished. 
 Those celebrated works in molten brass, executed by Hiram 
 the Tyrian, with which Solomon had adorned his temple, 
 the sea of ten cubits in diameter supported by twelve oxen, 
 the bases and the pillars Jachin and Boaz, each of them 
 eighteen cubits in height and twelve in circumference, which 
 stood in the porch, and had hitherto escaped the rapacity of 
 native and foreign spoilers, were now broken in pieces, to faci- 
 litate the transportation of the valuable materials to Babylon. 
 
 follows : Psammeticus, who reigned 
 54 years (Lib. n. 157, ending about 
 617, B.C.); Necho, 16 years (c. 159); 
 Psammis, 6 years (c. 161); Apries, 25 
 years (c. 161); Ainasis, 44 years; 
 Psammenitus, 6 months (Lib. HI. 10). 
 
 7 Jer. xxxvii. 5, &c. 
 
 B Jer. xxi. 8, 9 ; xxxviii. 14 23. 
 
 9 The apparent discrepancy between 
 
 Jeremiah xxxii. 4, and Ezekiel xii. 13, 
 which was thus reconciled, is mentioned 
 by Josephus as the reason of the dis- 
 belief of the king and the princes. It 
 was exactly such an inconsistency as 
 an infidel would delight to detect. But 
 " the foolishness of God is wiser than 
 men."
 
 46 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 It is remarkable, that neither in any of the three in- 
 spired accounts which we have of the destruction of Jeru- 
 salem, nor in the Lamentations of Jeremiah, nor in any 
 other part of canonical Scripture, is any mention made of 
 the fate of that most sacred object of veneration in the 
 Levitical worship the ark of the covenant, with its holy 
 contents. Of the sacred vessels, we are distinctly told that 
 part were carried away entire to Babylon, and deposited 
 there in the idol-temple, and afterwards desecrated to most 
 unhallowed uses, while the remainder were broken to pieces, 
 and their materials probably applied to the same purpose 1 : 
 it were strange that the ark should be passed over in silence, 
 if it shared a like fate. We know, from Jewish tradition, 
 that it had no place in the second temple, in which chiefly 
 consisted its inferiority to the former, in their estimation 2 : 
 an imitation of it was deposited in the most holy place, 
 which subsequently fell into the hands of the Romans, was 
 carried in the triumphal procession, and has been supposed 
 by some to be represented in the arch of Titus 3 ; but the 
 fate of the veritable ark, which had wrought such wonders 
 in the idol-temple of the Philistines 4 , is nowhere recorded on 
 any certain authority ; and we are left to adopt the most 
 probable of the conflicting legends of the later Jewish and 
 early Christian churches. 
 
 1 2 Chron. xxxvi. 7, 18; 2 Kings 
 xxiv. 13; Dan. i. 2; v. 2,3. 
 
 z See Johannis Buxtorf I. Fil. ; 
 Exeicitationes ad Historiam Arc 
 Foederis, p. 181. Basil. 1659, and Pri- 
 deaux's Connexion, anno 534, B.C. 
 
 3 Josephus, who was present at the 
 triumph, mentions the Candlestick, the 
 Shew-bread Table, and the Law, as 
 having been carried in the procession, 
 &c. de Bell. Jud. vu. v. fi. This last 
 
 is not represented in the arch ; it is 
 supposed to have been carried in the 
 Ark. Prideaux as above. It is now 
 agreed, that it is the Table, and not 
 the Ark, which is still to be traced, 
 with the Candlestick, on this venerable 
 and most interesting monument at 
 Home. Buxtorf, de Area Feederis, p. 
 201. Andricomius Theatrum Terrae 
 Sanctae, No. 77, on Jerusalem, takes it 
 tor the Ark. 4 I Sam. v.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 The prevailing belief of the former has been, that this 
 venerable relic of their religion is miraculously preserved in 
 a secret chamber of most difficult access, prepared by So- 
 lomon in the sacred rock within the great mosque at Jeru- 
 salem, where it was deposited by king Josiah, under the 
 direction of Huldah the prophetess 5 ; a tradition which is 
 faithfully recorded by the chroniclers of the Crusades 6 , but 
 which they hesitate to adopt, inclining rather to the account 
 contained in the ancient records referred to in the second 
 book of Maccabees, which relate that it was concealed by 
 Jeremiah the prophet in obedience to a divine command, 
 shortly before the destruction of Jerusalem, in a cave under 
 Mount Nebo, where, with the tabernacle and altar of incense, 
 it is preserved in safe custody, "until the time that God 
 gather his people again together, and receive them unto 
 mercy 7 ." And however unsatisfactory these accounts may 
 appear, it is surely a matter of no little interest, and it is 
 every way probable, that He who had honoured it as the 
 seat of his glory for so many centuries, would preserve it 
 from such desecration as it must have undergone had it 
 fallen into the hands of the Chaldeans ; and least of all is 
 it to be believed that it was consumed in the conflagration 
 of the temple, as the rapacity which prompted the spoliation 
 of its other treasures would not have abstained from the 
 
 s For this they quote 2 Chron.xxxv. 
 3, in his Commentary on which pas- 
 sage, R. D. Kimchi gives the tradition 
 of the Rabbies, as does Abarbariel on 
 Daniel ix. 24. Other great rabbinical 
 authorities think it was carried to Ba- 
 bylon. The curious reader may consult 
 Buxtorf, de Area Fcederis, capp. xxi. 
 xxii. where will be found some curious 
 specimens of the Biblical criticism of 
 
 the Rabbies. 
 
 6 See in the collection Gesta Dei, 
 per Francos; Albertus Aquensis, lib. 
 vi. cap. 22. p. 280 ; Fulcherii Gesta 
 Peregrin. Franc, c. xviii, and Gesta 
 Franc. Expug. Hierus. p. 573. 
 
 7 2 Mace. ii. 4 8, with which Jo- 
 sephus nearly agrees. Epiphanius, in 
 his life of Jeremiah, adds many cir- 
 cumstances to these accounts.
 
 48 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 precious materials with which this sacred depository was 
 ornamented and overlaid 1 . 
 
 The last invasion of Nebuchadnezzar, with its disastrous 
 termination, all but extinguished the national existence of the 
 Hebrew people, and the small remnant that was suffered to 
 remain in the ruined country persisted in a series of rebellion, 
 both against the majesty of heaven and their earthly rulers, 
 which involved them in further trouble, and finally terminated 
 in the entire depopulation of the land, which now lay waste 
 and enjoyed her sabbaths until the period determined before 
 by God, and declared by his prophets, had expired. 
 
 1 This last opinion of Dr Lightfoot 
 appears to be unsupported by any 
 authority whatever. See his Prospect 
 
 of the Temple, cap. xv. Vol. ix. p. 
 296. Pitman's edition.
 
 Tombs of the Kings. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ON his entrance into Babylon the Median conqueror 
 found the Jewish captives in possession of the highest 
 offices of trust in the empire. They had been recommended 
 to the monarchs of the old dynasty, not merely by their 
 natural endowments, and by their stedfast allegiance to their 
 heavenly Master the best earnest of fidelity to his earthly 
 delegates but by special miracles, wrought for their de- 
 liverance from a death which their constancy had earned. 
 The favorites of heaven would be recommended to their new 
 lord by the same excellent spirit which had originally led 
 to their exaltation 1 ; and they, for their part, would regard 
 him as the appointed instrument of that deliverance which 
 
 1 Daniel iii. vi.
 
 50 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 they knew must be nigh at hand 1 . The name of Cyrus had 
 been proclaimed as their restorer two centuries before, by 
 the mouth of the prophet Isaiah 2 ; a fact which would no 
 doubt be early communicated to him by the prophet Daniel, 
 now the first minister of state in the kingdom, whose peculiar 
 position as a captive in the land of strangers would enable 
 him to transfer his services to a new master, without the 
 suspicion or imputation of political infidelity. 
 
 The first year of the reign of Cyrus witnessed the pro- 
 mulgation of the decree permitting the return of the Jews, 
 and the restoration of their religious polity in the land of 
 their fathers 3 . It was heartily responded to by a large 
 body of the nation, although obedience was in no way com- 
 pulsory, and involved no small sacrifice. The children of 
 the captivity in Babylon had been enjoined " to build houses 
 and dwell in them, and to plant gardens and eat the fruit 
 of them, and to seek the peace of the city, whither they 
 had been carried captive, and to pray for it; for in the peace 
 thereof should they have peace 4 ." The favour and dis- 
 tinction enjoyed by their brethren in the capital, and in the 
 provinces, would have procured for them a position of security 
 and honour in their now adopted country, and a selfish feel- 
 ing might have led them to prefer the ease and quiet of a 
 settled land, to the confusion and distraction of a state of 
 incipient civilization, in a land emerging from ruin. But 
 the love of country a country associated in their minds 
 with all that was most sacred was not to be counteracted 
 by the love of ease ; so that the leaders of this first national 
 expedition were accompanied by more than fifty thousand 
 
 1 Daniel ix. 2. 
 
 a Isaiah xliv. 28. Joseph us says 
 expressly, that it was the reading of 
 this prophecy that instigated Cyrus 
 
 to issue his decree, Ant. xi. i. 3. 
 
 3 Ezrai. l,&c. 
 
 4 Jeremiah xxix. 6 7-
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY 51 
 
 persons, carrying with them large contributions from such of 
 their brethren as remained behind, and armed with full 
 powers to proceed immediately with the re-construction of 
 the temple. And, what would be of no less importance to 
 this devoted band, they had at their head a representative of 
 the royal house of David, and the lineal descendant and legal 
 successor of their last high priest, whose very name would 
 be a hopeful remembrancer to the returning captives of their 
 forefathers' entrance into the land of promise, under the 
 guidance of the son of Nun 5 . Moreover, such of the sacred 
 vessels as had escaped destruction were now brought back 
 to Jerusalem, having been restored by the munificence of 
 Cyrus, no doubt at the intercession of Daniel ; and as this 
 is the latest Scripture notice of this sacred furniture of the 
 temple, this will be a fitting place to introduce a singular 
 story of much later times. 
 
 It is reported by a contemporaneous historian 6 , that when 
 the great Belisarius triumphed over the Vandals at Con- 
 stantinople, in the sixth century, among other spoils recovered 
 from the barbarians in Africa were the sacred vessels of the 
 Jews, which Titus the son of Vespasian had brought to 
 Rome, with other trophies, after the taking of Jerusalem, 
 and of which the Vandals had become masters, on the sack- 
 ing of Rome, in the preceding century. A certain Jew 
 having seen these, mentioned his opinion to some of the 
 Emperor's familiars, that they could not be brought into the 
 palace without great risk, and that they could not be safely 
 
 * Zerubbabel (called in Haggaii. 1, 
 " the governor of Judah,") was the son 
 of Shealtiel, (called Salathiel, Matt, 
 i. 12) the son of Jechoniah; compare 
 1 Chron. iii. 17, and Matt. i. 12. Jeho- 
 zadak, the father of Joshua, was the son 
 
 of Seraiah, who had been put to death 
 at Riblah, on the destruction of the 
 temple, 1 Chron. vi. 14, 15. 
 
 6 Procopius the secretary of Belisa- 
 rius, De Bell. Vand. Lib. u. cap. 9. 
 
 42
 
 52 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 deposited in any other place than that where Solomon the 
 king of the Jews had originally dedicated them 1 . He re- 
 presented that it was on account of these Genseric had been 
 allowed to take the royal palace at Rome, and on account 
 of these again that the Vandals had been conquered by the 
 Romans. The Emperor, being awed by these representations, 
 immediately dispatched them in all haste to the Christian 
 Churches in Jerusalem. After which, I am not aware that 
 history makes any further mention of them. 
 
 Arrived in their own land, the restored exiles did not 
 wait for the re-edification of the material building, to provide 
 the essentials of divine worship. The altar was forthwith 
 built, and the daily burnt-offering duly established, and 
 materials were speedily collected, conformably to the decree 
 of Cyrus, for the fabric. Again the forests of Lebanon 
 rang with the woodman's axe unconsciously engaged in the 
 fulfilment of ancient prophecy again the ports of Tyre 
 and Joppa swarmed with a busy crowd conveying the 
 floats of timber to their destination, as in olden times; and 
 the work sped so well, that in the second month of the 
 second year of their return, the foundations of the temple 
 were solemnly laid amid the shouts of the rejoicing multitude, 
 strangely mingled with the sobs of the ancient men who had 
 seen the former house in its first glory, and in whose eyes 
 this second temple appeared " as a very little thing." The 
 glorious reminiscences of by-gone days might well produce 
 mingled emotions, venting themselves in tears, and they 
 who, while grateful for present mercies, have felt the melt- 
 ing, humbling influence produced by the contemplation of 
 
 1 It is an unfortunate circumstance 
 for the Solomonic origin of these sacred 
 vessels, that the book of Maccabees and 
 Josephus both relate the destruction of 
 
 them by Antiochus Epiphanes. They 
 may probably have been those which 
 Judas Maccabaeus dedicated on reco- 
 vering the temple.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 53 
 
 those gothic piles, which the piety of former ages however 
 faulty, and however despised created with earnest devotion 
 in the land of their birth, and contrasted it with the 
 " nicely-calculated " expenditure of a more enlightened age, 
 will sympathise with that war of feelings which agitated 
 these ancient men, and will feel comfort in being permitted 
 to mingle their tears with this reverend and mournful com- 
 pany ; while the vulgar more happy in their ignorance 
 may contemplate with unalloyed satisfaction the lesser offer- 
 ings of a wealthier age, more prodigal on self, more niggardly 
 in the service of God. Notwithstanding that the considerate 
 conqueror had provided for the due observance of his decree 
 by the appointment of a distinguished member of the royal 
 house of Judah as Tirshatha or Governor of Palestine, yet 
 the rejection of the aid tendered by the half-idolatrous 
 Samaritans, aggravated as it was by the denial of all affinity 
 with them, exasperated these aspirants to a share in the 
 religious privileges of Jerusalem, and enlisted all their pre- 
 judices against the undertaking in which the Jews were en- 
 gaged. They succeeded, by means of misrepresentation and 
 bribery, in procuring an order for the suspension of the 
 works, which led to an interruption of fourteen years. It 
 would appear that the conduct of the Jews on this occasion 
 should have determined a question much debated in later 
 times, as to the propriety of availing ourselves of the aid of 
 infidels or heretics, for the promotion of designs of an un- 
 doubtedly religious tendency. All that the Samaritans asked 
 was to assist in the restoration of the temple a laudable 
 object, without question but the acceptance of the offer 
 would have involved a recognition of their errors, utterly 
 inconsistent with the exclusive principles of true religion, 
 both under the Old and New Dispensation. 
 
 The hostility then provoked by the uncompromising
 
 54 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 maintenance of such principles was not imputed as a fault 
 to the Jews; but their easy acquiescence in the suspension 
 of their work subjected them to the Divine reproof 1 . Not 
 that they were encouraged to act contrary to the decree of 
 the*king, to whom God's providence had subjected them ; but 
 the fundamental law of the Medes and Persians, forbidding 
 the reversal of any royal decree, must have frustrated the 
 machinations of their adversaries, had it been urged at the 
 right time and in the proper quarters. But the zeal which 
 actuated the captives to undertake their pilgrimage had died 
 down ; they had turned aside to the consideration of their 
 own comforts, and persuaded themselves that the time had 
 not arrived for the restoration of the temple; an obvious 
 temptation to which "builders" in the spiritual temple, at 
 home and abroad, are exposed, which may in some measure 
 account for the tardy progress which the "holy house" has 
 made, in an age of missionary exertion on an extensive scale. 
 
 Recalled to a sense of their duty, by the earnest remon- 
 strances, and encouraged to the performance of it by the 
 gracious promises of God by Zechariah and Haggai, the 
 Jews, acting on the original decree of Cyrus, recommenced 
 the building, when a representation made to the seat of 
 government, by the viceroy of Syria, resulted in a strong 
 confirmation of that edict, which had been discovered in the 
 archives. 
 
 In the twentieth year after the return from Babylon, the 
 temple was dedicated with burnt-offerings and sacrifices, the 
 paucity of which contrasted no less strongly with the mul- 
 titude of Solomon's, than the poverty of this building with 
 the magnificence of that 2 . 
 
 1 See the prophecies of Haggai and 
 Zechariah throughout. 
 
 Compare Ezra vi. 17, with 1 Kings 
 
 <;:$.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 55 
 
 The removal by death of the leaders of those who first 
 returned, and of the prophets, led to great confusion and 
 disorder in the infant colony especially in respect to the 
 marriages which they contracted with the people of the land 
 so that when Ezra arrived, nearly sixty years after the 
 dedication of the temple, with a considerable detachment of 
 pilgrims, he witnessed a state of things which loudly called 
 for contrition and amendment. A strong influence very near 
 the throne of Persia had secured to him all the assistance 
 which government influence could afford, and his powers were 
 very ample ; but civil enactments could not reach the moral 
 evil : fasting, and weeping, and prayer, accomplished what the 
 commission could not effect, and the reformation of abuses pro- 
 ceeded much more speedily than could have been anticipated, 
 where the affections of the people were so deeply involved. 
 
 But while the ready scribe was thus engaged in the chief 
 seat of Jewish worship, a dark cloud gathered over his nation, 
 which threatened the destruction, not merely of their civil 
 and religious polity, but of their very existence 3 . The deep- 
 laid scheme of the artful Haman, the hereditary enemy of 
 the Hebrew nation, who would rid himself of the presence of 
 a hated rival by the extermination of the whole race, had 
 been provided against in a marvellous manner, by the watch- 
 ful providence of God, and was frustrated through the in- 
 strumentality of a Jewish captive, raised to the dignity of 
 queen by the favour of Artaxerxes Longimanus, the reigning 
 king of Persia. The wonderful deliverance thus accomplished 
 is still commemorated annually by the Jews, in the feast of 
 Purim, as indeed are most of the events connected with the 
 captivity, by the observance of festivals or fasts, according to 
 the colour of the event commemorated. 
 
 3 See the book of Esther throughout.
 
 56 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 But although the malice of Haman had been so graciously 
 overruled, that the Jews were placed on a better and more 
 secure footing than before, by the exaltation of their country- 
 man, Mordecai, to the chief management of the empire, yet 
 would this threatened destruction of their nation, which was 
 averted instrumentally only by their own prowess, strongly 
 impress upon Ezra and his coadjutors the defenceless con- 
 dition of the restored remnant, inhabiting an unwalled city, 
 in the midst of powerful and ever-watchful foes. But he 
 had no authority to rebuild the walls ; and to have attempted 
 it without express permission would surely have been re- 
 presented, and indeed would have worn the appearance, of 
 an overt act of rebellion against the Median king. In this 
 emergency, unexpected succour was vouchsafed unsolicited, 
 from the very capital itself 1 . Nehemiah arrived with full 
 authority from Artaxerxes himself, to repair and restore the 
 ruined fortifications of the city. He had learnt in Susa the 
 desolate condition of his brethren in Judaea, and was too 
 deeply afflicted to conceal his grief before his royal master, 
 near whose person he held an office of the highest dignity 
 and trust. Invited by the condescension of the king, and 
 encouraged by the presence of queen Esther 2 , he made 
 known the cause of his grief, and preferred the bold request 
 that he might be sent to the city of his fathers' sepulchres 
 to build it. The petition was instantly granted, and written 
 orders made out for the supply of all necessary materials, 
 and under a strong escort, spontaneously granted by his 
 master, the new governor set out on his joyful errand. 
 Three days after his arrival at Jerusalem he took a noc- 
 turnal survey of the walls, with all the secrecy rendered 
 
 1 Nehemiah i., &c. 
 
 * The parenthetic clause in Neh. ii. 0, is no doubt emphatic.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 57 
 
 necessary by the peculiar position of his countrymen, and 
 immediately afterwards proposed to commence their repair. 
 He was warmly seconded by the priests and nobles, to whom 
 he made known the full powers granted him by Artaxerxes ; 
 but their intentions were no sooner discovered by their 
 enemies, than they commenced a systematic opposition to 
 the undertaking. Neither force nor fraud were wanting, 
 the old accusation of disaffection and rebellion was revived 
 and urged with greater vehemence than ever, but the work 
 sped well notwithstanding. Watches were set against any 
 sudden assault, and the very labourers were armed, and all 
 requisite precautions adopted, so that in the incredibly short 
 space of fifty-two days, notwithstanding all hinderances, the 
 whole work was accomplished 3 . The ancient foundations, it 
 is true, with the materials of the old wall, were made avail- 
 able for the new, and were close at hand ; for although the 
 scanty population of the modern town might have been 
 compressed within much narrower limits than those of the 
 ancient city, yet Nehemiah and his companions in labour, 
 who were building for future generations, looked forward in 
 faith to a time when " the waste and desolate places, and 
 the land of their destruction, should be too narrow, by reason 
 of the inhabitants, and Zion's children should say in her ears, 
 The place is too strait for me ; give place to me, that I 
 may dwell;" and their faith was expressed in their acts, 
 while they built " from the tower of Hananeel unto the gate 
 of the corner, and the measuring line went forth over against 
 it upon the hill Gareb, and compassed about to GoathV 
 The reformation of various abuses, the devout observance of 
 the feast of tabernacles, according to the Mosaic ordinance, 
 
 3 Josephus, Ant. xi. v. 8, gives two 
 years and four months to the building 
 of the walls, which seems quite irrecon- 
 
 cilable with Nehem. vi. 15. 
 
 4 Isaiah xlix. 19, 20 ; Jerem. xxxi. 
 38, 39.
 
 58 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 
 
 and the solemn dedication of the wall, gave witness to the 
 restoration of the civil and religious polity of the Jewish 
 people ; and the two principal actors in this blessed work 
 would rejoice together in the good success of their labours, 
 which they endeavoured to render permanent, by the revival 
 of a strict discipline. 
 
 How long they were permitted to reap in joy what 
 they had sown in tears, we are nowhere told ; but Ezra 
 was probably advanced in years, at the time of Nehemiah's 
 arrival, and did not long survive the completion of the re- 
 formation ; but the Christian church has cause to remember 
 with gratitude the literary labours of this blessed man, for 
 to him is ascribed by universal consent 1 the collection of 
 the canonical Scriptures, and the careful revision of the 
 whole, with the addition of such notices as were necessary 
 for the elucidation of the sacred text : and because the Baby- 
 lonish captivity had rendered both the language and character 
 of the Hebrew Scriptures unintelligible to the majority of 
 those who returned, he provided for the present edification 
 of the people, by the appointment of scribes, whose busi- 
 ness it was to read and interpret the law in synagogues, 
 which appear now to have been first erected ; and for the 
 safe transmission of the sacred books, by the transcription 
 of them in the Chaldean characters, which have been ever 
 since in use among the Jews, while the more ancient ortho- 
 graphy has been continued to this day by the Samaritans, 
 in which also their highly valued Pentateuch and all their 
 sacred books are preserved 2 . 
 
 1 See St Irenseus apud Euseb. Hist. 
 Eccles. Vol. vin. for the tradition of 
 the Church, and Prideaux's Connec- 
 tion, Part i. Lib. v. under the year 441!, 
 for a full and particular account of 
 
 Ezra's labours, from Jewish authori- 
 ties; and for synagogues, under the 
 year 444 B. c. 
 
 2 See Prideaux, Part i. Book vi. 
 and under the year 409, for an interest-
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 59 
 
 The abuses and irregularities which had been reformed 
 with so much labour required constant vigilance and active 
 care to prevent them from getting head again. Even during 
 the temporary absence of Nehemiah they had taken root" in 
 the very courts of God's house, and on his removal by death, 
 the priests and people lapsed into their old evil practices; 
 then the peace, which had been secured by the wise measures 
 of their civil and ecclesiastical rulers, met with a sad in- 
 terruption from the violence of John, the grandson of Elia- 
 shib, who slew his own brother Jesus in the very temple, 
 while the latter was attempting to supplant him in his office 
 under the protection of the Persian general Bazores, who, 
 in revenge for this murder, polluted the temple and oppressed 
 the Jews for seven years 3 . But the younger son of John 
 was the cause of a greater and more lasting evil, by his 
 wilful contempt of the Divine ordinances. He had taken to 
 wife the daughter of one Sanballat, of Samaria ; and, by this 
 act, had so offended the prejudices of his countrymen, who 
 had been effectually drawn away from this prohibited practice, 
 by the earnest admonitions of the prophet Malachi, that he 
 was required to divorce his wife, or to abstain from the per- 
 formance of his sacerdotal functions. Unwilling to resign the 
 emoluments of his office, but without any sense of its real 
 value, he at first proposed to embrace the former part of the 
 alternative ; but his father-in-law proposed a measure by 
 which he might retain both the priesthood and his wife. 
 The Samaritans having been instructed by the Hebrew priests 
 
 ing account of this treasure of the Sama- 
 ritans. This valuable MS., which pro- 
 fesses to have been written by Abishua, 
 the son of Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, 
 the son of Aaron, was seen by the 
 writer and four other English travellers, 
 
 in the summer of 1842, after it had been 
 carefully hid for many years; the priest 
 having amused other Franks with a 
 view of a fictitious one. 
 3 Joseph. Ant. xi. vii.
 
 60 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 
 
 in the law of the God of Israel, had grafted his worship on 
 to their old idolatry 1 . But their polity was very imperfect 
 without a high priest of the family of Aaron ; and it was 
 probably a sense of this defect that had led them to proffer 
 their services in rebuilding the temple at Jeruslem. Disown- 
 ed by the Jews, and all affinity with them being strictly 
 prohibited, the desire of revenge would furnish an additional 
 motive to perpetuate the schism, which they had in vain 
 attempted to heal. To this end it was necessary, as with 
 the early heretics in Christian times, to secure by all means 
 the lawful succession of the priesthood. A favourable op- 
 portunity for effecting this was now presented. Sanballat 
 undertook to raise his renegade son-in-law to the highest 
 dignity of the Samaritan secession, and to build him a temple 
 on mount Gerizim, which should rival or eclipse that at 
 Jerusalem 2 . The simple design of church-discipline is to 
 correct or to dissever the corrupt members of the orthodox 
 body. The effect has frequently been, to diminish for a time 
 the forces of the faithful, but purity will always be con- 
 sidered far more important than mere numerical strength 
 in a spiritual community. There were many among the 
 priests and Levites who had imitated the practice of Ma- 
 nasseh, in taking to themselves foreign wives. It was no- 
 thing strange that they should follow him in his schism. Thus 
 the temple on mount Gerizim, erected by express permission 
 of the civil power, was consecrated under the auspices of this 
 recreant band, with such ceremonials as they had been ac- 
 customed to observe in their ministrations at the Holy City, 
 
 1 2 Kings xvii. 
 
 2 For the involved chronology of 
 this period, the reader is referred to 
 Prideaux's Connection, under the year 
 409. He takes this Sanballat to he the 
 
 old enemy of Nehemiah. Josephus, 
 viii. ii. says that the father-in-law of 
 Manasseh was then "an old man," 
 which I think Prideaux does not re- 
 mark.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THK HOLY CITY. 
 
 61 
 
 and the fire on its altars was doomed to burn long after the 
 ashes on the altar at Jerusalem had been scattered abroad 
 for ever 3 . During the continuance of the Jewish polity 
 "this mountain" became a refuge to the disaifected members 
 of the Jewish church, and a constant subject of dispute and 
 jealousy at home and abroad, and when their old rivals had 
 been removed, the Samaritans turned their hatred against 
 the Christians, until their violence called for the intervention 
 of the Christian emperor Zeno, who transferred to the 
 Christians the Samaritan temple, in reprisals for the ruin 
 and desecration of five churches in the city of Nablouse. In 
 the reign of Anastasius it was recovered for a short time 
 by the Samaritans, who were finally ejected by the emperor 
 Justinian, when the mountain was more strongly fortified, 
 many of the Samaritans converted to the faith of Christ, and 
 the five churches which they had destroyed rebuilt by the 
 munificence of the emperor 4 . 
 
 While the infant colony at Jerusalem had been slowly 
 advancing in strength, under the protection of the Persian 
 monarchs, who allowed them to live under their own laws, 
 and the free exercise of their national faith, the second 
 kingdom of Daniel's prophetic vision had run its course, the 
 bear must give place to the leopard 5 . The Persian monarchs, 
 who had tried the power of Grecian patriotism by sea and 
 land, during the preceding century, were now to succumb 
 before the ambition of the Macedonian "barbarian," who 
 had rolled back the tide of war across the Hellespont, which 
 
 3 They were indeed quenched for a 
 time on the destruction of their temple 
 by John Hyrcanus, Ant. xiu. ix. 1, 
 but only for a time. They still continue 
 to sacrifice thrice in the year, on the 
 great feasts, by night, amid the ruins 
 of Mount Gerizim. The writer arrived 
 
 at Nablouse on the very night of their 
 feast of Pentecost, in 1842, but did not 
 learn the fact until it was too late to be 
 present at their worship. 
 
 4 Procopiusde yEdifa'ciis Justiniani, 
 Lib. v. cap. vii. 
 
 5 Daniel vii. 6.
 
 62 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 their vessels had hardened into a road to afford a passage 
 to their countless .hosts. 
 
 The defeat of Darius in the battle of Issus transferred 
 his vast kingdom to the youthful conqueror, who forthwith 
 proceeded to reduce those strong-holds on the confines of his 
 new dominions, which had either hitherto maintained their 
 independence, or were disposed still to adhere to the fallen 
 fortunes of their old masters. It was to be expected that 
 the inhabitants of Jerusalem would be found among the 
 latter, considering how deeply they were indebted to the 
 Persian monarchs ; nor was it strange that this fidelity should 
 provoke the resentment of the Macedonian. Having reduced 
 Tyre, he marched down the coast to the southernmost ex- 
 tremity of Palestine, to secure the important maritime city 
 of Gaza, and then hastened to Jerusalem, to experience the 
 first check which his victorious career had known 1 . 
 
 In approaching Jerusalem from the south, the traveller 
 obtains the first view of its waUs from the convent of Elias, 
 at about a league distance, the plain of Rephaim being inter- 
 posed. The old road, which is still to be traced, passed 
 near the village of Beit-Sufafa, the Sapha of Josephus, 
 where Alexander encountered a host arrayed in other arms 
 than he was accustomed to match ; the whole multitude 
 of the Jewish people, clothed in white with garlands in their 
 hands, the priests in their sacred vestments of fine linen, 
 headed by the high priest, arrayed in his robes of purple 
 and scarlet, and the mitre with the golden plate engraven 
 with the incommunicable name of the God of Israel : the 
 conqueror of the world acknowledged its triumphant power, 
 the righteous nation experienced its saving virtue : he 
 adored that name, saluted the representative of the Most 
 
 Josephus, xi. viii.
 
 CHAP. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 63 
 
 High, and promised his protection to the Holy City, where 
 his presence dwelt. Then proceeding, as in a festive proces- 
 sion, he entered the sacred precincts of the temple to offer 
 sacrifices to the power which had subdued him, and to listen 
 to his own history dictated by the prophetic spirit two 
 centuries before his birth. Awed, or perhaps nattered, by 
 the omen, he accorded to the worshippers of this strange 
 God such privileges as they requested, permission for them- 
 selves and their dispersed brethren to worship the God of 
 their fathers, and release from tribute on the sabbatical year. 
 Josephus, who is the sole authority for this interesting 
 narration, accounts for the successful policy of the high 
 priest, Jaddua, by a vision which he had seen when reduced 
 almost to despair at the prospect of the impending ruin, and 
 for the conduct of Alexander, by the remembrance of a 
 prophetic dream while he was still in Macedonia. It is 
 unfortunate that the silence of Arrian, and other heathen 
 historians of the exploits of Alexander, affords what is con- 
 sidered a reasonable ground for scepticism 2 , in a story which 
 has nothing incredible even in the supernatural circum- 
 stances, if we allow that the Jews were under the special 
 protection of the Almighty ; the discrepancies of which may 
 be surely accounted for, by some means short of supposing 
 it altogether an invention of the Jewish historian, who had 
 access to contemporary records which have since been lost, 
 and whose national predilections would invest this event 
 with more interest than it would wear in the eyes of the 
 panegyrists of the Macedonian monarch, who might regard 
 
 2 Mitford's remark that Dr Hales' 
 " attempts to overbear the objections" 
 to which the former is disposed to 
 allow full force, shews that he was 
 " highly desirous that the story should 
 
 have credit;" and what then ? Who 
 but a pagan would not desire it ? See 
 Hist, of Greece, XLVIII. sect. iv. near 
 the end.
 
 64 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 this humiliation as unworthy of their hero, as indeed those 
 who witnessed it are said to have done, so as to have 
 imputed it to temporary derangement. 
 
 Thus much at least is certain, that the Jews from the 
 time of Alexander, and under his successors for many years, 
 were treated with much greater consideration than would 
 have been expected, considering their political insignificance, 
 and the exclusive character of their institutions, which would 
 be far from recommending them to their new masters. 
 
 Ptolemy Soter, indeed, to whom Judaea fell after the death 
 of Alexander 1 , is said to have seized on the city by treachery, 
 and to have ruled over it with violence; but when he had 
 carried away many of the inhabitants to Egypt, he there 
 conferred on them such distinctions and privileges as in- 
 duced many of their brethren voluntarily to offer him their 
 services for those offices of trust to which he appointed 
 them, in consideration, as is said, of their tried fidelity 
 to the Persian kings, of which he had experience after 
 the battle of Issus : and in the encomium on Simon, the 
 high priest, the son of Onias, who flourished during this 
 reign, we are told how " he fortified the temple, and built 
 the high fortress of the wall about it, and fortified the city 
 against besieging 2 ," a great privilege surely to be allowed 
 to a vanquished nation. 
 
 But the liberality of Ptolemy Philadelphus went much 
 beyond this, for he not only redeemed all the Jews who 
 were in captivity in Egypt, by a large grant from his trea- 
 sury, but further sent to the temple at Jerusalem mag- 
 nificent presents for the sacred service, consisting of vessels 
 of gold, a costly table for the shew-bread, and a consider- 
 able sum of money for sacrifices and other purposes. 
 
 1 Joseph. Ant. xn. i. &c. * Eccius. i.. 1, 2.
 
 CH. II ] THE HOLY CITY. 65 
 
 Nor were the SeleucidaB of Asia behind the Ptolemies 
 of Egypt in their favours to this people: Nicator allowed 
 them equal privileges with the Macedonians and Greeks, 
 not only in the new cities which he built within his domi- 
 nions, but in the very capital itself, and granted them other 
 immunities, which continued even under the Roman empe- 
 rors : and although their country could not but suffer se- 
 verely from the political revolutions to which it was exposed 
 by the struggles between two conflicting powers, yet had 
 they no cause to regret their old masters during the time 
 that they were subject to the domination of Antiochus the 
 Great. For, to adopt the simile of the Jewish historian, 
 who compares the nation at this period to a ship in a 
 storm, tossed by waves on either side, those who were 
 at the helm of affairs at Jerusalem seem to have under- 
 stood well how to direct the vessel through the dangerous 
 sea, and to trim their sails so as to catch the breath of 
 royal favour whether from the north or the south. 
 
 Juda3a, which had been seized by Antiochus during the 
 reign of Philopater, was recovered to Egypt by Siopas, 
 the general of Epiphanes, the son and successor of Philo- 
 pater. On this occasion, the Jews averted the vengeance 
 of the conqueror by a voluntary surrender, and with no 
 worse grace passed over again to Antiochus on the revival 
 of his broken fortunes, and by their hospitable entertain- 
 ment of his army, and the assistance which they rendered 
 him in ejecting the Egyptian garrison from the citadel in 
 Jerusalem, merited his favour, and were liberally requited 
 for their services by his permission to re-edify their temple 
 and city, and a considerable grant from his treasury to 
 enable them to do so. And because the city had been 
 much depopulated by the late calamities, he granted free- 
 dom to those families which had been carried away, and 
 5
 
 66 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 remitted for three years the taxes to all its inhabitants, in 
 order to induce them to return and settle in their old capital. 
 He even went so far as to grant, not merely a toleration, 
 but a full recognition of their national worship in a manner 
 that no heathen king had done before. The precincts of 
 the temple were declared inviolable by royal eclict, and 
 guarded from the approach of all but the true worshippers ; 
 and the pollution of the Holy City by any ceremonial de- 
 filement was prohibited, under heavy penalties, payable to 
 the high priest. 
 
 Shortly after this, Judaea, with the neighbouring pro- 
 vinces, were ceded to Egypt, by Antiochus, as the dowry 
 of his daughter Cleopatra, whom he gave in marriage to 
 Ptolemy Euergetes, during whose reign a cloud gathered 
 over Jerusalem, which was dissipated by the skilful manage- 
 ment of a member of the priestly family. This passage 
 of history is interesting as explaining the financial manage- 
 ment of the country in those times, which was continued 
 also under the Roman domination, and it is the very same 
 system which is at this day impoverishing both the govern- 
 ment and the subjects of that part of the Turkish empire. 
 
 Onias, the son of Simon the Just, who had succeeded 
 his uncle Manasseh in the high priesthood, was a person 
 of a sordid disposition, whose love of money induced him 
 to withhold the tax of twenty silver talents, which it had 
 been customary for his predecessors to pay to the royal 
 treasury. Euergetes sent to demand payment with a threat, 
 that if it were withheld he would seize the land and colonize 
 it with soldiers. The Jews were much alarmed, but Onias 
 was as little disposed as ever to satisfy the demand. At 
 this conjuncture appeared a spirited young man, named 
 Joseph, maternal nephew of the high priest, who having 
 reproved his uncle for his reckless selfishness, offered to
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 67 
 
 go as ambassador to Egypt to pacify the resentment of 
 the indignant monarch. Onias accepted the proposal with 
 indifference, the people with the liveliest gratitude, and the 
 youthful diplomatist set forth on his mission, having secured 
 the good services of the Egyptian ambassador by his atten- 
 tions at Jerusalem, and effected a loan from some Samaritan 
 friends for the purposes of his embassy. 
 
 It was the practice of the government to farm out the 
 revenues, by the year, to the principal inhabitants of the 
 various cities of Syria and Palestine, and Joseph travelled 
 to Egypt in the company of some of the public farmers 
 on their way to the annual auction at Alexandria. The 
 scanty retinue of the young Jew, and his mean appearance, 
 was a subject of merriment to these haughty rulers, who 
 having no cause to fear him as a rival, probably spoke of 
 their affairs more freely than was prudent in his hearing. 
 If these public farmers were not more honest than those 
 who at present administer the revenues of Palestine, it may 
 be safely concluded, that scarcely a tithe of the revenues 
 which they collected found its way into the royal trea- 
 sury ; and there was a mutual understanding among them 
 to screen one another in this iniquitous traffic. 
 
 On the day appointed for the sale, the highest sum 
 bid for the taxes of Caelosyria, Phoanicia, Samaria and 
 Judaea, was eight thousand talents. Joseph, having made 
 the best use of his time in Egypt in ingratiating himself 
 with the king and queen, through the mediation of their 
 favourite minister, Athenion, whom he had entertained at 
 Jerusalem, had already averted the royal resentment from 
 his countrymen, and he now availed himself of his position 
 to confer on them another benefit. He accused the public 
 farmers of a combination to defraud the treasury by depre- 
 ciating the revenue, and himself offered double the sum at 
 
 52
 
 68 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 which they then stood. Being asked for his securities, he 
 named the king and his royal consort. His pleasantry suit- 
 ing the king's humour, he was actually confirmed in the 
 appointment, and provided with a military force to aid him 
 in the collection of the taxes, which he administered for 
 two and twenty years, in his own and the neighbouring 
 countries, to the entire satisfaction of his employers, the 
 great relief of the Jews, and to his own aggrandizement. 
 
 The latter part of his life was embittered by the jea- 
 lousies of his children, which after his death distracted and 
 divided this people, while dissensions, which arose at the 
 same time relative to the high priesthood, further excited 
 the bad passions of the multitude, and called for the cor- 
 rection of Divine chastisement, which came in a terrible 
 form. 
 
 Onias, the son of Simon the Just, died about the same 
 time as his nephew Joseph, and was succeeded, during the 
 minority of his son, by his brother Jesus, who was removed 
 from the dignity by the king of Egypt, and a third son 
 of Simon, also named Onias, substituted in his room. 
 
 The deprived Jesus, who was also surnamed Jason, now 
 raised a party against his brother Onias or Menelaus, whose 
 faction being outnumbered by that of his rival, retired to 
 Antioch, where they met a favourable reception from An- 
 tiochus Epiphanes, who would no doubt regard them as useful 
 instruments for the accomplishment of his ambitious projects 1 . 
 They, on their part, entered with all readiness into the alli- 
 ance, renounced the religion of their ancestors, and proposed 
 to build a Gymnasium in Jerusalem. The consequence of 
 
 1 Here the first book of Maccabees 
 takes up the narrative, and confirms 
 Josephus, who seems to have consulted 
 
 it throughout the period which it com- 
 prehends.
 
 CH. 11.] THE HOLY CITY. 69 
 
 these proceedings was soon apparent. The Syrian monarch, 
 when he advanced upon the city after his retreat from 
 Egypt, forced upon him by the intervention of the Romans, 
 who now appear for the first time on the stage of Oriental 
 diplomacy, found within a powerful and influential party, 
 prepared to second his views, even at the sacrifice of their 
 national institutions, which they had already abandoned ; and 
 they now opened the gates of the city to the worst enemy 
 they had ever encountered. At this time however he satisfied 
 himself with the sacrifice of several of the opposite faction, 
 and the seizure of considerable booty, which he carried oft 7 to 
 Antioch. 
 
 It was not until two years after, that this terrible scourge 
 was let loose for the execution of the Divine judgments and 
 the correction of abuses in the Jewish nation. Marching on 
 Jerusalem under the pretext of peace, he. possessed himself 
 without difficulty of the city, and then commenced an in- 
 discriminate massacre of friends and foes. The temple was 
 stripped of its costly ornaments, not even the vails were 
 spared ; the palaces were burned, the city-walls demolished, 
 and a strongly fortified citadel erected on an eminence com- 
 manding the temple, and garrisoned with apostate Jews and 
 Macedonian soldiers. These calamities would have been tole- 
 rable to the Jews their ancestors had suffered the same 
 but the profanation which followed was so worthy of a 
 Jewish Julian, that we are forced to conclude that the 
 studied barbarity of it was suggested by a renegade. 
 
 On an idol-altar, raised on the very altar of the Lord, 
 the abomination of the pious Israelite was offered up; and 
 daily sacrifices of swine were ordered to be observed in 
 temples of idol-worship, to be erected in every city and 
 village throughout the Holy Land. 
 
 The practice of circumcision was prohibited, and frightful
 
 70 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 examples were made of those courageous mothers who dared 
 to disobey the impious decree ; the reading of the law and the 
 observance of all other religious duties were forbidden, under 
 the severest penalties ; while the destruction of the sacred 
 books threatened to bring the precepts themselves into 
 oblivion. The greater part of the nation yielded to the 
 severe temptation, and fell from their allegiance to their 
 fathers' God, but many continued stedfast, resolved to part 
 with their lives rather than abandon that which was infinitely 
 more precious. The sufferings of these righteous souls were 
 protracted by the ingenuity of their executioners; and the 
 description of multiform torture given by the apostle to the 
 Hebrews seems to be drawn from the history of these wor- 
 thies illustrious examples of the power of faith under the 
 old dispensation 1 . 
 
 But this wonderful nation was true to its type 2 " burn- 
 ing with fire, and not consumed" under this visitation also. 
 " When Israel is in the brick-kiln then cometh Moses 3 ." This 
 characteristic proverb was illustrated in this case, and the 
 triumphant Psalm of David was to be sung with a deeper 
 intensity of meaning by this generation. " Many a time 
 have they afflicted me from my youth, may Israel now 
 say : many a time have they afflicted me from my youth ; 
 yet they have not prevailed against me. The plowers 
 plowed upon my back : they made long their furrows. The 
 Lord is righteous: He hath cut asunder the cords of the 
 wicked 4 ." 
 
 The instruments ordained by God for this deliverance 
 were the priestly family of Mattathias, the son of Simeon, 
 
 1 See Hebrews xi. 3fl, &c. 
 
 2 See Exodus iii. 2, and the beau- 
 tiful commentary on it in tbe " Chris- 
 
 tian Year," < r >th Sunday in Lent. 
 * Jewish Proverb. 
 4 Psalm cxxix.
 
 CH. II ] THE HOLY CITY. 71 
 
 the son of Asamoneus, by whose name they are designated 
 by Josephus, being better known in the Christian church 
 by the appellation of " the Maccabees," a name of doubtful 
 origin 5 . Mattathias was a citizen of Jerusalem, but re- 
 sided with his five sons at a place called Modin, which 
 appears to have been situated on a conspicuous eminence, 
 where the mountain-region of Judaea descends to the great 
 western plain of Sharon, and at no great distance from 
 Lydda 6 . 
 
 His indignation was aroused by the visit of the govern- 
 ment officer, charged with the execution of the penal laws 
 against the Jews. Being required to sacrifice as the royal 
 edict directed, he not only refused to do so, but took 
 summary vengeance on a fellow-citizen who apostatized in 
 his presence, and put to death the officer and some of the 
 soldiers. This was a signal for revolt; the family retired 
 at once to the desert, where they were joined by many 
 of their countrymen with their wives and children, who 
 were compelled to take up their abode " in dens and caves 
 of the earth." 
 
 It is instructive to remark how far the principle of 
 obedience to their heathen lords was carried by the Jews, 
 
 5 I am quite satisfied with the Rab- 
 binical derivation from the initial 
 
 lettersofExodusxv.il: 
 
 6 Some modern travellers have found 
 Modin in the hill Soba, near Kuryat el 
 Anub, about two hours from Jerusalem. 
 , But this is contrary to Eusebius, in 
 unto whose days the tomb of the Maccabees 
 was still standing. He places it near 
 to Lydda (Onomast). It must have 
 been nearer to the sea than Soba, or 
 the pyramids could not have served 
 as a beacon to mariners. (Ant. xin. 
 vi. 6). 1 Maccab. xvi. 4, &c., seems to 
 place it a day's march from Jerusalem, 
 and near the plain. 
 
 Thee among the gods, O Lord ?" 
 Reland proposes ^pQ the final letters 
 
 of the names of the three patriarchs, 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But 
 this supposes that the Asmoneans were 
 of the tribe of Dan, who are said to 
 have carried this on their standard; 
 all which is uncertain.
 
 72 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 after their return from the captivity, and where the limit 
 of submission was drawn. It has been already remarked, 
 that the prophets who denounced the judgments of God 
 on their countrymen, for their delay in rebuilding the 
 temple, were far from encouraging them in opposition to 
 the edict of the Persian king, for a decree had been enacted 
 which was irreversible, not only allowing, but making ample 
 provision for the work ; and the Jews were guilty of most 
 culpable negligence in making no effort to procure its en- 
 forcement. The temple being finished, they would not pro- 
 ceed to the fortification of the city, until new powers had 
 been granted; and in the same spirit they seem to have 
 acted, in obedience no doubt to prophetic instruction, under 
 the Persian and Macedonian domination ; desiring only the 
 free exercise of their religion, and submitting to any other 
 inconveniences which a state of submission involved. 
 
 But when the liberty of their worship was violated, 
 the observance of the law prohibited, idolatrous observances 
 required and enforced, they had no alternative left but an 
 appeal to arms, in support of their character as God's 
 chosen people, and God blessed them in their national re- 
 sistance. The precept of passive resistance teaching " obe- 
 dience, and suffering where we cannot obey," is a precept 
 of Him whose kingdom is not of this world ; whereas the 
 lower economy that preceded, sanctioned, if it did not 
 even command, the use of carnal weapons, for the extirpa- 
 tion of idolatry and the establishment or defence of the 
 true faith. Yet the fugitives, when they retired to the desert, 
 seem not to have contemplated a systematic revolt from the 
 Macedonian yoke, intolerable as it was; this course was 
 forced upon them by the measures of their adversaries. 
 
 But of the exploits of these noble champions, during 
 the protracted struggle for the law of their God, such only
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 73 
 
 can be noticed as relate to the recovery of the capital and 
 the re-establishment of the temple services. This was ef- 
 fected by Judas, the third son of Mattathias, after a series 
 of successes against the superior forces of the Syrian king, 
 who spared no pains to reduce the country to subjection. 
 The command of the Jewish forces had been committed to 
 him by his dying father, twelve months after the outbreak 
 of the revolt, and the perfect unanimity among the brothers 
 of this devoted family is a token that the high principle 
 by which they were actuated furnished a bond of union 
 more powerful than those of friendship and of blood. His 
 valour, directed by the prudent counsel of his second brother 
 Simon, had already suppressed the idolatrous practices in 
 many parts of the land, and the terror of his arms, which 
 were directed with unsparing rigour against his apostate 
 countrymen, more than counterbalanced the dread of foreign 
 vengeance ; but nothing was effected in their estimation 
 until the temple had been purified from its pollutions, and 
 the daily sacrifice restored. This measure was no sooner 
 resolved on than executed. He allowed no time to be 
 wasted in useless lamentations over the sad spectacle of 
 desolation which awaited them in the hallowed precincts. 
 Having appointed a detachment to occupy the garrison in 
 the citadel, that they might not interfere with the work of 
 restoration, he vigorously set his hand to the pious labour ; 
 and exactly three years after the interruption of the service, 
 the lamps lighted in the candlestick, incense smoking on 
 the altar of incense, the shew-bread set in order on the 
 table, and the sacrifices burning on an altar of unhewn 
 stones, declared the restoration of the temple-worship, and 
 rewarded the zealous loyalty of the warrior-band. An 
 annual commemoration of this day was appointed, and the 
 feast of dedication was honoured by our Saviour himself
 
 74 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 in the days of his flesh 1 , and is still observed in the Syna- 
 gogue as the Feast of Lights. 
 
 The next care of Judas was to rebuild the city-walls, 
 which he further strengthened with towers, and to fortify 
 a strong position on the borders of Idumea, which might 
 serve, not only as a protection to the frontier, but also as 
 
 
 
 a place of refuge in the event of another expulsion from the 
 city. 
 
 The restoration of the Jews to a state of independence 
 was a signal for a general assault of their inveterate enemies 
 on ah 1 sides, and the tabernacles of the Edomites and the 
 Ishmaelites, the Moabites and the Hagarenes, the Philis- 
 tians, with them of Tyre, were again confederate against 
 the chosen people. But the God of Abraham was among 
 them still as the Lord of hosts, and his presence secured 
 them the victory. The Idumeans and the Amorites, in 
 the south, had been already vanquished, when Judas learnt 
 that the northern division of the country was endangered 
 by the inhabitants of the coast, and that large hostile forces 
 of the Arabians were assembled in Gilead. 
 
 Having detached his brother Simon to prosecute the 
 war in Galilee, he crossed the Jordan with Jonathan, leaving 
 Judaea in charge to two of his officers, directing them on 
 no account to hazard an engagement during his absence. 
 The neglect of this salutary counsel involved them in a 
 defeat, attended with considerable loss, while the valiant 
 brothers were entirely successful in their respective expe- 
 ditions, and Judas returned in time to repair the damage 
 occasioned by the rashness of his generals. 
 
 But the presence of the Macedonian garrison in the 
 citadel contiguous to the temple, was a constant source of 
 
 1 John x. 22.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 75 
 
 annoyance to the worshippers at Jerusalem, and Judas now 
 resolved to direct all his efforts to its expulsion; he ac- 
 cordingly formed the siege of the castle, and erected bul- 
 warks and engines of war against it. The renegades, who 
 had good reason to apprehend the vengeance of their in- 
 jured countrymen, should they become masters of the place, 
 effected their escape by night, and flying to Antioch, re- 
 presented the dangerous position of the small force at Jeru- 
 salem. 
 
 Eupator had now succeeded his father Epiphanes, who 
 had died a death of dreadful torment, while contemplating, 
 in Persia, a repetition of the atrocities which he had com- 
 mitted on the Jews ; and the Christian will feel little dif- 
 ficulty in choosing between the account of the Jewish writer, 
 who ascribes the visitation to the slow but certain vengeance 
 of that Majesty which had there been violated, and the 
 heathen historian, who refers it to the sacrilege on the 
 temple of Diana which he was then meditating. In- 
 censed at the intelligence communicated by the fugitives, 
 the young king raised a large army consisting, according 
 to the Jewish account, of 100,000 infantry, 20,000 cavalry, 
 and 32 elephants for the subjugation of Judaea. After 
 an engagement, which cost Judas the life of his brother 
 Eleazar, who perished in a deed of heroic daring, he re- 
 tired to Jerusalem, and defended himself in the temple, where 
 he was attacked by the enemy and reduced to the last ex- 
 tremity, by the failure of his stores and the consequent deser- 
 tion of many of his followers. At this critical juncture intelli- 
 gence was brought to Eupator, that a formidable rival, who 
 had risen in Persia, was threatening his throne at Antioch, 
 and he was compelled to conclude a peace with the Jews on 
 most advantageous terms to the latter. He demolished, how- 
 ever, the fortifications of the temple, and carried away
 
 76 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 Menelaus the author of all the calamities which had be- 
 fallen the Jews, among whom he had exercised the office 
 of high priest for the last ten years. He was subsequently 
 put to death ; and the dignity was conferred by the Syrian 
 general on Alcimus, a member of another family, while 
 Onias, the rightful successor, took refuge in Egypt, where 
 he procured permission to build a temple at Heliopolis, which 
 attained considerable celebrity. 
 
 But the Jews were not destined long to enjoy the 
 peaceful fruits of the liberty for which they had so nobly 
 struggled. Demetrius, the son of Seleucus Soter, who had 
 been deprived of his throne, by his uncle Antiochus Epi- 
 phanes, having returned from Rome to Syria, succeeded 
 in wresting the kingdom out of the hands of his cousin 
 Eupator, soon after the latter had obtained the mastery 
 of his rival, Philip. At the instigation of Alcimus and 
 other renegade Jews, he lost no time in sending his ge- 
 neral Bacchides, and subsequently Nicanor, to curb the 
 growing power of Judas. Neither fraud nor force were 
 spared for the accomplishment of this design ; but the watch- 
 ful providence of God enabled his servants to guard against 
 both. The blasphemy of Nicanor was visited by a signal 
 defeat, in which he lost his life, and Alcimus was suddenly 
 smitten by God while meditating innovations in the temple 
 at Jerusalem, and died soon after, when the high-priesthood 
 was conferred on Judas by the election of the people, and 
 the command of the army devolved on his brother Simon 1 . 
 
 The short interval of peace which followed on the route 
 
 1 The death of Alcimus and elec- 
 tion of Judas to the high priesthood 
 is related by Josephus, but there is no 
 notice whatever of it in the Maccabees, 
 which records the death of Alcimus 
 
 after that of Judas; but as Josephus 
 seems to have had the authority of the 
 public documents preserved in the 
 archives at Rome, he was probably 
 better informed on this point.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 77 
 
 of Nicanor's army, was seized on by Judas to form an 
 alliance which might hereafter be advantageous to his country. 
 The Romans, who had been for some years extending their 
 influence in the East, would naturally be averse to the pro- 
 ceedings of Demetrius, which were so opposed to their policy, 
 that they had twice rejected his petition to be restored to 
 his father's throne. His escape from Rome, and his suc- 
 cesses in Syria, must have incensed his masters greatly, 
 and prepared them to entertain with favour the offer of 
 alliance with a nation in open hostility to him. But the 
 treaty was of little present advantage to the Jews, who 
 were left to their own resources, when their country was 
 again invaded by Bacchides with a numerous host. The 
 warrior-priest exchanged the tiara for the helmet, and 
 marched to confront his old enemy, whom he engaged with 
 very unequal forces. On the first assault he completely 
 routed the right wing of the enemy, but pursuing his ad- 
 vantage too hotly, he was surrounded by the unbroken 
 left wing, and after a valiant defence, fell, with many of 
 his followers. His dead body was given up to his bro- 
 thers, and honourably buried at Modin, where a stately 
 sepulchre was afterwards erected, which was still to be 
 seen in the fourth century of the Christian era. 
 
 In the incessant struggles which agitated Syria during 
 the long and dubious contentions of the various aspirants 
 for the throne of that country, the aid of the warrior- 
 princes of the house of Mattathias could not but be eagerly 
 sought by the rival parties, and large bribes were offered 
 hi the form of immunities from taxes and other civil and 
 religious privileges, to attach them to their opposite in- 
 terests 2 . It would be difficult for a politician to ascertain 
 
 2 Ant. xni. i. &c.
 
 78 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 by what principle the Jewish leaders were governed in 
 their conduct to their different suitors ; but perhaps not dif- 
 ficult for a diplomatist to justify such inconsistency as was 
 necessary to keep them in favour with the dominant party, 
 as fortune shifted from one side to the other. 
 
 The successes of Jonathan, who succeeded his brother 
 Judas in the high-priesthood and supreme command, were 
 very brilliant in many campaigns ; and he was highly ho- 
 noured by the pretender Alexander Bala, and his father-in- 
 law, Ptolemy Philometor, the king of Egypt. On the death 
 of Alexander, he conferred singular services on Demetrius, 
 and was rewarded with base ingratitude instead of the 
 princely honours which had been promised. At length, 
 during the ascendancy of the son of Alexander, or rather 
 of his general Trypho, who used his sovereign as a step- 
 ping-stone to his own exaltation, he was taken prisoner by 
 treachery, and basely murdered. 
 
 His brother Simon succeeded as high priest and com- 
 mander-in-chief, and for him it was reserved to reap the 
 fruits of all the deeds of noble daring exhibited by his 
 heroic family. He freed his people altogether from the 
 Macedonian yoke after they had worn it for 170 years, 
 and was written in the contracts and public records, "Be- 
 nefactor and Ethnarch of the Jews." One signal service 
 of immense importance was, the reduction of the garrison 
 in the tower at Jerusalem, which had been a thorn in 
 the side of the Jews since its erection by Antiochus Epi- 
 phanes. Occupying a commanding position on the very 
 mountain of the temple, the worshippers were perpetually 
 exposed to their observation, or even to interruption, and 
 very persevering had been the efforts of Judas and Jona- 
 than to dispossess their enemies of this post, which served as 
 a rallying place for their discomfited legions. Failing to
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 79 
 
 accomplish this, Jonathan had converted the siege into a 
 blockade, by building a wall in the midst of the city to 
 shut off the garrison 1 from the market, so as to reduce 
 them by famine. The same plan was pursued by Simon, 
 with better success, and the garrison was forced to capi- 
 tulate 1 . The account given by Josephus of the proceedings 
 of Simon on the evacuation of this fortress by the Mace- 
 donians, is singularly at variance with that of the author 
 of the first book of Maccabees 2 ; the latter relating that it 
 was by him converted into a fortress for the temple, and 
 much strengthened, and afterwards inhabited by himself and 
 his troops, while the former asserts that it was levelled 
 with the ground, and the very mountain on which it stood 
 removed with incredible labour. An attempt will hereafter 
 be made to reconcile these conflicting statements. At present 
 it will be sufficient to remark, that the tower Baris, after- 
 wards called Antonia, soon afterwards occupied nearly the 
 same site, and was probably commenced by Simon, and 
 finished by his son Hyrcanus. 
 
 The peace and prosperity enjoyed by the Jews under 
 the mild reign of Simon, is very poetically described in the 
 book of Maccabees, and we seem now first to read the ful- 
 filment of the prophecies relating to their restoration from 
 the Babylonish captivity ; for " then did they till their ground 
 in peace, and the earth gave her increase, and the trees of 
 the field their fruit. The ancient men sat all in the streets, 
 communing together of good things, and the young men 
 put on glorious and warlike apparel. He made peace in 
 the land, and Israel rejoiced with great joy ; for every 
 man sat under his vine and fig-tree, and there was none 
 
 1 1 Mac. xiii. 49, &c. Comp. Josephus, Ant. xin. vi. 7. 2 Ibid.
 
 80 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 to fray them 1 ." These halcyon days he sought to perpe- 
 tuate by renewing the alliances with the Romans and 
 Lacedaemonians which his brothers had formed, and by 
 strengthening the defences of the temple, the city, and the 
 country, which they had not neglected : and though his 
 latter days were disturbed by another invasion from Syria, 
 yet through his own vigour, which was noway abated, 
 and that of his sons, he defeated his enemies, and returned 
 covered with laurels to Jerusalem 2 . But none of the sons 
 of Mattathias were to be allowed a tranquil end ; he was 
 treacherously murdered by his son-in-law Ptolemy at a 
 feast at Jericho, where his wife and two of his children 
 fell into the assassin's hands. 
 
 John, surnamed Hyrcanus, his third son, was happily 
 not present; he was informed of a plot against his life, 
 and effected his escape to Jerusalem, where being ap- 
 pointed to succeed his father, he sought to avenge the 
 treachery of Ptolemy, and besieged him in a fortress, to 
 which he had retired. Here the vengeance threatened to 
 his relatives, and the cruel tortures inflicted on his mother 
 in his sight, while with heroic firmness she exhorted him 
 to the attack, shook his courage. His heart failed him, and 
 the siege was protracted until the Sabbatic year led him 
 to abandon it. Ptolemy then murdered his captives, and 
 fled from the country. 
 
 Hyrcanus was scarcely settled in his principality, when 
 the king of Syria, indignant at the defeat of his general, 
 marched in person against him, and after ravaging the 
 country, shut him up in Jerusalem, which he then sur- 
 rounded with seven encampments, but was at first deterred 
 
 1 1 Maccab. xiv. 8, &c. 
 
 2 1 Maccab. xv. xvi. Josephus 
 
 only relates that Simon himself march- 
 ed in person against them, vii. 3.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 81 
 
 from an assault by the strength of the walls. We read on 
 this occasion that the enemy, as usual during a siege, 
 suffered greatly from drought, although they were at last 
 relieved by a seasonable shower 1 ; while we never read 
 of the besieged being in want of water, often as they 
 have been reduced to extremity by famine. The northern 
 quarter of the city was the weakest point in its fortifi- 
 cations, owing to the wall standing here on even ground 2 , 
 and here Antiochus cut a double trench, deep and wide, 
 and erected a hundred lofty towers to force the wall 
 The besieged meanwhile were not idle ; they made many 
 spirited sallies, and fell upon their unguarded enemies, and 
 having killed many, retired within their walls in security. 
 The danger of famine at length forced Hyrcanus to the 
 necessity of excluding from the city such as were unfit 
 for war. These wretched beings wandered about between 
 the city walls and the works of the enemy, and many died 
 miserably of famine. The survivors were received again 
 into the city on occasion of the feast of Tabernacles, which 
 afforded a breathing-space in the siege, and led to the ul- 
 timate adjustment of a treaty. Hyrcanus had requested a 
 truce of seven days to celebrate the solemnity ; he had a 
 generous enemy to deal with, the pious, not the illustrious 
 Antiochus, who not only granted what was asked, but sent 
 in a magnificent sacrifice to do honour to the festival 
 bulls with gilded horns, an abundance of sweet spices, and 
 cups of gold and silver for the sacred services. 
 
 The king of Syria had been recommended by those 
 
 1 This is one of the two notes of 
 astronomical time given by Josephus. 
 This drought and shower occurred at 
 the setting of the Pleiades, which would 
 be, at that period, about February, the 
 
 6 
 
 time of the latter rain in Judaea. 
 
 2 KaTCt Se TO fiopetov /ue'pos TOV 
 Teixpvs, ca6' o Gvvefiaivfv UVTO KOI 
 eiriireSov elvai, trvpyows ai/a<rr/<ras 
 eKa-rov Tpiwpofyows, K. \.
 
 82 
 
 THE HOLTf CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 about him to destroy the nation, as unsociable and rebel- 
 lious, but he inclined to the side of mercy, and proposed the 
 following terms; the Jews should deliver up their arms, pay 
 tribute for Joppa and other cities which bordered on Judaea, 
 and receive a garrison into the city. To this last term the 
 Jews, who had had such bitter experience of its effects, 
 would by no means consent, and it was generously dis- 
 pensed with. The conqueror satisfied himself with breaking 
 down the walls of the city; and having received hostages, 
 among whom was another brother of Hyrcanus, he departed, 
 and soon after lost his life in an unsuccessful expedition in 
 Parthia, on which he was accompanied by his Jewish ally. 
 
 From this time the Macedonian princes had but little 
 influence in Judsea, and the valiant exploits of Hyrcanus 
 against the Idumeans, Samaritans, and others, preserved his 
 country in peace during his long reign of thirty-one years, 
 the close of which was marked by his defection from the 
 Pharisaic sect, to which he had been attached through life; a 
 step to which he was provoked by the calumny of one of its 
 members, too lightly visited in the estimation of the injured 
 party, by the body to which he belonged 1 . With John Hyr- 
 canus departed the glory of the Asmonean race; it would 
 have been well perhaps, for the nation, had the family 
 become extinct in him. 
 
 He left five sons, and was succeeded by the eldest, 
 Aristobulus, who first assumed a kingly diadem. He fa- 
 voured his second brother, Antigonus, but imprisoned the 
 others, and starved his mother to death. Through the 
 intrigues and calumnies of his wife and others he was 
 
 1 Ant. xin. x. 6. It forms no 
 part of the plan of this work to enter 
 into the tenets of the Jewish sects, 
 which are so well known. They first 
 
 appear in Josephus a little earlier than 
 this, v. 9. In both these passages he re- 
 fers to thefuller account in theWar, Lib. 
 it. viii. 14. See also Ant. xviii. i. 3.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 83 
 
 alienated also from Antigonus, in the guilt of whose assas- 
 sination, though he was scarcely implicated, yet it affected 
 him very deeply; and an accident by which it was imme- 
 diately followed struck him with such horror, that he died 
 of remorse after a brief reign of one year. 
 
 His widow Salome now released his brothers from 
 prison, and conferred the kingdom on the eldest, Alexander 
 Jannaeus, the greater part of whose reign was passed in 
 the camp ; and the tide of war again rolled around Judaea, 
 but did not reach to Jerusalem. But one whose hands were 
 stained with a brother's blood, and whose many defeats 
 were less disgraceful than his excesses in the hour of victory, 
 was not popular among his own countrymen; he was pub- 
 licly insulted while offering sacrifice in the temple on the 
 feast of Tabernacles, and was subsequently engaged for six 
 years in a sanguinary war with his own countrymen, in 
 which no fewer than 50,000 fell a sacrifice to his vengeance. 
 His fury was checked for a time by foreign aid, invited 
 by his subjects, but it was only to break out into more 
 frightful acts of cruelty, by which he earned for himself 
 the name of Thracian. He died after a reign of twenty- 
 seven years, having advised his wife, on his death-bed, to 
 seek reconciliation with the powerful party of the Pharisees, 
 from whom he had been estranged, after his father's example. 
 Alexandra was not slow to profit by his politic counsel, the 
 wisdom of which was soon manifest, in procuring for him- 
 self a splendid burial, and a fame much beyond his merits, 
 and for his widow the quiet possession of the kingdom for 
 nine years, notwithstanding the restless ambition of her 
 younger son Aristobulus, while her elder son Hyrcanus 
 administered the priesthood, being a lover of quiet, and 
 little likely to cause her any uneasiness by attempts at 
 political innovations. But such a character as his was al- 
 
 62
 
 84 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 together unqualified to cope with the bold spirit of Aris- 
 tobulus, who aimed to succeed his mother in the kingdom, 
 and the peace-loving Hyrcanus proposed an accommodation 
 on terms satisfactory to both parties 1 . He was to retain 
 the priesthood, relinquishing the crown to his younger 
 brother, to whom also he ceded the tower Baris, which 
 he had hitherto occupied. Peace would have been secured 
 on this basis, but for the interference of one whose family 
 is now first introduced on the stage to play a conspicuous 
 part, until the tragic close of this act of the history of 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 The father of Antipater, an Idumean by birth, had 
 been appointed prefect of his native country by the Jewish 
 king, Alexander Jannseus, after the conquest of that pro- 
 vince, and had administered it during the reign of Alex- 
 andra. His son, who was a man of enterprising spirit, 
 enjoyed the friendship of the young Hyrcanus, whose easy 
 surrender of his worldly honours did not suit the ardent 
 temperament of the aspiring stranger. He made it his 
 business to stir up the minds of the most powerful Jews 
 of the dominant faction, and to work on the fears of the 
 gentle Hyrcanus, as though his brother was plotting against 
 his life. He succeeded so well in his plans that he at 
 last prevailed with him to flee for protection to Aretas the 
 king of Arabia, at Petra, whom he had already prepared 
 to act his part in the plot. An invasion of Judaea now 
 followed, and after a disastrous defeat, Aristobulus fled to 
 Jerusalem, and was besieged in the temple, where the priests 
 only held with him, the multitude of the people being 
 warm partizans of Hyrcanus. Civil dissensions are always 
 attended with more animosity than foreign warfare. The 
 
 1 Joseph. Ant. xiv. i. &c.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 85 
 
 feast of the Passover occurred during the siege of the 
 temple. The party of Aristobulus requested their coun- 
 trymen without to supply them with such sacrifices as the 
 law required, offering to pay whatever price they should 
 demand. An exorbitant sum was agreed on, and the money 
 was lowered in baskets from the walls of the temple ; the 
 perfidious Jews received the money, but broke their en- 
 gagement ; presenting a striking contrast to the conduct of 
 the heathen king, whose generosity has been lately re- 
 corded. 
 
 The siege of the temple was raised by command of 
 Scaurus, Pompey's general in Syria, whose services had 
 been purchased by Aristobulus, whose possession of the 
 temple and its treasures disposed the Roman to favour 
 his advances rather than those of Hyrcanus, who had the 
 city to win, and whose case would require more vigorous 
 measures than that of his brother. The Arabians had 
 scarcely retreated when the mighty arbiter of nations him- 
 self appeared to settle the dispute of the rival brothers, 
 who, by their ambassadors, pleaded before him at Damascus, 
 without any decisive effect. The crisis was hastened by the 
 intemperate rashness of Aristobulus, who might well mistrust 
 the justice of his cause, and with characteristic precipitation 
 flew to arms. Pompey invaded the country on his march 
 to Arabia, and having extorted a submission from Aristo- 
 bulus, would have allowed him to retain at least a shadow 
 of power, had not his wounded pride urged him on to 
 fresh acts of hostility. He retired to Jerusalem, and pre- 
 pared for a second siege. 
 
 Terrified however at the advance of the Roman army, 
 he met the general at Jericho, and tendered his submission, 
 and again experienced the forbearance of the conqueror, 
 who detached Gabinius with some soldiers to accompany the
 
 86 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 fallen monarch to Jerusalem, in order to receive the money 
 and the city. On their arrival they found the gates shut 
 and the city fortified against them, and Aristobulus had 
 not sufficient influence with his party to induce them to 
 admit them. This was too much for Pompey's equanimity ; 
 he imprisoned Aristobulus, and marched his army to Jeru- 
 salem. The councils of its inhabitants were divided, the 
 more moderate party advising to open the gates, the more 
 reckless utterly refusing to do so. The former admitted 
 the soldiers into the city and palace ; the latter fortified 
 themselves in the temple, and cut oft 7 the communications 
 with the city. The Roman general had the benefit of 
 Hyrcanus's counsel, who had been before employed in the 
 same undertaking. The temple was only assailable on the 
 north, the parts on the west being rendered .precipitous by 
 the precautions of the besieged. A wall was drawn round 
 the exposed quarter, within which the army was encamped ; 
 but in proportion as the temple was by nature more prac- 
 ticable on this quarter, had it been more strongly fortified 
 by art; solid towers and a deep fosse defied the assaults 
 of the legions. With infinite trouble the fosse was filled in, 
 at least enough to allow of the erection of the engines and 
 battering rams, which had been brought from Tyre; and 
 even this would not have been accomplished had not the 
 besieged made a practice of remitting from any defence 
 on the Sabbath, except such as was rendered imperatively 
 necessary by an armed attack of their enemies. When 
 this was understood, the Romans desisted from such assaults 
 on the day of rest, and occupied themselves without moles- 
 tation in raising the banks and carrying forward the engines. 
 Meanwhile the sacred services were daily ministered 
 by the priests with the utmost precision, undeterred by 
 any accidents from the stones and other missiles of the
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 87 
 
 besiegers, until the breach was effected by the fall of one 
 of the principal towers, battered by the powerful engines, 
 and the hallowed precincts carried. Many Jews were 
 slaughtered, others precipitated themselves into the deep 
 valleys, or burnt their houses over them ; twelve thousand 
 in all perished. 
 
 The conqueror now entered the holy house, and intruded 
 even into the Holy of Holies, but abstained from the rich 
 spoils of the temple, and restored the daily burnt-offerings ; 
 and when he had reinstated Hyrcanus into the priestly 
 office, he carried off Aristobulus, with his wife and family, 
 to grace his triumph at Rome. 
 
 His elder son however effected his escape on the way, 
 and occupied the arms of Gabinius, the new Roman prefect, 
 in a fruitless attempt to recover his father's kingdom. Judaea 
 was now to all intents a Roman province, and any indepen- 
 dence which its princes or its people fancied themselves to 
 possess from this time was purely imaginary, and the crown 
 and sceptre of their future princes toys which the great 
 republic could well afford to leave in their hands, if it 
 made their yoke less galling and more tolerable. At present 
 Gabinius appointed five sanhedrims or councils for the di- 
 rection of the nation, parted off into so many divisions ; 
 and this form could not but be most acceptable to the 
 Jews, as being so conformable to primitive practice; and 
 the wise and merciful policy of the Roman government, 
 satisfied to consult the national prejudices, so far as might 
 be safely done, challenges our admiration. 
 
 The restless Aristobulus had not yet relinquished the 
 hopes of recovering his crown. Escaping from Rome he 
 gathered a small army in Judaea, where he was soon taken 
 by the Roman general, and sent back to his bonds in 
 Rome, while his children were allowed to return to their
 
 88 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 own country. He was finally released by Julius Caesar, 
 and died by poison in his native land. His son Alexander 
 was put to death by Pompey's orders soon after. Mean- 
 while Hyrcanus continued in the exercise of the high priest- 
 hood at Jerusalem, aided always by the shrewd Antipater, 
 who was well skilled in such diplomacy as became one in 
 his position. The moderation of his predecessors was not 
 imitated by Crassus, who now succeeded to the command 
 of the eastern provinces. On his visit to Jerusalem, on 
 his Parthian expedition, his cupidity was excited by the 
 costly treasures of the temple, enriched as it was by the 
 pious offerings of devout Jews in all parts of the world. 
 The guardian of the sacred treasures sought to satisfy 
 his avarice and save the temple by a bribe of enormous 
 value, a wedge of gold of the value of nearly a million 
 pounds sterling, which the villain took and then stripped 
 the temple ! No marvel that the pious Jews should re- 
 gard his disasters in Parthia as a signal judgment on his 
 perfidy and sacrilege. 
 
 An attempt of Antigonus, the surviving son of Aristobulus, 
 to injure the position of Hyrcanus and Antipater hi the 
 estimation of Caesar, resulted, through the tact of the latter, 
 in the renewal of all their powers, and permission to repair 
 the breaches made by Pompey. On his return to Jerusalem 
 he appointed his eldest son Phasselus to the government of 
 Jerusalem, and Herod to the more distant district of Galilee. 
 Here the enterprising spirit of this remarkable man began 
 to display itself in his first public command. The country 
 had been long infested by formidable banditti, having for 
 their captain one Hezekiah, the terror of whose name had 
 spread throughout the country. The robber-chief and the 
 greater part of his band was taken and slain by Herod, and 
 loud were the praises which this daring exploit called forth
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 89 
 
 from the peacefully disposed inhabitants of the district : well 
 would it have been had he never, during his long adminis- 
 tration, stained his hands with more innocent blood! 
 
 The growing power and influence of the family of 
 Antipater had for some time excited the jealousy of the 
 Jewish party at Jerusalem; for although the Idumeans had 
 been forced to adopt the Jewish worship 1 , on their conquest 
 by Aristobulus the First, yet they were still regarded as 
 strangers and aliens from the Jewish commonwealth. An- 
 tipater and his sons were now charged before Hyrcanus 
 with political unfaithfulness, and Herod especially was ac- 
 cused of having acted contrary to law in putting the bandits 
 to death, without the consent of the sanhedrim. The high 
 priest, not daring to follow his own inclination, which would 
 have led him to disregard these complaints, summoned the 
 youthful offender to answer for his conduct before the council 
 at Jerusalem. He appeared in their chamber in arms, sur- 
 rounded by his armed followers, backed moreover by the 
 protection of Sextus Caesar, then president of the province. 
 The timid judges were awed, his accusers dared not appear. 
 One only of all the assembly was above the fear of man, 
 and he spoke boldly out. The members of the sanhedrim, 
 reassured by his boldness, would have pronounced sentence 
 of death, had not Hyrcanus, dreading the wrath of the 
 Roman prefect, adjourned the proceedings, and given the cul- 
 prit an opportunity of flight. Smarting under this insult, and 
 strengthened still more by the official appointment of general 
 of the Roman army in Coelosyria, conferred on him for 
 money by Sextus Caesar, Herod meditated vengeance on his 
 adversaries at Jerusalem, and actually marched his legions 
 towards the city. His father and brother with difficulty 
 
 1 Ant. xin. xi. 3.
 
 90 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 persuaded him to milder measures, and he desisted from his 
 purpose, thinking it enough at this time to have made a 
 show of his determination to quell the refractory sanhedrim 
 by force. 
 
 The murder of Julius Cassar, and the consequent dis- 
 tractions of the Roman empire, involved Judaea in new 
 troubles, during which the levy of the enormous taxes 
 exacted by Cassius gave to Herod a fresh opportunity of 
 shewing his address, and ingratiating himself in the favour 
 of his new master; so that when his father had been 
 poisoned by the treachery of one Malichas, the leader of 
 the Jewish party, he was able, after a period of dissimulation, 
 to take vengeance on the murderer, and to establish more 
 firmly the authority which he had already acquired. He 
 succeeded also in expelling from the country Antigonus, the 
 son of Aristobulus, who, having strengthened himself with 
 new alliances, had ventured again to try the fortune of war 
 against his more powerful rival. Returning from this ex- 
 pedition, the conqueror was received with open arms by 
 Hyrcanus, whose granddaughter he had espoused, thereby 
 contracting an alliance with the Asmonean family, which 
 rendered him for a brief season more acceptable to the 
 people; but on the arrival of Mark Antony in Syria, the 
 old complaints were revived, and a large deputation of the 
 most influential Jews waited on the Roman general to prefer 
 their accusations against the detested house of Antipater. 
 The triumvir's judgment had been already purchased by 
 the accused; Phasaelus and Herod were declared tetrarchs, 
 the government was confirmed in their hands, and it was 
 only at the intercession of the latter that the lives of 
 their accusers were spared. The representations of a 
 much more numerous deputation, which met Mark Antony 
 at Tyre, experienced a like reception, and on this occasion
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 91 
 
 some of the number paid the penalty of their persevering 
 persecution with their blood. 
 
 But a terrible reverse of fortune was now at hand, a 
 season of severe trial, which was to form the character of the 
 future king. Antigonus once more appeared in Judaea with 
 a detachment of Parthian troops, who, under the command 
 of Pacorus the king's son and Barzapharnes his general, had 
 invaded and conquered Syria. Herod and his brother were 
 shut up in the palace at Jerusalem, supported by Hyrcanus 
 and his adherents; but the partizans of Antigonus outnum- 
 bered the opposite faction, and a formidable army was at 
 hand to second his claims. For some time the Holy City 
 was the scene of confusion and bloodshed, especially when the 
 feast of Pentecost had assembled a multitude from the sur- 
 rounding country ; and the defence of the brothers against 
 such long odds, vigorous as it was, could scarcely have had 
 a successful issue. The dispute however was not to be 
 decided with arms, but, as usual, by treachery. Hyrcanus 
 and Phasselus were prevailed on, much against the better 
 sense of Herod, to go on an embassy to the Parthian com- 
 mander-in-chief, with a view of negotiating terms. As he 
 had foreseen, they were captured and imprisoned. A noc- 
 turnal flight with his betrothed wife, the lovely but un- 
 fortunate Mariamne, and his female relatives, under the 
 escort of a small retinue, scarcely saved him from a like 
 fate. His flight was discovered, he was pursued, and over- 
 taken ; and so deep was his distress on this occasion, that 
 he was only prevented from committing suicide by the 
 earnest entreaties of those about him. He succeeded how- 
 ever in effecting his escape, and retired first to Massada, 
 a strong fortress on the Dead Sea. Here, leaving the 
 females in safe custody under the protection of his brother
 
 92 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 Joseph, he departed to Petra in Arabia, where he met 
 with a less courteous reception than he had anticipated. 
 
 Meanwhile the Parthians plundered Jerusalem, Antigonus 
 using his victory with such moderation as might be ex- 
 pected from an unprincipled man who had treasured up 
 in his memory the recollection of long years of misfortune 
 and defeat. Phasaelus, condemned to death, sought to pre- 
 vent the execution by dashing out his brains against his 
 prison-wall. He did not succeed in his attempt, but only 
 fractured his skull. The wretch Antigonus sent his phy- 
 sicians to dress the wound, and ordered them to pour poison 
 into it! The last moments of the unhappy man were con- 
 soled by the intelligence of his brother's escape. Hyrcanus 
 was maimed by his nephew, and so disqualified for the 
 priestly office ; but his life was spared. 
 
 Rejected by Malchus king of Arabia, Herod now re- 
 solved on an attempt to repair his shattered fortunes by 
 a personal appearance at Rome. He went to Egypt, and 
 sailed thence for Italy ; was shipwrecked at Rhodes, and 
 scarcely escaped with his life, the freight being entirely 
 lost. His success at Rome exceeded his most sanguine ex- 
 pectations. The old friendship which had existed between 
 Octavius and Antipater, who had been companions in arms 
 in Egypt the remembrance of the costly presents made 
 by the suppliant to Antony in the East, the hatred of An- 
 tigonus, and the hope of finding a valuable ally against the 
 Parthians all conspired to recommend his cause to the 
 favourable consideration of the triumvirs and the senate. 
 Seven days after his arrival he left the shores of Italy, 
 honoured with the title of king, by those who had 
 power to enforce their decrees. He had intended to prefer 
 his suit in behalf of Mariamne's brother Aristobulus, the son
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 93 
 
 of Alexander, who, as the grandson of Aristobulus on the 
 father's side, and of Hyrcanus by his daughter Alexandra, was 
 the undoubted heir to the dignity ; and who would have 
 been the puppet of his crafty brother-in-law, as Hyrcanus 
 had been of Antipater. But now a grander prospect opened 
 before him, he could act undisguisedly in his own name. 
 
 Arrived at Ptolemais, the first care of the new king 
 was to enlist an army of mercenaries and march to the 
 relief of Massada, which had hitherto maintained a long 
 siege against Antigonus and his Parthian allies. Strong 
 as the position was 1 , and well stored with all kinds of 
 provisions, Joseph had once resolved to abandon its de- 
 fence, for want of water, when a timely shower filled the 
 cisterns, and enabled him to hold out until his brother's 
 arrival. Having released his family and friends from their 
 confinement, Herod next inarched to Jerusalem, and pitched 
 his camp on the west part of the city, hoping by the as- 
 sistance of the Roman general Silo, who had been instructed 
 to forward his views, to make himself master of the city. 
 But this officer, who had been bribed by Antigonus, got 
 up the appearance of mutiny in his army, and Herod was 
 forced to abandon the siege and place the legions in winter- 
 quarters. But his active spirit could not rest; the robbers 
 in Galilee had again got head, after his removal from that 
 government, and he occupied the interval in chasing them 
 
 i This site has been lately identi- 
 fied hy Dr Robinson, Bib. Res. n. 
 240. It is now called " Sebbeh." The 
 writer only viewed it as Dr Robinson 
 did, from the high cliffs above Ain 
 Jidy, but it was visited in 1842 by 
 Mr Woolcott, whose interesting ac- 
 count of it is published in Dr Robin- 
 son's Bibliotheca Sacra, Pt. i. p. 62, 
 
 &c. It occupies a position of immense 
 strength on the top of a perpendicular 
 rock, approachable only by a steep and 
 narrow pass, and there not without con- 
 siderable difficulty. Considerable ruins 
 still remain there. It is situated to- 
 wards the southern end of the Dead 
 Sea, on its western shore.
 
 94 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 from their dens. Then, leaving his brother Joseph to re- 
 present him in his kingdom, he marched to his friend Mark 
 Antony, who was now engaged in the siege of Samosata, 
 to prefer his just complaint at the conduct of the Roman 
 officers in Judaea. Then* old friendship, and an important 
 service which Herod had the good fortune to render him, 
 ensured his being well received by his faithful ally, and 
 he returned to his kingdom, where he found that his brother 
 had fallen a victim to his own rashness, having been en- 
 tangled and attacked by the soldiers of Antigonus, and 
 perished with his whole force, consisting of six cohorts of 
 newly-raised recruits. Herod hastened to avenge his brother's 
 death, aggravated by the mutilation of his body by Anti- 
 gonus, and success attended his arms. He was, however, 
 obliged to wait until the severity of the whiter was past, 
 to renew his attempt upon Jerusalem ; and meanwhile he 
 lay at Jericho. 
 
 As soon as the season was sufficiently advanced, he 
 again took the field, and marching to Jerusalem, prepared 
 for the reduction of his capital, three years after his ap- 
 pointment to the kingdom. While the works were in pro- 
 gress he departed to Samaria, where his marriage with 
 Mariamne, to whom he had been long espoused, was at 
 length consummated. Returning to the city with fresh 
 forces he vigorously pressed the siege, directing his chief 
 efforts against the north quarter of the temple enclosure, 
 as Pompey had done before him ; and having the able 
 assistance of the Roman general Sosius, whom Antony had 
 detached for this service. The same vigorous resistance 
 was made by the Jews as on the former .occasion, although 
 the scarcity of their provisions (it was a Sabbatical year) 
 reduced them to great distress. The first walj was carried 
 in forty days, the second in fifteen more, and the Romans
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 95 
 
 were now in possession of the lower city, and of the outer 
 temple. Antigonus was fortified in the royal palace of Baris, 
 and his forces occupied the upper city and the inner court 
 of the sacred inclosure. The former of these was taken 
 by storm, and a frightful massacre ensued, while the ra- 
 pacious soldiery flew upon the spoil, and were hardly re- 
 strained by the remonstrances of Herod, who repeatedly 
 inquired of his ally if the Romans were about to clear the 
 city of money and men, and leave him king of a desert ? 
 
 Antigonus surrendered at discretion ; he was abused and 
 insulted by the Roman general, and afterwards sent in chains 
 to Mark Antony, who put him to death at Antioch, at the 
 solicitation of Herod, with a view to confirm him on his tot- 
 tering throne. In him the royal line of the Asmoneans 
 ceased, after it had continued for 126 years, and Herod 
 was left in undisputed possession of Juda3a. 
 
 The dark v annals of the sanguinary reign of this splendid 
 monster, whose suspicious jealousy stuck at no inhumanity, 
 would be distressing alike to recite and to peruse 1 . That 
 he should wreak his fury on the adverse party was to be 
 expected ; worldly policy might plead necessity as a law ; 
 but the treacherous murder of the youth Aristobulus, his 
 kinsman, the cruel butchery of the old Hyrcanus the tried 
 friend of his family, and above all, the ruthless slaughter 
 of the high-spirited Mariamne, whose only crimes were, that 
 she could not submit without a murmur to the murder of 
 her grandfather and brother, and dared to question the 
 tenderness of a husband's love who had twice ordered her 
 immediate execution in the event of his own death ; these 
 acts, not to mention the other innocent victims of the earlier 
 half of his reign, have left a blot upon his character which 
 
 1 Ant. xv.
 
 96 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 all his magnificence and the real glory of his public ad- 
 ministration cannot for a moment obliterate from the memory. 
 After the battle of Actium, and the death of Antony, he 
 had repaired in person to the conqueror at Rhodes, in 
 whose presence neither his address nor good-fortune for- 
 sook him. He honestly avowed his attachment to Mark 
 Antony, his earnest desire to serve him, his conviction that 
 had he followed his advice he would not have succumbed 
 to his rival. Octavius, who could now afford to be gene- 
 rous, was not offended with the candour of the avowal, 
 and Herod was confirmed in his kingdom, whose limits 
 were enlarged by the favour of the conqueror. His vigorous 
 measures having secured the tranquillity of the country, and 
 awed the bordering tribes into submission, he was at leisure 
 to devote his thoughts and his wealth to the adornment 
 of his capital and the erection of cities, whose magnificent 
 ruins testify to this day the costly liberality of Herod the 
 Great; Samaria was converted into Sebaste, and Strato's 
 tower enlarged to CaBsarea, to natter the pride of his august 
 benefactor ; while Herodium, erected on the remarkable hill, 
 now known as Jebel Furdeis or the Frank Mountain, within 
 sight of Jerusalem, served to mark the scene of his victory 
 over Antigonus on the memorable night of his escape from 
 Jerusalem. Neither was his reign unmarked by one proof at 
 least that he had a human heart ; and the really affecting 
 account which the historian has left of his thoughtful solici- 
 tude and paternal care, not merely in behalf of his own peo- 
 ple, but of the neighbouring nation, on occasion of a severe 
 famine, when he opened his granaries and his treasury, and 
 imported corn from Egypt, and fed the hungry, and clothed 
 the naked, and succoured the distressed, might well change 
 the disposition of the multitude towards him, and dispose them 
 at least to forget his past barbarities in the benefits which
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 97 
 
 they were now reaping, and incline them to think that he 
 had been from the beginning, not such an one as they 
 had found him by experience, but such as the care he had 
 taken of them, in supplying their necessities, proved him 
 now to be. 
 
 But the introduction of foreign customs and amusements 
 into the Holy City was an unpardonable desecration in 
 the eyes of the zealous Jews, and the impiety of his acts 
 would be aggravated rather than excused by his profession 
 of their worship ; a conspiracy against his life was entered 
 into by ten citizens of Jerusalem ; they were betrayed and 
 punished with death. But the builder of a theatre and 
 circus, the president at quinquennial games, instituted in 
 honour of a pagan emperor, might weU be suspected, when 
 he proposed to rebuild the Jewish temple, and the religious 
 part of the community had good reason to fear a further 
 and more dreadful violation of their national prejudices. 
 But in this, his chief work, he acted with much more con- 
 sideration than could have been expected, however policy 
 might have taught the inexpediency of further provoking 
 the hostility of his subjects. Neither labour nor expense 
 was spared to render this temple a worthy successor of 
 that which the wealth and wisdom of Solomon had origi- 
 nally erected on the Holy Mount, and the fragments of 
 columns, built into the modern walls of the Harem, in various 
 parts, exhibiting most rare specimens of prophyry and other 
 precious marbles, still testify to the glory of this latter 
 house, which was magnificently adorned within and without, 
 and surrounded with stately cloisters, of which a further 
 notice will be necessary in a subsequent chapter, as also 
 of the Tower Antonia, at the north-east corner of the outer 
 area, which he had already rebuilt or greatly enlarged during 
 7
 
 98 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 the life of his friend, by whose name it was designated. 
 The temple was completed in nine years and a half. 
 
 But the last days of Herod were to witness a repe- 
 tition of the terrific acts of its commencement, and family 
 feuds were again to embroil his house in trouble and to 
 embrue his hands with blood 1 . The two sons of the mur- 
 dered Mariamne, who had been educated at Rome, were 
 brought back by their father when age and polite educa- 
 tion had perfected them in such graces and accomplishments 
 as they had inherited from their mother. They became 
 the idols of the people. Their popularity excited the envy 
 of Pheronas and Salome, the brother and sister of Herod, 
 who had indeed too just cause to dread their displeasure 
 for the part which they had acted towards the unhappy 
 Mariamne, which her children were too generous not to 
 feel, too frank and noble-minded to conceal; and as the 
 king was now advanced in years, and the accession of the 
 young men to power was probably not far distant, no time 
 was to be lost in getting them out of the way. The alli- 
 ance of Aristobulus, the elder of the two brothers, to the 
 daughter of Salome, tended in no measure to reconcile her 
 to the child of the woman whom she had so deeply injured, 
 and falsehood and calumny were incessantly plied, until the 
 father's affections were completely estranged from his darling 
 boys. Antipater, a son of Herod by his first wife, was 
 introduced at court, and entered into the evil councils of 
 his designing aunt with all the eagerness of one bent on 
 his own advancement. The counter-influence thus strength- 
 ened was too powerful for the two brothers. Being accused 
 before the tribunal of Augustus, as plotting against their 
 
 1 Ant. xvi. i. &c.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 99 
 
 father's life, they pleaded their defence with all the simplicity 
 of conscious innocence, were honourably acquitted, and a tem- 
 porary reconciliation with their father was the result. But 
 on their return to Judaea the attempts of Salome were re- 
 newed, and seconded by letters of Antipater, who was now 
 at Rome, and by the treacherous villany of a foreign spy, 
 until the king, worked up to a pitch of phrenzy, was at 
 last not only prepared to believe, but forward to invite 
 accusations, so that the very servants were tortured or bribed 
 to calumniate them. The young men, wearied out with this 
 incessant persecution, resolved to retire from the country, 
 and to seek refuge first with Archelaus, king of Cappadocia, 
 the father-in-law of Alexander, and finally at Rome. Their 
 intentions were discovered and represented as an overt act 
 of treason, and Augustus was prevailed upon to allow the 
 victims to be put on trial for their lives, before a Roman 
 court at Berytus. The wretched father here appeared in 
 person as the accuser of his sons, and so ably did he advo- 
 cate the cause of injustice and inhumanity, with such vehe- 
 mence and violence did he press the cause against them, 
 that the judges were absolutely prevailed upon to return 
 a sentence of condemnation, and the two brothers were 
 strangled at Sebaste. 
 
 Justly might the odium of this deed of blood attach to 
 the villanous Antipater, and most righteous was the ven- 
 geance which speedily overtook him 2 . Having removed these 
 rival claimants for his father's crown, nothing now remained 
 but to bring to the grave, no matter how, the hoary 
 head which it now encircled. Herod had cherished a nest 
 of vipers in his own house, and was doomed himself to be 
 the next victim. Salome his sister, Pheronas his brother, 
 
 4 Ant. xvn. i. &c. 
 
 72
 
 1 00 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 and Antipater his cherished son, conspired together to 
 poison him. The success of this plot was hindered by the 
 death of Pheronas, and an investigation which ensued on 
 the suspicion of his having met a violent death, led to the 
 discovery of the whole of the dark design, in which An- 
 tipater had taken part with the most diabolical determination. 
 He was immediately summoned from Rome, where he was 
 now awaiting the explosion of the mine to which he had 
 laid the train, in a letter full of affection, and arrived at 
 Jerusalem without suspecting the cause of his recall. His 
 salutation was repulsed with horror by his indignant father, 
 who now threw off the mask, and on the following day he 
 was put upon his trial before Quintilius Varus, the 
 president of Syria, whom Herod had already called to 
 Jerusalem to act as his assessor on this occasion. The elo- 
 quent Nicolaus of Damascus was counsel for the prosecution, 
 witnesses nocked forward in crowds, judging it a righteous 
 act to expose such monstrous wickedness, the most fright- 
 ful aggravations of the most complicated schemes of cold- 
 blooded villany came out on the trial, until Herod himself, 
 recreant as he was, stood aghast at enormities exceeding 
 his own, while the perjured wretch, in the face of the clearest 
 evidence, with well-dissembled horror at the imputations, 
 called God to witness his innocence ! He was condemned 
 to death, but some delay was necessary until the sentence 
 should be confirmed at Rome. 
 
 In this interval king Herod, who had now attained 
 his 70th year, was attacked by that dreadful malady, 
 which terminated his life. But his sun was to set in 
 blood, even as it had risen. Among other adornments of 
 his temple at Jerusalem he had erected a large golden 
 eagle over the principal gate. Two of the most celebrated 
 rabbies, Judas and Matthias, expecting the speedy issue
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 101 
 
 of his incurable disease, encouraged some of their young 
 pupils to demolish this emblem of idolatry : a report was 
 soon after raised that the king was dead, and the eagle 
 was instantly destroyed. The report was unfounded. Forty 
 of the young men were apprehended by the temple-guard, 
 and the instigators of the sedition voluntarily surrendered, 
 glorying in the act. The king, maddened by the fury of 
 the disease, tortured with the conviction that his approaching 
 dissolution was most anxiously expected by his subjects, 
 furious at the insult offered to him at almost his last hour, 
 ordered the whole number to be burnt alive ! ! Meanwhile 
 his body was consuming with an internal fire, and his heart 
 inflamed with the wildest passions. Can it be believed that he 
 had ordered his sister Salome to gather together, and con- 
 fine in the hippodrome, the principal Jews from all the 
 country, to be slaughtered immediately on his death, that 
 there might be a national mourning at his funeral ? Hu- 
 manity may rejoice that the sanguinary order was never 
 executed. The last act of his sanguinary reign, when he 
 had failed in an attempt on his own life, was to confirm 
 the order for the execution of his son Antipater. Five 
 days after this he died in extreme agony 2 , in the 37th 
 year of his reign, and was magnificently buried at Hero- 
 dium : while the frantic cries of the desolate mothers of 
 Bethlehem, mourning for their infants, whose execution he 
 had lately ordered, formed his funeral dirge, and attended 
 his guilty soul into the presence of his Righteous Judge ! 
 A very slight sketch of the interval which elapsed 
 
 1 Here occurs the other note of as- 
 tronomical time, which seems to have 
 been providentially inserted to mark 
 the time of our Saviour's birth. This 
 execution took place on the night of 
 
 the eclipse of the moon. It occuned 
 March 13, four years before the Chris- 
 tian ara. 
 
 3 Compare Matt. ii.
 
 102 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 between the death of Herod and the outbreak of the 
 Jewish revolution will suffice for this troubled period of 
 Jerusalem's history. Most of the provisions of the will of 
 Herod, as revised shortly before his dissolution, were con- 
 firmed by Augustus, and notwithstanding the most vehe- 
 ment opposition of the Jews, Archelaus his eldest son, by 
 Mathace, the sixth of his ten wives, entered upon the go- 
 vernment of half of his father's dominions, including Judaea, 
 which he administered for nine years, with the title of 
 Ethnarch, at the end of which period he was deposed for 
 mal-administration, and banished to Vienne in Gaul. Judaea 
 now became a Roman province, whose affairs were managed 
 by a procurator, under the prefect of Syria, with the 
 power of life and death, while the arrangement of matters 
 of minor importance was committed to the Sanhedrim. Co- 
 ponius was the first to hold the appointment of procurator, 
 in which he was shortly superseded by Marcus Ambivius, 
 to whom succeeded Annius Rufus, during whose procura- 
 torship Augustus died. The policy of Tiberius, more 
 considerate in this respect than liis predecessor, was averse 
 to the frequent change of the provincial governors, and ^ 7 a- 
 lerius Gratus continued in the office for eleven years. He 
 was succeeded by Pontius Pilate, on whose banishment 
 Vitcllius, the prefect of Syria, visited Jerusalem in person, 
 as some of liis predecessors had done. In the reign of 
 Caligula we find Petronius president of Syria, and Mar- 
 cellus procurator of Judaea. It was at this time that a 
 commotion arose among the Jews, which aided not a little 
 to inflame the spirit of insubordination towards their Roman 
 masters, which finally involved them in ruin. From the 
 time of Herod's death the country had been in a state 
 of terrible convulsion, and the streets of Jerusalem had 
 again flowed with blood. But the vengeance inflicted by
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 103 
 
 the Romans on the leaders of the revolt served rather 
 to exasperate than to overawe the obstinate spirit of the 
 Jews. They had seen two thousand of then* countrymen 
 barbarously crucified before their eyes 1 ; they had seen 
 their high priests deposed and set up at the will of pagan 
 generals; they had seen the idolatrous standards, the abo- 
 mination of desolation, introduced within the walls of the 
 Holy City 2 ; and yet they could flatter themselves with the 
 dream of liberty " We be Abraham's seed, and were never 
 in bondage to any man 3 ." But when they learnt that it 
 was the deliberate intention of Caius Caligula to set up an 
 image of himself in the Holy of Holies in their temple at 
 Jerusalem ; as soon as horror allowed them utterance, one 
 fierce and unanimous cry echoed from ah 1 parts of the 
 world where the Jews were found, invoking death rather 
 than such dreadful desecration 4 . Most happily for them 
 the president of Syria was of a different temperament from 
 their former governor, Pilate ; Petronius chose rather to 
 incur the displeasure of his imperial master than set his 
 hand to the barbarous massacre which he saw must take 
 place if he were to attempt to enforce his decree. Happily 
 too, a prince who had inherited some of the Asmonean 
 blood, was in a position to exercise some influence over the 
 tyrant, and Agrippa the son of Aristobulus, and so the 
 grandson of Herod by Mariamne, was chiefly instrumental 
 in reversing the fatal edict. 
 
 After a youth of contempt and poverty, Agrippa had 
 come a beggar to Borne, where he was imprisoned for debt 
 by Tiberius, released and promoted to the dignity of tetrarch 
 by Caius, and rewarded for important services to Claudius 
 
 1 J. W. ii. v. 
 
 2 Ibid. ix. 
 
 3 John viii. 33. 
 
 4 Ant. xviii. viii. and J. W. n. x.
 
 104 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 by the grant of his grandfather's kingdom, with the ad- 
 dition of another district 1 . During a reign of three years 
 he administered the kingdom with much address, and con- 
 ferred important services on the Jews. It would have been 
 well had he confined himself to such means of securing 
 their approbation as Josephus records 2 . 
 
 The chief of these will afford an opportunity of giving 
 a description of Jerusalem, which will be necessary to render 
 intelligible such an account of the siege as is here con- 
 templated, and such topographical notices as will follow in 
 a subsequent part of this work. 
 
 Jerusalem, as we have seen, was originally composed of 
 two distinct cities, incorporated by David, and enlarged by 
 Solomon and subsequent kings. It is situated geographically in 
 latitude north 31. 46'. 30", and longitude east of Greenwich 
 35. 12'. 30", in the heart of the mountain district, which, 
 commencing to the south of the great plain of Esdraelon, 
 is continued through the whole of Samaria and Judaea, 
 to completely the southern extremity of the promised land. 
 The city occupied two hills, separated by a valley (called 
 by Josephus the Tyropseon) and confined on three sides by 
 two other valleys of considerable depth, (the valley of 
 Jehoshaphat, and the valley of Hinnom), the former of which 
 commencing on the north divided it on the east from the 
 Mount of Olives, while the latter, running down from the 
 west and encircling its southern side, was united to the 
 former at the south-east quarter of the city. Of the two 
 hills covered by the city 3 , one was much higher than the 
 
 1 J. W. ii. xi. 5. 
 
 * See Acts xii. 1, &c. 
 
 3 I here follow Josephus, J. W. v. 
 iv. The importance of this description 
 will appear in the Second Part, and it is 
 
 given in the original in an Appendix, 
 No. 2. The discussion of this and such 
 subjects is reserved for distinct con- 
 sideration. See Part n. cap. i.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 105 
 
 other, and is called the Upper Market, which is Zion, in 
 distinction from the lower city, or Acra. The temple-mount 
 had been a third hill over against Acra, originally separated 
 from it by a wide valley, which however was filled up by 
 the Asmonean princes, so that these two hills had become 
 one, and are generally so reckoned by the historian. 
 
 The walls are described as follows : the Hippie tower, 
 which occupied the north-west quarter of Zion, being assumed 
 as a starting point, the first wall skirted the northern brow 
 of Zion, and then crossing the valley of the Tyropaeon, was 
 joined to the western wall of the temple, which was com- 
 pletely surrounded by a wall of its own. In the opposite 
 direction it encompassed the hill on the western and southern 
 sides as far as the pool of Siloam, where it again crossed 
 the valley of the Tyropseon, and was continued round the 
 ridge of the temple-mount, here called Ophel, until it joined 
 the extremity of the eastern wall of the temple. From 
 the pool of Siloam there was a wall along the eastern brow 
 of Zion 4 to meet that which bounded it on the north, so 
 that the upper city was completely surrounded by a wall 
 of its own. 
 
 Of the second wall we are only told that it commenced 
 at a place called the Gate of Gennath, a point in the first 
 wall east of Hippicus, and encircling the northern part of 
 the city, was joined to the fortress Antonia, which occu- 
 pied a considerable space at the north-west of the temple- 
 area. In process of time the population of this part, north 
 
 4 The important passage of Jose- 
 phus which declares this is overlooked 
 by Dr Robinson, who only conjectures 
 it, Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 461 ; but J. W. 
 v. vi. 1, Simon is said to have held as 
 much of the old wall as bent from Si- 
 
 loam to the east, (i. e. as usual, facing 
 the east) and went down to the palace 
 of Monobazus, which is somewhere 
 identified with Agrippa's palace on 
 Mount Zion, at the causeway, n. xvi. 
 3.
 
 106 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 of the temple, had overflowed the limits of the old city, 
 and had occupied a third hill to the north, which is known 
 as Bezetha, or the new city ; up to the period which we 
 have now reached the new-built part of the city had been 
 unprotected, and Agrippa liberally determined to add to 
 its security by the erection of a strong wall, which he re- 
 solved to extend much further than was now required, to 
 allow for a further increase of population. Commencing 
 then at the Hippie tower, it was extended far to the north, 
 and passing by the monuments of Helena, it reached the 
 upper part of the valley of Jehoshaphat at the Tombs of 
 the Kings, from whence it followed the course of the valley, 
 bending with it at the Fuller's monument, where was a 
 corner tower, until it was joined to the temple-wall at its 
 north-eastern angle 1 . This wall was intended by Agrippa, 
 who inherited his grandfather's magnificent ideas, to be a 
 lasting monument of his liberality, and an impregnable de- 
 fence to the city. It was commenced on an immense scale, 
 and the Jewish historian is of opinion that if it had been 
 completed according to the original design, the city could 
 never have been taken. But a representation was made to 
 Claudius, when the work had made some progress, and its 
 continuance was prohibited. The circumference of the city, 
 as inclosed by this outer wall, was 33 stadia, equal to 
 nearly 3-^ geographical miles 2 . 
 
 1 It appears to me very plain that | was. The idea of a wall in the valley 
 
 this must be the meaning of Josephus, is both absurd in itself and expressly 
 
 where he says that it joined the old contrary to Josephus, who says that on 
 
 wall at the valley of Kedron. The old j such parts of the city as were encom- 
 
 wall, he had before said, joined the | passed with impassable valleys, (and 
 
 eastern cloister at the temple : now he 
 says nothing about the cloisters, but 
 looks upon the temple-wall as a con- 
 
 surely the east was, if any) there was 
 but one wall. 
 
 2 J. W. v. iv. 3. and Bib. Res. i. 
 
 tinuation of the old wall, as indeed it | 467.
 
 CH 
 
 . II.] THE HOLY CITY. 107 
 
 On the death of Agrippa Judaea reverted into its former 
 condition of a Roman procuratorship, the emperor considering 
 the king's son of the same name too young to be entrusted 
 with the reins of government, though he afterwards set 
 him over his uncle's kingdom of Chalcis 3 . During the 
 administration of Cuspius Fadus and Tiberius Alexander 
 the country remained in comparative tranquillity ; but on the 
 succession of Lumanus, the gross licence of the Roman 
 soldiers, encouraged rather than repressed by their com- 
 mander, again exasperated the Jews, and stirred up the 
 fires of revolt, to which Ummidius Quadratus, the prefect 
 of Syria, added fresh fuel by his unjust and cruel measures, 
 when appealed to by the injured parties. 
 
 From this time forward the storm was gathering fast; 
 the aggravated evils of the Jews had become insupportable; 
 they had filled up the measure of their iniquities, and " wrath 
 had come upon them to the uttermost." Torrents of their 
 blood had lately flowed in Egypt and in Chaldaea, their two 
 houses of bondage; now it was to deluge their own land, 
 and to be shed in great part by brothers' hands. While 
 Felix was procurator of Judaea, the first under Nero, there 
 appeared in Jerusalem a secret band of assassins, called 
 Sicarii, who carried on their trade of blood in the open day, 
 in the public streets or in the crowded temple, without 
 detection. Their first victim was Jonathan the high priest, 
 and numbers followed, until the whole city was filled with 
 apprehension and distrust. Besides these there were num- 
 berless impostors starting up on all sides, laying claim to 
 Messiahship, or at least to some measure of divine inspi- 
 ration, and the state of the nation is not unaptly compared 
 to that of a diseased body, in which inflammation is re- 
 
 3 J. W. ii. xi. 6.
 
 108 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 pressed in one quarter only to break forth with greater 
 vehemence in another 1 . 
 
 Festus succeeded Felix, and was in his turn replaced 
 by Albinus, a worthy predecessor of Gessius Floras, whose 
 proceedings more than any served to hasten the fatal crisis, 
 being so well supported and matched by his superior Cestius 
 Gallus, prefect of Syria, that no complaints against the 
 subordinate officer were for a moment entertained. His 
 sacrilegious attempt to seize upon part of the sacred treasure 
 set Jerusalem in a blaze, which he sought in vain to ex- 
 tinguish in the blood of three thousand six hundred victims 2 . 
 Bernice, the sister of the younger Agrippa, who was now 
 in Jerusalem, interceded for mercy, but to no purpose ; a 
 second massacre followed, and then being satiated with blood 
 he retired to Ca3sarea, but not before he had succeeded in 
 irritating the people to such a pitch that all prospects of 
 accommodation were from thenceforth utterly hopeless. In 
 vain did Agrippa point out the madness of the attempt to 
 shake off the Roman yoke, and the certainty of the ruin 
 which must ensue; in vain did the more moderate part of 
 the citizens recommend patience and submission; the "dogs 
 of war" were now " let slip," and nothing would restrain 
 them. 
 
 The first open act of rebellion was the refusal to offer 
 the usual sacrifices for the emperor 3 . Then followed an 
 assault on the city, some of the principal buildings of which 
 were destroyed by fire. The chief priests and more peace- 
 ful part of the inhabitants had retired to Mount Zion ; they 
 were attacked, and the high priest, who had concealed 
 himself in a sewer, was discovered and put to death. The 
 fortress of Antonia was next forced, and the garrison slain. 
 
 1 J. W. ii. xiii. 2 Ibid. xv. xvi. ' Ibid. xvii.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 109 
 
 The palace of Herod, in the north-west angle of Mount 
 Zion, still remained in the hands of the Romans, strongly 
 fortified on the north by three towers. The garden where 
 the soldiers were encamped was carried, and they retired 
 to the towers ; the camp was fired, and the towers be- 
 sieged. The defenders were forced to capitulate ; they laid 
 down their arms, and were inhumanly slaughtered in con- 
 travention of the terms, and that on the Sabbath-day ! 
 Meanwhile the revolt had spread throughout the country ; 
 and the prefect was for a time too fully occupied to march 
 to Jerusalem. At length however he arrived 4 . He pitched 
 his camp on Scopus, seven furlongs from the city, and 
 waited three days in the hope that his appearance might 
 awe the rebels. Then he entered the city, the Jews hav- 
 ing abandoned the outer and second wall, when he fired 
 the new, and part of the lower, city. He then advanced 
 against the upper city occupied by the rebels, and encamped 
 before the royal palace of Herod, where was a space un- 
 occupied by buildings, between the outer and second wall. 
 A well-sustained attempt to storm the upper city at this 
 time would probably have been successful, but Providence 
 had ordered it otherwise. After five days he relinquished 
 the attempt, and turned towards the northern part of the 
 temple, from whence he was repulsed by the Jews. Soon 
 after a strange and unaccountable panic seized upon the 
 besieged, and it appeared as if nothing could save the city ; 
 when Cestius, without any apparent cause, raised the siege, 
 and commenced a disastrous retreat, which was followed by 
 the reassured Jews, and ended in a complete route. 
 
 No time was now lost in putting the city into a com- 
 plete state of defence, and in forging arms for the war ; 
 
 4 Ibid. xix.
 
 110 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 and ample space was allowed for it. It was two years 
 before the Roman army again appeared before their walls. 
 In the interval Vespasian, distinguished for the success of 
 his arms in Germany and in Britain, had been sent by Nero 
 to quell the sedition, and having subjected the district of 
 Galilee and the Decapolis before the end of that reign, had 
 remained inactive at Caesarea during the brief occupation 
 of the imperial purple by Galba and Otho 1 , soon after 
 which the death of ViteUius left the throne vacant for him 2 . 
 His son Titus, to whom he delegated the command, was now 
 at liberty to march at once for the reduction of the capital 3 . 
 By this time the aspect of the walls was so imposing as to 
 excite the admiration of the Romans 4 . But men, not walls, 
 are the defence of a city, and these nerves of war were weak- 
 ened as before by internal dissensions, which throughout 
 paralized the efforts of the Jews. The city was now divided 
 between two rival factions, under the command of two 
 tyrants, Simon and John ; the former supported by 10,000 
 armed followers, exclusive of 5000 Idumeans, the latter by 
 8,400, including 2,400 zealots, who had formed a combination 
 with him under their leader Eleazar 5 . Simon was in pos- 
 session of the upper and lower city, and of the greater part 
 of the wall of Bezetha; John held the temple with its 
 fortress Antonia, the southern part of the temple-mount 
 or Ophel, and apparently the eastern part of the wall of 
 Bezetha. 
 
 Titus at first encamped with two legions on Scopus, at 
 the north of the city, placing two more on Mount Olivet, 
 on the east 6 . He next proceeded to clear and level the 
 
 1 J. w. Lib. in. iv. 
 
 2 Ibid. iv. ix. x. 
 :) Ibid. v. u. 
 
 4 See Tacitus for a description of 
 the walls. 
 
 * J. W. v. vi. B Ibid. v. ii.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. Ill 
 
 ground to the north of the city, in order to facilitate his 
 operations. On a survey of the walls however he resolved 
 to establish his head quarters near the north-west angle of 
 the outer wall, which was fortified by the tower Psephinus 7 . 
 Here he accordingly encamped with one legion from the 
 Scopus, while the other also shifted its quarters to the 
 neighbourhood of the Hippie tower. After some further 
 deliberation he determined to commence his assault on the 
 outer wall, between these two points, at a part which 
 went by a name derived from the monument of John the 
 high priest. The wall in this quarter was not so strongly 
 fortified, owing to this part of the new city being but 
 thinly inhabited, and hence he would find easy access 
 to the third or innermost wall, through which he hoped 
 to take the upper city, which he expected would put him 
 in possession of the lower city, of Antonia, and so of the 
 temple. The wall was gallantly defended by the besieged, 
 and recourse was had on both sides to all the expedients 
 which the art of war had devised. The partizans of the 
 opposite factions even forgot for a while their differences 
 to join in repelling the common foe, and fought side by 
 side on the wall. At length an engine of tremendous 
 power, named Nico by the Jews, formed a breach, which 
 was carried on the fifteenth day of the siege 8 , when the 
 greater part of the wall and northern quarter of the new 
 city was demolished by the Romans. 
 
 The Jews were now confined within the limits of the 
 ancient city, while Titus pitched his camp within the third 
 wall, at a place called the Camp of the Assyrians, extend- 
 ing eastward to the brook Kedron. An assault was next 
 made on the second wall, while the besieged, divided into 
 
 7 Ibid. iii. Ibid. vii.
 
 112 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 several parties, courageously defended it ; John and his 
 faction occupying the tower Antonia, the northern cloisters 
 of the temple, and the part over against the monuments 
 of king Alexander, while Simon's party stood prepared 
 to repulse their assailants from near the monuments of John 
 the high priest, to a gate by which water was brought 
 into the Hippie tower. Desperate sallies were also made 
 by the besieged, in which the Romans sustained some loss. 
 The second wall was taken five days after the first, through 
 a breach at the middle tower of its north quarter ; but 
 the Jews availing themselves of the crowded buildings and 
 narrow streets of this part of the lower city, which Titus 
 had neglected to fire, succeeded in driving them out 1 . It 
 was re-captured after an obstinate resistance of three days, 
 when the northern part was entirely demolished, and the 
 towers in the southern part garrisoned with troops. 
 
 The temple with its strong fortress Antonia and the 
 upper city still held out, but Titus remitted the siege for 
 a while, in the vain hope that the Jews might be prevailed 
 upon to surrender 2 . To this end he sought to inspire them 
 with awe by a review of his soldiers on the northern 
 quarter of the city, which was viewed with admiration by 
 the Jews from the old wall and the northern cloisters of the 
 temple; and such of the houses as commanded the pro- 
 spect were crowded with spectators. But the die was cast, 
 and neither the terror of the Roman arms nor promises 
 of forgiveness could prevail on them to submit. On the 
 fifth day preparations were commenced for the assault of 
 the Antonia in one quarter and of the upper city in another 3 . 
 Four banks were raised by the legions, one at the tower 
 Antonia against the middle of a pool named Struthius, a 
 
 1 .7. W. v. viii. " Ibid. ix. 3 Ibid. xi.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 113 
 
 second twenty cubits from it; a third against the northern 
 wall of Zion, at the Amygdalon or Almond Pool; and the 
 fourth thirty cubits from that, at the High Priest's Mo- 
 nument, so often mentioned. Seventeen days were required 
 for this work, although the soldiers toiled incessantly ; when, 
 on bringing up their engines to the banks, they discovered 
 that they had been undermined by the besieged at the 
 Antonia, while their assaults on the upper city were re- 
 pulsed in the most determined manner by the sallies of the 
 Jews under Simon, and a successful attempt was also made 
 to destroy the engines by fire. 
 
 A council of war was now held by the Roman general, 
 in which it was determined to blockade the city by a wall 4 , 
 in the hope of reducing it by famine ; for up to this time 
 the besieged had been able to receive supplies from without, 
 as only one side of the city was occupied by the enemy. 
 This wall, thirty-nine furlongs in circuit, exclusive of irregu- 
 larities, was completed in three days! and frightful were 
 the effects on the inhabitants of the devoted city, where 
 famine had already made considerable progress. On the 
 completion of the wall the banks were again raised 5 , and 
 the siege of Antonia pressed with a vigour to which the 
 obstinate resolution of the Jews was at length obliged to 
 yield. As they retired to the inner court of the temple 
 they were pursued with reckless precipitation into the 
 sacred inclosure by one of the Roman soldiers, who after 
 sustaining alone an attack of the infuriated Jews, paid the 
 penalty of his rashness with his life. The fortress Antonia 
 occupied the highest point of the Temple mount 6 , at the 
 north-west angle of the area. Two staircases connected 
 
 4 J. W. xii. 
 
 5 Ibid. vi. i. 
 
 8 See i. 5. in Titus' speech, 
 
 v<pi\v eivai.
 
 114 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 it with the sacred inclosure at that angle, communicating 
 with the cloisters on the north and west side of the outer 
 court. A night-attack was resolved on, and a division 
 detached for this service, the stairs being too narrow to 
 afford space for the operations of the whole army 1 ; Titus 
 himself was persuaded by his soldiers to watch the success 
 of the attempt from the fortress, and not to expose his 
 life to danger in this perilous assault. The Jewish guards 
 were on the watch, and a sanguinary fight of eight hours' 
 duration ended in the retreat of the Romans. Meanwhile 
 the unoccupied legions had overthrown the foundations of 
 Antonia to level a way to the temple area; in addition to 
 which, four banks were raised against its outer wall, on 
 the northern and western sides. 
 
 The destruction of the temple was now commenced, the 
 Jews firing that angle of the cloisters which united it to 
 the Antonia, with the view to cut off the communication. 
 The work of demolition was carried forward by the Romans, 
 and the western and northern cloisters were reduced to 
 ashes 2 . So massive was the structure of the temple- wall 
 that the powerful battering-rams could make no impression 
 on it, and their attempts to undermine its foundations 
 were equally unsuccessful 3 . At length however the outer 
 court was carried, and the Jews, after a hard struggle, were 
 shut up in the inner enclosure. An attempt on the part 
 of the Romans to extinguish the fire which was raging 
 around the temple, opposed by the Jews, resulted in its 
 extension to the holy house itself, which Titus was most 
 anxious to spare. Terrible was the carnage that now 
 ensued, but not so terrible to the Jews as this conflagra- 
 tion, while the surrounding mountains echoed to their 
 
 1 J. W. ii. * Ibid. iii. 2. " Ibid. iv.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. J 1 5 
 
 shrieks of despair, mingled with the groans of the dying 
 and the shouts of the Roman legions 4 . 
 
 Such of the Jews of John's party as could effect their 
 escape now retired to the upper city, still held by the faction 
 of Simon, while others took refuge on the cloisters which 
 remained unconsumed. The Roman eagles were brought 
 within the sacred precincts, and sacrifices offered before 
 them; when the general was saluted with the title of 
 Imperator 5 . 
 
 The approach to the southernmost of the four gates 
 which gave entrance to the outer temple on its western side 
 was by a causeway 6 , carried across the deep valley of the 
 Tyropseon to the royal palace of the Asmoneans' on Mount 
 Zion, once occupied by the younger Agrippa 7 , as also by 
 his father before him 8 . This causeway, by which John 
 and the remnant of his partizans had escaped from the 
 temple to the upper city, was joined at its western ter- 
 mination to a public building called the Xystus, situated 
 below the palace, and commanded by it 9 . 
 
 The tyrants, who seemed now convinced that ruin was 
 inevitable, or at least that all further opposition must be 
 unavailing, requested a conference, which was granted by 
 the Roman general, in the same spirit of forbearance which, 
 according to Josephus, had distinguished his conduct through- 
 out the siege ; although it must be confessed that there are 
 many passages which seem utterly irreconcilable with this 
 favourable representation of the politic historian. The Jews 
 were drawn up around Simon and John at one extremity 
 of this bridge, the Romans around Titus at the other, with 
 
 4 Ibid. v. 
 * Ibid. vi. 
 ' Ant. xv. xi. 5. 
 
 7 J. W. 11. xvi. 3. 
 
 8 Ant. xx. viii. 11. 
 J. W. sup. ut. 
 
 82
 
 116 THE HOLY CITY [PART I. 
 
 Josephus to act as interpreter: and the parley began 1 . 
 After addressing them in terms of invective and reproach 
 for their rebellion and obstinacy, and in commendation of 
 his own unmerited lenity up to this point, the conqueror 
 promised them, that on conditions of their laying down their 
 arms and surrendering without further opposition, their lives 
 should be spared. The terms were perhaps more merciful 
 than they had any right to expect at this period, but they 
 failed to satisfy the besieged. They had the assurance to 
 require a free exit through the Roman works for them- 
 selves, their wives, and families, with their arms in their 
 hand ! This presumptuous demand sealed their doom, and 
 they were given to understand that the time for mercy 
 was past, they were now to look for nothing but a most 
 terrible vengeance. 
 
 The Roman soldiers were then commanded to destroy 
 the devoted city ; and on the day following the northern 
 part of the lower city was consumed with fire, including 
 the repository of the archives, the council-chamber, and the 
 palace of queen Helena, in the middle of Acra. 
 
 The occupation of the temple had put them into pos- 
 session of the whole of that mount, and of the remainder 
 of the Tyropa)on, south of the causeway, as far as the pool 
 of Siloam. On the second day this also was. burnt 8 , and 
 the banks began now to be raised against the upper city 3 . 
 
 It has been seen that this was completely encompassed 
 by a wall of its own, and surrounded by the natural de- 
 fence of deep valleys on three sides, while the fourth pre- 
 sented a cliff of thirty cubits in height, along the summit 
 of which the wall was carried. The works were raised 
 with great difficulty, owing both to the scarcity of materials, 
 
 1 J. W. vi. vi. 2, &c. * Ibid. vi. vii. 2. 3 Ibid. viii. 1.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 117 
 
 and these natural and artificial defences against which they 
 were directed ; but in eighteen days they were sufficiently 
 advanced for the engines to be brought up. They were 
 erected on the western and eastern sides of the upper city; 
 the former over against the palace of Herod, which occu- 
 pied the north-west angle ; the latter from the Xystus to 
 the bridge, below the palace of Agrippa, which stood at 
 the north-east angle. Meanwhile dissension and discord 
 reigned among the surviving Jews 4 , their arms were still 
 turned against each other ; and, as though the Komans had 
 not been sufficiently active in the work of destruction without, 
 they made it their business to carry fire and sword through 
 that part of the city which still continued in their hands. 
 They then retired to the royal palace of Herod, whose 
 three massive towers they trusted would afford them a refuge 
 still, even after the capture of the upper city, while others 
 concealed themselves in the large subterranean caves and 
 vaults in which they vainly hoped to lie hid until the vic- 
 torious army was withdrawn 5 . At length the western wall 
 yielded to the unwearied shock of the engines, scarcely re- 
 sisted by the besieged, and the Romans entered the upper 
 city, when the panic-stricken Jews abandoned the defence 
 of the impregnable towers without a blow, and the victo- 
 rious eagles waved over their battlements. The dreadful 
 havoc was now repeated throughout the length and breadth 
 of Zion, and the conflagration was extinguished by the blood 
 of the slaughtered thousands! But the oft-repeated horrors 
 of this most dreadful tragedy have been designedly passed 
 over almost without notice, nor will they here be entered 
 on. The annals of history furnish nothing that will bear 
 the slightest comparison with this frightful siege, and one 
 
 4 Ibid. vii. * Ibid, and viii.
 
 118 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 marvels that a Jew could have the nerve to pen records, 
 the very perusal of which is sufficient to sicken the heart 
 and make the blood run cold. Suffice it here to say that 
 not one of all the terrible curses on disobedience denounced 
 in the law no, not the worst of all, was spared 1 ; that 
 1,100,000 are calculated to have perished by famine or 
 the chances of war during the siege 2 ; and besides 40,000 
 of the population of this city, whom Titus allowed to go 
 free 3 , 97,000 were carried captive during the war. The 
 whole number of those who were killed or taken in the 
 city itself can scarcely be computed at less than 2,000,000 ; 
 and if this number should appear excessive and incredible, it 
 must be considered that the historian himself declares the 
 greater part of these were not citizens of Jerusalem, but 
 of those who had come up from all the country to the 
 feast of unleavened bread, and were suddenly shut up by 
 the army 4 , which further accounts for the famine, which 
 from the first made frightful ravages among them. And 
 it further deserves to be noted, that this is not a random 
 guess of the historian, but a calculation founded on an of- 
 ficial return of the numbers who were usually present on 
 such occasions, compared with actual observations during 
 the course of the siege 5 . Or if again it should be thought 
 that the limits of the city must have been much more ex- 
 tensive than is usually represented, to have contained so 
 large a number, it must be borne in mind that we have the 
 repeated testimony of the same historian to this fact also, 
 where he mentions that the circuit of the city, including 
 
 1 See Deut. xxviii. f>3 57- and 
 compare Josephus, J. W. vi. iii. 4. 
 * J. W. vi. ix. 3. 
 8 Ibid. viii. 2. 
 4 Ibid. ix. 2. Compare v. iii. 1. 
 
 and xiii. 7- See also n. xiv. 3. where 
 we find 3,000,000 present at the Pass- 
 over. 
 
 8 Ibid. vi. ix. 3. and see the fright- 
 ful statement, v. xiii. 7
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 119 
 
 the outer wall of Agrippa, was thirty-three furlongs 6 , and 
 the wall of circumvallation erected by the Romans, thirty- 
 nine 7 . But Josephus himself observes, that the city was 
 crowded with inhabitants when encompassed by the Roman 
 armies 8 , and the expansive powers of cities on festive oc- 
 casions is well known, and would still be more felt among 
 Orientals, owing to the simplicity of their mode of living, 
 and their disregard for what is understood by the comforts 
 and delicacies of civilized society in the west. 
 
 The rest is soon told : a few who had endeavoured with 
 desperate hardihood to break through the Roman lines, were 
 defeated in the attempt 9 ; such as had retired to the sub- 
 terranean hiding-places were starved or hunted out 10 . Among 
 the former was the tyrant John, who was doomed to per- 
 petual imprisonment. Simon, the leader of the opposite 
 faction, succeeded in evading detection until Titus had re- 
 tired. On the capture of the upper city, he had withdrawn 
 to a sewer with some of his most trusty adherents, and a 
 party of stonecutters, with a supply of provisions, hoping 
 to undermine a passage from the city. Their provisions 
 failed before they could accomplish their purpose, and he 
 was forced to surrender himself to the garrison in the 
 temple-inclosure. He was sent to Titus in chains, reserved 
 for the triumph, and then put to death 11 . 
 
 The city was wholly demolished except the three towers 
 of Hippicus, Phasaolus, and Mariamne 12 , and so much of the 
 western wall as would serve to protect the legion left there 
 
 6 Ibid. v. iv. 3. 
 
 7 Ibid. v. xii. 2. 
 
 " IIoXu Se TOVTO Tr\^6os e^taQev 
 (TuXXe'yexai, TOTS ye juiji/ uitnrep ets 
 eipK-rijv UTr6 TJ/S ei/iapjue'i/tjs irav a-v- 
 i/eicXei'i70t) TO eflvos, <cai va<rrji> o iro- 
 
 Xe/uos TI\V TroXtv dvSpiov 6<cu/cXa>'<raTo. 
 J. W. vi. ix. 4. 
 
 9 Ibid. viii. 4, 5. 
 
 10 Ibid. ix. 4. 
 
 11 Ibid. vu. ii. 1. and v. H. 
 
 12 Ibid. vn. i. 1.
 
 120 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. CH. 11. 
 
 to guard the ruins, who were probably placed in the palace 
 of Herod, which had before answered as a garrison 1 ; and 
 the conqueror marched to exhibit the captives in the bloody 
 spectacles of the amphitheatre at Ca?sarea and Berytus 2 , 
 as examples of the righteous judgments of God, whose 
 hand he was forced to recognize fighting with him through 
 this long and doubtful siege 3 . The death-throes still con- 
 tinued to convulse the remote members of the Jewish 
 population of Palestine for some time after the heart had 
 ceased to beat ; and these were scarcely stilled when the 
 whole body was to be reanimated with new life, and resus- 
 citated with new vigour. 
 
 1 J. W. ii. xv. 5. xvii. 8, 9. a Ibid. vn. ii. 3. 
 
 3 Ibid. vi. ix. 1.
 
 
 Arch of Titus. Rome, 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 IT was a wise caution, and worthy of imitation, which 
 withheld an old historian of the church 1 from commenting 
 on the events connected with the early ministry of our 
 Blessed Lord, and those first years of the Christian church 
 of which it has pleased the Divine Spirit to dictate an in- 
 spired history, lest the brevity of a human narrative should 
 
 1 Sulpicius Severus. Hist. Eccles. 
 Lib. ii. " Haec quae evangeliis ac 
 deinceps Apostolorum Actibus conti- 
 
 nentur attingere non ausus, ne quid 
 forma praecisi operis rerum dignitati- 
 bus diminueret, reliqua exequar."
 
 122 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 detract from the dignity of actions which have been judged 
 worthy of such a record : besides which, the unsuccessful 
 attempts of such as have tried the task, whose productions 
 are calculated to produce on a reverent mind a most painful 
 impression, from the remotest intention of which the authors 
 were, without doubt, entirely free, might well deter a writer 
 from such an undertaking. 
 
 Passing on therefore to uninspired records, we find the 
 notices of the Christian church at Jerusalem, during the 
 first three centuries, few and scattered; but in these his- 
 torical notices, scanty as they are, principles of great import- 
 ance are involved, which invest them with peculiar interest. 
 
 It is related by the father of ecclesiastical history, that 
 the church at Jerusalem, from the period of its establish- 
 ment to the time of the emperor Adrian, was governed by 
 fifteen bishops in succession, the first of whom was St James 
 the Just 1 , the brother of our Lord, one of the Twelve, and 
 the author of the catholic epistle which bears his name. 
 This tradition, it has been frequently remarked, is strikingly 
 confirmed by incidental passages in the Acts of the Apostles, 
 which seem to intimate that this saint had a precedency of 
 his brethren in the apostolic college at Jerusalem 8 . 
 
 And it is remarkable that one of the few facts relative 
 to this church, during the period that elapsed between the 
 destruction of Jerusalem by Titus and the foundation of 
 JEM& Capitolina, which has been rescued from oblivion, should 
 be the regular succession of its bishops; a fact with cir- 
 cumstances of such a nature that its credibility cannot be 
 gainsaid on any fair principles of historical criticism ; for 
 the names and order of all have been preserved, while the 
 
 1 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. TV. v., &c. 
 &c., as quoted below. 
 
 2 See Acts xii. 17; xv. 13; xxi. 17, 
 18; Gal. ii. 12.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 123 
 
 first links in the chain, which are of course the most im- 
 portant, as establishing the apostolic precedent, are those 
 to which the evidence is exhibited most in detail, and which 
 are therefore least open to cavil : indeed, had it been possible 
 for the historian to foresee that a time would arrive when 
 the Divine authority of the Episcopal government would be 
 called in question, he could scarcely have furnished modern 
 controversialists on the catholic side with stronger arguments 
 for its defence. 
 
 For it must be remarked that Eusebius in this, as in 
 other matters, does not follow vain rumours or uncertain 
 reports, but the records of earlier writers ; and besides the 
 usual intimation that such is the case, conveyed in the oft- 
 repeated words " as they relate," we shall see that, on this 
 particular subject, he quotes the very words of a writer 
 whose testimony belongs to " the first succession after the 
 apostles 3 ," and who would possess the most accurate in- 
 formation on all that concerned the Christians at Jerusalem, 
 inasmuch as he was himself a native of Palestine, an He- 
 brew believer 4 , and not improbably a member of the church 
 in that city. 
 
 This is Hegesippus, to the fragments of whose commen- 
 taries, preserved by Eusebius, we are so largely indebted 
 for many inter esting particulars relating to the early church. 
 
 The account which he gives of the life and martyrdom 
 
 3 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. it. cap. 
 xxni. o 'Hyjjo-tTTTros t'Tri T?} irpusTt]^ 
 T<av A.iro<TT6\iov yevojisvo^ 5ta&>x7, 
 K. T. \. In Lib. iv. cap. xi., Euse- 
 bius says that Hegesippus came to 
 Rome during the presidency of Anice- 
 tus in that see, and remained until 
 Eleutherius was made bishop : but 
 Hegesippus himself, whose words he 
 
 quotes, (cap. xxii. of the same book), 
 says only that he stayed at Rome until 
 Anicetus' time, whose deacon Eleu- 
 therius then was. He probably came 
 in the time of Pius, who presided from 
 156 to 165 ; Anicetus till 173 ; Soter to 
 177; Eleutherius till 192 A. D. 
 4 Hist. Eccles. iv. xxii.
 
 124 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 of St James is well known, but cannot be too frequently 
 repeated 1 . This blessed apostle had gained for himself, even 
 among the unbelievers, the surname of " the Just," by his 
 unblamable life of mortification and constant prayer. The 
 faith was widely propagated by his unwearied zeal, so that 
 " many myriads of the Jews believed 2 " by his means. But 
 the evil passions of the more zealous of the Pharisees were 
 aroused, and taking advantage of a short vacancy in the 
 government, they resolved on an attempt to induce him to 
 apostacy. He was placed in an exalted position in the temple 
 on the Feast of the Passover, and required to persuade the 
 assembled multitude against the Messiahship of the Lord Jesus. 
 He availed himself of the opportunity of bearing testimony to 
 the truth of it; proclaiming aloud His session at the right 
 hand of power, and His future advent in the clouds of heaven. 
 Many were convinced of the truth. The scribes and Pha- 
 risees, maddened with disappointment and furious at the 
 success of his preaching, resolved on instant vengeance. The 
 holy man was cast down headlong from the battlements and 
 stoned ; but he had space to fall upon his knees and pray 
 for the pardon of his murderers, after the example and 
 in the words of his Divine Master, saying, " I entreat 
 thee, O Lord God the Father, forgive them, for they 
 know not what they do." Wounded, bruised, and bleed- 
 ing, his life was still whole in him, when one of the by- 
 standers smote him on the head with a fuller's club, and 
 terminated at once his sufferings and his life. This bar- 
 barous murder is mentioned by the Jewish historian as 
 the chief sin of his countrymen which filled the cup of 
 vengeance to the brim 3 . 
 
 1 Hegesippus, apud. Euseb. Hist. 
 Eccles. n. xxiii. 
 Acts xxi. 20. 
 
 3 See Joseph. Ant. xx. ix. 1. for an 
 account of the martyrdom of St James, 
 but the words quoted by Eusebius as
 
 CH. III.1 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 125 
 
 The time of this martyrdom is variously given by 
 Eusebius, who in one passage of his History, and in his 
 Chronicon, places it about the seventh year of Nero, agree- 
 ably with Josephus ; while in another passage of the History 
 he fixes it immediately before the destruction of Jerusalem 4 , 
 in the first year of Vespasian, consistently with the Alex- 
 andrian Chronicon. If the earlier date be adopted, it will 
 be necessary to suppose a vacancy in the see for the 
 space of eight or nine years, during which the troubled 
 state of the city and country might prevent the church 
 from proceeding to an election; but here again, whatever 
 discrepancies there may be on a point of chronology, 
 there is none at all as to the main point, that Simeon, 
 the son of Cleopas and cousin of our Lord 5 , was chosen 
 by universal consent to succeed St James in the episcopal 
 office. 
 
 This election took place at Jerusalem after the return 
 of the church from Pella, and there were present at it 
 such of the apostles and disciples of our Lord as were yet 
 alive, and some of His kinsmen according to the flesh, of 
 whom many still survived 6 . It would appear from this, that 
 during the interval of their sojourn at Pella the Hebrew 
 
 from Josephus, after Origen, to the 
 above effect, are not found in the present 
 copies of that writer. The words are : 
 TO.VTO. <rv/j.fief3r)Kei> 'louocuois, KOTO 
 eicSiKntTiv 'laxiofiou TOV OIKULOV, S i|l> 
 ddeXtfros 'It)(roD TOV \eyo/j.evov Xpio-Tov, 
 eTreidtjirtp SmaioTaTov OVTOV OVTO. 
 'lovdaloi direKTfivav. Orig. Lib. I. 
 cont. Celsum, p. 3, and Comment, in 
 Matt. p. 233. I think the difficulty of 
 reconciling the Jewish and Christian 
 writers here has been unduly magnified 
 by Valerius. Note in Euseb. 1. c. 
 
 4 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. HI. 
 cap. xi., compared with n. xxiii. and 
 the notes of Valerius. 
 
 5 Eusebius says that Cleophas was 
 the brother of Joseph, which is com- 
 monly taken to denote the relationship 
 between the blessed Virgin, and Mary 
 the wife of Cleophas. John xix. 25. 
 See Euseb. ut sup., and Bishop Pearson 
 on the Creed, pp. 175, 176. Lond. 
 1699, &c. 
 
 6 Hist. Eccles. HI. xi., and iv. 
 xxii. from Hegesippus.
 
 126 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 Christians of Jerusalem were as sheep without a shepherd 1 ; 
 but the hand of Providence, so manifest in all that con- 
 cerned them, would remind them of the watchful guardian- 
 ship of the chief Pastor, under whose special protection they 
 were safe. During the days of His earthly pilgrimage, when 
 foretelling the destruction of Jerusalem, He had taken 
 thought for His own flock, and had warned them, when 
 they should see Jerusalem compassed with armies, to flee 
 out of the midst of it 8 . The extraordinary retreat of 
 Cestius, so perplexing to the Jewish historian 3 , was no 
 doubt divinely ordered, to allow the elect an opportunity 
 of escape; and, in obedience to our Lord's words, they 
 availed themselves of it, and sought safety beyond the 
 Jordan. And Josephus informs us, that many of the 
 principal Jews also took this opportunity of escaping as 
 from a ship on the point of sinking a remarkable simile, 
 reminding us of the ark of safety provided in and for the 
 church ! 
 
 The interest attaching to the city which afforded an 
 asylum to the believers under such circumstances, would invest 
 its ruins with peculiar charms, and frequent and earnest 
 were the inquiries of the writer and his fellow-traveller 
 in that country in the summer of 1842. Eagerly did 
 they catch at the sound of " Arbela 4 ," which might possibly 
 
 1 This seems to be confirmed by 
 what is said in Eusebius, that the ora- 
 cular revelation was made to approved 
 persons among them by an angel in 
 dreams, as Epiphanius writes. The 
 announcement would probably (if we 
 may conjecture) have been made to 
 the bishop, as in Revelation i. ii. iii., 
 had there then been one. See Euseb. 
 
 Hist. Eccles. in. v., and Epiphan. 
 Haeres. n. 7, and De Pond. etMens. 
 
 2 Luke xxi. 20, 21. 
 
 3 The words of the Jewish historian 
 are very remarkable: eai<t>vii?...ica- 
 Tayvoiiy eir' ovSe/nia TrXiiyfj TWV c\Tri- 
 dwit) -TrapaXoytoTcrra diro T>7 ircIXeo^ 
 dveevev. J. W. II. xix. T, 
 
 * No doubt identical with the Ar-
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 127 
 
 be a corruption of the ancient name; and anxiously did 
 they press on their jaded horses to the Christians' 1 Refuge, 
 determined to find in the modern village those features by 
 which they had learnt that Pella might be distinguished. 
 Chief among these was the characteristic of "abundance of 
 water 5 " and the reiterated inquiry, "Is there water?" 
 had now a deeper meaning than usual, and denoted an in- 
 tensity of mental thirst. Alas ! a tank of mud, black as ink, 
 was the only answer to the question, the death-blow to our 
 fondly cherished hopes of an interesting discovery. That same 
 evening, proceeding up the valley of the Jordan, on its east 
 side, we passed near an ancient site, where we were informed 
 there were extensive ruins ; but as it was already dark 
 we could not turn aside to examine them. From what I 
 have since read in the travels of Captains Irby and Mangles, 
 I am disposed to think that Pella must be looked for in 
 this locality, now known among the natives as Tabathat 
 Fahkil, which is thus described by those very intelligent 
 gentlemen : " Here the ruins of a modern village stand on 
 a hill bearing E. S. E. from the Acropolis of Bysan ; and 
 in a plain to the west of it are the ruins of a square build- 
 ing, with a semicircular end, which appears to have been 
 surrounded by columns. On the east and south sides of 
 the hill are considerable ruins of some ancient city, which 
 must have been of great extent. The situation is beautiful, 
 
 bela, mentioned by Eusebius, in the 
 district of Pella. Strange that the 
 very name of the capital of the dis- 
 trict should have perished, while the 
 town of inferior note is still so strikingly 
 marked. 
 
 5 This is Pliny's description of its 
 site, Nat Hist. v. 16. Other notes are 
 
 these : It was a city of the Decapolis 
 (id.) in Ccelo-Syria, (Ptolemy, ap. 
 Steph.), in the northern extremity of 
 
 eraea, (Josephus, J. W. in. 2), an 
 Jabesh lay between it and Gerash. 
 (Euseb. Onom. sub voc. 'Api<r<o6 and 
 'Ia'/3ts, and Procopius Goz. Comment 
 in lib. Judicum).
 
 128 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 being on the side of a ravine, with a picturesque stream 
 running at the bottom. As this place appears to be as 
 ancient as Scythopolis, and full two-thirds of its size, it 
 seems unaccountable that history should not mention a 
 town so near 'the principal city of the Decapolis' as this 
 is. We searched for inscriptions, but in vain. The ruins 
 of a fine temple are situated near the water-side, and 
 amongst the columns are found the three orders of archi- 
 tecture, Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian. The river, passing 
 
 to the south, falls into the Jordan To the eastward 
 
 we observed several excavations in the sides of the hills. 
 These are probably the Necropolis, for there are several 
 tombs in this direction resembling those at Bysan and 
 Om Keis 1 ." 
 
 The difficulty suggested in this passage will be obviated 
 on the supposition above hazarded, while the correspondence 
 of situation with that of Pella, and the " abundance of water," 
 are a strong confirmation of this hypothesis ; and it may 
 be, that on a more minute inspection, the ruined temple, 
 near the water, might prove to be a Christian church, there 
 situated with a view to the supply of the baptistery. It is 
 to be regretted that there is not the slightest affinity between 
 the names. 
 
 It is important to remark, that the return of the 
 Christians to Jerusalem is placed by all the ancient autho- 
 rities immediately after the destruction by Titus, as the 
 migration to Pella took place shortly before that event, 
 because this interval has been sometimes unduly extended, 
 and regarded as a hiatus in the chain of traditionary evi- 
 dence relative to the holy places, sufficient to throw discredit 
 
 Cap. vi. Date, March 12.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 129 
 
 on it altogether 2 . The unanimity of the witnesses to the 
 fact as here stated is, under the circumstances, very re- 
 markable ; for from this time forward there can be no 
 question that the Holy City was inhabited from generation 
 to generation by native Christians, who would be using in 
 ordinary-day language the names of those localities in and 
 about Jerusalem, which were consecrated by the awful events 
 recorded in the gospels 3 . 
 
 2 Thus Dr Robinson, whose inten- 
 tion is very obvious, writing of the 
 times after Adrian, says, " At this 
 period, probably, if ever, the former 
 church of Jerusalem, which as a body 
 is said to have withdrawn before the 
 siege of Titus to Pella, beyond the 
 Jordan, re-established itself in the new 
 city." Bib. Res. n. p. 10. And Dr 
 Muenter, in a work which will be pre- 
 sently referred to, says the same, and 
 adds, that " Judas, the 15th Bishop, 
 appears to have died in Pella." How 
 this appears I do not know : but if it 
 did, it might easily be accounted for. 
 It has been seen, that according to 
 Eusebius, following Hegesippus, St 
 Simeon was elected in Jerusalem soon 
 after its destruction, and Epiphanius, 
 we shall see below, declares in express 
 words that the Christians returned im- 
 mediately after the catastrophe of Jeru- 
 salem. 
 
 3 I have been most anxious to avoid 
 strong language in controversy with 
 the author of the Biblical Researches, 
 widely as I differ from him on almost 
 every point, and uncandid as he often 
 is ; but I do with the utmost delibera- 
 tion pronounce him guilty of a most 
 strange perversion of plain facts in the 
 following passage; and I appeal to read- 
 ers of whatever name, whether it would 
 
 9 
 
 be right to modify this language. Speak- 
 ing of the " alleged regular succession of 
 bishops (at Jerusalem), from the time 
 of St James to the reign of Adrian," 
 he says, " Eusebius, the only authority 
 on the subject, lived two centuries 
 afterwards; and says expressly, that 
 he had been able to find no document 
 respecting them, and wrote only from 
 report." Bib. Res. vol. n. p. 73. Now 
 to pass by the passages quoted by 
 Eusebius from Hegesippus, already 
 referred to, and to take only that on 
 which Dr Robinson rests this assertion, 
 to which he directs us in a note. Hist. 
 Eccles. iv. 5 : " The space of time 
 which the bishops of Jerusalem spent 
 in their presidency over that see, / 
 could in no wise find preserved in 
 writing. For, as report says, they 
 were very short-lived : but THUS 
 MUCH / have been informed of from 
 old records, ( t eyypd<f>u>v, ) that unto 
 the siege of the Jews in Adrian's time, 
 there were in number fifteen succes- 
 sions of bishops there;" and then he 
 mentions other particulars from these 
 old records respecting them, and gives 
 their names and order ! This will be 
 referred to below. The remarks of Dr 
 Keith on the same subject, (Land of 
 Israel, p. 189), have much the cha- 
 racter of very ignorant and somewhat
 
 130 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 It has been already remarked, that the election of St 
 James's successor took place at Jerusalem soon after its 
 destruction, and this fact has been shewn to rest, not on 
 the bare authority of Eusebius, as has been pretended, but 
 on the much earlier testimony of Hegesippus, whose oppor- 
 tunities of collecting accurate information had been most 
 favourable. The language of this same writer is also quoted ' 
 for the martyrdom of St Simeon, which occurred in the 
 reign of Trajan, when Atticus was president of Syria. On 
 the accusation of certain heretics he was charged with being 
 a son of David 2 and a Christian. Being subjected to various 
 cruel tortures at the advanced age of 120 years, he bore 
 them with such wonderful constancy for many successive 
 days, that the president and those about him marvelled 
 greatly. After which he glorified God by a death con- 
 formable to that of his divine Master, whose patience he 
 had followed. 
 
 St Simeon was succeeded in the government of the 
 Church at Jerusalem by one Justus 3 , of whose presidency 
 we know little, except that at this time the church, which 
 had hitherto maintained its virgin purity, became corrupted 
 by heretical pravity; a curse which it owed to the disap- 
 pointed ambition of an unworthy candidate for the Apostolic 
 chair 4 . From this period to the reign of Adrian the records 
 are very scanty 5 , preserving only the names and orders of 
 the episcopal succession, but furnishing no particulars of the 
 individual bishops ; it is sufficiently evident, however, that the 
 presidency of each must have been of very short duration, 
 
 vulgar railing, and do not pretend to 
 argument. They are quite unworthy 
 of him. 
 
 1 Hist. Eccles. in. 32. 
 
 * Compare Hist Eccles. in. 20. 
 
 8 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. in. 35. 
 4 Hegesipp. apud Euseb. Hist. 
 Eccles. in. 32, and iv. 22. 
 6 Id. iv. 5.
 
 CH. III. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 131 
 
 from the fact of thirteen having held the perilous dignity, in 
 the short space of 35 years 6 : and considering the excited 
 state of the Jewish population during that interval, and 
 their bitter hatred of the Christians 7 , it is far from im- 
 probable that the rapid succession may be accounted for 
 by martyrdom, since the believers would meet with no 
 protection from the Roman governors, or perhaps even be 
 sacrificed by them as a peace-offering to the turbulent 
 Jews. 
 
 But the time had now arrived when the infatuation 
 of their enemies was to work an important revolution in 
 their internal polity, the circumstances of which require a 
 detailed notice 8 . 
 
 It will be remembered, that on the destruction of Je- 
 rusalem, Titus had spared at least the three towers on 
 the northern wall of Zion, and part of the west wall, as 
 a protection for the Roman garrison, whom he probably 
 placed in the extensive palace of Herod, in the north- 
 west angle of the upper city. The remainder of the city 
 
 6 Viz. from the 3rd cf Trajan, A.D. 
 101, when St Simeon was martyred, 
 until about the 19th of Adrian, (A.D. 
 136), when Marcus was elected; for it 
 is self-evident that the uncertainty of 
 Eusebius as to the duration of the pre- 
 sidency of the Jerusalem bishops, (see 
 page 129, note 3 ), relates only to those 
 who followed St Simeon, whose mar- 
 tyrdom he places as above. 
 
 7 The Jews were always observed 
 to be more hostile to Christians than 
 the heathens in apostolic times. See 
 the passages collected from the New 
 Testament, with remarks, in Paley's 
 Horae Paulinas, in Ep. Galat. No v. 
 and 1 Thess. No. v., and the account 
 
 of the martyrdom of St Polycarp, cap. 
 12. Patr. Apost. Vol. n. p. 592. 
 Ed. Jacobson. The only thing that 
 could tempt the Jews to the theatre 
 was to assist in putting the Christians 
 to death. 
 
 8 For the Jewish war under Hadrian, 
 I am largely indebted to an interesting 
 pamphlet on this hitherto perplexed 
 subject, by Dr Miienter, late bishop of 
 Copenhagen, brought within reach of 
 the unlearned in a translation by Mr 
 W. Wadden Turner, published in the 
 third part of Dr Robinson's Bibliotheca 
 Sacra, pp. 393 to 455, to which my 
 references are made. 
 
 92
 
 132 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 was wholly reduced to ruin, according to the testimony of 
 Josephus; and it is very remarkable that, with this author 
 in his hands, Eusebius should imagine that only half of 
 the city was destroyed 1 . There can however be no question 
 that, as soon as possible after the desolation, many Jews 
 returned to settle on its ruins 2 , as we have seen that the 
 Christians also did ; and accordingly when visited by the 
 Emperor Adrian, probably in the 13th year of his reign 3 , 
 he found a Christian church with a few houses in its vici- 
 nity at the Coenaculum on Mount Zion, and not far distant 
 seven synagogues of the Jews one of which remained 
 even to the time of Constantine and the episcopacy of 
 Maximus, as a tent in a vineyard. It was apparently at 
 this time that the emperor conceived the idea of rebuilding 
 the city, and left there his friend and kinsman Aquila, a 
 native of Sinope in Pontus, and a pagan 4 , to superintend 
 the work. The miraculous gifts which had been continued 
 in the church on its return to Jerusalem after the deso- 
 lation, convinced him of the truth of Christianity, and he 
 was baptized, but being shortly after excommunicated for 
 the practice of astrology, in which he persisted after fre- 
 quent admonitions, he renounced the Christian profession, 
 
 1 Compare Joseph. J. W. vii. i. 1, 
 and Euseb. Dem. Evan. vi. xviii. 
 Yet liis language in the Theophania 
 would seem to imply a complete deso- 
 lation. See xviii. p. 247. 
 
 Dr Muenter, p. 416. 
 
 8 A.D. 130. See Dr Muenter, ix. 
 p. 411, who shews that he was in Pales- 
 tine in that year. For this visit, how- 
 ever, and its consequences, I follow 
 Epiphanius, de Pond, et Mens. xiv. 
 xv., except his dates. He makes 
 Adrian visit Jerusalem 47 years after 
 its destruction, i. e. A. D. 117, the first 
 
 year of his reign. I am surprised that 
 Dr MUenter has not made more use 
 of this author : in the only passage in 
 which he mentions him he misrepre- 
 sents him sadly, and then sneers at 
 him : xxiv. p. 448. He refers what 
 Epiphanius writes of Aquila to Marcus 
 the bishop. I cannot help suspecting 
 that the translation is in fault, but have 
 it not in my power to consult the 
 original. 
 
 4 ;UfTa Se Ti}v fpi]fi.<a<riv 'Ifpovaa- 
 Xjfi virava<TTpe\lfavTet . . . <rt]ft.ela /ue- 
 yaXo Trere\ovv, K. X. Epiph. loc. cit.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 133 
 
 and turned in disgust to the Jews, among whom, having 
 applied himself to the study of Hebrew, he afterwards 
 translated the Bible, with the design of weakening, as far 
 as possible, the force of the predictions which go to esta- 
 blish the Messiahship of Jesus. 
 
 One design of Adrian in rebuilding Jerusalem, which he 
 proposed colonizing with Roman veterans, was, no doubt, to 
 curb the turbulent spirit of the Jews, and to dissipate their 
 hopes of a national restoration 5 . During the reign of his 
 predecessor Trajan, their violence had broken forth in 
 alarming revolts in Cyrenia first, then in Egypt, Palestine, 
 Cyprus, and Mesopotamia; and the flame was only quenched 
 in torrents of blood, after severe loss to the Romans 6 . 
 Quenched indeed it was not ; it did but smoulder in its 
 ashes, to burst forth again with increased fury when new 
 fuel was added. The contempt, amounting to abhorrence, 
 in which the Jews were held by the Romans, served to 
 exasperate their enmity even more than the recollection of 
 what they had suffered from them ; the annual tax of two 
 drachmae, once due to the temple at Jerusalem, now exacted 
 as the price of their religious liberty, and applied to the 
 Capitoline Jupiter at Rome 7 , would not fail to shock their 
 religious feelings, and to keep alive the recollection of their 
 calamities. But the idea of the Holy City being given up to 
 the heathen, the possibility of the mountain of the Lord's 
 house being polluted by an idol-image, it was intolerable ; 
 they resolved to risk all to suffer all, as their fathers had 
 done, rather than submit to such desecration 8 . The widely- 
 organized conspiracy burst forth as in a moment, not only 
 in Palestine, but in ah 1 parts of the Roman empire where 
 
 5 Dr Muenter, xi. p. 415. 
 
 6 Ibid. HI vn. 401 408. 
 
 7 Joseph. J. W. vn. vi. 6; 
 
 Dion 
 
 Cass. LXVI. vii. 
 
 8 Dr Muenter, xn. p. 418.
 
 134 
 
 THE HOLY CITY 
 
 PART I. 
 
 Jews were located, so that almost the whole world was set 
 in commotion by the revolt. Fifty fortified towns, and no 
 fewer than nine hundred and eighty-five open towns and 
 villages in Judaea and the neighbouring countries, were in 
 the hands of the Jews, while the Romans, unprepared for 
 such an emergency, had but their peace-establishment to 
 oppose to them ; so secretly had the revolt been con- 
 certed 1 . 
 
 It was no time for weak measures on the part of the 
 government. Severus, the most renowned general of the 
 day, was summoned in haste from Britain; troops were 
 poured into the country from all quarters, and a mortal 
 struggle commenced. The insurrection was headed by Bar- 
 Cochebas (the son of a Star 2 ), a false Messiah, who was 
 aided in his councils by a learned Rabbi, of the name of 
 Akiba, a zealous proselyte ; and well did they support their 
 title to the positions which they respectively occupied. They 
 had at an early period of the revolt possessed themselves 
 of the capital, where they had attempted to rebuild the 
 temple. They were not driven out until the third year 
 of the war, having, as it appears, lost then 1 leader in the 
 
 1 Dion Cass. i.xix. xiv. See Dr 
 Miienter, xvn. p. 432. 
 
 a Justin Martyr, Apol. i. 316, 
 quoted by Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. iv. 
 viii.. whose account of the war will be 
 found in iv. vi. He adopts the sense 
 of the leader's name as above given, 
 as do most writers : tf iDlD~~li 
 Stella- filius. The learned Reland sug- 
 gests whether he may not have de- 
 rived his name from a town in Bashan, 
 mentioned by Epiphanius (Hares, i. 
 ii. 29), which he writes KeoKa/fy, but 
 says the Hebrews called it Xwxdfil, (as 
 Eusebius also writes it in Hist. Eccles. 
 
 i. vii.), which would exactly answer 
 to the Hebrew name. Reland takes 
 the "O to be equivalent to ttf'M so 
 
 as to mean merely " a man of Cochaba." 
 See Reland's Palest, pp. 727, 8. 
 
 8 For this see St Chrysost. Oral, 
 in. in Judaeos, as quoted by Dr 
 Muenter, xvi. p. 431, n. 2. The au- 
 thorities for the recovery of Jerusalem 
 by the Romans are given xvm. p. 
 434, notes. It was at this time pro- 
 bably that the foundations of the tem- 
 ple were ploughed up by Annius 
 Rufus. Muenter, xi. p. 418.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 135 
 
 siege. But these calamities did not put an end to the 
 revolt. Rufus, the son of Bar-Cochebas, succeeded his 
 father in the command, and the strongly fortified town of 
 Bether afforded for some time a safe retreat to those who 
 could effect their escape. Here they held out under Rufus 
 and his son Romulus for nearly three years ; when, worn 
 out by famine, no less than by the attacks of the Romans, 
 the city was captured with great bloodshed, and the ruin 
 of this phoenix-like people again accomplished 4 . 
 
 It is a great satisfaction to have it in my power to 
 determine beyond all doubt the site of this important po- 
 sition, which has so long and so strangely baffled the search 
 of the curious 5 . I say strangely, because its situation in 
 the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, where Eusebius has taught 
 us to look for it, the fact of its retaining its ancient name, 
 entirely unaltered which has even found its way into the 
 
 4 Dr Mlienter, xix. xx., with the 
 authorities chiefly Jewish. 
 
 5 For its position see Eusehius, iv. 
 vi. as quoted above. It has sometimes 
 been confounded with Bethoron. Re- 
 land shews the fallacy of this hypo- 
 thesis. Palest. 639. It seems to have 
 been despaired of. Thus Dr Muenter 
 writes : "Its site is not yet deter- 
 mined ; and indeed it will hardly be 
 possible to ascertain it, until at some 
 future day a more exact investigation 
 of ruins, and perhaps of inscriptions 
 bearing its name, shall bring it to 
 light." xx. p. 439. So late as De- 
 cember 1843, Dr Robinson writes: 
 " This mysterious city seems destined 
 to baffle the efforts of historians and 
 archaeologists to determine its position ; 
 for all the data extant are too few and 
 
 too indefinite to afford ground for more 
 than some degree of probability." After 
 pondering the question for some years, 
 he is disposed to place it at Bethel ! 
 The ingenious arguments by which he 
 seeks to establish this position are very 
 amusing, and I would add, without 
 offence, very characteristic. See p. 458, 
 et seq. Bib. Sac. Part in., in an ap- 
 pendix to DrMiienter's valuable paper 
 so often referred to. See also this 
 author's Bib. Res. n. p. 6 : " Strong 
 but now unknown city :" and yet he 
 had written in his map of the environs of 
 Jerusalem, " Wady Bittir," which he 
 tells us is the Latin way of writing 
 this very name ! ! ! Bib. Sac. 456. It 
 should be Beitir, the Hebrew " beth,"as 
 usual, being changed into the Arabic 
 " beit^ of the same signification.
 
 136 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 later maps, and, lastly, the local traditions existing among 
 the native Mahometans certainly not taught, because not 
 known, by monks or travellers contribute to form a chain 
 of evidence for its identity stronger far than any I met 
 with in Palestine, excepting such as I was prepared to ex- 
 pect. The importance of the subject will, I trust, excuse 
 the digression and minute detail. 
 
 Having heard of the existence of a village in the vicinity 
 of Jerusalem, whose name appeared of sufficient interest to 
 justify a visit, I took with me a Mahometan guide, a peasant 
 of Ain Karim, and on Friday the 28th of April, 1843, 
 went in quest of Beiter. Leaving the convent of the Cross 
 and Ain Malakh on the right, and Beit Safafa and es-She- 
 rafat on the left, I followed the deep Wady Hannieh, until, 
 after passing the fountains of Yalo and Wellager, I found 
 a valley running into it from the left, which comes down 
 from the neighbourhood of Beit Jala. This last Wady 
 derives its name from the village of which I was in quest, 
 standing at the point of juncture of the two valleys 1 . The 
 first feature that attracted my attention, as I approached the 
 spot, was a lofty hill projecting into the valley, which 
 surrounds it on three sides, attached to the modern village 
 by a rocky isthmus. On this hill my guide pointed out 
 Khirbet el Yehfid (the "Kuins of the Jews"), of which 
 
 1 I must refer to Dr Robinson's 
 map of the environs of Jerusalem, 
 which, however, can only be trusted in 
 those parts marked by his tracts. For 
 example, the following alterations must 
 be made in the case before us. Wady 
 Hannieh, (marked by him W. Beit- 
 Hanina), after receiving Wady Ismail, 
 in which Sataf stands, (see above p. 10), 
 continued its course to the southward, 
 
 on the west of Ain Karim, until it 
 meets Wady El-Werd. It then runs 
 about W. S. W., until it receives Wady 
 Beitir from the S. E., a little below 
 El-Wellajeh. Here it makes an elbow, 
 in which stands the hill mentioned in 
 the text, on a kind of promontory. The 
 valley then continues its course in the 
 same direction as before, under another 
 name.
 
 CH. HI.] THE HOLY CITY. 137 
 
 he had volunteered mention on the road. Following a track 
 down which a copious stream of water was flowing, I came 
 to a fountain which rises above the village, having a passage 
 cut through the solid rock to the source. In this passage 
 I found the Sheikh of the village, and immediately engaged 
 his services. On enquiring if there were ruins in the neigh- 
 bourhood, the Sheikh and several villagers who had congre- 
 gated, with one voice repeated the welcome words " Khirbet 
 el Yehud," pointing to the hill over against us. Under 
 the guidance of the Sheikh I ascended to it, passing on the 
 way some large caverns in its rocky sides, in some of which 
 he said there was architecture ; but they were blocked up, 
 and I could not explore them. On reaching the summit 
 of the hill, my guide conducted me, without the slightest 
 hesitation to the ruins of "a tower" on the north, near 
 which he pointed out the remains of an " old wall," which 
 he told me had surrounded the hill. There was also a 
 " second tower" on the south side, the ruins of which are 
 very distinct, though the masonry is not striking, but solid ; 
 and beneath this he directed my attention to " a fosse" 
 which had been contrived by art for the fortification of this 
 remarkable position. Surrounded by the almost precipitous 
 valley on three sides, the hill was by nature impregnable, 
 except on the south, where, as was said, it was attached 
 to the modern village and the mountain-region above it by 
 a rocky isthmus. This isthmus had been cut through and a 
 deep trench formed, to guard the approaches in that quarter ; 
 and a stronger position for ancient warfare can scarcely be 
 imagined. Having explored the spot for some time, and 
 made my notes, I was well satisfied with the result of my 
 visit, and was about to commence the descent, when the 
 Sheikh pointed to the hills behind the modern village, 
 rising to about the same height as that on which we stood,
 
 138 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 and remarked, " They shot at them from that hill." " Who 
 shot at whom?" I enquired. "Oh! I don't know," he re- 
 plied; "it was a long while ago. How should I know?" 
 
 Strange that the tradition of the siege by the Romans 
 should have been handed down to this day, in this vague 
 form, among the infidels ! for there are none but Mahometans 
 in the village, and the Greek monks at Jerusalem, to whom 
 I afterwards mentioned the facts, knew scarcely of the ex- 
 istence of the village, much less of its traditions ! The site 
 is more circumscribed than I had expected to find it; the 
 wall which surrounded the hill could scarcely have exceeded 
 a mile in circuit, but this diificulty may be solved by the 
 supposition of the town having covered the hill on whose side 
 the modern village now stands, and to which the isolated 
 hill would form the acropolis. The traditions of the rabbies 
 respecting the extent of Bether are no doubt absurdly ex- 
 aggerated 1 , but it is incredible that its whole population 
 should have been so long cooped up within such narrow 
 limits as those above described. Whatever solution may 
 be offered to this difficulty, I do not apprehend that any 
 objections can avail to set aside the evidence which has 
 now been adduced for the identity of this site with the 
 Bether of Jewish history ; and I have as little doubt that 
 the high region to the south of this, which I afterwards 
 traversed on the way to El Khudr, is described by Solomon 
 in the Canticles as the "Mountains of Bether V as the 
 valley which bounds it on the east is still called by that 
 name. 
 
 1 " It had, say they, from 4 to 
 500 synagogues, in each 400 teachers, 
 and in the smallest 300 scholars; or, 
 according to others, each teacher had 
 to instruct 400 children." Bib. Sac. 
 
 440. See note 2, on the same page, for 
 other " specimens of rabbinical his- 
 tories," (as l)r M. calls them), relating 
 to Bether. 
 
 8 Cant. ii. 17-
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 139 
 
 Hero then the last tragedy of the Jewish war under 
 Adrian was enacted ; here the grandson of Bar-Cochebas with 
 many of his compatriots lost his life, while Rabbi Akiba, 
 with thousands of his deluded followers, fell into their 
 enemies' hands. The former was executed, and with him, 
 says the Mishna, vanished the glory of the law; the latter 
 were sold as slaves under the terebinth of their father 
 Abraham, at Hebron, or at Goza, which hence received the 
 name of Hadrian's Mart 3 , while the remainder were trans- 
 ported to the slave-markets of Egypt, and thence dis- 
 persed throughout the world. 
 
 From this time forth the unhappy people were for- 
 bidden all access to " the city of their fathers' sepulchres," 
 and were not even permitted to feast their eyes with a 
 distant view of its sacred hills 4 , until the rigour of the 
 law was somewhat abated under Constantino, and they 
 were allowed at first to breathe their sighs towards it 
 from the surrounding heights, and afterwards to water it 
 with their tears on one day in the year 5 . Not that there 
 was much during this period to attract the Jewish pilgrim 
 to the Holy City, desecrated as it now was by all that 
 was calculated to disgust their national prejudices, exhibit- 
 ing as it did all the marks of a pagan city, in its mag- 
 nificent dwellings adapted to ideas of Roman luxury 6 , with 
 
 3 Dr MUenter, xx. to xxni.; Bib. 
 Sac. 438-446. 
 
 4 The authorities, as given by Dr 
 Muenter, are Justin Martyr, Apol. i. 
 xlvii. Dial. xvi. ; Aristo of Pella, 
 apud Euseb. Hist. Eccles. iv. vi. ; 
 Tertullian, adv. Jud. c. xv. ; Euseb. 
 Demonst. Evang. vm. 18, andChron. 
 Sulpicius Severus, Hist. Sac. n. xlv. 
 
 5 The prohibition was in full force 
 
 when Eusebius wrote his Theophania. 
 He not only says that " they were not 
 allowed to set foot in it :" but, " cannot 
 view it even from a distance." p. 249. 
 But when the Bordeaux pilgrim visited 
 the city, 333, the annual visit was per- 
 mitted. Itin. Hierosol. 
 
 6 Dr MUenter, xxiv\ Bib. Sac. p. 
 445, and the authorities there referred 
 to. With regard to the swine which,
 
 140 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 a theatre and other public buildings, and, worst of all, idol- 
 temples, one of which occupied the temple-mountain, in 
 realization of their worst apprehensions; while the very name 
 by which it was now called would perpetuate the memory 
 of their calamities and of its desecration, by uniting the 
 praenomen of their conqueror with the title of his god ; a 
 name conferred on it by the emperor on occasion of the 
 celebration of his vicennalia in 136. 
 
 But the Christian Church of ^Elia Capitolina will now 
 demand our notice. 
 
 During the troublous period of the Jewish revolt the 
 Christian population had suffered severely from the insatiable 
 malice of the insurgents. Bar-Chochebas would first have 
 persuaded them to make common cause with his party, 
 against their foreign lord, but besides that they had learnt 
 to be subject to the powers that be, "not only for wrath, 
 but also for conscience sake;" they had no reason to hope 
 that the Jewish domination would be less opposed to their 
 interests than that of their Roman masters ; but rather the 
 reverse. Their refusal to take part in the revolt subjected 
 them to most cruel tortures 1 , until the arrival of the 
 Roman army, by diverting the thoughts of their persecutors, 
 afforded them some relief. 
 
 Whether they retired from this storm as before, does 
 not appear ; but as Jerusalem was not the principal scene 
 of this war, it is not improbable that they resided there 
 throughout. In any case, they certainly were there soon 
 after the termination of the struggle, and then it was that 
 
 according to EusebiusfChronicon) was 
 engraven over the Bethlehem gate, it 
 is doubtful whether its design was to 
 insult the Jews. As they were never 
 to be permitted to see it, it could hardly 
 
 have had that intention. Dositheus, 
 Lib. i. cap. viii. sect. 5, gives a choice 
 of solutions. 
 
 1 Justin Martyr, Apol. i. 316, 
 quoted by Eusebius, iv. vi.
 
 CH. III. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 141 
 
 an important change was made in their polity. The sus- 
 picion of Judaism which attached to the Christian profession 
 in the minds of the Romans, was so much confirmed by the 
 peculiar practices of that Church, that its members could 
 scarcely expect not to be identified with the Jews in the 
 prohibition which has been mentioned. From the times of 
 the apostles until this period the Hebrew converts at 
 Jerusalem had united the Christian profession with the 
 observance of the ceremonial law, and circumcision had been 
 considered as an indispensable qualification for the episcopal 
 chair. Under these circumstances it may be readily ima- 
 gined that a pagan emperor would regard the Jerusalem 
 Church as an offshoot of the synagogue, however he may 
 have been taught by the apologists to distinguish between 
 Jews and Christians generally. The Hebrews resolved to 
 obviate the difficulty by relinquishing their peculiarity, and 
 Marcus, a believer from among the gentiles, was elected 
 to the chair of St James 2 . 
 
 An observation of an old historian will fitly introduce 
 a few remarks on this important epoch in the annals of 
 the Church at Jerusalem. It is Sulpicius Severus, who, 
 recording these events, introduces the observation that 
 " this happened by the Divine disposal, in order that 
 the liberty of the Church's faith might not be subject to 
 the yoke of the law 3 ." 
 
 The admission of the Gentiles as such to a full partici- 
 
 2 " Christian! ex Judaeis potissi- 
 mum putabantur namque turn Hiero- 
 solymae non nisi ex circumcisionehabe- 
 bat ecclesia sacerdotem. . . . Turn 
 primus Marcus ex gentibus, apud 
 Hierosolymam episcopus fuit." Sulp. 
 Sev. Hist. Sac. Lib. n. Compare 
 
 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. Lib. iv. cap. vi. 
 apud fin. 
 
 3 " Quod quidem Christians fidei 
 proficiebat. . . . Nimirum id Domino 
 ordinante dispositum ut legis servitus 
 a Hbertate fidei atque ecclesiae tollere- 
 tur." Ibid.
 
 142 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PAUT I. 
 
 pation in the privileges of the new covenant, which had been 
 repeatedly declared by the prophets of the old dispensa- 
 tion, would appear to be one of the truths reserved by our 
 blessed Lord, in condescension to the present weakness of 
 His apostles 1 . Not but that it was more than hinted at, 
 at a very early period of His Personal Ministry 2 ; and after- 
 wards more clearly taught, at least to our perception, by 
 many striking parables 3 . But when we consider the strong 
 national prejudices with which his disciples had to contend, 
 it is not perhaps strange that they should have failed to 
 apprehend his full meaning, especially as it does not appear 
 that he thought fit to interpret any such parables even to 
 them. It is perhaps more remarkable that his last parting 
 precept, distinct as it was, did not remove the veil from 
 their understanding 4 , and that even the first gift of the 
 Holy Spirit did not suffice for this revelation, for still they 
 confined their preaching to the circumcision only 5 ; so that 
 the proselytes of the gate were not suffered to be admis- 
 sible until an express intimation to that effect had been 
 given to St Peter 6 . It was subsequent to this that a fresh 
 revelation made known to the church the astounding truth, 
 that not even so much preparation was required for the 
 acceptance of the gospel tidings, that the synagogue was 
 to be from henceforth in no sense the door of entrance 
 to the church, but that all whose "hearts were opened'' 
 might pass at once from the idol-temple to "the house 
 of the living God" from the worship of devils to the 
 
 1 John xvi. 12. 
 
 * His discourse with the woman of 
 Samaria and the preaching to the Sa- 
 maritans. John iv. 23, &c. 
 
 8 e. g. The labourers in the vine- 
 yard, Matt. xx. 1, &c. ; the unthank- 
 
 ful husbandmen, xxi. 33, &c. ; the 
 marriage-supper, xxii. 1, &c. ; the 
 prodigal son, Luke xv. 11, &c. 
 
 4 Matt, xxviii. 19. 
 
 6 Acts xi. 19. 
 
 ' Acts x. xi.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 343 
 
 service of Christ 7 . No marvel that perplexing questions 
 should arise on such a revolution, and that the conflict 
 with old principles and prejudices and antipathies should 
 agitate the whole body, when in the first instance it had 
 been thought advisable to withhold the truth from the gene- 
 rality of believers 8 . The apostles, no doubt, received the 
 intelligence with joy, as the whole church had done when 
 the door of faith had been opened to the devout Gentiles 9 ; 
 but all were not actuated by the same fervent love, all 
 had not learnt as they had, to bring every " thought 
 into captivity to the obedience of Christ." The Judaizing 
 teachers, with all the busy perverseness of later heretics, 
 sowed dissensions in all the apostolic churches, by their at- 
 tempts to impose upon them the yoke of the ceremonial 
 law, and rendered necessary the council at Jerusalem 10 . 
 This council, however, confined itself strictly to the question 
 then brought before it, and its determination affected the 
 Gentiles only; no opinion whatever being pronounced as to 
 the obligation of ceremonial observances on the Hebrew 
 converts. Perhaps the time had not arrived, or the apostles 
 were instructed that Jerusalem was not the place for the 
 discussion of such a subject ; it cannot however admit of 
 a doubt that St Paul did promulgate the nullity of such 
 observances for all religious purposes, to Jews as well 
 as Gentiles 11 , although in certain instances he tolerated 
 
 7 See the terms of amazement in 
 which this " mystery" is spoken of by 
 the apostle as a new " revelation." 
 Eph. iii. 2 10; compare Rom. xvi. 
 25, 26; Col. i. 2527; 1 Tim. iii. 
 16. 
 
 8 Gal. ii. 2. 
 
 9 Acts xi. 18. Compare xv. 3. 
 
 10 Acts xv.'&c. &c. 
 
 11 Especially in the Epistle to the 
 Galatians, which "goes farther than 
 any of St Paul's epistles, for it avows 
 in direct terms the supercession of the 
 Jewish law, as an instrument of salva- 
 tion, even to the Jews themselves. 
 Not only were the Gentiles exempt 
 from its authority, but even the Jews 
 were no longer to place any depend-
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 them so long as no undue importance was attached to 
 them 1 . The circumstances of the church at Jerusalem, 
 composed as it was of zealous adherents to the law, ren- 
 dered a greater measure of forbearance advisable there; 
 and St Paul himself, on his occasional visits, conformed 
 to .the practice of his brethren in that city, becoming " a 
 Jew to the Jews, that he might gain the Jews." In like 
 manner the other apostles, when without the limits of that 
 diocese, laid aside " the yoke from which Christ had set 
 them free," but to which they voluntarily submitted rather 
 than put a stumblingblock in the way of their weaker 
 brethren 2 . They wished that the law should die a natural 
 death ; they saw that it had " decayed and waxen old, and 
 was ready to vanish away 3 ;" and when they considered the 
 example of their divine Master 4 , the promulgator of the law 
 
 ency upon it, or consider themselves 
 as subject to it on a religious account. 
 (Ch. iii.23 25.) This was undoubt- 
 edly spoken of Jews and to Jews. In 
 like manner, chap. iv. 1 6. These 
 passages are nothing short of a decla- 
 ration that the obligations of the Jew- 
 ish law, considered as a religious dis- 
 pensation, the effects of which were to 
 take place in another life, had ceased 
 even with respect to the Jews them- 
 selves." Paley's Horse Paulina; in Ep. 
 ad Gal. No. vn. See again, No. x. 3. 
 "St Paul of all the apostles of Christ 
 met with the greatest opposition and 
 contempt from the false Judaizing 
 apostles, that troubled the church in 
 his time. The true reason whereof 
 was, that he first of all openly and 
 everywhere proclaimed and preached 
 the utter abolition of the Mosaic law, 
 both as to Jews and Gentiles." Bp. 
 Bull, Sermon 5. Work*, i. p. 113. 
 
 1 Acts xvi. 3. and xxi. 26. See 
 Paley's remarks on these passages, 
 Horas Paulinae in Ep. Gal. No. vu. 
 
 2 Galat. ii. 12. See St Chrysostom's 
 Commentary on this Epistle, in which 
 he always speaks of the practice of the 
 church at Jerusalem as a condescen- 
 sion of the apostles to the weakness of 
 the believers, " of permission, and not 
 of commandment," as a prudential 
 measure (olKovofita,) to avoid scandal 
 to their weaker brethren, wishing to 
 draw them away by degrees from the 
 law. 
 
 8 Hebrews viii. 13. 
 
 4 " While the law continued, it was 
 to be 'magnified and made honour- 
 able,' not disregarded. Consider our 
 Saviour's example. . . . He actually 
 came to supersede it, yet how reve- 
 rently did He treat, how dutifully did 
 He obey His own ordinances! He 
 went up to the temple continually, and
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THK HOLY CITY. 
 
 145 
 
 no less than of the gospel, and its fulfilment also, they 
 had abundant authority for the course which they pur- 
 sued, independently of the Divine light that was in them. 
 Meanwhile the Hebrew converts were weaned from their 
 fond attachment to the "schoolmaster" by the exhibition of 
 the great truth that Christ had become " the end of the 
 law for righteousness to every one that believeth 5 ;" that 
 the type had given way to "the Truth;" the shadow to 
 the substance ; the " circumcision of the flesh," to the " cir- 
 cumcision made without hands;" Sinai to Mount Zion 
 but not the Mount Zion at Jerusalem, since the earthly 
 Jerusalem itself had given place to the " Jerusalem which 
 is above, which is free, and the Mother of us all 6 ." And 
 this teaching of the holy Apostles was followed up by their 
 coadjutors and immediate successors 7 . 
 
 Yet the destruction of Jerusalem did not convince the 
 members of the Hebrew church of their dispensation from 
 legal observances. On their return from their brief sojourn 
 in Persea, they proceeded to elect to the vacant chair of 
 
 bade his hearers obey those who sat in 
 Moses' seat ; He sent those whom He 
 cured to the priests ; He paid the temple- 
 tribute ; He did not destroy, till He 
 had gained (so to say) a right to de- 
 stroy, in that He had fulfilled. Not 
 till He could say ' It is finished,' did 
 the veil of the temple rend in twain." 
 Newman's Sermons, last Vol. Sermon 
 xxiv. pp. 420, 421. It is a happy il- 
 lustration of St Augustin. Ep. 82. al. 
 19 : The law was dead, it was to be 
 honourably buried. This whole epistle, 
 as indeed the whole controversy of 
 which it forms a part, has an important 
 bearing on this question. 
 
 5 Rom. x. 4. See this epistle at 
 
 10 
 
 large, especially the striking figure in 
 vii. 1 4. 
 
 8 Gal. iv. 26. See this epistle and 
 that to the Hebrews at large, for the 
 law (not abrogated but) fulfilled in 
 Christ and his people, as set forth in 
 two sermons of Mr Newman, in his 
 last Volume, xiv. " Christian Church 
 a Continuation of the Jewish ;" and 
 xv. " Principle of Continuity between 
 the Jewish and Christian Churches," 
 pp. 203244. 
 
 7 It will be enough to mention St 
 Barnabas and St Hermas. The epistle 
 of the former, considered in connexion 
 with Gal. ii. 13, &c., is very remark- 
 able. It looks like an act of repentance.
 
 146 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 St James a strict observer of the ceremonial ritual ; and if it 
 be true, as Hegesippus affirms, that the surviving apostles 
 assisted at this solemnity, the continuance of such practices in 
 the church would have, so far, the highest earthly sanction 1 . 
 In what light its further continuance was regarded by the 
 Catholic body does not appear ; for it happens that the his- 
 torian to whom we owe the records of their church was 
 himself one of the circumcision 2 , and consequently not an 
 impartial witness, even had he pronounced a judgment upon 
 it, which he does not seem to have done, further than to 
 state that the church maintained its virgin purity until the 
 election of its third bishop, probably at the commencement 
 of the second century ; when it was corrupted by the errors 
 of one of the seven sects of the Jews; at which time there 
 was an innumerable company of circumcised believers in 
 communion with it 3 . 
 
 It was not however strange that the second Jewish 
 war, accompanied as it was by the almost entire anni- 
 hilation or dispersion of that nation, and followed by the 
 prohibition which has been already noticed, should appear 
 to them in the light in which we have seen it was re- 
 garded by a later historian, as intimating the abrogation 
 of the Old Covenant, with all its carnal ordinances. And 
 they acted upon this intimation in the election of Marcus, 
 the sixteenth in succession from St James. 
 
 It was perhaps to be expected that this measure, how- 
 ever approved by the majority, as the election shews that 
 it actually was, would scandalize some who were " other- 
 wise minded," and if these latter were self-willed as they 
 were weak 4 , they would manifest their disgust, as others, 
 
 1 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. in. xi. iv.v. 
 * Ibid. iv. xxii. 
 
 :l Ibid. in. xxxv. 
 
 4 See Phil. iii. 15, and the context,
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 147 
 
 from various causes, had already done, by breaking the 
 unity of the Church, and separating themselves from their 
 Christian brethren. Thus it came to pass, and the sect 
 of the Nazarenes was the offspring of this unhappy di- 
 vision. 
 
 In what light these sectarians were regarded by the 
 generality of believers no long time after this schism, we 
 ascertain from a passage in Justin Martyr's Dialogue, 
 (cir. 150) which is interesting on more accounts than one 5 . 
 The Jew had proposed a question touching the salva- 
 bility of those who lived under the law, and the Christian 
 had professed his belief that they would be saved, in like 
 manner as those who lived before the law, through the 
 merits of Christ, on Whose essential Divinity and proper 
 Humanity he takes occasion to dwell. The next question 
 is more perplexing; whether they who desire to observe 
 the law that was given by Moses, believing at the same 
 time in Jesus who was crucified, acknowledging Him to be 
 the Christ of God, to Whom the judgment of all is com- 
 mitted, and Whose is the everlasting kingdom whether such 
 an one can be saved? The Christian apologist, naturally 
 unwilling to pronounce an opinion on those whom the 
 Church had not judged, at first seemed desirous to evade 
 the question, and would have returned to the point which 
 they were before discussing ; but being pressed for a reply, 
 he returned a guarded answer in the affirmative, as ex- 
 pressing his own private opinion, but not at all as implying 
 a general consent of the Church. This was observed by 
 
 where St Paul speaks of the reuuncia- 
 tion of the law as a mark of perfection ; 
 the contrary, as weakness and blind - 
 
 Paris Ed. 1742. 
 5 It contains one of the strongest 
 
 10 2 
 
 testimonies of the Ante-Nicene Fathers 
 to the divinity of our blessed Lord. 
 See Dial. sect. 45, &c. pp. 140, seqq.
 
 148 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 Trypho, and the question which he next propounded brought 
 out the whole truth. " Why do you say," he asks, " I 
 think that such will be saved, unless there be some who 
 deny that they can?" Justin grants that such is the case. 
 There are those who would not even venture to hold com- 
 munication with such on any terms of intimacy, with whom 
 he does not agree ; for if there be any who, through weak- 
 ness of mind, observe the Mosaic ordinances as far as they 
 can, after they have hoped in Christ ; so long as they 
 continue in the practice of the moral precepts of piety, and 
 in Christian fellowship with their brethren from among the 
 Gentiles, without compelling them to be circumcised, or to 
 conform in other respects to the Mosaic law, having the 
 same compassion and affection for them notwithstanding 
 for his part, he thinks it probable that such will be saved : 
 but for those, who, not satisfied with bearing the yoke them- 
 selves, seek to impose it upon others, and refuse to hold 
 communion with those who will not conform to their prac- 
 tices, of such he can acknowledge no such thing. It is 
 apparent then that at this time there were shades of opinion 
 on both sides relative to the practices in question ; that 
 their observance was regarded as a weakness by all, even 
 the most moderate of the orthodox, but was not supposed 
 by these to vitiate the purity of the Christian profession, 
 so long as it was attended by no breach of charity ' ; while, 
 
 1 Origen uses the same lenity to- | 3. Those who observed them seeing 
 wards these weak brethren, Lib. vn. \ only their literal sense. These would 
 in Epist. ad Rom. In his work against ! answer respectively to the reXetot, the 
 
 Celsus, Lib. n. he distinguishes the 
 Jewish Christians into three classes. 
 1. Those who had forsaken the rites of 
 the law, under the idea that they were 
 to be understood spiritually. 2. Those 
 who interpreted them spiritually, yet 
 did not forsake their literal observance. 
 
 creptes (ftpovouvrev, or dv&evev, and the 
 ai/oeo-Korai. The author of the Cle- 
 mentine Epistles, about the middle of 
 the second century, is thought from 
 numerous passages in his writings, to 
 have belonged to the second class.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 149 
 
 on the other hand, the Judaizers differed as to the limits 
 which they should assign to their ceremonial strictness 
 some refusing to acknowledge as brethren any but those 
 who thought with them, while the more moderate were 
 satisfied to act upon their own principles, without respect 
 to the practices of others. This latter section would, no 
 doubt, in a short time be absorbed into the orthodox or dis- 
 senting body, and finally disappear ; while the vicious ex- 
 treme of this error would probably lead on to heretical 
 opinions, as all declension from truth is likely to do. Had 
 the work of Clemens Alexandrinus, whose title has been pre- 
 served by Eusebius 2 , continued to our days, we might have 
 seen the progress of this schismatical body, giving birth to 
 a yet more vicious progeny, and gradually preparing itself 
 for the unenviable distinction of being enrolled under the 
 head of formal heresies, as it is reckoned by Epiphanius 
 in the fourth century, whose account of them is worth tran- 
 scribing as representing the judgment of the Church at 
 that period. He describes them as "in all respect Jews 
 and nothing else, for they have not renounced the law, 
 nor do they differ from them on any point except that they 
 believe in Christ. They confess the resurrection of the 
 dead, and the creation of the universe by God ; they profess 
 one God and Jesus Christ His Son ; they are learned in 
 the Hebrew, and read the sacred books in that language, 
 
 2 " The Ecclesiastical Canon ; or, 
 against those who Judaized." Hist. 
 Eccles. vi. xiii. alluded to below, p. 
 154. The doubt expressed by Epipha- 
 nius as to the time of the rise of the 
 Nazarite heresy, seems to imply that 
 it developed itself gradually. It is 
 scarcely correct to say that Epiphanius 
 is the first to enrol them as formal 
 
 heretics ; for there cannot be the slight- 
 est doubt that the second division of 
 the Ebionites, noticed and condemned 
 by Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. in. xxvii. 
 are the same as were afterwards distin- 
 guished by the appellation of Nazarenes . 
 His account of their tenets agrees en- 
 tirely with that given in the text from 
 Epiphanius, Hwres. i. ii. No. 29.
 
 150 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 as do the Jews. But they differ from Jews and also from 
 Christians 1 from the Jews, in that they believe in Christ; 
 from Christians, in that they are still bound to the law, 
 to circumcision, sabbaths, and other rites. As to their be- 
 lief in Christ, he cannot say whether they consider him 
 a mere man, as the Cerinthians, or acknowledge that he 
 was born by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, as in 
 truth He was 2 . This heresy is found in the country of 
 Peraea in Crelo-Syria ; for there it had its commencement." 
 And yet he observes, "they cannot fulfil the law of which 
 they make their boast; for the law being brought to an 
 end, and its observance rendered impossible, it is evident 
 to all persons of sense, that Christ has come to fulfil the 
 law : ' not to destroy, but to fulfil ; ' and to remove the 
 curse denounced against the transgression of its precepts, 
 and has given us more blessed gifts than the legal ordi- 
 nances." 
 
 "How then," he concludes, "have they not fallen from 
 the grace of God, when St Paul says, ' If ye be circumcised 
 Christ shall profit you nothing?' But it is easy to detect 
 and refute such as these, since they are Jews, and nothing 
 else. Yet the Jews hate them thoroughly, and curse them 
 in their synagogues thrice a day, and are the more opposed 
 to them because that, being of the Jews, they preach that 
 Jesus is the Christ; a doctrine most hateful to those Jews 
 who as yet believe not." This is nearly the last notice we 
 have of them as an existing sect. Probably it shared the 
 fate of other heresies, and became extinct soon after, to 
 reappear again, it may be, at some subsequent period of 
 
 1 So St Jerome says of them : " Dum 
 volunt et Jinls-i esse et Christian!, nee 
 Judsei sunt nee Christian!." Epist. 
 
 LXXX. 
 
 2 Eusebius says they were sound 
 on this point. Hist. Eccles. 1. c.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 151 
 
 the church's history, as has been the case with so many 
 exploded perversions of Christian truth. 
 
 To return now to the church of ^Elia. Eusebius, who 
 could consult the succession of the bishops, carefully pre- 
 served in all the ancient Churches, has handed down to 
 us the names and the order of those who occupied the see 
 during the interval that elapsed between the reign of 
 Hadrian and the accession of Commodus; but their annals 
 apparently exhibited nothing worth preserving 3 . The notices 
 of Narcissus are very frequent, and very full of interest; 
 he seems to have presided in that see for many years, and 
 to have taken an active part in the discussion of the ques- 
 tions which agitated the Church at that period. He pre- 
 sided, jointly with Theophilus of Caesar ea, in the Council 
 of Palestine, assembled to consider the controverted point 
 relating to the observance of Easter, wherein the tradition 
 of the churches of Asia differed from that of the rest of the 
 world 4 ; the former concluding their fast on the fourteenth 
 day of the paschal moon, on whatever day of the week it 
 might happen to fall, quoting the authority of those great 
 lights which had shone so brightly in their candlesticks be- 
 fore them, for this mode of reckoning ; while the remainder 
 with one consent agreed in what is now universally prac- 
 tised, the termination of the lenten fast only on the day of 
 the weekly commemoration of our Lord's resurrection. 
 
 The miracles of Narcissus had been handed down by 
 the Christians of his diocese in uninterrupted succession 
 until the times of Eusebius 5 , and one is mentioned by that 
 
 3 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. v. xii. 
 
 4 Ibid, xxiii. xxv. 
 
 5 Ibid. ix. It is not my intention 
 here or elsewhere to enter upon the 
 much controverted question of the cre- 
 
 dibility of the ecclesiastical miracles. 
 The subject has been discussed with 
 great ability in an Essay, to one part of 
 which allusion will be frequently made 
 in a subsequent part of this work. The
 
 152 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 author. It was on the great Vigils of the Feast of Easter, 
 when oil was wanting for the church, and the drawers 
 were greatly perplexed, that he ordered them to draw 
 water out of the nearest well, which, being consecrated by 
 his prayers, and "poured into the lamps with sincere faith 
 in the Lord, contrary to ah 1 reason and expectation, by a 
 miraculous and Divine power, was changed into the fatness 
 of oil." Another scarcely less remarkable story related of 
 this bishop would indeed prove that he was under the 
 especial protection of his Divine Master. It runs as follows: 
 Three worthless wretches, moved with hatred at his blame- 
 less life, and dreading his ecclesiastical censures, which they 
 were conscious that they deserved, had agreed together 
 to ruin the fan- fame of this excellent man by propagating 
 some grievous calumny reflecting on his moral character ; 
 they were rash enough to imprecate most fearful curses 
 on themselves in confirmation of their false accusations ; and 
 the peculiar curses which they had named suddenly came 
 upon them; one was consumed by fire, the second wasted 
 with some loathsome disease, the third, being alarmed into 
 confession by the terrible fate of his two accomplices, and 
 visited with compunction and remorse, wept himself blind 
 the curse which he had invoked. But, although the holy 
 man was thus wonderfully vindicated in the sight of his 
 church, which indeed had never given heed to the calumnies 
 of his accusers, he could not endure the severe shock, but, 
 availing himself of this opportunity of embracing a solitary 
 life, which he had long pined for, he retired from the di- 
 rection of the church, and hid himself so effectually that 
 no one could discover his retreat. 
 
 learned author of that Essay was sure 
 to exhaust the subject; and I cannot 
 help fearing that he has said more than 
 
 can with safety be advanced, not in 
 defence of them generally, but in sup- 
 port of particular alleged miracles.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 153 
 
 It was judged necessary in this emergency to appoint 
 him a successor, and the bishops of the neighbouring churches 
 proceeded to elect Dius to the vacant office 1 ; Germanis 
 and Gordius followed next in order, when, during the pre- 
 sidency of the latter, Narcissus again appeared, and was 
 reinstated in his former dignity by universal consent. He 
 was considerably advanced in years, when he was warned 
 in a vision to call Alexander, a Cappadocian bishop, to a 
 participation in the episcopal government of his diocese. 
 This prelate had come to Jerusalem, " both to offer his 
 prayers there, and to visit the holy places 2 , 1 ' for pilgrim- 
 ages date as far back at least as this tune, and most of 
 the eminent fathers of this century had visited the sacred 
 localities. 
 
 It was this bishop Alexander of Jerusalem, who, con- 
 jointly with Theoctistus of Caesarea, the most approved and 
 most famous of all the prelates in Palestine, admitted Origen 3 
 to the order of priesthood ; an act which certainly in- 
 volved a breach of ecclesiastical discipline, and was no small 
 injury to Demetrius of Alexandria, in whose church he 
 had served as catechist, which might justly excite his in- 
 dignation; but as Eusebius appears to approve of the con- 
 duct of the Palestine bishops in this matter, it would be 
 scarcely safe to pronounce judgment upon a question of 
 such moment, without far more light than we can have on 
 the subject. 
 
 1 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. vi. ix. | in most quarrels, faults on both sides ; 
 
 2 Ibid. ix. Origen must have been more than 
 
 3 Ibid. viii. See the note of Vale- i mortal not to have been pufted up with 
 
 sius, cap. xxiii. 1 will only remark 
 that the apologist of Origen was scarce- 
 ly likely to deal fair measure to his 
 opponents. There were probably, as 
 
 his popularity : Demetrius, not to 
 have regarded with jealousy the cele- 
 brity of his learned and laborious 
 catechist.
 
 154- THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 The friendship which Alexander contracted with Origen 
 on this occasion was kept up by means of correspondence, 
 and Eusebius has preserved to us an extract from a letter 
 of the former, to "his most excellent lord and brother," 
 which informs us that he was also on terms of intimacy with 
 two other great lights of the Egyptian church "the truly 
 blessed Pantaenus, his master, and the honoured Clemens, 
 his master, who also profited him much 1 ." And it was 
 an interesting token of respect and affection in the latter, 
 exhibiting one of those traits of courteous consideration, 
 which refresh us so frequently in the pages of the Church's 
 early history, that he should dedicate his " Ecclesiastical 
 Canon, a work against those who judaized,". to bishop 
 Alexander of Jerusalem, whose flock would be most in dan- 
 ger from the error which he therein combated, and whose 
 hands and heart would require to be strengthened, and his 
 testimony confirmed, by another and so able a witness. 
 
 For many years did Narcissus and his coadjutor con- 
 tinue in the joint administration of the church of ^Elia, 
 until the former had attained the very advanced age of a 
 hundred and sixteen, an age at which he could serve the 
 church more effectually by his prayers and exhortations to 
 charity and loving agreement, like St John at Ephesus, than 
 in the more active duties of his office, which he delegated 
 entirely to his junior 2 . 
 
 One work of Alexander, by which he conferred a lasting 
 benefit on the Church, and merited the gratitude of all 
 posterity, must not be passed over in silence ; the erection 
 of a library at Jerusalem, from the materials of which 
 Eusebius drew so largely for his Ecclesiastical History ; 
 especially, it would seem, from the collections of corre- 
 
 1 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. v. xiv. 2 Ibid. xi.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 1 55 
 
 spondence between eminent ecclesiastics, which form so im- 
 portant and interesting a portion of this work, and which 
 the founder of this library had been most careful to pre- 
 serve 3 . 
 
 How long he administered the affairs of the diocese 
 alone does not appear, since no notice is taken of the death 
 of Narcissus ; but it was his privilege to wear on earth a 
 " crown of glory," " a hoary head found in the way of 
 righteousness," in preparation for a martyr's crown. He 
 had been distinguished, many years before, in the perse- 
 cution under Severus 4 , and was reserved to witness a good 
 confession in the reign of Decius, before the governor at 
 Caesarea of Palestine 5 . His departure is noted with beau- 
 tiful simplicity by his brother of Alexandria : " Blessed 
 Alexander, being in prison, there died a happy death 6 ." 
 
 He was succeeded by Mazabanes, during whose pre- 
 sidency the Churches of the East enjoyed an interval of 
 repose from outward persecution and internal strife ; which 
 however was not destined to be of long duration. But 
 this bishop, of whom we know only that he was one of 
 the most eminent prelates of his day 7 , was taken away 
 from the evil to come, and the vacant see was filled by 
 Hymenseus, whose fame was fresh in the days of Eusebius*. 
 His name appears second in the list of those eminent 
 champions of orthodoxy who assembled at Antioch in the 
 reign of Aurelian to condemn the heresy of Paul of Sa- 
 mosata, who had lately been appointed to the presidency 
 
 3 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. vi. xiv. 
 * Euseb. Hist. Eccles. vi. viii. In 
 
 his Chronicon he places this confession 
 
 in the 12th year of Severus, the second ! Ka/otws 
 of the persecution. ^ Ibid. vn. v. 
 
 5 Hist. Eccles. vi. xxxix. Ibid. xiii. 
 
 a Dionysius apud Euseb. Hist. Ec- 
 cles. vi. xxxviii. o pei> yap /ua^a'ptos 
 'A\eavdpos ev <f>povpq yei/o/newos, fia-
 
 156 THE HOLY CITY. [p.VKT I. 
 
 of the church in that capital 1 . His is the bad notoriety 
 of being the first to broach the blasphemous doctrine re- 
 vived in these latter days by Socinus, of the simple humanity 
 of our adorable Lord. All previous heresies relating to 
 His Sacred Person had gone to the denial of His proper 
 humanity ; Paul was the first to call in question His Divinity. 
 The " pestiferous novelties " were condemned, as might be 
 supposed, by universal consent and with extreme horror, and 
 the bishop branded as a renegade " who had denied his 
 Lord and his God, and kept not the faith which he formerly 
 professed ; " being as vicious in his life as he was corrupt in 
 his doctrine. After insidious promises of retractation, and 
 various attempts at evasion, in the true spirit of here- 
 tical sophistry, he was finally excommunicated 2 and deprived 
 by the sentence of the synod, which was ratified by an 
 imperial edict; the miscreant having appealed to the pagan 
 power against the authority of the church ! 
 
 On the death of Hymenjeus 3 , Zambdas entered upon the 
 government of the church of ^Elia, and was shortly suc- 
 ceeded by Hermon, the last of those before the Diocletian 
 persecution, an era in the history of Palestine at which 
 we have now arrived ; but the circumstances of which, as 
 relating rather to the Church in general, than to Jerusalem 
 in particular, will be but very briefly noticed in these 
 pages. 
 
 The peace and prosperity which the Church had for 
 some years enjoyed, had, according to the testimony of 
 Eusebius, fostered a spirit of carelessness and sloth, which 
 loudly called for correction, and the unity of the body of 
 Christ was torn by factions and unholy divisions 4 ; add to 
 
 1 Dionysius apud Euseb. Hist. 
 Eccles. vn. xxiv. 
 
 2 Ibid. vn. xxiii. 3 Ibid, xxxii. 
 4 Euseb. Hist. Eccles. vui. i.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 157 
 
 which, we may well suppose that the wrath of the great 
 adversary of the Church would wax the more fierce " be- 
 cause he knew that he had but a short time 5 ." It was in 
 the nineteenth year of Diocletian's reign, the three hundred 
 and fifth of the Christian era, that this terrible sifting began 6 . 
 In the month of March, towards the feast of Easter, the first 
 edict was published at Nicomedia, for the total demolition 
 of the churches, for the degradation of such Christians as 
 held any honourable appointments, and for enslaving such 
 private persons as persisted in the profession of the gospel. 
 Shortly after another prescript threw all the prelates of the 
 Church in prison, and subjected to the most cruel tortures 
 such as refused to sacrifice to idols. Then the persecution 
 became general ; neither age nor sex was respected, and 
 every refinement of cruelty that malice could invent was 
 practised against the martyr-host. The dreadful enumeration 
 may be spared ; the historian, who enters much into detail, 
 declares that no expressions could describe the scenes. The 
 West enjoyed comparative peace throughout, under the mild 
 sway of Constantius and his son in Britain, but the eastern 
 provinces were deluged with blood. Egypt and Palestine 
 were distinguished above all others for the severity of the 
 trial and the constancy of the sufferers ; and Eusebius, who 
 was an eyewitness of the persecutions at Caesarea, has re- 
 corded them in a separate work 7 . The tyrant Maximinus 
 presided in person on several occasions at the bloody spec- 
 tacles in this city 8 . 
 
 The proto-martyr was a native of ^Elia 9 , but a servant 
 of the church of Scythopolis ; nor do we read of any mem- 
 
 s Rev. xii. 12. 
 
 6 Hist. Eccles. viu. ii., &c. 
 
 7 Martyrs of Palestine. 
 
 8 Cap. vi. 
 
 9 See the Passion of St Procopius 
 in a note of Valesius to the martyrs of 
 Palestine, cap. i.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 bers of the church at Jerusalem being called to glorify God 
 by their death at this time, except one venerable deacon of 
 the name of Valens, whose knowledge of the holy Scrip- 
 tures was so perfect that he could repeat whole pages of 
 any part of the sacred volume from memory as accurately 
 as if he had been reading from a book. This grey-haired 
 saint was crowned with martyrdom in company with Pam- 
 philus, a presbyter of the church of Caesar ea 1 , whose name 
 is so well known in connexion with his affectionate disciple, 
 who loved to associate it with his own as a surname. 
 
 But there is a singular relation concerning one citizen, 
 not of ^Elia, but of Jerusalem, which it will be proper to 
 record, for several reasons. During the heat of the perse- 
 cution, five Egyptians who had accompanied some of their 
 brethren to the mines in Cilicia, while on their return to 
 their own county, were apprehended at the gates of Cse- 
 sarea and committed to prison ; the chief of these, in his 
 examination before the judge, was questioned as to his 
 name. He had assumed, instead of his pagan name, the 
 appellation of one of the old prophets, to represent, as 
 the historian writes, "that he belonged to the true and 
 genuine Israel of God, those who are Jews inwardly." He 
 was next questioned as to his country. " Jerusalem is my 
 country," was the reply, meaning that Jerusalem of which 
 St Paul speaks, " but Jerusalem which is above, is free, 
 which is the mother of us all;" and "ye are come to 
 mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the hea- 
 venly Jerusalem." The judge, having never heard of such 
 a city, was very inquisitive as to its situation, and tortures 
 were applied to elicit the truth. The courageous martyr 
 persisted in his declaration, and added moreover that " it 
 
 1 Martyrs of Palestine, cap. xi.
 
 CH. Ill 
 
 .] THE HOLY CITY. 159 
 
 was their country only who were God's worshippers ; none 
 but they should enter it, and it was situated eastward to- 
 wards the sun-rising." No torments could shake his reso- 
 lution, and he was delivered over to the executioner. 
 
 The narrative is instructive as demonstrating, first, how 
 entirely the very memorial of the ancient name of ^Elia 
 had perished, when it was so strange to the Roman pro- 
 curator of Palestine, that he thought it must be a city 
 which the Christians were erecting in defiance of the go- 
 vernment ; and secondly, as proving how fully the Christian's 
 mind was imbued with the persuasion that the earthly type 
 had been superseded by the heavenly reality. 
 
 It was under the same idea that shortly after, when 
 the Holy City had been adorned with churches and ren- 
 dered illustrious as a Christian capital, it was called " the 
 New Jerusalem ;" a name by which it is commonly known 
 among church-historians from the period of the emperor 
 Constantine, which will next demand our notice. 
 
 The persecution had somewhat abated in violence in the 
 eighth year 2 , owing to the manifest judgments of God on 
 Galerius, who had been chiefly instrumental in instigating 
 his colleagues to these barbarities ; and who when visited 
 by a complication of most loathsome diseases, which termi- 
 nated in his death, recalled these sanguinary edicts. But 
 the effect of this decree was nullified by Maximinus 3 , who 
 was still unsatiated with blood; and it was not until the 
 tenth year that it wholly ceased. This blessed change was 
 first effected by the successes of Constantine and Licinius 
 against Maxentius in the west, and Maximinus in the east ; 
 and the peace of the church was established on a firm basis 
 by imperial edicts proclaiming universal toleration 4 ; and 
 
 , a Hist. Eccles. vin. xvi. xvii. 3 Ibid. ix. i., &c. 4 Ibid. x. v.
 
 160 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 FPART r. 
 
 requiring the restoration of all the lands and property 
 of the Catholic church which had been confiscated in former 
 reigns. The privileges and immunities accorded to the 
 church by the liberality of the first Christian emperor, and 
 the blessed effects which speedily ensued, cannot here be 
 dwelt on ; it will be enough to particularize that act which 
 has invested Jerusalem with its chief interest from that 
 time to the present; the recovery 1 of the Holy Sepulchre 
 of our Lord, and the erection of the Basilica of the re- 
 surrection. But it will be necessary to preface the narra- 
 tive with some preliminary remarks. 
 
 It is usual, when several historians differ one from 
 another in their relation of the same event, to endeavour 
 to reconcile the discrepancies, by considering how far the 
 facts related by later writers may be merely amplifications 
 of the earlier statements, and not to reject such additions 
 until they are proved to be inconsistent with the records 
 of the most credible witnesses. It would be difficult to 
 assign any sufficient reason for departing from this mode 
 of proceeding in the present case ; and there can be no 
 doubt that, if a matter of only common interest were in 
 question, the various facts recorded by the several historians 
 might be woven into a connected narrative, which would 
 approve itself to all as consistent and harmonious in all 
 points of importance ; and this has been done by all writers 
 on the subject until quite modern times; but because it 
 happens to relate to a subject of the most intense interest, 
 because especially the falsification of the facts would ensure 
 a triumph over the whole Church Catholic, therefore it has 
 
 1 It is incorrect to speak of this as 
 a discovery, and is virtually begging 
 the whole question relating to a conti- 
 
 nuous tradition. It is represented by 
 KuNcbius simply as a recovery, and so 
 I always speak of it.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 161 
 
 pleased later writers, who are no friends to catholic truth, 
 to magnify the variations and to set the accounts in the 
 widest possible opposition one to another. It seems strange 
 that it should not occur to them, that as Rufinus, Socrates, 
 Sozomen, Theodoret, and others 1 , were quite as well informed 
 as we can be as to what Eusebius had written on the subject, 
 that they were in fact following his narrative ; therefore 
 it is highly improbable that they would venture, under any 
 circumstances, to contradict his statements, or even to make 
 any important additions without some sufficient warrant ; 
 for they were not so very far removed from the time of 
 these transactions as to render it impossible for them to 
 recover from other quarters some particulars which the 
 earlier writer had failed to record. In any case it can 
 be hardly safe for those who, after so long an interval as 
 fifteen centuries, take upon themselves, with some confidence, 
 to make important alterations in the narrative of Eusebius, 
 to cavil at the additions of those who wrote little more 
 than a century after that historian. For example ; Eusebius 
 has most distinctly and repeatedly declared, both in his 
 own words and those of Constantino himself, that the design 
 to recover the Holy Sepulchre originated in the emperor's 
 own mind, from a Divine impulse, and that the design was 
 conceived long before it was carried into execution. A 
 living writer has discovered that it was from beginning to 
 end a work of " pious fraud," and that " it would not be 
 doing injustice to the bishop, Macarius, and his clergy, if 
 we regard the whole as a well-laid and successful plan for 
 restoring to Jerusalem its former consideration, and elevating 
 
 1 Their dates of the main authori- 
 ties are as follows : Eusebius, A.D. 33?. 
 St Cyril, A.D. 347. St Chrysostom, A.D. 
 394. St Ambrose, A.D. 395. St Pauli- 
 11 
 
 nus, and St Sulpicius, and Rufinus, 
 cir. 400. Socrates, Sozomen, and Theo- 
 doret, dr. 440.
 
 162 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 his see to a higher degree of influence and dignity 1 ." Now 
 can the author of this shameful calumny, who has not only 
 no authority whatever from antiquity for him but the 
 express testimony of Constantino and Eusebius against him 
 can he, with the slightest regard for consistency, imagine 
 that the greater prominence given to St Helena, by the 
 later writers, is irreconcilable with the fainter notice of 
 Eusebius, or that their minuter details on some points are 
 contradictory of this earlier author? Theirs are but ad- 
 ditions he has ventured a positive counter-statement : let 
 him choose which alternative he will give up his accusation 
 against the bishop, which would be only charitable, or his 
 objections to the credibility of the narrative grounded on its 
 inconsistencies. . 
 
 But are the variations from Eusebius so very material ? 
 "All the writers of the following century relate, as with 
 one voice, that the mother of Constantine was from the first 
 instigated by strong desire to search out and discover the 
 Holy Sepulchre and the Sacred Cross." Does Eusebius con- 
 tradict this, or is he altogether silent on the subject? Is 
 there indeed "not a word, not a hint, by which the reader 
 would be led to suppose that the mother of the emperor 
 had anything to do with the discovery of the Holy Sepul- 
 chre, or the building of the church on the spot 2 ?" Let 
 it be remembered that the object of Eusebius was to set 
 forth the praises of his imperial patron, during his life- 
 time and some years after St Helena's death ; what more 
 natural than that he should dwell on the part which the 
 emperor had taken in the work, rather than on the acts of 
 
 i Bib. Res. ii. 80. 
 
 * Bib. Res. ii. 14. Mr Newman 
 goes so far as to say that Eusebius " is 
 silent about St Helena's visiting Jeru- 
 
 salem." Preface to Fleury, cxlix. Do 
 I misunderstand him, or is it an over- 
 sight ?
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 163 
 
 his deceased mother 8 ? Yet he does not obscurely intimate 
 that much of the merit was due to her pious devotion. He 
 records in terms of eulogy her pilgrimage to the holy places, 
 and her veneration for the footsteps of our Saviour, which 
 she there traced ; he mentions her erection and dedication 
 of two churches to the God whom she had adored, one at 
 Bethlehem, the other on Mount Olivet ; which the emperor 
 soon afterwards adorned most magnificently with costly 
 presents, by which at the same time "he immortalized the 
 memory of his own mother, who had rendered so much 
 good service to mankind 4 ." No doubt these last words will 
 bear many interpretations, but it would at any rate not 
 be forced to suppose that they refer to the main subject 
 of the discourse, the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre, and 
 the erection of the church over the Sacred Cave. The 
 truth would seem to be that the two churches particularly 
 specified as hers 5 were erected at her own charges, and 
 only adorned by her son, whereas the . Church of the Re- 
 surrection was built by a grant from the imperial treasury, 
 according to the rescript addressed to Macarius, which 
 Eusebius has preserved 6 . This rescript was written after 
 the success of the attempt to recover the Sepulchre had 
 been made known to the emperor ; and as St Helena must 
 have remained some time in Palestine, for the erection 
 and dedication of her two churches, if we may suppose that 
 she was the bearer of the first imperial orders for the 
 
 3 See the concession of Dr Robin- 
 son, Bib. Res. ii. 15. 16, which is 
 however half retracted in a later publi- 
 cation. 
 
 * Vita Const. III. xli. /cat Tau-ra 
 S& <i\OKaA.u)s eTifia' TJJS aii-rov /JLIJ- 
 T/oos, fl TOffOVTov dyaOov Tto TWJ; aV- 
 Optoirwv 5it]KOi/eiTo /3ia>, Siaiiovi^iav TI}V 
 
 See also xlii xlvii. 
 
 6 Yet these two churches, ascribed 
 to her in the Life of Constantino, are 
 attributed to the emperor himself in 
 the Laudes. ix. The reason is very 
 obvious. 
 
 8 Ibid, xxx xxxii. 
 
 112
 
 164 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 demolition of the idol fane 1 , it may well be imagined that 
 she would be assisting in the operations at Jerusalem 
 with intense interest, and instigating the munificence of 
 her son, who " had granted her power over the impe- 
 rial treasures, to make use of them according to her own 
 option 2 ." 
 
 With regard to the success of these pious endeavours, 
 much more will be said in a subsequent part of this work. 
 According to the representation of the emperor and his 
 historian, the Sacred Cave had been carefully concealed from 
 sight for many years, by a large mound of earth, on the 
 top of which was erected a temple to Venus ; nor does their 
 language imply the slightest doubt that, on the demolition 
 of the fane and the removal of the obstructions, the site 
 would be recovered. The emperor's orders were not that 
 any enquiry should be instituted, not that any search should 
 be made, but simply that the temple should be levelled 
 with the ground, and the earth carried away. This was 
 done, and the Sepulchre came to light. Was it not a rea- 
 sonable cause of amazement to those who witnessed it, that 
 the pagans, when they sought to obliterate the memory of 
 the spot, should have left the Sacred Cave entire ; and that 
 notwithstanding so long concealment, it should come forth 
 to light unharmed, presenting, as it were, a figure of the 
 Resurrection, in its own recovery ? and will not this satisfy 
 the strong language of the emperor's letter? Again, true 
 it is that Eusebius does not mention the existence of any 
 tradition of the erection of the temple, but this may be 
 for one of two reasons, either because there was no such 
 
 1 Theodoret alone makes her the 
 bearer of the second letters which fol- 
 lowed the recovery, i. xviii. 
 
 * See xlvii. ^Sij Se Kal Qijaavpiuv 
 l'iini\ihti>n irapel'xe TT\V eov<riav } XPn- 
 atiat KOTO trpoaipetrtv, K.T.\.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 165 
 
 tradition, or because its existence was so well known that 
 it was needless to mention it ; that it is asserted as a fact 
 does not prove that there was no tradition ; and it deserves 
 to be considered, whether it is likely that the emperor, 
 writing of his mere motion from a distance, would instruct 
 Macarius to demolish a certain idol temple, which he specifies, 
 and to clear away the very ground on which it was built, 
 for the express object of recovering the Holy Sepulchre, 
 without some warrant for believing that it did really exist 
 beneath that heap. And if any persons have such large 
 faith as to credit this, there will be yet another question 
 for their consideration, if they be Christians. It is this. 
 If English Christians after a lapse of three centuries can 
 point out the scenes of the sufferings of the martyrs of the 
 Reformation, e. g. in " Smithfield," London, and " before 
 Balliol College," Oxford, with no natural or artificial mo- 
 numents to mark the spots, can it be imagined that the 
 saints of the primitive church could forget in a shorter time 
 the place of HIS SUFFERINGS, so strikingly designated both 
 by the name and nature of the locality " The place of a 
 Skull," and the " Sepulchral Cave ?" If the idol fane 
 had not been erected over it, it seems quite impossible that 
 its situation should not be known to the native Christians : 
 if it had, it would, as we are assured it did, preserve the 
 memory of the sacred spot. 
 
 Many of the facts of the history have been anticipated 
 in this discussion, and others will be noticed hereafter. It 
 will be sufficient to remark, that in the year following that 
 in which the Nicene Council was held, the emperor found 
 himself at liberty to carry into execution the plan which 
 he had long before contemplated, and to which he had been 
 incited, as he was persuaded, by a Divine impulse. The 
 measures taken for the recovery of the Holy Cave sue-
 
 166 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 ceeded beyond all expectation, and no expense was spared 
 to render the church which was erected on the spot worthy 
 of the great event which it was designed to commemorate. 
 An unlimited discretion was left to the bishop, Macarius, for 
 the suitable adornment of the buildings. Workmen were 
 furnished by the president of the province and other im- 
 perial officers ; while the emperor himself took charge for 
 supplying such marbles and other materials as were judged 
 necessary ; and his thoughtful solicitude concerning the most 
 minute details marks the real and heartfelt interest with 
 which he engaged in the undertaking 1 . In the first year 
 of the building Macarius died, and was succeeded by Maximus, 
 who was a confessor in the last persecution 2 . 
 
 It does not seem necessary to enter into a particular 
 description of these buildings, which, unhappily, have been 
 long since demolished, but the following outline may be in- 
 teresting. This New Jerusalem is represented by the con- 
 temporary historian as being situated " over against" or 
 "opposite to the old city, which had been reduced to ruin 3 ," 
 and here was erected the trophy of our Saviour's victory 
 
 1 See his letter. Vita Constantini, 
 in. xxx xxxii. 
 
 * Sozomen, in. xx. Dositheus, n. 
 xi. 1, mentions from Alexander, that 
 he had suffered severe tortures, and 
 lost his right eye in the persecution. 
 This author mentions that Macarius 
 died in the 21st year of Constantine, 
 and that Maximus presided twenty- 
 three years. 
 
 3 Not in the ancient city, but dvrt- 
 x-pofftoTros TT; iraXaV TOUTTJ ax-riK^us, 
 V. C. in. xxxiii. Imitated by So- 
 crates and others. The ruins of the 
 ancient city would plainly shew its 
 extent in those days. Thus Sulpicius 
 
 Severus speaks of Jerusalem, at the 
 time of St Helena's visit, as " horrens 
 ruinis." and witnesses to her building 
 three churches m the places of the 
 Passion, Ascension, and Nativity, 
 Hist. Sac. 11. Even so late as St 
 Jerome's time it is thus spoken of : 
 " portus Sion, ... quas hodle cerni- 
 mus in favillam et cinerem dissolutas," 
 although he had said a little above, 
 "quae ab l'.\\i> postquam Hadriano, de 
 ruinis et cineribus in /Kliain suscitata 
 est." p. 86 ad Eustach. Epitaph. 
 Paula, Works, iv. Pt. 2, pp. 673, 4, 
 Ed. Bened.
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 167 
 
 over death. The first care was to adorn the Sacred Cave 
 itself with all imaginable splendour, as the head of the whole 
 work, and magnificent columns and other ornaments were 
 profusely lavished upon it. Immediately to the west of 
 the cave the rocky mountain presented an obstacle to the 
 erection of the buildings in that quarter 4 , so that the church 
 was necessarily placed east of the cave. The Basilica was 
 not united under one roof with the Sepulchre, as is the 
 present Greek church, which must however occupy part of 
 the site of Constantino's magnificent structure, which stood 
 in a spacious court inclosed with porticoes on three sides 
 and paved with polished marble 5 . The church itself was 
 as rich as gold could make it. It was entered by three 
 gates at the east, opposite to which was the place of the 
 holy table, in a recess built in the form of a hemisphere, 
 surrounded by columns with silver capitals, equal in number 
 to the apostles of our Lord 6 . A double cloister adorned 
 the church on either side. The grand entrance to the 
 court Was from the east ; and the Propyla3um was mag- 
 
 4 This is remarked by Dositheus. 
 *E)(ei o vaos TOW dyiou T(i<f>ov kafd 
 /j.ev TI}V Suariv, Kid TO elvai o/oos, fjiovov 
 TOV Tol\ov auTov, ii. i. 7. Which is 
 quite agreeable with fact and with the 
 testimony of Eusebius, who places the 
 Basilica of Constantine to the east of 
 the cave. Those who have visited 
 the convent of St Sabba, and remem- 
 ber the position of that saint's tomb 
 and the church, will understand the 
 arrangement of the sepulchre and 
 church at Jerusalem. I ha^e to thank 
 M. Mouravieff for the illustration. 
 
 5 The Atrium is described in xxxv. 
 
 6 xxxvi xxxix. The language of 
 Eusebius leaves no room to doubt that 
 
 the general rule of placing the Holy 
 Table to the east was departed from 
 in this instance. It was placed nearest 
 to the Holy Cave. This is not the 
 case in the present Greek church. It 
 is, as usual, at the east end. As the 
 B7jua in the church of St Sophia at 
 Constantinople was also in the form of 
 a hemisphere, (according to Procopius) 
 a sight of this has made the descrip- 
 tion of Eusebius much more intelli- 
 gible. It is a subject for deep' regret 
 that the treatise of Eusebius on the 
 church at Jerusalem, affixed to his life 
 of Constantine, has not been preserved. 
 See Vit. Const, iv. xlvi.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 nificently adorned in a manner calculated to excite the 
 admiration and curiosity of the pilgrim, as he approached 
 the sacred precincts 1 . - 
 
 The venerable Helena, who shares with her son the 
 glory of this undertaking, was not permitted to witness its 
 consummation. Soon after its prosperous commencement, 
 which she encouraged by her presence and forwarded by 
 her prayers, she had set out on her return to Nicomedia 2 . 
 Her whole progress was marked by acts becoming a Christian 
 empress. All who came within her reach experienced her 
 munificence; but especially the poor, the naked, the des- 
 titute, excited her sympathy, and were relieved by her 
 bountiful alms. She fed the hungry, covered the naked 
 with garments, set at liberty the captives, released convicts 
 from the mines, befriended the weak against their more 
 powerful oppressors, restored exiles to their homes and 
 families. Constant in her attendance at church, modest and 
 decent in her apparel, and exemplary in her deportment, 
 she scorned not to mix with the vulgar crowd in the mean- 
 est chapels of the poorest towns. Such was the person 
 whom modern Christians can pity and despise, whose name 
 they dare to cast out as evil, and to stigmatize in language 
 which it were a sin to repeat: nothing can excuse her 
 interest in the holy places, and her pious care for the houses 
 
 1 Dr Robinson seems to have en- 
 tirely mistaken the form of this edifice, 
 when he suppose* the hemisphere to 
 have been something in the shape of 
 "a semicircle in front of the whole 
 building," separate from it, and at 
 some distance towards the east. It is 
 evident that the hemisphere must have 
 formed part of the church, for it is 
 said to have reached to the top or 
 
 roof of the building. This could have 
 been nothing else than the apse, which 
 was usually called in this as well as 
 in other Greek churches, "the Hemi- 
 sphere," the upper part being of a 
 hemispherical form, and the lower 
 part lined with columns. Eusebius 
 does not say a Hemisphere, but TO 
 ilHi<Tij)aipiov, the Hemisphere. 
 
 2 XLIV. xlv.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 169 
 
 of God, which she everywhere beautified with splendid or- 
 naments. She was soon after taken to her rest, and mag- 
 nificently buried at Rome, from whence her remains were 
 transferred to Constantinople, and deposited in the Church 
 of the Apostles. 
 
 The Martyrium of the Resurrection was completed in 
 about ten years, and the dedication was kept on the tricen- 
 nalia of the emperor, in the year 336. He had summoned 
 a council at Tyre for the settlement of a controversy which 
 had arisen in Egypt, and he directed the prelates assembled 
 in that synod to adjourn to Jerusalem to assist at the 
 solemnity. The consequence was, that the festival was ho- 
 noured with the presence of a large company of the most 
 distinguished prelates, from all the provinces of the eastern 
 empire, and prayers, and praises, and divine discourses 
 suitable to the occasion, occupied the assembled multitude. 
 The consecration was attended by other and not less ac- 
 ceptable sacrifices. Marianus, a tried and highly valued 
 servant of the emperor, had been sent on this occasion to 
 represent his imperial master, and it was his care "to 
 distribute vast quantities of money and a great number of 
 garments amongst the indigent and naked, and amongst 
 an infinite multitude of poor of both sexes, who stood in 
 great need of food and other necessaries." How do these 
 examples of St Helena and her son sanction the oft- 
 repeated remark, that poor-laws were not required when 
 cathedrals and colleges and other religious houses were 
 built and endowed ! An age of unexampled destitution, 
 temporal and spiritual, scoffs at sacrifices which it wants 
 faith to imitate. 
 
 It would have been well if the Jerusalem Synod had 
 confined itself to the solemn services which attended the
 
 170 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 dedication of the church of the Holy Sepulchre, and had 
 not taken a step which the bishop was afterwards called upon 
 to retrace, not without some confusion and disgrace. The 
 object of the Council of Tyre had been to consider some 
 calumnious accusations which had been brought against the 
 great champion of the orthodox faith, by his busy enemies 1 . 
 St Athanasius had there appeared to answer to the charges ; 
 and God's providence had so ordered events that he was 
 enabled to confute them in the most triumphant manner; 
 but the opposite faction was too strong notwithstanding. The 
 truth was to prevail as usual by suffering ; its enemies were 
 to be confounded through their temporary success. The 
 bishop of Alexandria, seeing little chance of a just decision 
 where his accusers were to be his judges, after a solemn pro- 
 test against the proceedings withdrew to Constantinople, and 
 laid his appeal before the emperor, who was unhappily 
 swayed by an influence in the wrong direction*. The re- 
 sult was, that the catholic Doctor was banished in disgrace 
 to Treves, in Gaul ; the heretical leader received with dis- 
 tinction at the imperial court 3 . Meanwhile the Jerusalem 
 Synod was prevailed upon by misrepresentation to admit 
 to communion either the heresiarch himself, or a name- 
 sake and disciple 4 ; while the blessed Athanasius was un- 
 
 1 Socrates, H. E. i. xxviii. &c. 
 
 8 Ib. xxv. &c. 
 
 :| xxxv. xxxvii. The banishment 
 of St Athanasius is represented by 
 Constantine the younger as an act of 
 mercy on the part of his father, to 
 deliver the bishop out of his enemies' 
 hands, who sought his life. Socrates, 
 n. Hi. He adds, further, -that it had 
 been his father's intention to recal him, 
 
 but he was prevented by death. The 
 latter statement may be true, the former 
 seems scarcely reconcilable with other 
 facts. 
 
 4 It is difficult to imagine that this 
 Arius was not the arch-heretic. But 
 Valesius denies it ; and thinks that he 
 died long before. See note on Socrates, 
 i. xxxiii. and the treatise there referred 
 to.
 
 CH. Ill 
 
 I 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 J71 
 
 justly condemned and deposed 9 . He was not re-admitted 
 to communion with this church until after his third expul- 
 sion from his diocese, when on his return to Egypt armed 
 with the imperial letters, he passed through Palestine, and 
 was restored by a Synod assembled expressly for that 
 object 6 . Indeed, the bishop of Jerusalem had long since dis- 
 covered the fraud which had induced him to subscribe the 
 condemnation of that holy man, and so bitterly did he re- 
 pent of the part he had taken against him, that he refused 
 to be present, in person or by deputy, at the Council of 
 Antioch summoned by Eusebius, who had been lately trans- 
 lated from Nicomedia to Constantinople, and was using all 
 the influence which he possessed against the orthodox faith. 
 But the countenance which Maximus gave to St Athanasius 
 exposed him to the displeasure of the Arian party, which 
 was everywhere dominant in the East, through the oppo- 
 sition of the civil powers to the faith of the Catholic church 7 . 
 It was now his turn to suffer for the truth's sake 8 . 
 He was deposed from his episcopal dignity by Acacius, the 
 successor of Eusebius in the see of Caesarea 9 , who was en- 
 tirely devoted to the heterodox, as his predecessor the 
 historian is by some supposed to have been 10 ; Cyril was 
 appointed in his stead to the church of Jerusalem, but his 
 patron did not allow him to occupy it in peace. He had 
 been supposed to be more favourable to the impieties of 
 Arius than he proved to be, and owed his elevation to this 
 misconception of his real sentiments 11 . Yet it was some 
 
 5 So says St Athanasius himself. 
 De Synodis : JUCTO TO eopia-Qi)vat TOV 
 eTritrKOTTov TJJS 'A\6^aj/fi(Deas 'A6ai/a- 
 CTIOJ/, ypd(f>ovres oelv oexOrivai'Apfiuv' 
 K<fl TOIIS triii/ altTia. 
 
 6 Socrates, n. xxiv. 
 
 7 Socrates, n. viii. Sozomen, in. vi. 
 
 8 Soc. ibid, xxxviii. 
 
 9 iv. 
 
 10 See his defence by Socrates, n. 
 i. 
 
 11 Dositheus, u. xi. 2.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 years before that serious dispute arose between the two 
 prelates which led to his deposition. Its circumstances are 
 somewhat involved in obscurity 1 , but it appears to have 
 originated in the following manner. 
 
 During the prevalence of a grievous famine at Jeru- 
 salem, St Cyril had been constrained to dispose of some 
 of the furniture of the church, in order to supply the poor 
 with bread. Among other ornaments was a rich cloth for 
 the altar 2 , which the purchaser, a merchant, afterwards sold 
 to an actress, who wore it in public according to some 
 accounts, on the stage. The pious donor might reasonably 
 feel aggrieved at the profanation of his sacred gifts ; and 
 though the bishop was innocent of the sacrilege, an accu- 
 sation was preferred against him, and he was summoned 
 to Caesarea to answer to the charge. He refused to ap- 
 pear, and persisted in his contempt for two years. The 
 grounds for this contumacy are not stated. He evidently 
 interpreted the dignity reserved to the metropolitan see, by 
 the Council of Nicsea, by a different rule from its occupant ; 
 and probably regarded the summons as an uncanonical 
 infringement of the honour accorded to the bishop of ^Elia 
 by the same canon 3 . Besides which, Acacius had himself 
 been deposed from his episcopal dignity by a' council of 
 orthodox bishops at Sardica, and had retained his seat in 
 
 1 Socrates, n. xl. says that he does 
 not know the ground of the accusation 
 against Cyril. This seems to be sup- 
 plied by Sozomen, iv. xxvi., but he is 
 not clear. I endeavour to present a 
 connected and consistent narrative from 
 these two historians, aided by Theo- 
 doret, n. xxvi. 
 
 8 It was worthy of Acacius, to re- 
 present to Constantius that this was a 
 robe of cloth of gold presented by his 
 
 father to bishop IVf acarius, to be worn 
 at the administration of holy baptism. 
 Theodoret, xxvii., and compare Sozo- 
 men, 1. c. 
 
 3 'E'Treidtj a-vvt'ideia KeK/octTtj/ce, /cat 
 ira/oa'&xris dp^ala, co<rre TOV ev Al\ia 
 eTrirrKoirov Tj/uao-ttai, e\frio Tr\v O.KO- 
 \ovOelav Trj? Tt/i(j, TJJ Mr/T/oo-rroAei 
 mo^ovfjieuov TOV otKtiov aiu)/uaTo. 
 Can. Con. Nic. Z.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 173 
 
 defiance of their authority. St Cyril might not unreason- 
 ably question the competency of such a tribunal to take 
 cognizance of his offences. The irritating dispute concern- 
 ing supremacy was still further embittered by serious doc- 
 trinal differences, and in the end St Cyril was deposed by 
 the Metropolitan. He felt justified in appealing to a higher 
 court ; and although he has subjected himself to the charge 
 of departing from the ecclesiastical canon in this conformity 
 to the practice of secular suits, yet he was perhaps justi- 
 fied by the peculiar circumstances of the case ; and the 
 precedent was frequently followed in subsequent ages. He 
 submitted at least to the sentence pending the decision, 
 and withdrew first to Antioch, and afterwards to Tarsus, 
 where he was received into communion by the bishop 
 Silvanus, whose flock he edified by his wholesome dis- 
 courses; nor did the remonstrances made to Acacius, who 
 followed him even to Cilicia with his persecution, prevail to 
 silence him. 
 
 On the assembling of the Council of Seleucia, he pre- 
 sented himself there for trial, but his accusers, though 
 frequently summoned, refused to appear. He was accord- 
 ingly reinstated, and Acacius was, in his turn, deposed 
 for contempt. But the court-influence of the heretical 
 party overbore the decisions in favour of the orthodox, and 
 St Cyril was again driven fronr his see by the decree of 
 an Arian council, assembled by Acacius at Constantinople, 
 to which the emperor gave full effect 1 ; nor was he restored 
 until the accession of Julian, who, with feigned liberality, 
 reversed the persecuting edicts of his predecessor, and re- 
 called both the orthodox and Arian bishops from their 
 exile 5 . 
 
 4 Socrates, n. xlii. 
 
 5 He appears, from the interesting 
 
 story related by Theodoret, in. xv., 
 to have returned first to Antioch with
 
 174 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 Soon after his return to Jerusalem he was witness of 
 the impious endeavour to falsify the divine predictions, 
 the ill success and confusion of which he had from the 
 first foreseen and foretold with the greatest confidence 1 . 
 This design originated with the emperor, and was not the 
 least artful of his insidious endeavours to uproot the faith 
 of Christ. 
 
 The obstinacy of the Jews had involved them in fresh 
 troubles during the reign of Constantius*. They had risen 
 in arms at Diocesarea, or Sepphoris, in Galilee ; and it was 
 not until they had overrun the whole neighbourhood with 
 fire and sword, that they were subdued, and their city 
 completely demolished by the emperor's cousin Constantius 
 Gallus, the brother of Julian. 
 
 Meanwhile their rancour towards the Christians had 
 been no whit abated 3 by their misfortunes, nor by the re- 
 laxation of the severe laws through the clemency of Con- 
 stantine. This hostility so recommended them to the 
 apostate, as valuable allies in his attack on the Church, 
 that he was blinded to the certain consequences that must 
 have ensued on their national restoration, which he set 
 himself with all earnestness to effect. But with an especial 
 
 St Meletius, and thence to have come 
 to Jerusalem with the courageous young 
 confessor, from whose own mouth the 
 historian had the narrative. 
 
 1 TOT Sti o Ku/otXXos o TWV 'Itpo- 
 ao\vfi.tav 'ETTIO'/COTTOS r6 TOV irpo<jn'\Tov 
 AavttjX KO.TO. vovv eXanfidvev, oirep KOI 
 o X/oi<rr<h ev TO! ayiots EvayyeXioiy 
 eirta'f^pa.yiaaTO iroXXots 6e irpocXeyev 
 tos dpa vuv iJKei o Ktttpov, OT XiOos 
 tiri \i6ov OVK uv fievoi eis T&V vaov, 
 aXXa TO roD 2a>Tr;/oos \6yiov irXtj/aa)- 
 ()ia-t)Ti. Socr.-it. Hist. Eccl. in. xx. 
 
 2 Socrates, u. xxxiii. This revolt 
 is placed in A.D. 339, by Theophanes, 
 as quoted by Reland, Palest, p. 1000. 
 He adds that the Jews had murdered 
 many Greeks and Samaritans. 
 
 8 They are still called in Constan- 
 tino's letters to the churches, Euseb. 
 V. C. in. xviii., " that most hostile 
 multitude of the Jews." Mq&y tol- 
 vvv e<TT<o rjfjuv KOIVOV [ne-rd TOV c~)$i- 
 <TTOV TWV 'lovfitttiav o^Xou : and so 
 writes Sozomen.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 175 
 
 view to falsify the predictions of our Lord-, he encouraged 
 them to undertake the re-edification of the temple at Je- 
 rusalem, and further granted an immense sum from his 
 exchequer for the purpose 5 . His confidential friend Alypius 
 was set over the work ; an infinite quantity of materials 
 was prepared, timber and stones, and bricks and lime; 
 and the work was pressed forward by the zealous Alypius, 
 aided by the governor of the province 6 . The old foun- 
 dations were opened up, and the building about to commence, 
 when fearful balls of fire breaking forth with irresistible 
 and repeated violence from near the foundations, scorched 
 the workmen and drove them from the spot, until the 
 attempt was finally abandoned 7 . Other circumstances of 
 more minute detail are also related in connexion with this 
 extraordinary event 8 , but what has now been recorded rests 
 on the testimony of an unexceptionable witness, who seems 
 to have been providentially led to preserve the memory of 
 this impious attempt and its signal defeat 9 . " For were in- 
 fidelity itself, when it would evade the force of evidence, to 
 prescribe what qualities it expected in a faultless testimony, 
 
 4 Sozomen (v. xxii.) goes fully 
 into the motives. But as Bp. War- 
 burton says, " Christian writers are 
 unanimous" on this subject. Julian, 
 p. 385. See the quotations at the foot 
 of that page from St Gregory Nazian- 
 zene, Theodoret, Socrates, &c. 
 
 8 " Ambitiosum quondam apud 
 
 Hierosolymam templum instaurare 
 
 sumptibus cogitabat immodicis, nego- 
 tiumque maturandum Alypio dederat 
 Antiochensi, qui olim Britannias pro- 
 curaverat propraefectus." Ammianus 
 Marcellinus, xxm. i. 
 
 8 Socrates, HI. xx. " Rei fortiter 
 
 instaret Alypius, juvaretque provincise 
 rector." Amm. Mar. 1. c. 
 
 7 " Metuendi globi flammarum 
 prope fundamenta crebris assultibus 
 erumpentes, facere locum exustis ali- 
 quoties operantibus inaccessum : hoc- 
 que modo elemento destinatius repel- 
 lente cessavit inceptum." Ibid. 
 
 8 These have been collected by Mr 
 Newman. Essay on Miracles, clxxv., 
 et seq. A most interesting section, to 
 which the reader is referred. 
 
 9 Such is Bp. Warburton's view in 
 his admirable work on this subject. 
 Julian, p. 385.
 
 176 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 it could invent none but what might be found in the his- 
 torian here produced 1 ." 
 
 It was soon after this insane attempt that the apostate 
 lost his life in the Persian expedition by a dart from an 
 unknown hand, and in the hour of victory acknowledged 
 himself vanquished by "the Galilean" whom he had so 
 impiously defied 2 . He died in the 32nd year of his age, 
 having reigned only twenty months. 
 
 The accession of Jovian, and his avowed attachment 
 to the doctrines of the Church, excited the hopes of the 
 orthodox, which however were not destined to be realized. 
 He held the purple only seven months, and was succeeded 
 in the dignity by Valentinian, who associated his brother 
 Valens with himself in the imperial dignity. The former 
 undertook the management of the western, the latter of 
 the eastern provinces, which were again to endure the misery 
 of an Arian domination, while the other division, as before, 
 enjoyed tranquillity and repose under an orthodox govern- 
 ment 3 . 
 
 Whether St Cyril was again disturbed in the possession 
 of his see during these troublous times in which so many 
 of his brethren were driven into exile, does not appear. In 
 the reign of Theodosius he was present in the second general 
 council at Constantinople, where the heresy of Macedonius 
 
 1 In connexion with this the reader 
 may find it interesting and instructive 
 to compare Gibbon, Decline and Fall, 
 cap. xxiii., and Mosheim, Ant. iv. 
 Part I. cap. i. sect. 14, with Dr Robin, 
 son, Bib. Res. ii. p. 19. The qualifi- 
 cations of Ammianus Marcellinus are 
 well summed up by the author of Ju- 
 lian, 1. c. 
 
 * 'E/ceti/oj/ Be yi >t>u<rl ca'/xf I/OP TtjV 
 
 af/ia-ros, /cat TOVTO pi\l/at eis T&V 
 depa /cat </>ai/at, Me i/t/ojcras, FaXeXate. 
 Theod. in. xxv. This must, I pre- 
 sume, be one of the " calumnies" or 
 " legends" which, we are told, " may 
 now be silently despised :" at least by 
 such writers as Gibbon. Vol. iv. p. 
 203, n. 99. 
 
 3 Socrates, iv. ii., &c.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 177 
 
 was condemned, and the Nicene faith reasserted by general 
 consent 4 . In the eighth year of this reign he died, be- 
 queathing to the church a precious legacy of orthodox 
 doctrine, in his admirable catechetical lectures, which toge- 
 ther with his sufferings for the maintenance of the faith 
 therein expounded, have entitled him to canonization as a 
 confessor and doctor of the church. 
 
 No notice has yet been taken of the luminous cross 
 which is said to have appeared in the heavens at the begin- 
 ning of St CyriTs presidency; but the story is too interesting 
 to be passed over in silence, and too well authenticated to 
 be lightly rejected as fabulous. The account is given in 
 a letter purporting to be written on this occasion by the 
 bishop of Jerusalem to the emperor Constantius, and is as 
 follows 5 : " During the holy days of Pentecost 6 , at the 
 third hour of the day, in the second year of his epi- 
 scopate, (May 7th, 351), there appeared a luminous cross 
 of enormous dimensions over the holy Golgotha, extending 
 even to the Mount of Olives 7 : it was extremely brilliant, 
 surpassing the light of the sun ; and was seen not by one 
 or two individuals, but by the whole city. It was no 
 passing phenomenon, but continued visible for several hours. 
 The effect on the believers was to inspire them with fear 
 
 4 Ibid. v. viii. The historian here 
 says that St Cyril had retracted and 
 assented to the " Homoousian" Creed. 
 But the time of his retractation does 
 not appear. It is evident from his 
 writings that he avoided the word, as 
 did many orthodox fathers. It is of 
 course no proof that he denied the 
 doctrine involved in it. Dositheus 
 defends his orthodoxy from imputa- 
 tion, ii. xi. 2. 
 
 5 Vid. Sti. Cyrilli Epist. ad Const. 
 
 12 
 
 ch. iv. ; and on the genuineness of the 
 letter, the authorities referred to in 
 Mr Newman's Essay, cxlviii. n. o. I 
 adopt his words in the text. 
 
 8 Fleury remarks that this ex- 
 pression does not signify the days 
 following Whit-sunday, but the in- 
 terval between Easter and Pentecost, 
 according to the then mode of reckoning. 
 Histoire, Lib. xui. cap. v. 
 
 7 It is said to have been five stadia 
 in length, and of proportionate width.
 
 178 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 'ART I. 
 
 mingled with joy : the churches were thronged not only by 
 Christian worshippers, but by Jewish and heathen candidates 
 for the sacrament of initiation, convinced of the truth of 
 the church's faith by this symbol of their salvation in the 
 heavens." Men are very inadequate judges of the secret 
 purposes of the Almighty, albeit they do take upon them- 
 selves to determine with some confidence under what 
 circumstances He shall manifestly interfere with the order 
 of the universe which His wisdom has been pleased to es- 
 tablish ; as if it were not far more rational, not to say 
 more reverent, to expect that in the depths of His counsels 
 some occasions might be found which we are wholly incom- 
 petent to appreciate. Without pretending then to fathom 
 the reasons of this phenomenon, a word may be said of the 
 historical evidence, which it is properly within the province 
 of human reason to estimate and examine. 
 
 The genuineness of St Cyril's letter has been questioned 
 by later critics, though without good reason ; for the story 
 does not rest exclusively on his testimony, but is supported 
 by all the evidence that any occurrence of that date can 
 be expected to shew. It is recorded not only by three 
 historians 1 , the general credibility of whose narratives is 
 universally admitted, but it is further noted in two ancient 
 chronicles 2 . The variations of these writers are exactly such 
 
 1 Socrates, 11. 28, apud fin.; Sozo- 
 men, iv. 5 ; Philostorgius apud Pho- 
 tium, in. 2ti. The narrative of Sozo- 
 men (A.D. 440) agrees entirely with 
 that of St Cyril given above, to whose 
 letter he refers. Socrates, writing at 
 the same time, is more brief and ob- 
 scure. He says that the sign appeared 
 in the east, when Constantius was en- 
 tering Antioch, but leaves it uncertain 
 
 to whom it appeared. Philostorgius 
 says that it appeared at Jerusalem, and 
 was seen by the conflicting armies of 
 Constantius and Magnentius, and adds, 
 that the cross was surrounded by a 
 rainbow. 
 
 2 The Chronicle of Idacius says 
 that this took place on the 3rd of the 
 calends of February, on the 28th of the 
 month, but the Alexandrian Chronicle,
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 179 
 
 as would indicate that their information was derived from 
 independent sources, and so would serve to corroborate, 
 rather than to invalidate, the proof of the main outline of 
 the history 3 . 
 
 St Cyril was succeeded in the episcopate of the church 
 at Jerusalem by John, the second of that name, who is 
 chiefly known to history by the representations of Epipha- 
 nius and St Jerome 4 , with whom he was at variance on 
 points both of discipline and of faith. It is no pleasing task 
 to expose the infirmities of great and good men, as were 
 the venerable bishop of Cyprus and the learned monk of 
 Bethlehem; but an impartial judge can scarcely fail to de- 
 termine, even from their own writings, that the bishop of 
 Jerusalem was treated by them with less consideration than 
 was due to his office. Indeed, the first act of hostility ap- 
 pears to have been a clear invasion of his diocesan juris- 
 diction, unjustifiable by the ancient canons, which had deter- 
 mined the limits of such authority. This was the ordination 
 of St Jerome's brother Paulianus, for the service of the 
 monastery at Bethlehem. This ordination was performed by 
 Epiphanius, then on a visit in the country, in a convent 
 situated within the diocese of Eleutheropolis, which was the 
 bishop's defence, when accused of a violation of the canon 
 by John of Jerusalem. But the plea appears insufficient, 
 
 agreeably with St Cyril, &c., refers it i the east of that town. In the year pre- 
 
 to the nones of May, about the day of 
 Pentecost. See Valesii Annot. in So- 
 crat. 1. c. 
 
 3 1 can as little explain or question 
 the fact, as 1 can the following. On 
 
 ceding, a dark cross was observed, for 
 many successive nights, in the heavens, 
 at Jerusalem, as if the part were void 
 of stars. I have both these from an 
 eyewitness of undoubted veracity and 
 
 the morning after the bombardment of sobriety. 
 
 Acre in the year 1839, before sun-rise, ! 4 For this controversy, see St Je- 
 coruscations, in the form of hierogly- rome's Letters, LX LXII. The first 
 phics, were seen by the crews of the | is a translation of Epiphanius. 
 English vessels over the mountains to ' 
 
 122
 
 180 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 insomuch as Bethlehem was within the limits of the latter 
 see at that period, and the services of the person ordained 
 were designated to that church. To this indeed it was re- 
 plied, that the Latin monks were not subject to the eastern 
 bishop l ; but an exemption so inconsistent with the peace 
 of the Church, as subsequent experience has fully proved, 
 was not recognized at that period; nor was it strange that 
 such an invasion of his diocesan rights should excite the 
 indignation of one of warm temperament, as John appears 
 to have been. 
 
 But although there seems to be little doubt that the 
 strife between the opposite parties was kindled by this act, 
 yet it was unquestionably much fomented by doctrinal dif- 
 ferences, on which St Jerome lays the greatest stress. But 
 his intemperance and evident want of candour towards his 
 adversary, hi this as in other cases, will dispose an im- 
 partial reader to believe that he has not the full case be- 
 fore him. John was suspected of the errors of Origen; 
 Epiphanius, in a sermon preached in the church of the Resur- 
 rection, not only opposed these errors, but reflected in a 
 marked and uncalled-for manner on the bishop, as though 
 he were involved in them. John, nettled, as was not un- 
 natural, at being thus dishonoured in his own cathedral 
 church, by a foreign bishop, present only by sufferance, 
 vindicated himself in a sermon wherein he proposed a sum- 
 mary of orthodox belief. He probably exhibited undue 
 warmth and violence in his gesture and address; but he 
 need not have deserved the imputation cast upon him by 
 
 1 " In monasterio fratrum, et fra- 
 truin peregrinorum qui provincia nihil 
 tuae deberent." Epiphanius, 1. c. This 
 seems to refer to Bethlehem, and to be 
 another plea from that urged by St 
 
 Jerome. The Benedictine editors deny 
 the genuineness of the last part of this 
 letter, which they find inconvenient : 
 one would feel disposed to suspect an 
 interpolation here.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 181 
 
 St Jerome, as if he had considered one discourse sufficient 
 for a full exposition of the Catholic faith. Indeed, the very 
 charge shews the spirit in which the controversy was carried 
 on ; nor can the bishop of Jerusalem be reasonably blamed 
 because he disputed the competency of a Latin presbyter, 
 who claimed exemption from his jurisdiction, to act on a 
 commission of enquiry into his orthodoxy ! On the whole, 
 although John's faith does not appear to have been free 
 from all admixture of the errors with which he was charged, 
 and although his sympathy with the heresiarch Pelagius at 
 a later period, is another blot upon his memory, yet the 
 terms of unqualified commendation in which he is mentioned 
 by several eminent contemporaries of unquestioned orthodoxy 2 , 
 allow us ground to hope that the most serious accusations 
 preferred against him were destitute of any solid founda- 
 tion 3 . 
 
 It will be unnecessary to follow in detail any further 
 the history of the church of Jerusalem, whose annals from 
 this period are chiefly occupied with pilgrimages and the 
 monastic lives of those numberless ascetics who had fixed 
 their residence in the neighbourhood of the Holy City. 
 Something however must be said on both these subjects. 
 
 From the period of its adornment by Constantino, Je- 
 rusalem had become, in a greater degree than before, an 
 object of religious attraction to all Christendom. It was not 
 to be expected that all the pilgrims would be actuated by 
 a spirit of true devotion : many would follow the prevailing 
 
 2 e. g. Anastasius of Rome and 
 St John Chrysostom, Theodoret, and 
 St Basil of Seleucia, may be likewise 
 mentioned. 
 
 3 He is charged with having coun- 
 tenanced or connived at the devStruction 
 
 of the monasteries at Bethlehem, by 
 the Pelagians. The interference of 
 Innocent the First, of Rome, on this 
 occasion, was a prelude to the ag- 
 gression of the Papacy of later times.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 fashion from motives of curiosity or the desire of diversion ; 
 and the spirit of the world and of the flesh would vitiate 
 and corrupt the morality of the city subject to a continual 
 influx of visitors of every description. The following pas- 
 sages from two celebrated fathers of the fourth century, will 
 shew how widely the abuse had spread, when they applied 
 all their eloquence to correct it. 
 
 St Gregory of Nyssa 1 , who had proceeded to Jerusalem 
 after the Council of Antioch, (A.D. 370), with the charitable 
 design of pacifying the churches, distracted by the Arian 
 controversy, had there witnessed the grievous scandals to 
 which the rage for pilgrimages had given occasion, and on 
 his return to his diocese he addressed a letter to a Cap- 
 padocian priest on this subject. He sets forth that the 
 sacred writings do not reckon a pilgrimage to Jerusalem 
 among the number of good works, and that such journeys 
 conduce not to virtue, and make nothing to heaven : that 
 purity and sanctity are required both of men and women, 
 which are best promoted by the study of wisdom in re- 
 tirement and solitude : that many duties are neglected in 
 the bustle and confusion of a hasty journey, which is espe- 
 cially dangerous to female modesty ; for extreme licentious- 
 ness prevails in many hostelries and cities of the East, which 
 corrupt the ears, the eyes, and the heart. If Jerusalem 
 were more enriched with grace than other countries, it 
 might be expected that its inhabitants should be less wicked ; 
 but, so far as he had observed, the very contrary was the 
 fact; there was no place more addicted to crimes of the 
 blackest dye. Why then, it might be asked, had he resorted 
 
 1 1 here follow Fleury, Ilistoire du 
 Chriiitifinisme, Lib. xvn. cap. xlix., 
 and Poujoulat'st Ilistoire de Jerusalem, 
 
 Vol. in. p. /. The letter is contained 
 in Vol. ii. of St Gregory's works.
 
 CH. HI.] THE HOLY CITY. 183 
 
 thither ? To reform the churches of Arabia, and to con- 
 verse with the chiefs of the holy churches of Jerusalem. 
 But the journey had been conducted without neglect of 
 religious duties, and was not necessary for the increase 
 of his faith. Before he saw Bethlehem he believed that 
 the Son of God had assumed flesh in the womb of a 
 virgin ; he believed the resurrection before he saw the Holy 
 Sepulchre ; and confessed the glorious ascension before he 
 saluted the Mount of Olives. One only thing he had learnt 
 on the journey, that his own country was far more holy 
 than foreign lands. It is not by change of clime that we 
 shall come to God, but rather He will come to us, where- 
 soever we be, if our soul be made meet for His habitation ; 
 while, on the contrary, if with hearts full of iniquity we 
 fly to Golgotha, to Mount Olivet, or the Holy Sepulchre, 
 we shall still be as far from Christ as though we had never 
 known the principles of the faith. "My friend," he con- 
 cludes, "persuade your brethren not to quit Cappadocia 
 for Jerusalem, but to go out of their bodies, that they may 
 be joined to the Lord The Divine Spirit 'bloweth where 
 it listeth,' and they who exercise firm faith shall partake 
 of the gifts of grace according to the measure of faith, and 
 not by a visit to Jerusalem." 
 
 And is this really one of those ancient doctors who 
 are so frequently and freely charged with superstitious igno- 
 rance for their veneration for the sacred localities, and who, 
 it is represented, took such pains to palm upon others the in- 
 ventions of their own imagination, for filthy lucre's sake ? But 
 it may be supposed that St Gregory of Nyssa was in ad- 
 vance of his age, and was animated by a more genuine spirit 
 of devotion than his colleagues. St Jerome, the translator 
 of the Onomasticon, the historian of the pilgrimage of St 
 Paula, will be adduced as an instance of doating superstition
 
 184" THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 in the seclusion of his cave at Bethlehem. But even he 
 may claim to be heard before he is condemned; and his 
 letter to Paulinus 1 will not unaptly follow the above ex- 
 tract from the eastern father : " The city to be sought 
 after and extolled is not that which killed the prophets and 
 shed the blood of Christ, but that which is made glad by 
 the streams of the river, that which is set upon an hill, 
 and cannot be hid ; that which the apostle calls the mother 
 of the saints, in which he glories to be a fellow-citizen 
 with the righteous....! dare not confine the Omnipotence 
 of God in so narrow a boundary, nor limit within a certain 
 district Him whom the heavens cannot contain. Believers 
 will be weighed, not by diversity of clime, but by their 
 measure of faith ; and the true worshippers worship the 
 Father neither at Jerusalem nor yet on Mount Gerizim; 
 for ' God is a Spirit, and they that worship hi.pi must 
 worship him in spirit and in trnth.' ' The wind bloweth 
 where it listeth.' ' The earth is the Lord's, and the ful- 
 ness thereof.' After that the fleece of Judaea was dry, and 
 the whole world sprinkled with the heavenly dew, and 
 many have come from the east and from the west, and 
 kid down in Abraham's bosom ; from thenceforth God is no 
 more known in Jewry only ; His name is great not in Is- 
 rael alone ; but the voice of the apostles has gone forth 
 into all the earth, and then* words into the ends of the 
 world. The place of the cross and of the resurrection 
 may be profitable to those who take up their cross daily, 
 and rise with Christ, and shew themselves meet for such 
 an habitation ; but for those who say, ' The temple of 
 the Lord, the temple of the Lord,' they must be re- 
 
 1 Sti. Ilieronymi Epist. No. XMX. Opera, Vol. iv. Part 11. pp. 503, 4. 
 Edit. Bencd.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 185 
 
 minded of the apostle's words, ' Ye are the temple of the 
 Lord, and the Holy Spirit dwelleth in you.' An entrance 
 into the kingdom of heaven is open equally from Britain 
 as from Jerusalem; for 'the kingdom of God is within 
 you/" 
 
 Much more to the same effect follows, which it will be 
 unnecessary to quote. What is here given may suffice to 
 prove how very unjust are the insinuations of many modern 
 writers against the fathers of that age how little they 
 understand or appreciate the spirit by which they were 
 influenced. But it should by all means be added, that the 
 whole object of the epistle is to dissuade his friend from 
 removing to Jerusalem, and that the argument which he 
 most strongly urges, and which he appears to know would 
 have the greatest weight is this, that a city crowded, as 
 this now was, by a mixed multitude of both sexes, from 
 all parts of the world, and exhibiting, as did other cities, 
 all that could minister to vanity and folly and sin, all that 
 would serve to counteract the hallowed influences of sacred 
 associations, was not a place best calculated to promote his 
 spiritual advancement, and to draw his heart from earth 
 to heaven. 
 
 Surely such passages as these, which are but specimens 
 of innumerable others of like import, will serve to shew 
 that lights as weh 1 as shades can be found to rest on the 
 monastic cell of St Jerome, and may encourage the hope 
 that the same may have been the case with those thousands 
 of unknown recluses, who, amid the confusion of the period 
 at which we have now arrived, betook themselves to the 
 deserts and caves of Palestine, to prepare for the coming 
 of the day of Christ, which all around betokened to be 
 near at hand. At the same time, a very slight acquaint-
 
 186 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 TpART 
 
 ance with the lives of these solitaries will suffice to prove 
 that there was something radically wrong in the ascetic 
 discipline as practised by them, which it would be instructive 
 to investigate and serviceable to expose. The duty and 
 benefit of such exterior bodily discipline as the Bible en- 
 joins and the Church directs, with a view to interior self- 
 government, will be denied by none who have fairly tried 
 it ; but the view of these ascetics seems to mistake the body 
 for the flesh forgetting that the flesh is the carnal mind, 
 not the earthly vessel, and that apostolic asceticism had re- 
 spect to the will and conscience, not to bodily infirmities 
 and needs'. To spite the body is not to rule it; and its 
 vicious and excessive appetites may be mortified without 
 denying its natural and lawful demands. The aim there- 
 fore to macerate the earthen vessel, and the excessive attri- 
 bution of sanctity to the practice, which forms the essence 
 and foundation of their system, can scarcely be too strongly 
 condemned, as tending to the subversion of Christian liberty 
 and sobriety, to an unhealthy tone of feeling, and to a for- 
 getfulness of the cardinal truths that Christian circumcision 
 is " circumcision of the heart ;" and that " to be spiritually- 
 minded is life and peace." 
 
 There is, however, a great debt of gratitude due to the 
 most eminent recluses of Palestine for important services 
 rendered to the Church, which it were ungrateful not to 
 acknowledge ; namely, the firm uncompromising maintenance 
 of the orthodox faith, when its natural champions were 
 
 1 Acts xxiv. 10 : " Herein do I ex- 
 ercise myself (dtTKtu), to have always a 
 conscience void of offence," &c. : the 
 only passage where the word occurs in 
 the New Testament. The friend who 
 
 will recognize the observations in the 
 text as his own, will, I hope, pardon 
 me for borrowing his language to ex- 
 press sentiments common to us both.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 187 
 
 silenced for their fidelity. Two remarkable instances of this 
 may serve to exhibit the position of the Church at Jerusalem 
 in the fifth and sixth centuries 2 . 
 
 John was succeeded in the episcopal dignity by Praylus, 
 whose mild presidency was marked by natural convulsions, 
 which recalled the times of the apostate Julian. He was 
 followed by Juvenal, who occupied the chair of St James 
 for many years, and took an active part in the great 
 questions which agitated the Church at that period. He 
 was present at the third Ecumenical Council, where he 
 warmly seconded St Cyril of Alexandria, in his opposition 
 to the heresy of Nestorius ; his excessive abhorrence of 
 which drove him for a time into the opposite extreme 
 of Eutychian error. He was even present at the " Synod 
 of Robbers," assembled by Dioscorus, at Ephesus, and aided 
 by his countenance to lend authority to proceedings which 
 the Church could not confirm. Being soon convinced of 
 his error, and reconciled to the Church at the Council of 
 Chalcedon, he was shortly called to witness the sincerity 
 of his repentance by confessorship for the truth. The ca- 
 tholic doctrine of the two Natures in the one Person of 
 our adorable Saviour, which had been fully established in 
 the third and fourth General Councils, is matter for faith, 
 not for reason, and therefore, like other doctrines of re- 
 velation, unpalatable to the carnally wise. On his return 
 
 2 In the absence of original autho- 
 rities, I am glad to avail myself here 
 of Vies des Peres des Deserts d'O- 
 rient, &c. par le R. P. Michael-Ange 
 Marin ; Histoire de Jerusalem, &c. 
 par M. Poujoulat; and another by 
 M. Mouravieft', written in Russ, and 
 put within my reach by the great kind- 
 ness of my friend the Rev. R. W. 
 
 Blackmore, (the translator of the " His- 
 tory of the Russian Church," by the 
 same author,) to whom I shall be 
 further indebted in subsequent parts 
 of the present volume. The original 
 authority chiefly consulted by the first 
 of these writers is the monk Cyril, the 
 contemporary biographer of St Euthy- 
 mius and St Saba.
 
 188 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 from the Council of Chalcedon, the patriarch Juvenal found 
 that the minds of his people had been alienated from himself, 
 and from the doctrine in favour of which he had there declared, 
 by the artifices of a monk of evil repute, named Theodosius, 
 who had represented the decisions of the fathers of Chal- 
 cedon as at variance with those of the Council of Ephesus. 
 He had succeeded in drawing over to his party the Empress 
 Eudocia, who, after the death of her husband Theodosius 
 the younger, had retired to Jerusalem, and her influence had 
 enlisted on his side a large number of partizans. Juvenal 
 was glad to escape with his life to Constantinople ; the 
 monk procured his own election to the vacant see ; and then 
 sought to establish himself in his usurped authority by the 
 countenance of that great and good man, who at that time 
 governed the monastic colleges of the deserts of Palestine. 
 This was St Euthymius, with whom neither flattery nor 
 threats could avail to shake the constancy of his profession, 
 nor to recognize as rightful bishop the heretic who had 
 stained his hands with innocent blood. He even exhorted 
 the superiors of the monasteries to withdraw from his schis- 
 matical communion, and himself set the example, by retiring 
 to the desert until the pseudo-patriarch was expelled through 
 the interference of the civil power. It would have been 
 well if the moderation of the Emperor Marcian on this oc- 
 casion had been more commonly imitated ; and it is pleasing 
 to know that he had been persuaded to milder counsels 
 than he would otherwise have adopted, by the intercession 
 of the injured patriarch. The imperial rescript addressed 
 to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, while it deprecates com- 
 pulsory subscription to the orthodox confession, or any 
 attempt to reduce the wanderers to the way of truth by 
 menaces or the sword, declares the emperor's determination 
 to support the orthodox faith, and to remove the scandal
 
 CH. III.] THK HOLY CITY. 1 89 
 
 which the violence of Theodosius had occasioned. The 
 rightful patriarch was restored after an absence of twenty 
 months. But the degradation of the heretical bishops who 
 had been consecrated in the interim, and the encyclical 
 letter of an orthodox synod, convoked by Juvenal, would 
 not have secured the peace of the Church, had not the 
 Empress Eudocia, softened by domestic afflictions, been re- 
 stored to the truth by the earnest persuasion of Euthymius, 
 to whom she was referred by the celebrated Stylite of 
 Antioch. Her return to the orthodox communion influenced 
 a numerous party, and led to the temporary re-establishment 
 of peace in the distracted Church ; the disaffected withdraw- 
 ing to two monasteries, which they founded for themselves, 
 on the independent principle, at Bethlehem and Tekoa. 
 During the short remainder of her life the munificent Eu- 
 docia devoted her wealth to works of piety and charity in 
 Jerusalem, where she founded churches 1 and monasteries 
 and almshouses, and rebuilt the wall of the city 2 . On 
 her death her remains were deposited in the large church 
 of St Stephen the Deacon, which she had erected on the 
 supposed site of the death or burial of the protomartyr, a 
 furlong distant from the walls, on the north of the city. 
 
 Anastasius, the immediate successor of Juvenal, was dis- 
 turbed in the possession of the patriarchal dignity by the 
 monk Gerontius, who was in his turn degraded on the acces- 
 sion of the orthodox emperor Zenon. Martyrius, a disciple 
 of the great Euthymius, was next elected to the vacant chair, 
 which he occupied eight years, and was followed by Sallustius 
 
 1 M. Mouravieffsays : " The beau- 
 tifying of the cathedral church at Beth- 
 lehem is ascribed to her, and it is not 
 improbable that she also erected the 
 grotto of Gethsemane. We may gene- 
 
 rally refer to her all those buildings 
 that have been inconsiderately ascribed 
 to the Empress Helena." Cap. ix. 
 Vol. i. 142. 
 
 3 Evagrius, H. E. i. xxii.
 
 190 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 for seven years. On his death, Elias, another disciple of 
 Euthymius, was promoted, during whose presidency the Euty- 
 chian storm, which had been only lulled for a time, burst out 
 again with increased violence. During his occupation of the 
 throne he actively promoted monasticism in and about Je- 
 rusalem, and undertook the erection of several churches, 
 among which the Church of the Purification, now the Mosk 
 of Aksa, apparently owes its commencement to him 1 . He 
 was interrupted in his undertakings by a sentence of banish- 
 ment, for refusing to receive the synodal letters of Severus, 
 a Eutychian monk, who had intruded into the see of Antioch, 
 and was countenanced in his usurpation by the emperor Ana- 
 stasius. He died in exile at Ailah (Elath) on the Red Sea 2 . 
 
 But the designs of the heretics were signally defeated by 
 the firmness of St Saba, who had even succeeded, for a time, 
 in allaying the emperor's displeasure against the orthodox 
 patriarch. This celebrated abbot, whose memory is still 
 preserved by the monastery which he founded in the wild- 
 est part of the rocky desert, to the west of the Dead Sea, 
 was no sooner informed that the envoys of Severus had 
 arrived with an armed force at Jerusalem to compel Elias to 
 receive his letters, than he hastened to the city, where 
 having convoked several superiors and monks with the people 
 of Jerusalem to the Church of Calvary, he publicly anathe- 
 matized Severus and all who would communicate with him, 
 even in the presence of the officers and soldiers who had 
 been sent to enforce the imperial mandate. Subsequently, 
 on the banishment of Elias, and the substitution of John, 
 
 1 The church was completed and 
 the whole design enlarged by the ad- 
 dition of hospitals, &c. by the Emperor 
 Justinian, at the instigation of St Saba ; 
 and will demand a full notice in the 
 
 Second Part of this volume. There can, 
 I think, be no doubt of their identity. 
 3 For this city, see Robinson's Bib. 
 Res. i. 250, &c.
 
 CH. III. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 191 
 
 who had pledged himself to embrace the Eutychian heresy, 
 the holy abbot prevailed so far as to alter his determination, 
 and persuaded him to retract his wicked promise. This was 
 no sooner reported to the emperor than he sent an officer 
 named Anastasius to Jerusalem, and the patriarch was thrown 
 into the public prison. Being released shortly after, he im- 
 mediately sent to St Saba to inform him of the position of 
 affairs, and assistance was promptly supplied : ten thousand 
 monks from various monasteries hastened to the city, where 
 they assembled in the church of St Stephen, the cathedral 
 church of the Resurrection being incapable of receiving so vast 
 a multitude. Here, in the presence of the imperial officers 
 and of the Christian congregation, the patriarch ascended 
 the ambon, supported on one side by St Saba, the superior 
 of the Anchorites, and on the other by Theodosius, the chief 
 of the Cenobites, and amid the acclamations of the people the 
 three fathers with one voice anathematized JSestorius, Euty- 
 ches, and Severus of Antioch, and all who refused to receive 
 the decisions of the Council of Chalcedon. These proceedings 
 served but to irritate the emperor, whose resentment would 
 have been felt by the three champions, had he not been de- 
 terred from more violent measures by a firm though respect- 
 ful remonstrance of the whole body of monks 3 . They thus 
 succeeded in maintaining the orthodoxy of the patriarchal see 
 of Jerusalem, until the accession of Justin relieved the Church 
 from the tyranny of an heretical emperor ; but the Mono- 
 physite controversy has been a fruitful source of discord in 
 the eastern churches from that time until the present day. 
 
 The revival of the errors of Origen at this period added 
 to the confusion of Palestine in the sixth century 4 ; but the 
 
 3 Great part of this interesting me- 
 morial to the Emperor Anastasius is 
 given by M. Marin, Vies des Peres, 
 
 Lib. vn. cap. xix. 
 
 4 For these troubles see Fleury's 
 Hist. Eccl. Lib. xxxm. lii. and liii.
 
 192 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 annals of the Holy City furnish little of public interest or 
 importance, except a synod assembled by the patriarch Peter, 
 at the instigation of his brethren of Rome and Constantinople, 
 in which the decrees of the fifth Ecumenical Council were con- 
 firmed, and the prevailing errors condemned with great una- 
 nimity, by the bishops of the three Palestines 1 . 
 
 At the commencement of the seventh century a cloud 
 gathered over the church of Jerusalem, which was to prove 
 a forerunner of the thick darkness which shortly after fell 
 upon it, and has enveloped it during that long night through 
 which the light has scarcely glimmered in her candlestick. 
 
 By the victorious career of Chosroes the Second, from 
 the banks of the Tigris to the Hellespont and the Nile, the 
 limits of the Persian kingdom were for a time extended as 
 far west as in the days of its ancient renown, and Judaea 
 again owned the dominion of a Magian monarch 2 . Jeru- 
 salem was taken, apparently without a struggle, when the 
 usual horrors attendant on the sacking of a city by a bar- 
 barian army were enhanced by the malice of the Jews, 
 who to the number of 26,000 had followed the Persians 
 from Galilee, to gratify their vengeance by the massacre 
 of the Christians, and the demolition of their most sacred 
 churches. They were amply glutted with blood : no fewer 
 than 90,000 of both sexes, and of all ages and conditions, 
 fell victims to their indiscriminating hatred. The churches 
 of Gethscmane, and that erected by the Empress Helena on 
 Mount Olivet, being without the walls, first became a prey to 
 their fury : then the Basilica of Constantine, the churches of 
 
 1 For the authorities and a general 
 view of the condition of Jerusalem 
 during the sixth century, the reader 
 may consult the "Biblical" Research- 
 es, Vol. ii. pp. 2633. 
 
 3 For the expedition of Chosroes the 
 English reader may consult Gibbon, 
 Decline and Fall, cap. xlvi. I follow 
 Eutychii Annales, p. 213, not having 
 the contemporary writers within reach.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 193 
 
 Calvary and of the Holy Sepulchre were demolished, the 
 last two being burnt to the ground. 
 
 The greater part of the city was also destroyed. The 
 sacred vessels 3 and other treasures, accumulated in the 
 churches, which had attracted the avarice of Nushirvan 4 , 
 were transferred to the coffers of his grandson; and the 
 patriarch Zacharias, with numerous other captives, accompa- 
 nied the wood of the true Cross in its journey to the distant 
 capital of the conqueror. 
 
 But the providence of God had prepared a home and a 
 friend for the exiled patriarch in the land of strangers. He 
 was redeemed and entertained, with many of his flock, in the 
 house of the Christian consort of Chosroes, the daughter of 
 the Emperor Maurice 5 , who also guarded the sacred Cross 
 against the desecration to which it might have been exposed 
 from the zeal of the idolaters. Zacharias ended his days in 
 the land of his captivity, and the widowed church continued 
 for fifteen years without a head 6 . 
 
 Meanwhile its desolations had awakened the commisera- 
 tion and excited the zeal of Modestus, superior of the monas- 
 tery of Theodosius, who travelled throughout Palestine and 
 Syria to collect funds for the restoration of the sacred 
 buildings. He was warmly seconded in his pious under- 
 taking by the bountiful assistance of John the alms-giver 7 , 
 
 3 Among these were the sacred ves- 
 sels of the Jewish temple, captured by 
 Titus, and subsequently by Genseric, 
 and restored to Jerusalem by Justinian 
 after their recovery by Belisarius. See 
 above, cap. ii. 
 
 4 Procopius de Bell. Pers. Lib. n. 
 cap. xx. The expedition of Belisa- 
 rius forced him to retreat over the Eu- 
 phrates, before he could execute his 
 design. 
 
 5 So says Eutychius, p. 215, who 
 
 13 
 
 calls her Mary ; other writers give her 
 name as Sira. Gibbon, 1. c. n. 111. 
 
 6 Eutych, 1. c. Other writers make 
 Zecharias return to Jerusalem. See 
 Fleury, Lib. xxxvn. cap. xxxiv. 
 
 7 The enumeration of the gifts is 
 interesting, as characteristic of the 
 times and of the worthy patriarch's 
 bounty. They consisted of 1000 pieces 
 of gold, 1000 pounds of iron, 1000 
 sacks of wheat, the same of pulse, 
 1000 barrels of dried fish, as many
 
 194 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 patriarch of Antioch, who had already most liberally re- 
 ceived and entertained such of the inhabitants of Jerusalem 
 as had succeeded in effecting their escape from the swords of 
 the Persians and Jews. 
 
 But the principal treasure of the church of Jerusalem 
 still remained in the power of the fire-worshippers, nor was 
 it recovered until the last . of those glorious campaigns in 
 which the Emperor Heraclius rolled back the tide of war into 
 the heart of the Persian kingdom, and humbled the pride of 
 the haughty Chosroes 1 . The year after his well-earned 
 triumph at Constantinople, the Christian emperor repaired in 
 person to Jerusalem, carrying with him the true cross, which 
 had remained inviolate during the captivity, the seals of the 
 chest in which it was contained having continued unbroken. 
 On the 14th of September, A. D. 629, a day still marked in 
 the English calendar, and whose anniversary is celebrated 
 with especial solemnity in other churches of the west and 
 east, Heraclius, having laid aside his royal apparel, entered 
 the gates of the Holy City, clothed in mean garments, and 
 barefoot, carrying on his shoulder the precious wood on 
 which the World's Redemption had been accomplished. It 
 is only consistent in an infidel to sneer at the spectacle of 
 the victorious hero of the Persian war bowing his neck to 
 the yoke of the crucified * ; but the last appearance of an 
 emperor of the east in the Holy City, which was soon to be 
 wrested from his dominions for ever, might have been con- 
 
 skins of wine, 1000 Egyptian labour- 
 ers, accompanied with a modest letter, 
 asking pardon for sending nothing 
 worthy of his Lord, and expressing 
 his desire himself to come and assist 
 as a common mason in the restoration. 
 Eutych. Ann. n. p. 218. Fleury, 
 xxxvin. xi. Modestus, who was cal- 
 led a second Bezaleel, or Zerubbabel, 
 
 Heraclius, Eutych. Ann. n. p. 249. 
 He only occupied the see nine months, 
 and on his death it remained vacant 
 six years, until the appointment of 
 Sophronius. 
 
 1 Gibbon's Decline and Fall, cap. 
 xlvi. 
 
 2 See a truly characteristic passage 
 in Gibbon, 1. c. near the end of the 
 
 was afterwards appointed Patriarch by ' chapter.
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 195 
 
 templated with satisfaction by the believer, had he not sullied 
 the triumph of his self-abasement by a sanguinary retaliation 
 on the Jews, to which he was instigated by the fears or by 
 the fury of the Christians, who had been threatened with 
 extermination in a conspiracy of that fanatical people, which 
 was happily detected in time to prevent the execution of their 
 terrible purpose 3 . This had occurred at a time when the 
 danger which threatened the capital had left Palestine unpro- 
 tected; but however this new evidence of their relentless 
 spirit of animosity against the Christians might have jus- 
 tified severe precautionary measures against the Jews, it 
 could not palliate nor excuse the vindictive massacre or dis- 
 persion of the whole people ; the guilt of which was enhanced 
 by the additional crime of perjury, for which the fastings of 
 the Greeks could ill atone 4 . The spirit exhibited on this 
 occasion too clearly proves that the heavy chastisement in- 
 flicted by the Persians had not accomplished its work on 
 the church of Jerusalem, and another furnace was prepared 
 for its debased gold, in which we may hope that the pro- 
 cess of purification is still going forward. 
 
 3 Eutych. Ann. 221, 222. 
 
 4 See the account in Eutych. Ann. 242 249. 
 
 132
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 JERUSALEM DURING THE MAHOMMEDAN DOMINATION. 
 
 IN the year that the Emperor Heraclius set out on the 
 first of his victorious campaigns against Chosroes, an Arabian 
 adventurer, driven as an impostor from his native city of 
 Mecca, hardly escaped with his life to Medina ; and in the 
 year that the emperor celebrated his triumph at Jerusalem, 
 the son of Abdullah returned at the head of 10,000 followers 
 to the city from which he had been expelled, forced his 
 enemies to submission, demolished the idols of the Caaba, 
 and changed the religion of Arabia. His successes in his 
 own country were but a prelude to the victories which were
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 197 
 
 to attend the arms of his generals throughout their irre- 
 sistible career, wherein, in less than a century, they sub- 
 jugated to the Prophet and his khaliphs, or successors, the 
 whole of the Persian, and the fairest and the most fertile 
 provinces of the Roman empire, including Syria, Egypt, 
 Northern Africa, and Spain ; a vast extent of territory com- 
 prehended in the three continents of the old world, and 
 stretching from India to the Atlantic Ocean 1 . 
 
 The Roman army had first heard the war-cry of the 
 Arabs, and experienced the lightning flashes of Kaled, the 
 " Sword of God," in the battle of Muta, during the lifetime 
 of Mahomet, and the first act of the first khaliph was to 
 raise an army for the invasion of Syria, which was placed 
 under the command of Abu Obeidah, with whom Kaled was 
 afterwards associated, having been recalled from the Persian 
 war 2 . The wild enthusiasm of the disciples of the Koran 
 supplied the place of military tactics, while the corruptions 
 and divisions of the Christian Church, loudly calling for 
 Divine judgment, armed them with a power which nothing 
 could withstand. The fall of Damascus and other im- 
 portant cities of Syria, above all the obstinate and decisive 
 battle of Yermuk, which had crushed the Roman power in 
 the country, left the generals the option of proceeding de- 
 liberately to the reduction of the cities which stiU held out, 
 in such order as they pleased. Gaza had been already 
 reduced by Amrou, the future conqueror of Egypt. By the 
 direction of the khaliph the siege of Jerusalem was resolved 
 
 1 For the rise and progress of Islam, 
 the English reader may consult Pri- 
 deaux's Life of Mahommed, Ockley's 
 History of the Saracens, the Abbd de 
 Marigny's " History of the Arabians," 
 or the shorter notices of Gibbon's De- 
 
 cline and Fall, 1. li. White's Bamp- 
 ton Lectures with the copious notes 
 present a good view of the genius of 
 the religion. 
 
 2 Eutychii Annales, 11. 258.
 
 198 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 on, and Yezid-Ibn-Abu-Sophian was sent forward with a 
 detachment of 5000 Arabs, Abu Obeidah himself brought 
 up the main body only eleven days later, and was shortly 
 joined by Amrou and his victorious troops from the south. 
 When the city was thus invested it contained 12,000 Greeks 
 and 50,000 natives 1 . Sophronius, who then held the patri- 
 archate 2 , was a dignitary equal to the emergency, and holds 
 a conspicuous place in the Christian and Mahometan annals 
 of these events, as the mediator of peace and war. The 
 summons to surrender is characteristic : "In the name of 
 God, merciful and gracious ! from Abu-Obeidah-Ibn- Jirah 
 to the Christians of the people of ^Elia, health ! and to all 
 who follow the right way, and believe in God and in His 
 Prophet ! To come to the point. For my part, I beg you 
 to bear witness that there is no God but God, and Mahom- 
 med is the Apostle of God, and that the moment of judgment 
 will come beyond all doubt; and that God will raise men 
 from the dead. And if you will stand to this, your blood 
 is sacred unto us as well as your property, and your children, 
 and you shall be to us as brothers: but if you refuse, I 
 will bring down upon you a people more earnest in their 
 love of death than you in the drinking of wine, or eating 
 of hog's flesh ; nor will I ever pass away from you, please 
 God, until I have killed your warriors, and made captive 
 your children 3 ." 
 
 1 " Jalal-Addi'n, History of the 
 Temple at Jerusalem, translated by 
 Reynolds," p. 157- This collection of 
 testimonies, to which 1 shall have oc- 
 casion to refer constantly, would be 
 more valuable if it were less diffuse 
 and verbose. 
 
 2 This dignitary had before distin- 
 guished himself as an author on the 
 orthodox side of the Monothelite contro- 
 
 versy, which then troubled the Church. 
 His predecessor, Modestus, had occu- 
 pied the see only nine months; then 
 was an interregnum of six years. Eu- 
 tychii Annales, n. p. 249. And on the 
 death of Sophronius, after four years, 
 the see was vacant for twenty-nine 
 years. Eutychii Annales, n. pp. 270. 
 290. 326. 
 
 3 Jalal-Addin, p. 158.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 199 
 
 The proposals were rejected by the inhabitants, who re- 
 solved to try the fortune of war, and made a vigorous 
 resistance for four months, during which the Arabs suffered 
 severely both from the sallies of the besieged and the in- 
 clemency of the season ; for it was then winter 4 . At length, 
 despairing of succour from the discomfited troops of the 
 empire, and convinced of the obstinacy of the Saracens, the 
 patriarch advanced to the walls, and invited the commander 
 to a parley. His attempt to terrify the infidel by threats of 
 the Divine vengeance for the desecration of the Holy Land 
 was skilfully parried by Abu-Obeidah, who professed equal 
 veneration for the sacred city, as the mine of the prophets, 
 whose sepulchres it contained; and claimed a better title to 
 its possession than the Christians could have, inasmuch as it 
 was from it that Mahommed had commenced his nocturnal 
 journey to the ninth heaven ; and he finally declared his 
 resolution not to withdraw from the siege until God delivered 
 it into his hands, as He had delivered other places before it. 
 At length the patriarch consented to capitulate, but refused 
 to treat of terms with any subordinate officer, and required 
 the presence of the Khalif himself ; binding the people by an 
 oath to surrender the city, on fair terms, into his hands 5 . 
 A messenger was dispatched to Medina, and after some hesi- 
 tation on his part, and conflicting opinions in his council, 
 Omar resolved to set out for the scene of action. His pre- 
 parations were soon complete : a modern Bedouin is not 
 more economical in his wardrobe and equipage than was 
 the great " Commander of the Faithful." A pair of 
 saddle-bags, filled with the commonest provisions, slung before 
 him on the camel, a large leathern bottle, and a wooden 
 platter behind, were all his equipment ; and with these he 
 
 4 Ockley's Saracens, i. 214. 5 Jalal-Addin, p. 161.
 
 200 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 entertained his fellow-travellers at their frugal meal in their 
 journey through the desert. On his progress he set in 
 order what he found amiss hi the villages through which 
 he passed, administered even-handed justice without preju- 
 dice or partiality, and set his companions an edifying 
 example in the punctual discharge of the prescribed duties 
 of religion 1 . 
 
 Coming in sight of the Holy City, he exclaimed : " Allah 
 Acbar! (God is great!) God, give us an easy conquest!" 
 He fixed his head-quarters at a village named Jabit, and 
 there received a deputation from the Christians, with whom 
 he concluded articles of capitulation, which are interesting as 
 "a model for capitulation of every Christian city 2 ." " In 
 the name of God, merciful and compassionate ! The following 
 are the terms of capitulation which I, Omar, the servant of 
 God, the commander of the faithful, grant to the people of 
 ^EHa. I grant them security for their lives, their possessions, 
 and their children ; their churches, their crosses, and all that 
 appertains to them, in their integrity, and their lands, and 
 to all of their religion. Then* churches shall not be im- 
 poverished, nor destroyed, nor injured ; neither their endow- 
 ments nor their dignity; and nothing of their property. 
 Neither shall the inhabitants of Jerusalem be exposed to 
 violence for following their religion ; nor shall one of them 
 be injured; nor shall one of the Jews be impoverished in 
 ^Elia. And it is stipulated with the people of JElia, that 
 they pay a tribute according to the tribute paid by the 
 people of the other cities 3 . Moreover, the Greeks and 
 robbers shall depart therefrom, with security for their life 
 
 1 Ockley, i. 217. 
 " Jalal-Addfn, p. 168. 
 ; Five dinars were imposed upon 
 the richest class; four upon the next; 
 
 three upon the next. Very old men, 
 or very young children, paid nothing. 
 Ibid. p. 158.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 201 
 
 and property 4 . . . And whoever there be of the people of 
 the land who wish to reside therein, upon them is the same 
 tribute as upon the people of ^Elia. And whosoever wishes 
 to go with the Greeks, or to return to his land, from him 
 shall be taken nothing of the stores of his magazines. And 
 of all this may God be the Ratifier ! and be this the cove- 
 nant of his Apostle (upon whom be the blessing and peace of 
 God !) and the covenant of the orthodox khalifs, if they yield 
 possession." Other conditions are added by various autho- 
 rities, allowing the free exercise of their religion to the 
 Christians, but forbidding them to obtrude it upon the Mussel- 
 mans in any public exhibition, or to place obstacles in the 
 way of any who chose to embrace Islam 5 . 
 
 These preliminaries being arranged, the gates were 
 thrown open, and the khalif was met at his entrance by the 
 patriarch. The salutation of the latter might have been 
 more courteous, though his reception of such a conqueror 
 could scarcely have been less sad. The khalif, dressed in a 
 raiment of camel's hair, made no very imposing appearance ; 
 practising in his own person the moderation which he preached 
 to others, as the only substantial foundation of the greatness 
 of the Musselmans. When Sophronius saw him, he ex- 
 claimed : " Verily, this is the abomination of desolation, 
 spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place !" 
 and as he went he bewailed the affliction of the Christians 
 with many tears 6 . But the satisfaction of the emir on 
 discovering that he had been the subject of prophecy 
 under any description, could not but be great in the ab- 
 sence of all prophetic or miraculous testimony of the mission 
 
 4 "Three days were assigned for 
 their departure ; the safe conduct and 
 time being null and void with respect 
 to any one who should remain after 
 
 the expiration of that term." Ibid. p. 
 
 157. 
 
 6 Ibid. p. 172. Ockley, i. p. 223. 
 6 Theophanes, Chorograph. p. 281.
 
 202 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 of Mahommed, and would no doubt excuse the tears of the 
 patriarch 1 . 
 
 The strict observance of the letter of the treaty, and the 
 thoughtful consideration with which he provided against its 
 violation by his followers, redound to the credit of the khalif, 
 and serve to prove that the high integrity of his character 
 has not been over-estimated by Mahommedan writers. He 
 proceeded, under the conduct of the patriarch, to the Church 
 of the Resurrection 2 . While there the Moslem's hour of 
 prayer arrived, and Omar expressed a wish to pray. " O 
 Commander of the faithful," said the patriarch, "pray here!" 
 " I will not pray here," replied the khalif. He was con- 
 ducted to the Church of Constantine, in the middle of which 
 a mat was spread for his accommodation : " Neither will I 
 pray here," he repeated. He then went out of the church 
 to the door facing the east, and there prayed alone on the 
 steps. Then sitting down he enquired : " Knowest thou, 
 patriarch, why I would not pray within the church? 
 Had I done so, you would have lost your right in it, for the 
 Moslems would have taken it from you after my death, 
 saying, Here prayed Omar." Not satisfied with this precau- 
 tion, but fearing lest his act, as it was, might be drawn into 
 precedent, he asked for paper, and wrote an order that 
 the Moslems should not pray even on the steps except 
 one at a time, and should not be called to prayer there, 
 as at their own mosks. This writing he delivered to the 
 patriarch. 
 
 The khalif next performed his devotions at the Tower of 
 David, and then requested to be conducted to the " Mosk 
 
 1 See Ockley's Saracens, pp. 21ft, 16, 
 for the very probable conjecture that 
 the Mahommedan story of a prophecy 
 among the Christians relating to Omar's 
 
 conquest, was grounded on this ex- 
 clamation of the patriarch. 
 
 8 Eutychii Annales, Vol. 11. p. 
 285, 6.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 203 
 
 of David." The patriarch might guess that the Temple of 
 Solomon was intended by this strange designation; but the 
 site had been so long neglected that the memory of it was 
 well nigh lost, which will account for the hesitation which 
 followed 3 . He conducted Omar and his attendants to the 
 Church of the Resurrection, and said, " This is the Mosk 
 of David." Omar considered attentively, and replied : " Thou 
 liest ! for the Apostle of God (on whom be the blessing and 
 peace of God !) described to me the Mosk of David, which 
 does not answer to this." The same objection was repeated 
 at the Church of Zion, and at other churches in the city. 
 At length he came near to a gate called the Gate of Mahom- 
 med. Water was running down the steps, and through the 
 street which led to the city-gate, so that great part of the 
 stairs were under water 4 . Then said the patriarch to him : 
 " Thou canst go no further except by crawling on hands and 
 knees." The khalif, nothing daunted, proceeded thus through 
 the water-channel, until he came to a level space at the 
 top of a hill, where there were ruins 5 . Here he looked 
 about him and contemplated for a while ; then he said : 
 " Allah Acbar ! By Him in whose hands is my life, this is 
 that which the Apostle of God (on whom be the peace and 
 blessing of God !) described to me." 
 
 3 I make out the best story I can 
 from Eutychii Annales, Vol. n. pp. 
 286, 289 ; from the various and often 
 conflicting traditions preserved by Ja- 
 lal-Addm, in his History of the Tem- 
 ple of Jerusalem, pp. 176 190 of the 
 Translation; and from the Arabic 
 History of Jerusalem, translated in 
 Fundgraben des Orients, Vol. n. p. 
 160. 
 
 4 I here regret very much the am- 
 
 biguity of the authors and their con- 
 flicting traditions. It is not clear 
 whether this is a sewer or a water-course 
 which the khalif traversed ; and a 
 question of some interest, which will 
 be discussed below, is involved in it. 
 
 5 "Aliqua vetusti operis extantia 
 vestigia demonstrantes." William of 
 Tyre, Lib. i. cap. ii. p. 630. Gesta 
 Dei.
 
 204 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 The sacred rock, reputed to be the Bethel of Jacob's 
 vision 1 , the Holy of Holies in Solomon's Temple, the start- 
 ing point of Mahommed's celestial journey, had been con- 
 verted into a dunghill by the Christians, as an insult to 
 the Jews, who regarded the spot with especial veneration 2 . 
 The zealous khalif himself set the example of clearing it 
 from its defilement, and was warmly seconded by his fol- 
 lowers, converting their garments into barrows, to transport 
 the soil to the neighbouring valley. Having accomplished 
 their task, they proceeded to two fountains in the valley 
 of Hinnom, where they performed the necessary ablutions, 1 
 and then returned to the rock to pray there. 
 
 Monk of Omar. 
 
 1 The tradition which identifies 
 Bethel with Jerusalem, owes its origin, 
 I believe, to the Moslems, with whom 
 it is quite in character to crowd to- 
 gether a number of incidents, without 
 the slightest regard to topography, 
 chronology, or history. 
 
 * The parallel between the Temple 
 and the Holy Sepulchre should be ob- 
 served. The traditionary evidence in 
 favour of the former is not nearly so 
 distinct as for the latter : yet no one 
 doubts that its site was actually re- 
 covered.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 205 
 
 Thus was the spot selected for that magnificent structure 
 which at this day perpetuates at Jerusalem the name of 
 the second khalif, its first Moslem conqueror. Not that 
 the present building owes its erection to him; his mosk 
 does not appear to have possessed many architectural at- 
 tractions : it did but stand a few years, and is described 
 by those who saw it as a mean building 3 . The existing 
 temple was built by Abd-el-Malik Ibn Marwan, of the 
 house of Ommiyah, the tenth khalif. The grandeur of its 
 conception, and the magnificence of its execution, deserved 
 a better reward from posterity than the oblivion of his 
 name. It was commenced in the 69th year of the Hejira, 
 and completed in three years. It is said that he spent 
 upon the building the produce of a seven years' tax upon 
 Egypt, amounting, according to another authority, to 100,000 
 dinars; and the Arabian historians are lost in admiration 
 at the prodigality of the expenditure; but as the minute 
 detail of its ornaments would be tedious and uninteresting, 
 it may be dispensed with 4 . The neighbouring church of 
 Justinian, dedicated to the Virgin, had already been con- 
 verted into the Mosk el Aksa. The munificent Khalif 
 Abd-el-Malik covered its gates with plates of gold and 
 silver, but it was soon stripped of its treasures in conse- 
 quence of the poverty of his successors 5 . During the kha- 
 lifat of his son Waled, the eastern part of the Mosk el 
 Aksa fell to ruin, and as he had no funds to repair it, 
 
 3 Poujoulat, Histoire, Vol. m. p. 
 106, so represents the testimony of 
 
 4 Jalal-Addfn, pp. 184-190, gives 
 a full description. 
 
 Arculphus, to which I have not now j 5 For the traditionary notices of the 
 the opportunity of reference. If this Mosk el Aksa, see Jalal-Addin, Hist. 
 
 be correct, Arculphus must have visited 
 Jerusalem earlier than C97, as will 
 presently appear. 
 
 of the Temple, &c. pp. 190194; and 
 Fundgraben des Orients, Vol. u. pp. 
 157, 159.
 
 206 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 he ordered the ruined part to be pulled down, and the 
 price of the materials to be distributed to the poor. Forty 
 years later, in the time of the second Abbasside khalif, 
 Abu-Jafar-Al-Mansur, other parts of this extensive building 
 were decayed by time, or injured by an earthquake, and 
 as he could not afford to restore it, he stripped the gold 
 from the doors, coined it, and applied the proceeds to the 
 necessary repairs. A second earthquake shook down what 
 he had rebuilt, and his son and successor, Al-Mahadi, found 
 the mosk in ruins. The character of the building was 
 altered by this khalif, whose taste was offended by its 
 proportions, and he gave orders that its length should be 
 diminished and its width increased. Again, in the 452nd 
 year of the Hejira, A.D. 1060, it suffered materially from 
 the falling in of the roof, and occasioned to the Moslems 
 sad forebodings of approaching calamities, which were shortly 
 verified by the Crusaders. The facts here stated will suf- 
 ficiently account for the debasements noticed by modern 
 travellers in this very interesting building, decidedly one 
 of the most ancient in Jerusalem debasements which have 
 so altered its character, as to lead them to question whether 
 it can be the church of the Purification built by Justinian 1 . 
 It is described as " consisting of a nave and six side-aisles, 
 of a mixed architecture, the entire breadth being 180 feet, 
 or 100 feet less than the length. The columns and piers 
 are very irregular in size, material, and architectural cha- 
 racter ; some being evidently Roman, while others are Sara- 
 
 1 Further notice will be taken of 
 iliis church in Part 1 1. cap. ii. 
 
 2 See a communication from Mr 
 Catherwood, in Bartlett's Walks about 
 Jerusalem, p. 160. The architect adds 
 
 in a note : " It is supposed to be the 
 church built by Justinian, but if so, 
 it has been greatly altered by the Ma- 
 homedans." This conjecture is seen 
 to be well founded.
 
 CH. IV. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 207 
 
 From the period of its conquest by Omar, but espe- 
 cially subsequent to the erection of the Kubbet es-Sakhrah 
 (the Dome of the Rock) by Abd-el-Malik Ibn-Marwan, 
 Beit el-Mukaddus 3 (the Holy House) so the Moslems name 
 Jerusalem became almost as much an object of religious 
 attraction to the Mahometan devotee as to the Christian 
 pilgrim 4 . Not that the zeal of the latter was in the 
 least abated by the occupation of the Holy City by 
 the infidels ; nor do the strangers from, the west ap- 
 pear to have suffered any material annoyance from them 5 . 
 The native Christians themselves enjoyed the peace and 
 protection secured to them by the treaty of capitulation, 
 during the reign .of Omar's upright successors, and of the 
 princes of the house of Ommiyah 6 ; but their circumstances 
 underwent a considerable change for the worse on the acces- 
 sion to power of the family of Abbas. A dynasty which 
 had waded to the throne through the blood of their co- 
 religionists was not likely to spare those whom they despised 
 as infidels ; and the yoke of servitude began to press more 
 heavily on the Christians of the East ; a frequent change 
 of local governors exposing them to frequent change of 
 
 3 So they write. In common par- 
 lance they use the more convenient 
 abhreviated form, and call it simply 
 "el-Kuds," i. e. "the Holy." 
 
 4 Eutychii Annales, ii. 365. Abd- 
 el-Melik, after the example of his 
 predecessor Merwan, had forbidden 
 pilgrimages to Mecca, on account of 
 its occupation by Abdullah Ibn-Zo- 
 bain. 
 
 5 See the notices in Bib. Res. n. 
 38, 9, where will be found, in the 
 notes, references to the authorities for 
 
 this dark period of Jerusalem's his- 
 tory, through which I am compelled to 
 run very rapidly. 
 
 6 The first five khalifs are distin- 
 guished by the designation of "the 
 Upright," which their administration 
 seems to have merited. The dynasty 
 of Ommiyah acceded by the usurpa- 
 tion of Moawiyah in A. D. 661, and 
 became extinct by the murder of Mer- 
 wan II. A. D. 752. For a succinct his- 
 tory of these princes, see Gibbon, capp. 
 1. li.
 
 208 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 fortune, according to the caprice of their tyrants 1 . The 
 reign of Harun el-Rashid (A.D. 786 809) is a bright 
 spot in the dark annals of Jerusalem's history under the 
 Abbasside khalifs, and presents to us the two most powerful 
 monarchs of the West and of the East, a Christian and a 
 Musselman, known to each other only by report, united 
 in bonds of amity by the mutual veneration which their 
 respective characters inspired. 
 
 The biographer of Charlemagne 2 represents that the 
 friendship of Harun the Just was so highly valued by the 
 monarch of the West, that he preferred it to the alliance 
 of all the kings and princes in the whole world, and judged 
 him alone worthy to be treated with distinction. The first 
 advances were made by the western emperor, whose legates 
 to the court of the eastern monarch were entrusted with 
 costly offerings for the Holy Sepulchre. They carried 
 back to their master the keys of the church, in token that 
 the khalif renounced all power over that " sacred and salu- 
 tary place" in favour of his Christian ally ; a more acceptable 
 present than the robes and spices, with other rich produc- 
 tions of the East, which the munificence of Harun forwarded 
 on that occasion, on the sole elephant in his possession, 
 for the acceptance of Charlemagne. 
 
 Although the exertions of the emperor in behalf of 
 the oppressed Christians were not limited to Palestine 3 , 
 yet Jerusalem experienced in a fuller measure his bounteous 
 liberality. Alms were collected and sent thither for the 
 
 1 William of Tyre, Lib. i. cap. iii. 
 p. 630, in the Gesta Dei. 
 
 2 See Eginhardi Vita Caroli Magni, 
 as quoted by William of Tyre, 1. c. ; 
 and gee Bib. Res. n. p. 41, and notes. 
 
 3 "Ob hacmaxime transmarinorum 
 tegum amicitias expetens, ut Christi- 
 anis sub eorum dorninatu degentibus, 
 refrigerium aliquod et relevatio prove- 
 niret." Eginhard, 1. c.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 209 
 
 restoration of ruined churches and the relief of the poor ; 
 and more than fifty years after his death, notwithstand- 
 ing a storm had since visited the Christians, a library and 
 hospice for pilgrims, founded by him, were still seen at 
 Jerusalem, in the neighbourhood of St Mary's Church, which 
 formed the southern side of the court of the Holy Se- 
 pulchre 4 . 
 
 The troubles which attended the decline of the power 
 of the khalifs of Bagdad deeply afflicted the Christians of 
 Palestine, and the transfer of the country to the dominion 
 of the Fatimites prepared for them fresh calamities, which 
 called forth the sympathies of Europe, long since invited 
 in a touching letter from the Patriarch Elias 5 . At first 
 indeed the Egyptian yoke appeared more tolerable than 
 that from which they had been released 6 , but the occu- 
 pation of the throne by the fanatical Hakem, was a signal 
 for a repetition of the scenes enacted by the Persians under 
 Chosroes. This monster of iniquity, whose memory is still 
 reverenced by the Druses as the latest incarnation of the 
 Deity ! succeeded to the throne of his father Aziz at the 
 
 4 The monk Bernhard visited the 
 city circ. A.D. 870. See Poujoulat, 
 Histoire, m. 109, and Bib. Res. p. 42. 
 This hospice was probably the com- 
 mencement of that of the merchants of 
 Amalfi, the foundation of the knights 
 of St John, of which presently : it oc- 
 cupied the same site. 
 
 5 A.D. 881. See this letter to 
 Charles the Young, in Bibliotheque 
 des Croisades, de M. Michaud, Pt. 1, 
 pp. 443, 4. It appears to have re- 
 ceived no answer ; but at the close of 
 the following century, Pope Sylvester 
 II. endeavoured to excite an active in- 
 terest in the cause of the suffering 
 
 14 
 
 Christians. See the authorities Bib. 
 Res. ii. 44. 
 
 6 William of Tyre, i. iv. p. 631. 
 This appears inconsistent with the ac- 
 count of the destruction of the Holy 
 Sepulchre by Muez, when the Patri- 
 arch John is said to have been burnt 
 in the flames. Bib. Res. 43. I can- 
 not help suspecting some confusion 
 between this and the destruction of 
 the church by Hakem (presently to 
 be noticed), on which occasion the 
 Greek annals inform us that the Patri- 
 arch John VII. was burnt with the 
 church of the Holy Sepulchre.
 
 210 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 early age of eleven years 1 , (A.D. 996.) The motives which 
 actuated him in his persecution of the Christians are variously 
 stated. Two contemporary chroniclers 2 declare that he was 
 instigated to it by the hereditary enemies of the Christian 
 name, who alarmed him by representations, which the letter 
 of Gerbert, archbishop of Ravenna, and the descent of the 
 Genoese and Pisans on the coast of Palestine, as indicating 
 the general feeling of the West, would fully justify. The 
 Jews of Orleans suborned an apostate Christian to carry 
 to the Khalif a letter, written in Hebrew characters for 
 greater security, and concealed in his staff, which is de- 
 scribed as a masterpiece of perfidy and wickedness. This 
 is said to have succeeded in its object, and to have resulted 
 in the destruction of the church of the Holy Sepulchre. 
 
 A different account is given by later writers 3 . The 
 mother of Hakem was a Christian, and her two brothers 
 had been raised by the favour of Khalif Aziz to the pa- 
 triarchal chairs of Jerusalem and Alexandria. This con- 
 nexion involved Hakem in the suspicion of Christianity, and, 
 in order to clear himself from the imputation, he resolved 
 on the demolition of the most sacred of their churches. By 
 his orders the church of the Resurrection was completely 
 overthrown; an ineffectual attempt was made to destroy 
 the sacred Cave itself, by levelling it with the ground : 
 and the Christians were reduced to extremities which they 
 had not experienced since their subjugation to the Moslems. 
 Enormous tribute was exacted in violation of privileges 
 
 1 An interesting account of this 
 monster is contained in the notes to 
 Mr Reynolds' translation of Jalal- 
 addin, p. 520; and in a valuable little 
 book on Syria and Mount Lebanon, 
 lately published, in which, I think, I 
 
 recognize the hand of a gentleman 
 whom I met in the East. 
 
 3 Olaben and Adhemar, as quoted 
 by Poujoulat, Vol. in. p. 119. 
 
 3 William of Tyre, i. iv. p. 31.
 
 CH. IV 
 
 .] THE HOLY CITY. 211 
 
 granted by former khalifs. The celebration of their solem- 
 nities, which had been formerly allowed, was now prohibited, 
 or subjected to violent and barbarous interruptions, and not 
 only liberty of worship, but liberty of speech, was taken 
 away, the accusations of unprincipled informers eagerly be- 
 lieved, and the faithful subjected to most cruel punishments 
 for the lightest offences. John VII. the patriarch for the 
 time, who enjoyed only the privilege of a priority of suffer- 
 ing, encouraged his flock, both by precept and example, 
 to endurance of present evils, by the prospect of future 
 rewards. 
 
 The intercession of Romanus Diogenes, the unfortunate 
 emperor of Constantinople, prevailed with Dhaher, the brother 
 and successor of Hakem, to consent to the re-edification of 
 the church of the Holy Sepulchre, which the patriarch NI- 
 cephorus was enabled to accomplish through the liberality of 
 another Constantine (Monomachus), who granted funds for 
 the purpose from the imperial treasury. Yet the condition 
 of the Christians was little ameliorated. They were still 
 treated with insult, loaded with reproaches, exposed to the 
 calumnious accusations of the basest sycophants, and im- 
 poverished in their attempts to satisfy the exorbitant de- 
 mands of a rapid succession of greedy governors 4 . 
 
 But even these afflictions, heavy as they were, were 
 nothing in comparison with those which followed, and at 
 length aroused the whole of Western Europe to arm in 
 defence of their oppressed brethren of the East. The Turks, 
 whose political existence dates from the middle of the sixth 
 century, when their ancestors first left their native mountains 
 to handle in their own cause the swords which they had so 
 long forged for others, had extended their influence in Persia, 
 
 4 William of Tyre i. v. vi. p. 632. 
 
 142
 
 212 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 
 
 under the Saracens, until they had gradually usurped all but 
 the shadow of power, which was still claimed by the khalifs 
 of Bagdad 1 . In the middle of the eleventh century the 
 destinies of Asia were in fact ruled by the Seljukian sultans, 
 nominally the servants, but virtually the tyrants, of the 
 " Prince of the Faithful" a venerable phantom, who slum- 
 bered in inglorious ease in his palace at Bagdad, leaving to 
 his lieutenants the task of propagating the faith of the Koran 
 which they had embraced. Malek-Shah, the eldest son of 
 the celebrated Alp Arslan, hi the course of a prosperous 
 reign of twenty years (1072 1092), extended the limits of 
 his jurisdiction in Tartary to the frontiers of China, eastward, 
 reduced the borders of the Greek empire by the conquest of 
 Asia Minor on the west, and was not withheld by a com- 
 munity of faith from the invasion of the territories of the 
 Fatimite khalifs of Egypt. Syria and Palestine were wrested 
 from their grasp by his lieutenants, and Jerusalem groaned 
 under a bondage more intolerable than it had hitherto known 2 . 
 Still the innumerable perils of the way, increased as they 
 were by this late revolution, could not repress the ardour of 
 the Western Christians of all conditions, who still flocked in 
 crowds to pay their adorations at the Holy Sepulchre 3 . 
 
 Yet the melancholy picture of the state of Christendom, 
 drawn by the pen of one who would not overstate its cor- 
 ruptions 4 , forbids us to hope that the zeal which vented 
 itself in foreign pilgrimages was either intelligent or rightly 
 directed. " The people were faithful only in name ; princes 
 
 1 An account of the origin and pro- 
 gress of the Turks is contained in 
 Gibbon, capp. xlii. lii. Ivii. 
 
 2 William of Tyre, i. x. 030. 
 
 8 An interesting notice of some of 
 these pilgrimages of the eleventh cen- 
 
 tury will be found in Dr Robinson's 
 Bib. Res. n. p. 48, &c. 
 
 4 The following description is taken 
 from William of Tyre, i. viii. pp. 034, 
 035.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 213 
 
 and subjects, clergy and laity, had all alike departed from 
 purity both of faith and morals. Sacrilege, violence, gross 
 fornication, injustice, luxury, and a long catalogue of other 
 sins, betokened that the world was declining towards evening, 
 and that the second advent of the Son of man was at hand ; 
 for the love of many had waxed cold, and faith was no more 
 found in the earth. The bishops, instead of correcting the 
 prevailing abuses, were grossly negligent ; ' dumb dogs, not 
 able to bark;' accepting persons; leaving the sheep to wolves, 
 as hirelings ; given to simony ; followers of Gehazi. In short 
 ' all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth ;' and nature 
 itself gave token of approaching judgments ; for there were 
 prodigies in heavens and signs upon earth; pestilence, and 
 famine, and earthquakes." 
 
 Such was the condition of the world when the nations of 
 the West and of the East were brought into deadly collision 5 . 
 The spark which produced the tremendous explosion was 
 kindled by an obscure individual, a French hermit, of the 
 diocese of Amiens. He had come as a pilgrim to Jerusalem 
 (A.D. 1094), where his sympathy was awakened by the 
 sufferings of the native church, and his righteous indignation 
 aroused by the flagitious practices of its ruthless oppressors. 
 An aureus* was exacted for admission to the city ; not one 
 in a thousand of the wretched pilgrims, who had lost their 
 all on the road, could satisfy the demand ; and their tribute 
 and maintenance imposed an intolerable burden on the in- 
 
 5 I may say, once for all, that I 
 follow in the history of the earlier 
 Crusades, the collection of writers in 
 the Gesta Dei per Francos, but especi- 
 ally William of Tyre. A short out- 
 line is given by Gibbon, cap. Iviii. 
 where a tabular view of references to 
 
 this interesting collection will be 
 found. 
 
 6 "A gold Byzant, equivalent to 
 about five Spanish dollars." Bib. Res. 
 ii. p. 48, note 3. The value of the 
 Spanish dollar is now four shillings 
 and fourpence English.
 
 214 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 habitants. They were constantly exposed to insults in their 
 visits to the holy places, whose sanctity was no protection 
 against the infidels. The churches, which had been repaired 
 with great labour and cost, were violently entered even during 
 the celebration of the divine offices, and the tyrants would sit 
 upon the altars, overthrow and trample under foot the sacred 
 vessels, insult the clergy with abuse and blows, and pluck the 
 venerable patriarch from his seat by the hair of his head or 
 beard. They would even occasionally proceed so far as to 
 throw him into prison 1 . 
 
 Distressed beyond measure at these barbarities, Peter 
 sought an interview with Symeon, offered his condolence, and 
 recommended him to write to the sovereign pontiff of the 
 Roman Church, to the kings and princes of the West, since 
 he must now despair of all succour from the East. For 
 himself, he undertook to make known throughout the length 
 and breadth of Europe the facts of which he had been 
 assured by ocular proof, and to leave no means untried to 
 furnish a remedy to these bitter persecutions. His aid was 
 thankfully accepted, and he departed on his errand. Most 
 faithfully did he execute his voluntary commission. 
 
 Peter the hermit is described as of short stature, and 
 a contemptible presence as regards the outer man ; but 
 he had a mighty spirit, quick wit, a piercing eye, and a 
 pleasing flow of eloquence, which he turned to the best 
 account in preaching the first Crusade. The cause was 
 strenuously taken up by Pope Urban II. The council of 
 Clermont, summoned by that pontiff, witnessed the success 
 of his earnest exhortations; the watchword claiming the 
 Divine sanction for the undertaking, ran like wild-fire 
 
 1 It is impossible not to be struck 
 by the similarity of these barbarities, 
 
 to those practised by the Puritans at 
 the time of the Commonwealth.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 215 
 
 through the countries of the West, and Europe was con- 
 vulsed to its centre with preparations for the Holy War 2 . 
 
 Various were the motives which induced the thousands 
 of Italy, France, and Germany, to arm for the recovery 
 of the Holy Sepulchre. Some were actuated, no doubt, by 
 deep and sincere devotion to their Lord : they looked upon 
 Palestine as " ImmanuePs Land " in a peculiar sense. The 
 feudal laws, which then prevailed, would inculcate the duty 
 of the vassal to fight for the expulsion of the unbelievers 
 to whom it was enslaved ; and the authority of the Church, 
 holding out to them the sure promise of eternal reward, 
 still further enflamed their religious ardour ; the zeal for 
 pilgrimage being increased by the glorious prospect of a 
 martyr's crown. But whether it were " the mightiest lever 
 known to the moral world, imagination," or superstition, 
 or simply worldly motives, that " upheaved all Christendom 
 from her natural station," and stirred to its lowest depths 
 the elements of society, he must be blind indeed who does 
 not see, and ungrateful who will not acknowledge, a higher 
 Providence directing the misguided zeal of his creatures to 
 his own merciful purposes ; checking the desolating course 
 of the scimeter and the Koran in Europe, by the terrors 
 of the cross and sword in Asia 3 . 
 
 I am compelled reluctantly to pass over the mustering of 
 
 2 The decisions of the Council of 
 " Deus vult," (as it was called from 
 the words in which the unanimous 
 opinion of the assembly was declared 
 God willeth it!) held A. D. 1095, 
 were said to have been known, at the 
 moment of their enactment, through, 
 out Europe. 
 
 3 I am not quite sure whether the 
 poet Wordsworth, in his sonnet on the 
 
 Crusades, whose language I have bor- 
 rowed, has not pleaded a better de- 
 fence than many who have entered 
 more fully into the justification of the 
 " Holy Wars." M. Michaud has con- 
 ferred a benefit on the world by the 
 publication of his valuable Histoire 
 des Croisades ; and the important 
 translations in the Appendix, Biblio- 
 theque des Croisades.
 
 216 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 the mighty hosts under their several leaders, the various for- 
 tunes which they experienced on their passage through Europe, 
 until they were reunited under the walls of Nicaea in Bithynia, 
 the subsequent divisions and disputes of the princes, and 
 the reverses or successes that attended their arms in Asia 
 Minor, before Antioch, in Syria, and Palestine, until the 
 remnant that had escaped the perils of the way sat down 
 under the walls of Jerusalem, on the seventh of June, in 
 the year of our Lord one thousand and ninety-nine. 
 
 Since the first warning of the impending storm, the 
 Moslem inhabitants of the city had not been inactive. In 
 the course of the same year Afdhal, vizier of the Fatimite 
 khalif el-Mustaly, had succeeded in expelling the Turkish 
 usurpers, and had left it in charge of Emir Iftikar ed- 
 Dauleh. This governor had no sooner heard of the de- 
 parture of the Turks from Antioch, where they had expe- 
 rienced so serious, and he might hope effectual check, than 
 he set himself, by the khalif 's orders, to restore the forti- 
 fications, and -laid in such stores and ammunition as were 
 necessary for the approaching siege 1 . In a general assem- 
 bly held in the court of the great mosk, it was pro- 
 posed to put all the Christian inhabitants to the sword, 
 and to root up the very rock of the Holy Sepulchre, so 
 as to remove for ever the object of this present expe- 
 dition. But perceiving that by this means they would the 
 more exasperate the incensed minds of their dreaded ene- 
 mies, and expose themselves to the risk of extermination 
 in the event of their success, they happily abandoned the 
 design, and satisfied themselves with imposing a tax of 
 enormous amount on the Christians, and expelled from the 
 
 1 William of Tyre. Lib. vn. cap. xxiii. p. 343. The siege is described 
 in the viii th book.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 217 
 
 city all but the aged, sick, women, and children. The 
 crusaders might have learnt a lesson of moderation from 
 
 o 
 
 the humane exception. 
 
 The walls of the city, at that period much more cir- 
 cumscribed than in earlier tunes, appear to have enclosed the 
 same space occupied by modern Jerusalem B . Three sides, 
 defended for the most part by a natural fosse of immense 
 depth, and the almost precipitous valleys of Jehoshaphat and 
 Hinnom, were inaccessible to the assault of the besiegers: 
 the north alone exposed an approachable front to their 
 attack, but that also frowned defiance from its frequent 
 towers. The princes were encamped in the following order 3 . 
 The prince of Lorrain, Godfrey of Bouillon, occupied the 
 extremity of the left wing, extending from the Valley of 
 Jehoshaphat and opposite to the tower which then filled the 
 north-east angle of the walls. Next to him, on the right, 
 was Count Robert of Flanders, then his namesake of Nor- 
 mandy, and afterwards the renowned Tancred. His posi- 
 tion is determined by the corner-tower, afterwards called 
 by his name, whose substantial ruins in the north-west 
 angle of the city still furnish a valuable topographical mark 
 for the illustration of the historical description 4 . These 
 four generals being thus disposed along the northern line, 
 a position was taken up by the Count Raimond of Tou- 
 louse over against the Tower of David, on the west But 
 as there was little prospect of making an impression on 
 
 2 For the changes in the walls of on the spot to examine the ground. 
 Jerusalem, see Biblical Researches, i. This is to me quite inexplicable; no- 
 pp. 384, 469. j thing can be clearer than the account 
 
 3 Twenty-two years of study, (I 
 learn from M. Poujoulat, Histoire, 
 Vol. in. p. 156,) could not satisfy M. 
 
 of the chroniclers, and wonderfully 
 consistent. 
 
 4 Dr Robinson coincides doubting- 
 
 Michaud how the crusaders penetrated i ly. Bib. Res. i. p. 471, note 1. 
 into the city even though he had been
 
 218 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 that quarter, owing to the strength of the tower which 
 defended the Jaffa gate, and the disadvantage of his posi- 
 tion with a deep valley interposed, he was prevailed on 
 to remove half his army to that part of Mount Zion ex- 
 cluded from the city, where he pitched his camp between 
 the walls and the Zion church, which was without range 
 of the enemies' missiles. 
 
 The siege was then pressed with vigour for five suc- 
 cessive days, on the last of which, after a long and ob- 
 stinate engagement, the Saracens were driven from the 
 outworks, and compelled to confine themselves within the 
 inner wall ; and had the Franks been furnished with scaling 
 ladders for the escalade, that day would have seen them 
 in possession of Jerusalem. But their sufferings were to 
 be yet protracted, or even increased. It was now appa- 
 rent that all their attempts would be ineffectual without 
 machines, and the usual difficulty was experienced in find- 
 ing materials for their construction. At length a Syrian 
 Christian guided them to a valley, six or seven miles distant 
 from the city, where they found timber, not indeed suited 
 to the work, but such as they were glad to avail them- 
 selves of in their present exigency. The trees were felled, 
 conveyed on camels to the city ; and while artificers were 
 engaged on these, the rest of the multitude were employed 
 in forming wattled covering for the machines, in order 
 to protect those who should work them. High and low, 
 rich and poor, emulated each other ; all distinctions of rank 
 were forgotten ; diligence and aptitude for the work were 
 the only recommendations to respect. 
 
 Meanwhile the Christian host suffered as severely from 
 drought, as they had previously at Antioch from famine. 
 The fountains and wells about the city had been stopped 
 on the first news of their approach. Siloam alone remained,
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 219 
 
 but its uncertain and scanty supply was wholly inadequate 
 for an army toiling incessantly during the dog-days, under 
 the oppressive heat of a Syrian sun. The Bethleheraites 
 and Tekoites conducted them to fountains four or five miles 
 distant ; but the enemy sallying from the uninvested part 
 of the city, intercepted the unarmed foragers; and so 
 perilous was the service, that the water which reached the 
 camp was sold at an enormous price. To the horrors of 
 drought, infection was shortly added, from the multitude 
 of cattle that had died for want of pasture ; and while the 
 unrecruited forces of the faithful were daily diminishing 
 by the operation of these causes, the besieged were con- 
 stantly receiving fresh supplies through the open walls, and 
 strengthening the defences of the city. 
 
 In this extremity, the seasonable arrival of some Genoese 
 vessels at the port of Jaffa, which hardly escaped the 
 Egyptian fleet, revived the flagging spirits of the besiegers. 
 The cargo and crews were convoyed to Jerusalem by an 
 escort from the Count of Toulouse. On their way to the 
 port they had experienced some loss in a skirmish with 
 a much superior force of the enemy, but the loss was 
 fully compensated by the skill of the artificers, whom they 
 succeeded in bringing safely to the camp. They came 
 prepared with all necessary implements, and Raimond, 
 whose funds alone were unexhausted, took them into his 
 employ. Then* ready ingenuity turned even the disasters 
 of the army to account. The animals which had died 
 from starvation, or had been mercifully killed to save them 
 from it, were skinned, and the raw hides nailed over the 
 machines, served as a protection against the fire by which 
 the enemy afterwards sought to destroy them. 
 
 In four weeks the preparations were completed, and the 
 day fixed for the assault. But in order to secure its sue-
 
 220 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 cess, it was resolved first to propitiate the Almighty by a 
 general humiliation, and a reconciliation of the differences 
 and animosities which existed among princes and people. 
 In long but peaceful array, with bare feet, the clergy in 
 their priestly vestments chanting solemn litanies, they first 
 proceeded to the Mount of Olives, where they were edified 
 by sermons, from Peter the Hermit, and Anculphus, an 
 eloquent friend of Count Robert of Normandy, exhorting 
 them to endurance and the exercise of other Christian graces. 
 They then visited the Church of Zion, where several were 
 wounded from the walls, on which the enemy exposed and 
 insulted the sacred symbol of our salvation. All was now 
 ready. 
 
 There was a part of the wall between the Damascus 
 Gate and the Valley of Jehoshaphat, which had hitherto 
 been neglected by the besieged, owing to no part of the 
 Christian army being encamped before it. On the night 
 preceding the assault, the Duke Godfrey, despairing of forcing 
 the strongly fortified wall before him, with incredible labour 
 removed his machine in fragments, a distance of half a mile, 
 and under cover of the darkness erected it against this weaker 
 part; the other generals got all in readiness, each in his 
 own quarter. The fashion of all their towers was much the 
 same. They were four-sided, the part turned to the wall 
 being guarded by a double coating, the outer one of which 
 when let down formed a draw-bridge for communication with 
 the wall, while the second covering protected those within 
 the tower. 
 
 At dawn of day the assault commenced : the soldiers of 
 the cross, animated by one spirit, proposed to themselves only 
 one of two alternatives victory or martyrdom. Even the 
 aged and the sick, women and children, took part in the 
 fight. The machines were moved towards the walls under
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 221 
 
 cover of a discharge of stones from engines and slings, but 
 a deep fosse before the outworks impeded the operations of 
 the besiegers, and the stout defence of the Moslems occa- 
 sioned them considerable loss. The fosse was with difficulty 
 filled, the castles advanced to the outworks, and a deadly 
 struggle ensued. The shock of the assailants' missiles was 
 broken by sacks of straw and chaff, or beams and ropes, 
 suspended from the walls. The castles were fired by means 
 of brands attached to darts composed of sulphur, pitch, and 
 oil, with other combustibles, and the flames were scarcely 
 extinguished by streams of precious water. Huge masses 
 of stone hurled from the battlements crushed the legs of the 
 engines, and the soldiers by whom they were manned were 
 thrown headlong to the earth. Meanwhile the catapults 
 on the wall discharged incessant showers of shot with won- 
 derful precision and effect. 
 
 Night parted the combatants, but though exhausted with 
 the toils of the day, neither party could devote it to repose. 
 The crusaders, apprehensive for the safety of their engines, 
 prepared with so much labour, and on which their success 
 depended, watched anxiously for the morning to renew the 
 assault, while the garrison, no less fearful of a night-attack, 
 paced the walls and guarded the gates, while the elders, 
 passing through the streets of the city, exhorted and en- 
 couraged the people to vigilance and bravery. 
 
 At length the anxious night, worse than the toilsome day, 
 gave place to the dawn of the memorable 15th of July. The 
 battle raged as on the preceding day, and in addition to the 
 usual arts of war the Moslems called to their aid the charms 
 of sorcery. One very large and destructive engine of the 
 Franks had done terrible execution ; the incantations of two 
 witches were to disarm it of its power : while engaged with 
 their spells on the wall, three girls of their company were
 
 222 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 struck by a mass from the same engine, and fell lifeless from 
 the walls ; a circumstance which occasioned great joy to the 
 Christians and proportionate consternation to the infidels. 
 At length, after seven hours hard fighting, the courage of 
 the weary and dispirited besiegers beginning to flag, they 
 proposed to draw back their battered and smoking engines, 
 which sadly needed repair, and to defer the attack till the 
 following day, devoting the interval to necessary refreshment 
 and repose ; when a timely apparition on Mount Olivet, dis- 
 tinctly seen by Duke Godfrey and his brother Eustachius, 
 from the upper story of their tower, revived the dying em- 
 bers of zeal. The soldiers returned with fresh vigour to 
 the action, and the last and successful struggle commenced. 
 The outworks were carried, and the engines applied to the 
 wall. The besieged averted the strokes of the battering- 
 rams by long beams of great thickness suspended from the 
 battlements by ropes: the soldiers in Godfrey's tower cut 
 the ropes, and the beam fell to the ground. The enemy 
 had thus furnished the means of their own destruction. The 
 drawbridge of the castle was weak and required support, the 
 means of which this beam so opportunely furnished. Under 
 cover of a cloud of smoke, raised from ignited straw and flax, 
 and carried by the wind with blinding effect into the faces 
 of the enemy, the valiant brothers at the head of a chosen 
 band carried the wall, and the besieged fled in all directions. 
 The Franks seeing their comrades in possession of the city, 
 speedily brought their ladders, the northern gate was opened, 
 and the crusaders were masters of Jerusalem. The panic 
 soon spread among the Moslems, the defence was abandoned, 
 and the Count of Toulouse, on the western quarter, ignorant 
 of what had occurred, entered without opposition, and the 
 Zion gate admitted the main body of his followers. It was 
 on a Friday afternoon, at three o'clock, that the city was
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 223 
 
 taken ; and the chroniclers do not fail to remark, that it 
 seemed to be divinely ordered that at the very hour and 
 on the self-same day of the week on which our Lord suf- 
 fered for the salvation of the world in that city, His followers 
 were permitted to see the consummation of their wishes in 
 their triumph over His enemies through the might of His 
 name 1 . 
 
 Alas! the soldiers of the Cross were little mindful of 
 His precepts and example in His dying prayer for His mur- 
 derers. Humanity shudders and religion revolts at the 
 frightful carnage committed under His banner, by these in- 
 human butchers, flushed with victory, thirsting for blood, 
 and wholly devoted to its terrible work 2 . The two generals, 
 advancing from opposite quarters, met in the middle of the 
 city, leaving the ensanguined streets behind them so thickly 
 strewn with the mangled corses of their victims as to be 
 almost impassable, the miserable fugitives being intercepted 
 between the two detachments. Such as escaped immediate 
 death fled to the court of the Temple, and a few to the 
 castle of David. The former became the next object of 
 attack. Tancred was the first to enter, and while his soldiers 
 were busy with carnage he was occupied with rapine, and 
 pillaged the vast riches of the Mosk of Omar. The arrival 
 of the other generals consummated the tragedy. The marble 
 platform of the sacred building was deluged ankle-deep with 
 
 1 It is singular, that even a more | per urbem erat strages hostium, tan- 
 remarkable coincidence is mentioned | taque sanguinis effusio, ut etiam vie- 
 by Moslem writers on its recovery by toribus posset tsedium et horrorem in- 
 Saladin. He took it on the anniversary gerere." William of Tyre. The his- 
 of Mohammed's night-journey from torian labours for language, and he 
 Jerusalem to heaven ! ! and others seem to take especial de- 
 
 2 " Infidelium cruorem sitiens, et light in describing the sanguinary pro- 
 ad caedem omnino proclivus stra- ceedings. 
 
 gem operati sunt horrendam. Tanta
 
 224 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 blood, and the mangled limbs of the slaughtered floated on 
 its crimson tide, and the grim aspect of the conquerors, 
 smeared from head to foot with human gore, was not less 
 dreadful than the havoc in which they were engaged. Ten 
 thousand of the enemy are said to have fallen in this con- 
 fined space; the number slain in the city was not to be es- 
 timated. It had been before agreed that the victors should 
 have for their share of the booty what each could seize for 
 himself; and the consequence was that houses were dispos- 
 sessed of their occupants by the indiscriminate slaughter of 
 whole families, some being slain with the sword, others thrown 
 headlong into the streets. 
 
 The transition in the events of this day fills perhaps 
 the most striking page in the history of enthusiasm. When 
 the arms of the conquerors were wearied, and their swords 
 blunt with slaughter, when guards had been stationed in 
 the towers and at the gates as a precaution against a 
 sudden attack, the whole multitude, having laid aside their 
 weapons, washed their hands and changed their garments ; 
 with bare feet, and groans and tears, the outward indi- 
 cations of a humble spirit and truly contrite heart, mingled 
 with hymns and spiritual songs of praise, proceeded to the 
 venerable places which their Saviour had deigned to adorn 
 and sanctify by His presence, but especially to the scenes 
 of His Passion and Resurrection; kissing and embracing 
 each sacred memorial with indescribable fervour of devotion. 
 Their tears were tears of joy and gratitude ; their sighs and 
 sobs appeared to proceed from hearts wholly inflamed with 
 love, and to ascend as a whole and acceptable burnt-offering 
 to God. To this succeeded works of mercy and bountiful 
 alms-giving. The newly-acquired spoil was bestowed with 
 prodigal profusion on those who had obtained nothing for 
 themselves, and they who, an hour before, with greedy ava-
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 225 
 
 rice had seized all on which they could lay hands, now 
 voluntarily impoverished themselves, and counted the privi- 
 lege of this day their all-sufficient reward ! 
 
 Had the scene closed here the theory of temporary 
 demoniacal possession might have explained their former 
 fury, which nothing could excuse ; but the cold-blooded 
 butchery of the surviving Moslems is the darkest crime of 
 this shocking tragedy. It was committed upon deliberation, 
 contrary to the laws of war, three days after the capture 
 of the city, when the boiling blood of the conquerors had 
 had time to cool, and reason and humanity to resume their 
 controul. Some who had escaped to the roof of the Mosk 
 of Aksa 1 , to whom Tancred had given security for their 
 lives, were put to death in violation of the treaty ; and the 
 same fate would have befallen those in the Tower of David 
 but for the determination of the Count of Toulouse, who 
 enabled them to effect their escape to Ascalon, with their 
 wives and children and baggage. 
 
 The first act of the assembled princes, after the burial 
 of the dead and purification of the city, was the election of a 
 king. The personal merits and important services of Godfrey, 
 Duke of Lorraine, secured to him their unanimous suffrages, 
 but the haughty spirits of his late compeers did not readily 
 submit to his authority. Count Raymond, who had taken 
 possession of the Castle of David on its evacuation by the 
 Saracens, refused to relinquish his title. He was probably 
 disappointed, and with good reason, in his expectation of the 
 throne ; nor would the electors have disregarded his superior 
 claims, had not his moral character been purposely misrepre- 
 sented by many of his followers, who, anxious for their own 
 
 1 Jalal-Addin extends the slaugh- i were slain in the Mosk of Aksa 
 ter to seven days, and says that 70,000 ! alone ! 
 
 15
 
 226 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 return to Europe, hesitated not to calumniate their leader 
 in order to effect it. The disputed castle was adjudged to 
 the king, and the count, having in vain attempted to quench 
 his indignation in the waters of the Jordan, soon after re- 
 turned home in disgust. 
 
 The history of the Frank kingdom in Palestine, inte- 
 resting as it is, can only be slightly glanced at. The early 
 care of the good king was to provide for the worship of God 
 in his capital. Twenty canons were appointed to the church 
 of the Holy Sepulchre, others were attached to the church 
 of Grethsemane, and the dignity of the Mosk of Omar, con- 
 verted into a church under the name of the " Temple of the 
 Lord," was similarly maintained. An altar of white marble was 
 raised upon the sacred rock, and loud are still the lamenta- 
 tions of the Moslems at such grievous desecration, deep their 
 indignation at the violence sustained by es-Sakhrah es-Sherif 
 on this occasion; the marks of which, existing to this day, 
 are a perpetual memorial of the temporary triumph of the 
 faith which they hate or despise. 
 
 The appointment of a patriarch was the next care. 
 The venerable Symeon, who held that dignity, was absent 
 in Cyprus on the investment of the city. He had gone to 
 that island for the purpose of collecting the exorbitant tax 
 demanded of his church, and had sent presents to the princes 
 during the siege, hoping by their means to be delivered 
 from his oppressors : he died apparently before the capture 
 of the city. The Franks seem not to have entertained the 
 least doubt of their competency to elect a successor from 
 their own body, without the slightest reference either to 
 the local church or to the supreme pontiff of the West ; 
 and the only impediment was, that no candidate worthy of 
 the honour was to be found. A chancellor of the holy 
 church of Jerusalem was therefore appointed until the
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 227 
 
 vacancy could be satisfactorily filled ; and the subsequent 
 appointment of unprincipled and mercenary bishops to that 
 dignity was a constant source of trouble to the king and 
 his successors. 
 
 Godfrey remained in Jerusalem scarcely a fortnight, 
 when he marched to meet the troops of the khalif, which 
 which were completely routed in the battle of Ascalon. 
 The king then marched to the north, and only returned 
 to his capital to die there after a brief reign of twelve 
 months. Boemund, who was appointed to succeed him, being 
 captured by the Turks, Baldwin, the brother of Godfrey, 
 was crowned at Christmas, in the church of Bethlehem : 
 for he would not presume to wear a diadem of gold and 
 jewels where the King of kings and Lord of lords had 
 submitted to wear a crown of thorns for the redemption 
 of the world 1 . 
 
 But indeed the Frank kings of Jerusalem were doomed 
 to find that the office with which they were invested was 
 no sinecure. The helmet was their crown, the coat of 
 mail their robe of state, the heavens their royal canopy, 
 and the saddle of the war-horse their throne. After sitting 
 in the Palace of Solomon (so they named the Mosk of 
 Aksa) for three days, to administer justice to his subjects, 
 Bang Baldwin I. left the Holy City to prosecute the war 
 for the subjugation of Palestine. One after another the 
 cities and fortresses of the Saracens were compelled to own 
 a foreign lord; and the conquest of Ascalon, the strongest 
 
 1 The words are as beautiful as the 
 sentiment : " Noluit enim nee prsesu- 
 sumit in urbe Jerusalem diademate 
 auro vel gemmis pretiosis exaltari 
 
 nus dominantium humiliatus et obe- 
 diens usque ad mortem pro mundi re- 
 demptione, spinis horridis et acutis 
 coronatus est." Alb. Aq. vii. xliii. 
 
 adornari et in Regem promoveri, ubi | p. 307. 
 Dominus Jesus, Rex regum et Domi- 
 
 152
 
 228 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 garrison in the land, after an obstinate defence, left them 
 at liberty to extend their arms beyond the limits of the 
 Holy Land. Wiser had it been to concentrate their forces 
 within its natural ramparts of rivers and mountains and 
 deserts ; then might the tottering throne of Jerusalem have 
 been strongly supported, instead of falling before the expi- 
 ration of a century. But the fervour of religious zeal had 
 given place to the thirst for glory, and the prevailing cor- 
 ruption of morals among the Franks deprived them of their 
 strongest support. Only the warrior-monks of the Temple, 
 and the knights of the Hospital of St John, maintained their 
 devotion to the Holy Sepulchre unimpaired, and earned for 
 themselves a deathless fame, which the cruel calumnies of 
 powerful enemies and persecutors, bent upon then* destruc- 
 tion, has not been able to blast. 
 
 The former college originated in the voluntary devo- 
 tion of a small band of noble knights, binding themselves 
 to the protection of the Christian pilgrims, associated under 
 the name of " The poor fellow-soldiers of Jesus Christ 1 ." 
 The foundation dates from a period little posterior to the 
 capture of the city, in which they had distinguished them- 
 selves ; but they had no fixed place of abode until the nine- 
 teenth year of the Frank kingdom, when Baldwin assigned 
 them the Palace or Temple of Solomon for their habita- 
 tion. This building, erected by Justinian, had undergone 
 many extensive repairs during the Saracen domination 2 ; but 
 it is probable that the hospitals formerly connected with it 
 were still standing, and, with the addition of other buildings, 
 would afford accommodation to the augmented numbers of 
 
 1 I refer with great satisfaction to 
 " The Knights Templars," by C. G. 
 Addison, Esq. of the Inner Temple, 
 for the history of this body; a work 
 
 to which I am much indebted in the 
 few following pages. 
 * See above, p. 206.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 229 
 
 the Templars 3 . The powerful advocacy of St Bernard, the 
 distinguished abbot of Clairvaux, created an enthusiastic in- 
 terest in their behalf; their recognition in the council of 
 Troves, and the confirmation of their rule by a papal bull, 
 gave them the fullest sanction of the Church ; and the 
 order soon became the most popular in Europe*. Kings 
 and princes of the highest name felt that they honoured 
 themselves by its patronage, and lands and manors and 
 churches were given or bequeathed to it in various nations 5 , 
 until its rich endowments tempted the cupidity of the sove- 
 reigns, and finally led to its irretrievable ruin. 
 
 In the immediate neighbourhood of the church of the 
 Holy Sepulchre is a large heap of ancient ruins, entered 
 by a gateway, whose fragments, exhibiting a variety of rich 
 and exquisite ornament 6 , with a Latin inscription on the 
 cornice, not easily deciphered, will tempt the architect or an- 
 tiquary to pause and examine it, notwithstanding the very 
 disgusting odours of the neighbouring tannery. The deserted 
 wreck itself will amply repay a visit. From the ruined apse 
 of a large church a flight of steps leads up to a small court 
 surrounded by a cloistered corridor, on the south side of 
 which are three large rooms in a fair state of preservation. 
 The northernmost of these, whose shell is entire, was for- 
 merly a chapel, as is still evident from its appearance ; albeit 
 the sacred building is now desecrated as a depository for 
 dung for the fires of a neighbouring bath. These are the 
 
 3 Addison's Templars, p. 10, &c. 
 2d Ed. Something has been said of this 
 building above, and much more must 
 be said hereafter. See above, p. 206. 
 
 4 Templars, p. 14, &c. An abstract 
 of the rule is given, pp. 18 29. 
 
 s For a list of their possessions and 
 privileges, see Templars, pp. 94, &c. 
 
 and 334. 
 
 6 The diaper-work on this gate- 
 way, and the lace-work round the 
 small square-headed doorway, with a 
 curious key-stone, which gives entrance 
 to the gallery, are beautifully exe- 
 cuted, and the latter is in perfect pre- 
 servation.
 
 230 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PAKT I. 
 
 remains of the hospital of the Knights of St John, another 
 religious order, which claims a passing notice. There were 
 two hospitals, one for males, the other for females, with 
 chapels dedicated, the former to St Mary Magdalene, the 
 latter to St John, the almsgiving patriarch of Alexandria, 
 whose interest in Jerusalem, already recorded, fairly enti- 
 tled him to such a memorial 1 . They were founded by the 
 merchants of Amalfi in the eleventh century, and the self- 
 denying charity of the society, whose original duties consisted 
 in attending the sick and destitute pilgrims whom devotion 
 had attracted to the city, challenged the admiration of the 
 crusaders, while the zeal of the latter added fresh fuel to the 
 devotion of the Hospitallers. They resolved to devote them- 
 selves to their self-imposed task by the bond of monastic 
 vows, and assumed a distinguishing habit, and the honour- 
 able title of " Guardian of the Poor " was conferred on their 
 superior. Subsequently they undertook the protection of the 
 pilgrims, after the manner of the Templars. Both the mili- 
 tary orders had soon to extend their operations, and to arm 
 in defence of the kingdom itself. The Seljukian sultans had 
 given place in their turn to their servants the Atabeks 8 , a 
 formidable race of warriors, whose name became terrible to 
 the Frank power in the East. Zenghi, the founder of the 
 dynasty, recovered Antioch and Edessa from their hands, 
 and spoiled them of their conquests east of the Euphrates ; 
 his son and successor Nour-ed-din, an able and generous per- 
 
 1 A fuller account of the institution 
 of the Knights of St John may be 
 seen in Addison's Templars, p. 61, 
 &c. See also Biblical Researches, ii. 
 pp. 44, 45, and note. 
 
 '* For this revolution, and the reigns 
 of Zenghi, and Nour-ed-din, and Sala- 
 
 din, see the authorities referred to by 
 Gibbon, cap. lix. An interesting es- 
 say on the Khalifate of Bagdad during 
 the latter half of the 12th century, by 
 Mr F. Lebrecht, will be found in the 
 second volume of Asher's edition of 
 Benjamin of Tudela.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 231 
 
 secutor of the Christian faith 3 , waged incessant and successful 
 war with them in Syria and Egypt, where he extinguished 
 the race of the Fatimite khalifs, and restored the spiritual 
 supremacy of Bagdad ; leaving to his nephew, the redoubted 
 Salah-ed-din, the task of crushing the Frank kingdom of 
 Jerusalem, whose strength was greatly reduced not only 
 by defeats in the field, but by division and treason in the 
 cabinet. 
 
 In place of Godfrey and his valiant companions, the 
 guardianship of the Holy City had devolved on a leper, a 
 child, a woman, a coward, and a traitor 4 ; its strength lay 
 in the divisions of its enemies ; and the consolidation of the 
 Moslem power by the victories of Saladin was the signal for 
 its overthrow. In the year A. D. 1186, Guy of Lusignan 
 succeeded to the throne, under suspicious circumstances, 
 through his connexion by marriage with Sybilla, the sister 
 of the fourth, and mother of the fifth Baldwin, by a for- 
 mer husband. The fidelity of the most powerful vassal prince, 
 Count Raymond of Tripoli, had been alienated by disappoint- 
 ment, his malice thirsted for revenge, and to his secret under- 
 standing with the enemy are ascribed the calamities which 
 ensued. The truce which protected the Franks against the 
 Moslems was rashly violated by the former, and that in a 
 manner most calculated to exasperate their enemies. The 
 
 3 " Noradinus maximus nominis et 
 fidei Christianae persecutor; princeps 
 tamen Justus, vafer, providus, et se- 
 cundum gentis SUK traditiones religi- 
 osus." Will. Tyr. xx. xxxiii. Abul- 
 pharagius, p. 267, gives even a higher 
 character. 
 
 4 The words are Gibbon's. The 
 succession of the Frank kings of Jeru- 
 salem was as follows : 
 
 1 . Godfrey. 
 
 2. Baldwin I. brother. 
 
 3. Baldwin II. cousin. 
 
 4. Melisenda, daughter. 
 
 5. Bid win III. son. 
 
 6. Amaury, brother. 
 
 7. Baldwin IV. son. 
 
 8. Baldwin V. nephew. 
 
 9. Guy of Lusignan, husband of 
 Sybilla, mother of the above.
 
 232 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 caravans of pilgrims to Mecca were attacked, the sacred 
 cities themselves threatened, and satisfaction for the out- 
 rages refused. Saladin was not slow to profit by the 
 opportunity thus afforded him: he invaded the kingdom 
 with a force of 80,000 men. The disastrous battle of Ti- 
 berias shattered the Christian power, delivered the king 
 and princes into the hands of the enemy, and left the un- 
 defended cities of Palestine an easy prize to the conqueror 1 . 
 The warlike monks of the Hospital and of the Temple, whose 
 black and white standard, Beauseant, had been distinguished 
 in the thickest part of the fight, were almost annihilated in 
 the fatal encounter : and such as were taken were led forth 
 to execution on the following day. Refusing, to a man, the 
 offer of life on the condition of apostacy, they calmly pre- 
 pared for death ; at sunset they looked down from the moun- 
 tain of Beatitudes, on the fairest scene hi Palestine, on a lake 
 conscious of the voice of Him whose sign they bore, then 
 entered at His call on the unfathomed depth before them, 
 in full confidence of His upholding arm. 
 
 Three months after the battle of Tiberias, eighty-eight 
 years after the conquest of the crusaders, the green and 
 yellow banners of the Moslems were unfurled before the 
 walls of Jerusalem, at the hour of evening prayer. The 
 enthusiasm of the army of Saladin on beholding the walls of 
 their Beit-el-Makuddus, and the sacred domes of es-Sakh- 
 rah and el-Aksa, was little less intense than had been that of 
 the Christian army on its first approach ; the terror of the 
 besieged Saracens on that occasion could not exceed that of 
 the Christians now. Every mark of humiliation which super- 
 
 1 See a lively account of this battle, 
 otherwise called the Battle of Hattin, 
 with its causes and consequences, in 
 Robinson, Bib. Res. in. 242 249, 
 
 where the original authorities are re- 
 ferred to. See also Addison's Tem- 
 plars, 149163.
 
 CH. IV 
 
 .] THE HOLY CITY. 233 
 
 stition could invent or devotion practise, was had recourse to 
 by the inhabitants to avert the wrath which their sins had 
 provoked. The day of grace had passed, the God of battles 
 had deserted their standard ; yet so gallantly did the brave 
 defenders resist the violent assaults of the infidels for fifteen 
 successive days, the clergy and monks assisting on the walls 
 amid showers of arrows aimed with unerring precision and 
 deadly effect, that Saladin was compelled to suspend his 
 operations until the construction of engines should enable 
 him to prosecute them with surer success. A fortnight was 
 consumed in these preparations, and from that time the bat- 
 tering rams were plied with unwearied diligence, night and 
 day, by ten thousand soldiers. All the efforts of the Moslems 
 were directed to that part of the wall between the gates of 
 Damascus 8 and Joppa, on the north side of the city, but west 
 of the point where Godfrey had effected his entrance. All 
 the arts of war were called into service by the besiegers, 
 which neither prayers nor invocations could defeat ; a mine 
 was formed at the north-west angle of the wall, a breach 
 effected, and the defence abandoned. Happily the sultan de- 
 ferred the assault ; but no bribes could induce the dispirited 
 soldiers to stop the gap, and on the following day it was 
 carried. A proposal to surrender on terms was rejected with 
 scorn, and the hour of retribution for the former enormities 
 of the crusaders seemed to have arrived ; but despair had 
 succeeded to fear in the hearts of the Christians : the few 
 
 * Should Mr Addison, to whose 
 full and most interesting account, p. 
 172, &c. (extracted from the narrative 
 of an eyewitness of these scenes) I am 
 here indebted, see this note, and take 
 the trouble to consult the first part of 
 the last chapter but one in this volume, 
 
 he will understand why I substitute 
 for modem readers "Damascus" for 
 " St Stephen," and will probably avail 
 himself of this and some few other 
 corrections, in a future edition of his 
 work ; which deserves to go through 
 many.
 
 234 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 knights of the two military orders, who still remained, were 
 the salvation of their brethren, in their last extremity. They 
 charged the enemy with determined resolution, and drove 
 them from the breach ; and Saladin, fearing further results 
 of their desperation, now listened to the proposal which he 
 had lately rejected ; a capitulation much more lenient than 
 they had a right to expect was granted, and the Moslems 
 took quiet possession of the city. Ten gold bizants for every 
 man, five for women, and one for children under seven years 
 of age, was the price stipulated for liberty and security; hard 
 terms indeed for the poorer class, whom they necessarily 
 enslaved, but infinitely easier than those which they had 
 proposed under similar circumstances death in war, or death 
 in peace. The Templars and Hospitallers, faithful to their 
 vows, devoted all their funds to rescue their poorer brethren, 
 whom they escorted in safety to Tripoli; but many were led 
 captive by their conquerors, and bitter were their tears in the 
 house of their bondage 1 . 
 
 The dismay of Christendom at the fall of Jerusalem was 
 equalled only by the joy of the Moslems at its recovery, 
 which they celebrated with all imaginable tokens of grati- 
 tude. The Koran was restored to the pulpit, the voices of 
 the Muezzim again called to prayer, the mosks rung with 
 the shout of victory and the confession of Islam. The holy 
 rock was disencumbered from its abominations, and extreme 
 was the horror of the Moslems to discover that it had suf- 
 fered diminution by violence. The walls and pavement were 
 
 1 It is computed that 14,000 men, 
 women, and children, were reduced to 
 slavery at this time. Addison's Tern- 
 plars, p. 178. Jalal-Addin, p. 221, 
 complains that universal corruption 
 was practised by those who collected 
 
 the ransom, but that 100,000 dinars 
 came into the treasury notwithstand- 
 ing (p. 221); before and after which 
 is a full and wordy account of these 
 transactions, which I use.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 235 
 
 purified from Christian defilement with rose-water from Da- 
 mascus, the golden cross, torn from its height to be replaced 
 by the crescent, was dragged in dishonour through the 
 streets amid the triumphant exultation of the Moslems, 
 while the weeping Christians tore their hair, beat their 
 breasts, and rent their garments at the heart-rending sight 
 of such awful desecration ! The lodgings of the Templars on 
 the west of el-Aksa, with their granaries and offices, were 
 removed, all things were restored to their former condition, 
 and the mosques richly furnished with lamps and carpets. 
 The sultan soon afterwards left for Tyre, having written 
 an account of his successes to the khalif of Bagdad, and 
 given the necessary instructions for the repair of the for- 
 tifications 2 . After an ineffectual attempt upon Tyre, he 
 departed to Damascus. 
 
 But the gallant defence of Tyre by the youthful Conrad 
 of Montferrat, the arrival of the Emperor Frederic Barba- 
 rossa, of Philip Augustus of France, and Richard Plantagenet 
 of England; the long and obstinate siege of Acre, and its 
 ultimate surrender to the Christians ; their slow advance 
 along the coast, debating every inch of ground with de- 
 termined valour until they reached the mountain-barrier of 
 Judaea, whose narrow defiles, guarded by the squadrons of Sa- 
 ladin, defied their further progress ; these, with the daring 
 deeds of the military friars, and the feats of prowess dis- 
 played by the lion-hearted monarch hi the fields of Ascalon, 
 must be sought for in other quarters 3 : only one effect of 
 this formidable but unsuccessful enterprize can be mentioned 
 here. 
 
 On the advance of the Christian army towards the south, 
 
 2 Addison's Templars, p. 182, &c. 
 
 3 The reader cannot do better than 
 consult the interesting volume so often 
 
 referred to above, from the pen of Mr 
 Addison.
 
 236 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 through the bloody fields of Csesarea and Arsouf, the fortifi- 
 cations of Ascalon, Lydda, and Ramlah, were demolished by 
 the sultan, who determined to concentrate all his forces on 
 the principal point of attack 1 . He repaired in person to 
 Jerusalem to superintend the preparations for defence which 
 were there in progress. He took up his quarters in the 
 deserted hospital of the Knights of St John, and devoted 
 all his energies to the work. The labourers furnished by 
 the governor of Mosul, aided by 2000 Christian prisoners, 
 were employed in digging a deep fosse, and erecting a wall 
 of massive stones with the materials thus provided. Their 
 principal exertions were directed to the northern part of 
 the wall, between the Damascus gate and that of the great 
 Altar, afterwards called the gate of Abraham 2 , formerly the 
 most assailable part of the fortifications, but now strengthened 
 with bastions. Aadel prince of Kerak, brother of Saladin, 
 was set over the work, but the sultan himself was personally 
 present from morning to night, encouraging the workmen 
 by his exhortations, and stimulating them by his own ex- 
 ample : bringing stones in the saddle-cloth on his horse, 
 until his zeal was emulated by the inhabitants of all con- 
 ditions, and the work of many years was accomplished in 
 six months. But the precautions were unnecessary. The 
 Christians were effectually checked at Beit-nubah, or La- 
 trun, the entrance to the hill-country of Judaoa ; once indeed 
 a party forced its way as far as Kolonia, not more than 
 five miles from the city, but were glad to save themselves 
 
 1 I have followed the Arabic his- 
 tory of Jerusalem, contained in a 
 French translation in Von Hammer'n 
 Fundgraben des Orients, Vol. iv. pp. 
 216237. 
 
 3 The Damascus gate is called by 
 
 my author Bab-el-Amoud, the gate of 
 the column, by which name it is still 
 known. The other gate I cannot iden- 
 tify, but I think it must be the small 
 gate now closed, marked as the gate of 
 Herod, east of the Damascus gate.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 237 
 
 by a precipitate retreat. Soon after a truce was concluded, 
 and the English king set out on his disastrous return. 
 
 The combined armament of the three most potent mo- 
 narchs of Europe arrived either too late or too early to 
 accomplish its object. Had it reached Palestine in time to 
 prevent the fatal battle of Tiberias, or to secure the victory 
 of the Christian arms, or after that the death of Saladin had 
 left his dominions to be weakened by the divisions or dissi- 
 pated by the rivalry of his successors, the crusaders might 
 have retained or renewed possession of the Holy City. But 
 now all was vain. 
 
 On the death of Saladin, his son Efdhal succeeded to 
 the government of Syria, and another son, Aziz, to the 
 throne of Egypt. The latter conspired with his uncle Aadel 
 to expel Efdhal from Damascus, and Aadel seized the govern- 
 ment of Syria. Aziz died shortly after, leaving as his 
 successor Mansour-Mohammud his son, a child of nine years 3 . 
 The emirs invited his uncle Efdhal to the regency, which 
 he accepted. An unsuccessful attempt to revenge his wrongs, 
 and recover his former dominion from the usurper, led to 
 his ruin, and Aadel became master of Egypt, which he 
 governed nineteen years ; when on his death his dominions 
 were again divided between his two sons, Moazzam Yosa and 
 Kamel Abd-el Maali Mohammud ; the former of whom pos- 
 sessed himself of Syria, leaving Egypt to his brother. It 
 was during this reign, when the Franks had taken Damietta 
 by assault, that Yosa, fearing their projects against Jeru- 
 salem, sent a party of sappers and miners to destroy its 
 
 3 The history of the Eyoub dy- 
 nasty, after the death of Saladin, is 
 contained in the same Arabic history, 
 continued in Vol. v. pp. 145 156, in 
 Fundgraben dea Orients. See also, 
 
 Jalal-Addin, p. 264, &c. Addison's 
 Templars contains all the events of the 
 crusaders at this period, from the best 
 authorities.
 
 238 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 fortifications, and the city was wholly dismantled. Two 
 years later it was proposed by the brothers to cede Jeru- 
 salem, Ascalon, Tiberias, and all the places on the coast 
 conquered by Saladin, retaining only Kerak and Chaubek, 
 on condition of the Franks evacuating Damietta. The liberal 
 proposal was rashly declined ; an indemnity of 300,000 
 ducats being demanded for the demolition of the walls of 
 Jerusalem, in addition to the cession of the reserved for- 
 tresses. The Franks were soon after forced to capitulate, 
 under very different terms the unconditional surrender of 
 their highly-valued prize ! 
 
 A few years after this, the reinforcement of the Franks 
 and the divisions of the house of Eyoub, put the former in 
 possession of the ruins of Jerusalem : Kamel of Egypt, medi- 
 tating an attack on his nephew Nasir David, the successor 
 of Yosa at Damascus, entered into a correspondence with 
 the Emperor Frederic the Second, then the champion of the 
 Christian cause in the East, which resulted in an armistice 
 on the following conditions. The Franks were to receive 
 Jerusalem with its ruined walls, which they were not to 
 rebuild, nor to violate the sanctity of es-Sakhrah es-Sherif, 
 or of Masjid-el-Aksa, but Christians and Moselms should 
 have equal liberty to visit and worship at those holy places. 
 Lastly, only the villages on the road from Acre to Jerusalem 
 should belong to the Christians. Thus was Jerusalem again 
 delivered over to the Franks, to the infinite disgust of the 
 Moslems ; and Nasir did not neglect the opportunity thus 
 afforded him of injuring the reputation of his uncle, by pro- 
 curing an eloquent preacher to pronounce a panegyric on the 
 Beit-el-Makuddus, and the injury done to Islam by its sur- 
 render to the infidels. His touching elegy drew tears from 
 the auditors ! 
 
 At the close of ten years, Saleh Nejmed-din Eyoub, the
 
 CH. IV.J THE HOLY CITY. 239 
 
 son of Kamel, having received intimation that the Franks, 
 in contravention of the stipulation, were engaged in repairing 
 the wall of Jerusalem, marched to the city. Having be- 
 sieged and taken it, he levelled with the ground the Castle 
 and Tower of David, which had been spared on its former 
 demolition. Once again after this it reverted to the posses- 
 sion of the Franks, four years after their expulsion; when 
 they availed themselves of their unrestricted liberty to re- 
 build its walls and occupy its mosks ; and a worthy dis- 
 ciple of the prophet, who passed through Jerusalem during 
 the period of their occupation, has recorded with expres- 
 sions of horror that he had seen with his own eyes the pro- 
 fanation of the noble rock, by cups of wine placed on it 
 by the monks ; and other scenes scarcely less afflictive. But 
 the heart of Kadi Jemal-ed-din Ibn-Wasil was soon com- 
 forted. The approach of the wild Carizmian hordes, in- 
 vited to the aid of the Sultan of Egypt, alarmed the small 
 garrison of the city ; its defence was declared hopeless, its 
 walls abandoned to the invaders, and the disastrous battle 
 at Gaza hastened the downfal of the Christian cause in the 
 East. 
 
 The subsequent history of Jerusalem may be told in 
 few words. The defenceless state of the city was the pro- 
 tection of its inhabitants from further molestation during the 
 expiring struggles of the crusaders, whose ruin was hastened 
 by the conquests of Bendocdar, the first Mamluk sultan 
 of Egypt, and consummated by the fall of Acre before the 
 victorious arms of Kelason. The historical importance of 
 Jerusalem terminates with the expulsion of the Franks from 
 the country. As a military position it would be utterly 
 insignificant in modern warfare, did not the approaches to 
 the city and the mountains which command it present a 
 serious obstacle to the operations of heavy artillery. Its
 
 240 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 inhabitants have acted wisely, however, in not trying the 
 fortune of war. 
 
 At the commencement of the 16th century the Mamluk 
 sultans exercised little more than a nominal jurisdiction over 
 Syria. A western traveller 1 , who visited the Holy City 
 A.D. 1507, with letters from the Egyptian court, purchased 
 at a high price at Cairo, derived little benefit from them at 
 Jerusalem. The governor indeed received them with every 
 token of submission and reverence, placing them on his head 
 and kissing them; but "backshish a " alone could open his 
 heart, and unclose the doors of the Holy Sepulchre to the 
 pilgrims. 
 
 Ten years after this, the shadow of power vanished 
 before the arms of the Ottoman sultan, Selim I. A.D. 1517, 
 who visited Jerusalem in person both before and after his 
 conquest of Egypt. His successor Soleiman (A.D. 1542) 
 erected a monument at Jerusalem, which remains to this day, 
 in the well-built walls which surround the city ; and his 
 name is perpetuated, but probably not immortalized, by in- 
 scriptions in various parts. From this period the Holy City 
 has been the scene of a warfare of a different character, the 
 circumstances of which I pass over without regret to myself 
 or injury to the reader 3 . Not a year, scarcely a month, 
 
 1 Bauragarten visited Palestine in 
 1507. His words are: "Nihil tune 
 nobis liter Soldani...profuerunt, pro 
 quibus octo seraphos in Cayro ex- 
 promseramus ; licet eas dominus Hie- 
 rosolymse cum summa acceptas et ex- 
 osculatas reverentia, capitique suo su- 
 perimpositas legisset...ad nummos ire 
 oportebat, eorum uti opera, eorum 
 fulciri presidio. Datis itaque viginti 
 seraphis intrandi templi et sepulchri 
 vendita nobis licentia." Peregriuatio, 
 
 p. 81. One might imagine it written 
 last year ! 
 
 a " Backshish," or " present," is the 
 first and last word which will ring in a 
 traveller's ears who now visits this 
 country. 
 
 8 A full account of this period I 
 have met with in M. MouraviefPs 
 History, but it is not only most un- 
 edifying, but deeply distressing and 
 humiliating.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 241 
 
 has passed for three successive centuries without disputes 
 between the three principal Christian communities which 
 divide the sacred city. Suffice it here to say, that the limits 
 fixed to their respective possessions within the Church of 
 the Holy Sepulchre, as shown in the coloured Plan, have 
 been invaded by hostile encroachments, and defended, inch 
 by inch, with an animosity which, however creditable to their 
 veneration for the holy places, is most disgraceful in every 
 other view. It was even suspected that the destruction of 
 the sacred building by fire, at the commencement of this 
 century, was the result of the disappointment of the Ar- 
 menians in a contest for the acquisition of power over the 
 Greek possessions in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre; 
 and although the charge is not proved by the mere fact of 
 the fire having originated in their church, yet the imputation 
 of such awful sacrilege demonstrates the spirit that animates 
 those who could insinuate it. Though the circumstances of 
 that fire are not of sufficient interest to call for a detailed 
 account, the only fact which I would record is certainly a 
 most remarkable one. The heat was so excessive that the 
 marble columns which surrounded the circular building hi 
 the centre of which stood the Holy Grotto, were completely 
 pulverized. The lamps and chandeliers, with the rest of the 
 vessels of the church, brass and silver and gold, were melted 
 like wax ; the molten lead from the immense dome which 
 covers the Holy Sepulchre poured down in torrents ; yet the 
 Holy Cave itself received not the sh'ghtest injury, externally 
 or internally ; the silk hangings and ornaments remaining 
 unscathed by the flame, the smell of fire not even having 
 passed upon them 4 . 
 
 4 I have read the Greek account of 
 
 by M. Mouravieff; and the Frank 
 
 the fire in the History of Jerusalem, version, by a Frenchman, in Mr Arun- 
 
 16
 
 242 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 This sad calamity happened on the 12th of October, 
 1808, and destroyed both the churches of the Resurrection 
 and of the Holy Golgotha, and all the buildings connected 
 with them. They were restored in the following year, at 
 an immense expense, chiefly borne by the Greek Christians, 
 and so exactly after the model of the former building, that 
 they might be thought identical. 
 
 Jerusalem has since shared the fortunes of Syria, with- 
 out having in any way guided them, or being materially 
 affected by them. It passed into possession of Ibrahim 
 Pasha in 1832, and was restored to the Ottoman power after 
 the memorable bombardment of Acre, in November, 1840 1 ; 
 having in the interim suffered the dishonour of a capture 
 from the undisciplined Fellahin the "bold peasantry" of 
 Palestine, who held possession of it for some weeks. It has 
 latterly enjoyed the distinction of a resident pasha, having 
 been formerly subject to the pashalic of Damascus; but 
 since the united wisdom of Europe has thought fit to destroy 
 despotism and restore anarchy in the country, it has ex- 
 perienced, as may be supposed, a questionable security ; the 
 tranquillity of which is liable at any moment to be disturbed 
 by the lawless sheiks of the country, whose violence Ibrahim 
 Pasha was alone able to repress by the terrors of the sword. 
 Even while I write a report has reached Europe, that in a 
 late outbreak of one of the most powerful chiefs in the 
 country, he has had the insolence to attack the Holy City ! 
 So low has she now fallen who defied for months the arms 
 of Imperial Rome ! 
 
 del's Illustrations of Jerusalem, &c. 
 p. 46, &c. which is within the reach of 
 English readers. The accounts are 
 consistent with each other. 
 
 1 An account of the return of Jeru- 
 
 salem to its allegiance to the Porte, may 
 be seen (if any one cares to see how 
 revolutions are managed at Jerusalem) 
 in Mr John's work on the Anglican 
 Cathedral Church, &c. p. 4, note 1.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 243 
 
 And now, who shall venture to dissipate the darkness 
 of that night hi which the wisdom of Providence has been 
 pleased to envelope the events of futurity? Who shall 
 declare the future destinies of the Holy City ? That it is 
 yet to be the theatre of great and important actions, may 
 be concluded with sufficient warrant from the language of 
 inspiration; and some who have most deeply studied the 
 pages of prophecy, look to it as the appointed scene of 
 the last great struggle of antichrist, and of the revelation 
 of the Son of Man 2 . The restoration of the Jews is by 
 many expected to precede this final consummation; and the 
 remarkable preservation of that wonderful people must be 
 regarded as a striking confirmation of their view who plead 
 for a literal fulfilment of prophecy, besides that higher spi- 
 ritual interpretation which has met with its accomplishment 
 hi the people of Christ, who are "Abraham's seed, and 
 heirs according to the promise." Whether the declining 
 power of the Ottoman empire will retain its feeble hold 
 of Palestine until the hour for that restoration arrive, it 
 were presumption to determine. The days of that empire 
 seem indeed to be numbered, and infatuation, the precursor 
 of destruction, is apparent hi its counsels. Are the Jews 
 as yet prepared to receive their possessions, if such be 
 indeed the Divine purpose concerning them? Awful indeed 
 were the prospect of their restoration in an unconverted 
 state. The preceding pages have shewn how the spirit with 
 which they they are animated against the disciples of Christ 
 has manifested itself on various occasions, without provo- 
 cation ; and when we call to mind the many centuries of 
 oppression and bloody persecution which they have endured, 
 
 * I shall not be expected to enter 
 on a prophetical disquisition. I only 
 adopt what appears to myself the most 
 
 probable interpretation of Holy Scrip- 
 ture ; but I hope I should not dare to 
 dogmatize on a subject so awful. 
 
 162
 
 244 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 without the opportunity of retaliation or revenge, the long 
 catalogue of wrongs and insults meekly borne, but trea- 
 sured up in the dark recesses of the unregenerate heart 
 against a day of retribution, who can contemplate without 
 a shudder the consequences of their speedy restoration to 
 power and political independence? 
 
 If, then, in mercy to the Church, their restoration be 
 delayed until the blessed influences of the gospel of Christ 
 have penetrated their hearts, enlightening them with the 
 precepts of love, and teaching them to bless and pardon 
 their persecutors, what is to be the condition of Palestine 
 during this interval? 
 
 I cannot forbear adducing the opinion of a popular 
 French writer on this subject 1 . It need scarcely be said 
 that the first object in a plan of operations in any part 
 of the globe, must, according to a Frenchman's theory, be 
 the humiliation of England ; " that terrible vulture of the 
 political world, who has pounced upon Mount Lebanon, the 
 borders of the Nile, the Red Sea, and the Indian Ocean; 
 whose only idea of civilization is to convert the world to 
 her own advantage. The welfare of the human race de- 
 mands that vigorous obstacles be offered to the monstrous 
 developement of Britain's power. In order that the fall 
 of the Ottoman empire may subserve the cause of civiliza- 
 tion in the East, she must be checked. The only means 
 to effect this is the union of France and Russia. The 
 active and persevering spirit of the latter, requires the 
 genius of France to enable her to fulfil her destinies; and 
 France, on her side, demands this grand support to enable 
 
 1 M. Poujoulat, Histoire de Jeru- 
 salem, p. 275. I only adduce the pas- 
 sage as a specimen of French policy 
 
 in the East, and as a hook on which 
 to hang a few remarks.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 245 
 
 her to triumph over an enemy whose glory is of neces- 
 sity the abasement of her own. Austria will of course 
 assist. This accomplished, France, the champion of the 
 faith, guided by her conquering genius, is to plant the 
 Cross on all the Asiatic capitals, as thirty years ago she 
 planted her standard on all the capitals of Europe; and 
 the regeneration of the East is to be accomplished by her 
 
 missionaries 
 
 2 f 
 
 Now, without advancing any claim to political discern- 
 ment, still less to prophetic prescience, I venture to pro- 
 nounce that there is no combination further without the 
 reach of probability than this no expectations less likely 
 to be realized. Russia must forget the French invasion 
 and the sacking of Moscow both must forget the memora- 
 ble retreat for which Russia offers her annual Te Deum, 
 before such a coalition as that here contemplated can be 
 effected ; and the holy orthodox Church of the East, the 
 church of the Russian empire, must acknowledge the pa- 
 pal supremacy, whose claims she has resisted since they 
 were first advanced, before she will delegate to French 
 priests the duties which she is commissioned to perform. 
 The protection of the oppressed Christians in the East has 
 devolved on the Autocrat of Russia; it his high preroga- 
 tive, it is his solemn duty as a Christian and as a faith- 
 ful son of the holy Church catholic. That duty he will 
 perform. The establishment of the orthodox Church in his 
 dominions commends it to his special regard; the extension 
 of then* limits so as to comprehend the seat of the chief 
 
 3 This flourish will be thought to 
 be exaggerated by me ; I can assure 
 the reader that I translate the nonsense 
 
 verbatim, and have omitted as much 
 equally silly. But the passage will 
 repay a perusal.
 
 246 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART i. 
 
 patriarch of the Armenians, has entitled that important 
 community to his countenance and support; and the fact, 
 of the frontiers of the two most formidable Mahommedan 
 powers bordering on his immense empire, gives a weight 
 to his arbitration which no other Christian sovereign can 
 exercise. And I confess that when I observed the silent 
 and beneficial influence of Russia, as exercised by her re- 
 presentatives in the East, with a degree of impartiality 
 which I did not expect, but especially when I contrasted it 
 with the busy, restless interference of the French political 
 agents, aiming only at the aggrandisement of Rome, with 
 a love too fierce even for its favoured objects, I could not 
 participate in the jealous and suspicious fears with which 
 my countrymen are wont to regard Russian diplomacy. 
 And further, when I discovered that the laws of Russia 
 have contrived to reconcile the firmest possible support to 
 the national church, with the greatest degree of toleration 
 to other religious communities, better than any country 1 , 
 I could not but feel that the extension of those laws might 
 prove most salutary to the East in its present distracted 
 state. On the other hand, the suppression of many an- 
 cient sees in Georgia, on its annexation to the empire at 
 the commencement of the last reign, with the subjection of 
 the whole Church to the Holy Governing Synod of Russia, 
 whose constitution is not unexceptionable in itself, and which 
 certainly could exercise no rightful jurisdiction over inde- 
 pendent bishops without the free consent of their church, 
 had led me to apprehend an uncanonical interference with 
 
 1 In proof of the former, I appeal 
 to the Ustaf, or Code of Laws for the 
 Regulation of the Holy Governing 
 
 Synod, &c. &c. ; and to the testimony 
 of foreign residents in Russia for the 
 latter.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 247 
 
 the ancient patriarchates, in the event here contemplated. 
 But these apprehensions have been much allayed by the 
 liberal and enlightened policy displayed on occasion of the 
 late vacancy in the highest dignity of the Armenian church, 
 when a free election 2 by the whole body was not only 
 allowed, but invited and ensured, by the high authority of 
 an imperial ukase; and if the report of some late enact- 
 ments had awakened alarm in behalf of the Jews, whose 
 interests demand the second consideration in all views of 
 Eastern politics, a more accurate knowledge of the facts 
 of the case, and the very promulgation of an edict affect- 
 ing them, dictated by a spirit of consideration worthy of 
 a Christian monarch 3 , has convinced me that the lives and 
 liberties of the Israelites would be no less safe in the cus- 
 tody of Russia than of any other Christian power. 
 
 England has already shown what she can and what 
 she will do in the East. She spread the wings of her 
 protection to adopt the Frenchman's comparison of the 
 vulture over the persecuted Jews at Damascus, because 
 they were friendless and oppressed; and if she did light 
 
 8 " The free election of the Patri- 
 arch Narcissus to the highest dignity 
 of the Armenian church, which took 
 place at Etchmiazine, April 17th, 1843, 
 and was confirmed by an imperial 
 ukaze, August 10th, in the same year, 
 is the more honourable to the emperor, 
 because there was not the slightest 
 doubt of the unanimous election of a 
 prelate who had been so unfortunate 
 as to fall under the suspicion or dis- 
 pleasure of the government. That 
 prelate was so elected, and no objection 
 offered. The appointment had been 
 
 for centuries in the hands of the Porte, 
 where all has been carried by bribery. 
 Who would not desire that the most 
 disgraceful simoniacal proceedings, re- 
 lating to the orthodox patriarchate of 
 Constantinople, might be terminated in 
 the same manner? and what other 
 European sovereign would permit a free 
 election by the whole Church ?" 
 
 3 I allude to an ukaze, dated Gat- 
 china, November 13 25, 1844, ad- 
 dressed to the minister of public in- 
 struction, relating to the education of 
 the Jews.
 
 248 THE HOLY CITY. [PART I. 
 
 upon Mount Lebanon for awhile, it was that she might 
 defend the lives and liberties of the Maronites, endangered 
 by the fury of the Druses, or the bigotry of the Turks; 
 and this she did for the name of Christ which they bore, 
 though she knew them to be the stanchest Romanists in the 
 world. She procured for the Syrian Jacobites an order for 
 the restoration of six churches and monasteries between 
 Damascus and Aleppo, which the Latins, aided by their 
 French allies, had unjustly seized ; and this she did not from 
 enmity against Rome or France, still less from sympathy 
 with Monophysite heresy, but as an act of justice, which had 
 been grossly outraged. This is the gauge of England's 
 policy in the East. She will protect the weak against their 
 oppressors, without respect of persons. She will procure 
 the administration of evenhanded justice to all alike as far 
 as her influence extends. Nay, she has done much more. 
 
 Acting through the moral weight of her ambassador to 
 the Porte, whose uncompromising firmness and irreproach- 
 able uprightness command the respect while they provoke 
 the hatred of the most corrupt court in the world, she 
 has broken down the mighty barrier of Mahommedan pre- 
 judices, and cast an aegis over all the Christians of the 
 East, beneath which they may henceforth enjoy full liberty 
 of conscience, free from the terrors of penal statutes; and 
 she will use all her endeavours that those merciful enact- 
 ments be respected in their fullest meaning. This is what 
 England has done ; this is what, by God's help, she will 
 continue to do ; and woe to those who attempt to check 
 her while she holds on in this course. Rather let the 
 other nations of Europe imitate her enlightened policy ; and 
 if the balance of power can only be maintained by uphold- 
 ing the integrity of the Ottoman empire, at least let them
 
 CH. IV. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 249 
 
 provide that its protracted existence occasion no detriment 
 to the Christian name, nor hinder the progress of that 
 faith to which they owe all the superiority, moral, religi- 
 ous, and political, which they now enjoy over that power 
 which was once the terror of the world.
 
 O 10
 
 REFERENCE 
 
 i Knit-,,,,,-.- 1,, /; chard, 
 -> vi.,,:- /;,,- ,i,.. Turkish d.ar,!., 
 
 3Ste,ne,,fi;,cli,,n 
 
 4 Toixl, ,.f Xi,,,/ C,,,,lfre\- 
 BToKbofSxng JMdwi,, 
 
 (') 'In, nli /' Meldiitcdech 
 
 7 O^rclofStJohnthc lianiist IcAdam, 
 
 8 Fissure in Hie met- nf <; /,///, 
 VRahina rooms 
 
 10 Aliar of the Armenian., 
 
 11 Hare where ihr lifrirflin Mary .,/,/ 
 whfii ll,.-l,o,ly,,l'l'l,rist -was anointed 
 
 VI K,,lr:,, u -c l:.li,,-l,,,l,,,n, lx ,.flh f Ar,n f m ani 
 
 13 Place ofiht Stan- rollc,) fn,m the, Sepulrh, 
 
 14 Tn If f ' 
 
 15 Allnroflhe Copts 
 Hi _///,, ./'//I,- .frri.in.f 
 
 17 Ton,/,,,!-.!,,.,;'.,,!, a- \,,;,,l,., l ,, l . f 
 
 18 7^^ ../nVi !/// I,,,,,,;;',,/ 
 
 \'.1 <'i-nll;-,,t't/ir<;,;;-l; C/1,,,1-/, 
 
 'K> Stalls fa-Monks 
 
 -'I .s,,,/ ///, P,,h-iarch,fJeni, 
 22 SeatfoMiei other Patriarchs 
 
 ~>3 77,r IL-onortM l'l, ln - ,,f il,,- ',,, 
 
 of the Patriarch 
 
 i/i the likfnrs.s nfa Gardener 
 28 Where Mary ifaqiialfne, stood, 
 
 30 Par! of the Pillar to which 
 our Lord wag bound 
 
 31 Clum-l, ,,nl,,-Jt,,,,,,,,, tatnolia 
 
 32 FloTf. in which our Lord appeared, to 
 If is Mother fi/}rr hl.f Jtr.rurrecti'arv 
 
 33 Place,,/'//,,- r.:;,,i,,ilionofau- Ovss 
 34oh'nff plate forthc franks 
 
 35 The bonds ofnu-i.il 
 
 36 Chapel of the yirqirv 
 
 37 ChapAtrfLonyima the Centurion 
 
 :J8 Chanel ot'lheiH,rlii, ;l ,-f,,,,rlm^ <,uru,cn 
 .'!!> OupttofAcmodJng, whenualn the. 
 
 /ill,,,-,:,, ,,-l,i,-h ,:, /;/ ... .,-,/,-,/ 
 
 1O Stain going Jotm I'url nine xl,-)i.-. 
 
 rft'/tt 
 
 42 Chufielnfilu-Prtiitenl Thief 
 -I.", .V<yw,/,, M -Hir,A- Ihirln-nsl,;,.-- 
 
 i-i ri,,,;-, ,,-th,- ;,,,, ,;/ 
 
 (h-eeks 
 Latins 
 Common toafl. 
 
 Ariiii'iiia 
 Svriiins 
 Cojit s
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 PAKT II.
 
 " Even the lifeless stone is dear 
 For thoughts of HIM." 
 
 PART II. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE, AND 
 DR ROBINSON'S TOPOGRAPHY. 
 
 OF all the topographical questions relating to Jerusalem 
 those connected with the position of Mount Calvary are so 
 incomparably the most important, that no further explanation 
 will be asked for giving them precedence ; and if any apology 
 be required for attempting a defence of the tradition relating 
 to the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, it is offered in the con-
 
 254 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 sideration that the credit of the whole Church for fifteen 
 hundred years is in some measure involved in the question. 
 
 The interest which every Christian must feel in the 
 establishment of a fact, which was appealed to in former ages 
 as an evidence of our Lord's resurrection 1 , might not unnatu- 
 rally predispose us to believe it on insufficient grounds ; and 
 however we may pity or despise the credulity, we cannot but 
 envy the simplicity of the devout pilgrim, who with real sin- 
 cerity of heart gives himself up to the influence of those asso- 
 ciations which these sacred localities are calculated to awaken, 
 ignorant alike of arguments for or against their identity with 
 the scenes of his Saviour's humiliation and glory, and undis- 
 turbed by any doubts. Granting it to be a delusion, ic is 
 to him at least a pleasing and a profitable delusion, impli- 
 cating him in no guilt ; and he might reasonably regard the 
 wisdom, which would rob him of his gratification, as folly, and 
 count his ignorance the greater bliss. But were nothing 
 more serious than this involved, the question would be one 
 of comparatively little importance, and we might be content 
 to relinquish the point, with a feeling of regret for ourselves, 
 and of surprise at those who had taken so much pains to 
 perform the thankless office of shaking our confidence in a 
 harmless opinion so long and so fondly cherished. 
 
 But when the moral character of one important branch 
 of the Church, if not of the whole Church, is at stake, the 
 question assumes a graver aspect, and we are bound in 
 charity, if not in gratitude, to weigh with the most suspicious 
 jealousy the evidence which would convict of deliberate fraud 
 and shameless hypocrisy, not only the bishops and clergy 
 of the church at Jerusalem, but the brightest lights of the 
 universal Church at a period which we have been taught to 
 regard as " uncorrupt," when Christianity was " most pure 
 
 1 St Cyril of Jerusalem, Cat. x. 19. See Eusebius, Vita Constaiitini, cap. xviii.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 255 
 
 and indeed golden 2 ." For the plea of ignorance can hardly 
 be admitted in their behalf, and would scarcely be an ex- 
 tenuation of their fault if it could 3 . They were impostors, 
 and not dupes or they had sufficient evidence to believe that 
 they had really recovered the Sepulchre of our Lord. And 
 it is remarkable that the strongest objection that has been 
 urged against the authority of the tradition is such as it 
 would have been most easy to obviate, such as an impostor, 
 if he had any of the art of his profession, would have been 
 certain to foresee and most careful to anticipate. 
 
 Supposing Macarius to have failed in his endeavours to 
 ascertain the true site, and his principles to have allowed him 
 to commit " a pious fraud 4 " in the invention of a fictitious 
 one, it is inconceivable that he should have presumed so 
 much on the ignorance or credulity of the emperor and all 
 his contemporaries, to say nothing of succeeding generations, 
 as to fix upon a spot which common sense or common obser- 
 vation would shew them to have been within the ancient 
 city 5 . So that instead of arguing against the tradition, as 
 
 2 Our Homilies invariably speak of 
 the Church of the 4th century in these 
 and such-like terms, and of its bishops, 
 &c., as " godly learned men." 
 
 3 " The Quarterly Reviewer of De- 
 cember 1841, professes to consider it 
 only a question of ' poetic statement,' 
 ' fond reminiscences,' { reverential feel- 
 ings,' ' pleasing visions,' and the like ; 
 and contrasts them with 'the stern 
 voice of truth,' &c. &c. : whereas the 
 simple question is, whether we shall 
 consider the Church of the 4th century 
 very credulous or very profligate." 
 Newman's Preface to Fleury, p. cliv. 
 n. e. 
 
 4 The words are Dr Robinson's. 
 Vol. ii. p. 80. " The alleged dis- 
 
 covery of them (Golgotha and the 
 tomb) by the aged and credulous 
 Helena, like her discovery of the Cross, 
 may not improbably have been the 
 work of pious fraud. It would per- 
 haps not be doing injustice to the 
 Bishop Macarius and his clergy, if we 
 regard the whole as a well-laid and 
 successful plan for restoring to Jeru- 
 salem its former consideration, and ele- 
 vating his see to a higher degree of 
 influence and dignity." In these smooth 
 words they are charged with ambition, 
 fraud, falsehood and hypocrisy, of the 
 most aggravated character and " no 
 injustice done them !" 
 
 5 The following remarks of Mr 
 Newman are as weighty as they are
 
 256 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART it. 
 
 its impugners are accustomed to do, from the probable extent 
 of the ancient city, it would be much more reasonable, in 
 considering so very uncertain and difficult a question as the 
 course of the second wall, to take into account that less than 
 three centuries after our Lord's ascension, the place now 
 called Calvary was said to have been without its range: 
 because, the more improbable the supposition, the better 
 reason must there have existed for marking this as the spot ; 
 since the fact of the crucifixion and place of sepulture being 
 " without the gate " is not a modern discovery ; it is plainly 
 so written in holy Scripture, and all the ancient writers bear 
 witness to it, and declare with one voice that the site then 
 and now revered was formerly without the city, but brought 
 within its bounds by a later disposition of the walls. 
 
 It must be considered in examining the question that the 
 nature of the case does not admit of demonstrative proof ; the 
 most we can expect is a high degree of probability ; and if 
 we can divest ourselves of an undue prejudice against tra- 
 ditionary evidence, we shall be ready to grant that there 
 is a strong antecedent presumption on the side of a tradition 
 which has antiquity and universality in its favour, and relates 
 to a matter of such vast importance : and that it is fairly 
 entitled to regard, and worthy of some degree of credit, until 
 its veracity be clearly disproved. On subjects such as these 
 
 forcible. " Were Macarius or St Cy- 
 ril and the clergy of Jerusalem the 
 most covetous and unprincipled of 
 hypocrites, why should this lead them 
 to fix on a false site for our Lord's cru- 
 cifixion and burial ? Why should they 
 not do their best to fix on the right 
 one ? Why should they subject them- 
 selves to an additional chance of de- 
 tection, and give to persons like their 
 present impugners a gratuitous ad- 
 
 vantage ; as if it were not enough to 
 fabricate a cross, but they must hazard 
 a superfluous mistake in respect to the 
 sepulchre ? Were they then knaves 
 and impostors of the most appalling die, 
 this would be no reason for their omit- 
 ting, nay the strongest reason for their 
 taking all possible pains to find the 
 very and true spot where our Lord 
 suffered." Preface to Fleury, p. clvii.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 257 
 
 it seems safer and more wise, and is certainly more pleasant, 
 to endeavour to reconcile apparently conflicting testimonies, 
 so as to believe as much as possible, rather than to set them 
 in opposition one to another, as though they could by no 
 possibility be brought to agreement. It is our duty to guard 
 as far as possible against the opposite extremes of credulity 
 and scepticism. 
 
 And I cannot but think that there is something very un- 
 reasonable in the excessive prejudice of Dr Robinson against 
 ecclesiastical tradition which led him as a principle " to 
 avoid as far as possible all contact with the convents and 
 the authority of the monks 1 " during his investigations in 
 Palestine. I am satisfied that he would have done more 
 justice to his subject, and have added much to the authority 
 of his work in the eyes of some of his readers, if he had 
 informed them of the opinion of Christians on the questions 
 under discussion. 
 
 I will illustrate this by reference to a point of some 
 little importance, though not immediately connected with the 
 present subject. 
 
 In 1842, (October 7th and 8th) I visited Beit Jebrin with 
 a friend 2 deeply interested, like myself, in the investigation of 
 the antiquities of Palestine. We read and studied Dr Robin- 
 son's proofs of the identity of this village with the site of 
 
 1 Vol. i. p. 377. We shall see 
 how far he is consistent with him- 
 self. " The native Arab population," 
 to whom "solely he applied for in- 
 formation," are very apt to adopt, not 
 merely the traditions of monks, but 
 the suggestions of travellers, and to 
 pass them off as authoritative. In 
 1843 I was pointed out, on the sea of 
 Tiberias, the site of Bethsaida, where 
 
 17 
 
 a friend and myself had endeavoured 
 to fix it in the preceding year, by the 
 very boatman who on my former visit 
 had denied all knowledge of such a 
 name ! He was a native Mahommedan. 
 2 The Reverend John Rowlands, 
 fellow of Queens' College, Cambridge, 
 to whom this volume is so much in- 
 debted.
 
 258 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 Eleutheropolis 1 . We were interested by his arguments, 
 struck by his coincidences, carried away as he himself 
 seems to have been by the romance of his measurements 2 , 
 but not fully satisfied, not thoroughly convinced. Some 
 time after my friend, on his departure from Palestine, 
 (January 10, 11, 1843) again visited this place, and again 
 with the same result. He wrote me word, "I am not yet 
 quite satisfied that Beit Jebrin is ancient Eleutheropolis. I 
 hope you will find an opportunity at some future tune to 
 visit 'Es-Safieh' or 'Alba Specula 3 ,' and see whether that 
 may not be Eleutheropolis." Meanwhile I had discovered, 
 from a very intelligent Greek priest in the convent at Je- 
 salem 4 , that the continued tradition of his church, written and 
 unwritten, had delivered that Beit Jebrin does represent the 
 Betogabra of Ptolemy and the Eleutheropolis of ecclesias- 
 tical history, and that they had no doubt of the fact. This 
 placed the matter beyond all question in our minds, and I 
 will venture to say that there are few persons who would 
 not consider Dr Robinson's arguments very much confirmed 
 by this agreement, while there may be some with whom this 
 simple testimony of the Greek church would have more 
 weight than all his ingenious and learned arguments to- 
 gether ; considering that the city to which the tradition 
 refers was formerly an episcopal see and a place of great 
 
 1 See Bib. Res. Vol. 11. pp. 355 
 362, and 395420, for a full description 
 and for a discussion of the question. 
 
 * Especially pp. 403, 4. "I know 
 not when I have felt more excitement 
 of suspense than while travelling this 
 short distance ;" i. e. between Beit 
 Jebrin and Idhna. 1 can quite sym- 
 pathise with his feelings under such 
 circumstances. 
 
 3 See Bib. Res. Vol. 11. pp. 363 
 367. 
 
 4 It will be a pleasure to introduce 
 the name of my worthy and excellent 
 friend Papa Joel, Archimandrite, and 
 formerly superior of the convent of the 
 Archangel, and the hospitable enter- 
 tainer of English and American mis- 
 sionaries at Jerusalem.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 259 
 
 importance in Palestine 5 . But since, on the other hand, no 
 tradition, however venerable, has force to counterbalance the 
 evidence of the senses and of existing phenomena, or the 
 authority of history, much less of holy Scripture, we are 
 bound to examine objections which appear to be weighty 
 and are by many supposed to be decisive, especially if they 
 come recommended to us by a shew of learning and dili- 
 gent research, and seem to have prevailed against the pre- 
 possessions of the objector 6 . 
 
 It will be unnecessary to notice the arguments of Dr 
 Clarke against the authority of the Holy Sepulchre 7 , not 
 only because it is evident that his indignation against what 
 he calls "the farrago of absurdities," and his contempt for 
 " the credulity for which no degree of preposterousness 
 seemed too mighty," put it out of his power to consider 
 the question calmly and dispassionately, and indisposed him 
 for the investigation during his short visit to Jerusalem 8 , but 
 
 5 Witnessed not only by the cha- 
 racter of the ruins still to be seen, (pp. 
 355, 6), but by history and by the fact 
 of its being assumed as a terminus in 
 the old Itineraries, e. g. Antoninus, 
 Eusebius, and St Jerome. 
 
 6 This Dr Robinson states to have 
 been the case with him, (Vol. n. pp. 
 69, 80), and we are bound to believe 
 him. One cannot help remarking, 
 however, that he was singularly un- 
 fortunate when all the received tra- 
 ditions relating to the passage of the 
 Red Sea, the mountain of the Law at 
 Sinai, the cave of the Nativity at Beth- 
 lehem, the place of the Crucifixion and 
 Burial, at Jerusalem, and of the As- 
 cension on Mount Olivet, not to men- 
 tion numberless others of less import- 
 ance, failed to satisfy him. But for 
 
 his own declaration he would hardly 
 have escaped the suspicion or impu- 
 tation of mortal enmity to ecclesiastical 
 traditions; which indeed he appears 
 elsewhere to avow. See above, p. 257. 
 
 7 Indeed he grants that the identity 
 of the Holy Sepulchre " has every evi- 
 dence but that which should result from 
 a view of the sepulchre itself." Vol. 
 iv. p. 309, 8vo. ed. i. e. he is satis- 
 fied with the traditionary evidence, and 
 sees no difficulty in the site ; this will 
 occupy us at present ; the other point 
 will be considered hereafter. 
 
 8 Really one cannot be sorry that a 
 man who could write so indecently and 
 irreverently as to call the pious Helena 
 " an infatuated and superstitious old 
 woman," and the saints and fathers of 
 the 4th century " ignorant priests," 
 
 172
 
 260 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 because Dr Robinson may now be considered the champion 
 of the opinion which that great traveller first published in 
 England, and he has brought much learning and much re- 
 search to the question, and done ample justice to the cause 
 which he espoused. I shall therefore proceed at once to state 
 some arguments against Dr Robinson's theories on points 
 nearly affecting the question under debate theories which 
 if correct, would materially weaken, if not altogether destroy 
 the authority of the tradition. 
 
 I am fully persuaded then, and hope to be able to prove, 
 that Dr Robinson has entirely mistaken the position of Acra, 
 the valley of the Tyropason, and the gate of Gennath ; and 
 that there is not the slightest evidence that the pool, on 
 which the greatest weight of his argument rests, is in fact 
 the Pool of Hezekiah. 
 
 Referring to a former chapter for a descriptive account 
 of Jerusalem as it existed in our Saviour's time 1 , it will 
 be sufficient here to remind the reader that Acra was the 
 hill sustaining the lower city, separated from Zion or the 
 " much higher " hill which contained the upper city, by the 
 valley of the Tyropaeon ; and that the gate of Gennath was 
 
 should fall into the monstrous ab- 
 surdity of placing Mount Zion south 
 of the Valley of Hinnom ! This 
 surely, to use his own words, " is 
 discordant not only with history, but 
 with common sense;" this is indeed 
 " wanton temerity :" and if instead of 
 " breaking away from his monkish 
 instructors," he had gone " peering 
 through the spectacles of priests," 
 all over Jerusalem, it may reasonably 
 be doubted whether they would have 
 required his assent to anything so 
 
 " preposterous" as this. Objecting to 
 the received sites, he has the presump- 
 tion to assign others for the Crucifixion 
 and Burial ! See his Plan of Jerusa- 
 lem at the commencement of Vol. iv., 
 and pp. 324, 5, 6. The spot assigned 
 for the former must have been within 
 the ancient city ! But he does not 
 seem to have read Joseph us. He ran 
 through Palestine, including Jerusa- 
 lem, in fifteen days ! 
 
 1 See above, Part i. chap. ii. p. 104.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 261 
 
 a place in the north wall of Zion, near which the wall encom- 
 passing Acra had its beginning 2 . 
 
 This gate Professor Robinson wishes to place near the 
 Hippie tower 3 , which occupied the north-west angle of the 
 wall of Zion. " It must have been to the east of Hip- 
 picus," as he justly remarks, "for the third wall began at 
 that tower ;" and I agree with him in thinking that " it was 
 probably not included within the second wall, in order to 
 allow a direct passage between the upper city and the 
 country." But the following considerations will oblige us 
 to place it some considerable distance to the east of the 
 Hippie tower. 
 
 The towers of Phasaelus and Mariamne stood not far 
 from Hippicus on the first or ancient wall, which ran from 
 the latter tower eastward to the temple, along the northern 
 brow of Zion, which was here a rocky eminence, thirty 
 cubits high 4 , and added greatly to the apparent height of 
 
 8 Joseph. J. W. Lib. v. cap. iv. 
 sect. 1, 2, and above, Part i. chap. ii. 
 p. 105. 
 
 8 He says first (Vol. i. p. 411), 
 " The second wall began at the gate 
 of Gennath (apparently near Hippi- 
 cus)." Then p. 453, Josephus, it is 
 said, " assumed the ancient tower Hip- 
 picus as the starting point in his de- 
 scription of all the city-walls." Then 
 p. 461, " This gate of Gennath in the 
 first wall doubtless was near the tower 
 Hippicus." And then (Vol. n. p. 67), 
 " The second wall, as we have seen, 
 began at the gate of Gennath, near the 
 tower of Hippicus," &c. A process of 
 reasoning which no stretch of charity 
 can call logical; meanwhile not the 
 slightest proof of this is attempted, 
 except in a note on p. 462: " It must 
 
 have been on the east of Hippicus, for 
 the third wall began at that tower. 
 It could not however have been far 
 distant, because that part of Zion was 
 then high and steep. Joseph. J. W. 
 v. 4. 4." This last remark is, I con- 
 fess, perfectly unintelligible to me. and 
 seems to disprove what it is adduced to 
 prove. For how a city gate could have 
 an exit where the wall was carried 
 along a perpendicular cliff thirty cubits 
 high, 1 cannot understand. 
 
 4 The professor writes, " above the 
 valley of the Tyropaeon ;" but this is 
 an assumption without any warrant 
 from Josephus, who says not a word of 
 a valley, and never in any one passage 
 hints at the Tyropaeon being near the 
 Hippicus. His words are : " TrjXtKoD- 
 TOI Se owres ol rpels TO /ueye6o, -jroXii
 
 262 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 the towers. Connected with these three towers was the 
 royal castle or palace of the first Herod, which was enclosed 
 by the said wall on the north ; so that the gate of Gennath 
 must have been east, not of the Hippie tower only, but of 
 both the others, and of the whole space on the north wall of 
 Zion, occupied within by the palace of Herod, which was 
 very extensive, comprehending not only "two immense cham- 
 bers, so large and splendid that the temple itself could not 
 be compared with them, 1 " " large bed-chambers, that would 
 contain beds for one hundred guests apiece," and a vast 
 number of other apartments, but "many porticoes one be- 
 yond another, round about ; and green courts, and groves 
 of trees and long walks through them, with fountains sup- 
 plied by deep canals and cisterns 2 ;" and abundant space for 
 the encampment of soldiers 3 . The absurdity of supposing 
 an exit for a city-gate through such a royal palace, and 
 down a precipice of thirty feet, is obvious, and need not be 
 insisted on. 
 
 But this is not all. After the taking of the outer and 
 second wall, which gave possession of the new and lower 
 city, Titus made his advances towards the fortress of An- 
 tonia in one quarter, and towards the upper city in another. 
 We have only now to do with the latter. A bank was raised 
 against the northern wall of Zion by the tenth legion, "at 
 the pool called Amygdalon, as was done by the fifteenth 
 legion about thirty cubits from it, at the high priest's 
 monument 4 ." Now the former of these two banks must 
 
 Hei^ovev kfyaivovro Sid rAv TOTTOV. dwro 
 Te yap T& dp\aiov Tfi^os, tv <5 t)<rai/, 
 l<p' v\]/t)\u> \6<py $e$6(ir)To, Kal rov 
 \6(j>ov naddtrep Kopvfyi) TI w^tjXorepa 
 irpodveiyev eli rptaKovra Trtjxeis, it-Trip 
 i)v ol irvpyoi Keifievoi iro\v oj ri tov 
 
 (jiCTetopov TiyxxreXa/i/Jafoi/." J. W. V. 
 iv. 4. 
 
 1 Ibid. i. x*i. 1. 
 
 8 Ibid. v. iv. 4. 
 
 8 Ibid. ii. xv. 6, and xvii. 7, 8. 
 
 4 Ibid. v. xi. 4.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 263 
 
 have been somewhere east of the three towers, which " the 
 Romans could not assail with their machines and towers 5 " 
 on account of their great strength, aided as it was by the 
 cliff below 6 , which would probably continue some further 
 distance, and present an obstacle to the erection of the 
 engines ; while the latter was also west of the second wall ; 
 for not only would the existence of a sepulchral monument 
 within the old city be unaccountable, whereas it would be 
 quite natural within that which had been lately enclosed ; 
 but while the crowded buildings of the old city would have 
 obstructed the operations of the soldiers, had the bank been 
 raised within that wall, there would be no such impediment 
 in this part of the new city, which was thinly inhabited 7 , and 
 the outer wall once taken, afforded an easy passage to the 
 third or inner wall, through which Titus had hoped to take 
 the upper city. 
 
 It is not true then, as Dr Robinson asserts, that Jose- 
 phus " assumed the tower Hippicus as the starting point in 
 his description of all the city walls ; " for he says ex- 
 pressly that the second wall "had its beginning near the 
 gate Gennath," the position of which he leaves undeter- 
 mined ; yet the assumption that it was " doubtless near the 
 
 4 Bib. Res. i. 412; and Joseph. J. 
 W. vi. viii. 4. 
 
 6 J. W. v. iv. 1, vi. viii. 4, and 
 
 the third wall was not so strongly 
 built It was on this part also that 
 
 Cestius encamped his army within the 
 ix. 1. I outer wall opposite to the royal palace. 
 
 7 Is it not uncandid of Dr Robin- J. W. n. xix. 5. The populous part 
 
 son to speak of " the existence of popu- 
 lous suburbs in this part," " which 
 must already have existed before the 
 time of our Lord's crucifixion ?" (Bib. 
 Res. ii. 69); for this part is expressly 
 excepted by the Jewish historian, who 
 states that on account of the new city 
 being thinly peopled in this quarter, 
 
 of the new city was on the north, not 
 on the west. J. W. v. iv. 2. Jose- 
 phus says : Tavry yap TO, TC irpoarov 
 tjK epvft.a. -xftafjLaktoTepov, /cat TO Seu- 
 Tepov ou (ri/vjjTrrej/, a'/teXtjeraVraii/ KO&' 
 a /aj Xiav j Kttivtj TroXis trvvoaKiaTO 
 Teix^ 6 *"- ^' '"""' T< > Tpi-rov >)v eirjre- 
 reia, K. r. \. J. W. v. vi. 2.
 
 264 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 tower of Hippicus," so far from being supported by any 
 evidence from this author, is disproved by those incidental 
 passages which have been now adduced ; and had it been 
 near he would probably have intimated it, as it is quite true 
 that this is " assumed as the starting point of all the walls 
 except the second" 
 
 To proceed now to Acra, or the lower city. The sim- 
 plest plan will be to compare the language of Josephus with 
 the topographical notices of Dr Robinson, and see how far 
 they are consistent. 
 
 In the language of Josephus, the ancient city " lay upon 
 two hills, over against each other, separated by an inter- 
 vening valley, at which the houses terminated 1 ." And his 
 language throughout plainly implies that the city compre- 
 hended the whole of the two hills, Acra as well as Zion 
 that Acra was hi fact a distinct hill. But Dr Robinson's 
 Acra 2 is "the continuation, or rather the termination of 
 the broad ridge or swell of land" to which " a compara- 
 tively modern tradition has given the name of Mount Gihon." 
 
 1 Joseph. J. W. v. vi. 1, quoted 
 by Dr Robinson, Vol. i. pp. 409, 10. 
 8 His words are (p. 391) : 
 "Acra North of Zion is the hill 
 of Acra. It is the continuation or ra- 
 ther the termination of the broad ridge 
 or swell of land which lies north of the 
 basin at the head of the Valley of Hin- 
 nom, and extends down into the city, 
 forming its N.W. part. Indeed the 
 N. W. comer of the city-wall is directly 
 on this ridge ; from which spot the 
 wall descends immediately towards the 
 N.E., and also, though less rapidly, to- 
 wards the S. E. To the whole ridge, 
 both without and within the city, a com- 
 paratively modern tradition had given 
 
 the name of Mount Gihon ; though 
 there is no trace of any hill so named 
 in Scripture or other ancient history." 
 In a note here he says : " The name 
 of Gihon, as applied to this ridge, 
 seems to be first mentioned by Bro- 
 cardus about A.D. 1283" (cap.ix. in p. 
 391). In p. 351, he had thus spoken 
 of this same ridge : " The whole in- 
 terval between this gate (the Damascus) 
 and Gihon, (called by him more cor- 
 rectly II immni, in the passage quoted 
 above), is occupied by a broad hill or 
 swell of land rising somewhat higher 
 than the N. W. part of the city it- 
 self."
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 265 
 
 The principal part of this high rocky ridge is without the 
 city, on the right of the Jaffa road, which traverses its 
 southern edge, so that Dr Robinson's Acra is not a distinct 
 hill, but the termination or declivity of a swell of land. 
 
 Again, Josephus asserts that the two Mils on which 
 the city stood, " were everywhere enclosed from without by 
 deep valleys 3 ;" but the wall enclosing the Professor's Acra 
 " ran from near Hippicus northwards, across the higher and 
 more level part of Acra*," leaving without towards the 
 north-west, not a deep valley, but a broad ridge or swell 
 of land, which is continued to a considerable distance 5 . 
 
 Further, Josephus invariably speaks of Zion as higher 
 than Acra. " Of these two hills that which contains the 
 upper city is much higher. It was called the citadel by 
 king David ; by us, the Upper Market-place. But the 
 other hill, which was called Acra, sustained the lower 
 city," and occupied " the lower hill 6 ." But Dr Robinson's 
 Acra is considerably higher than Zion, as is evident even 
 from his own words. The Jaffa gate, it will be remem- 
 bered, is at that tower which is supposed to occupy the 
 site of Hippicus, and its situation at the north-west angle 
 of Mount Zion is as high as any on this hill 7 ; but " when 
 one enters the Jaffa gate and takes the first street leading 
 north" (i.e. to the Professor's Acra,) "immediately from the 
 
 3 J. W. v. iv. 1. " The only topo- 
 graphical notice of Josephus," says 
 Dr Robinson, " as to which I have 
 doubts," the language of which " is 
 not literally exact," p. 414. But it 
 will be found that he must apply the 
 same summary mode of proceeding to 
 other passages of this same author. 
 
 4 Yet in another passage he finds 
 it convenient to bring it lower down ; 
 
 p. 392, note 1. 
 
 6 See Dr Robinson's Plan of Je- 
 rusalem, Vol. ii., and Bib. Res. as 
 above. 
 
 6 J. W. v. iv. 1, &c. 
 
 7 The only question could be at the 
 Armenian convent ; but the street lead- 
 ing to it from the castle is quite level, 
 and the ascent, if anything, quite im- 
 perceptible.
 
 266 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 adjacent open place, he has before him a considerable 
 ascent, though afterwards the way is more level quite to 
 the Latin convent 1 ." Indeed, this north-west angle of the 
 modern city-wall is considerably higher than the highest 
 point of Mount Zion ; so much so that the ground here 
 will be found nearly on a level with the top of the Ar- 
 menian convent on Mount Zion, which is by far the loftiest 
 building in Jerusalem 2 , and the native rock is here visible 
 above the surface of the ground, so that the theory of rub- 
 brish &c., can have no place. 
 
 Lastly. The broad valley which had once parted Acra 
 from Moriah was filled up by the Asmoneans, so that these 
 two hills became one; whereas the valley between Dr 
 Robinson's Acra and Moriah has not been at all filled up, 
 except by the accumulation of rubbish 3 , but remains most 
 distinctly to this day, as he himself constantly testifies 4 . 
 
 1 p. 391. This is not quite correct ; 
 from being more level at first, it be- 
 comes steeper as you approach the Casa 
 Nuova and Latin convent, and still 
 more so beyond, towards the north- 
 west angle of the modem wall, without 
 which is the large terebinth-tree, p. 
 345. 
 
 8 I had frequent opportunities of re- 
 marking this. The house then occu- 
 pied by our excellent consul stood in 
 this quarter, and his garden extended 
 to this angle. 
 
 a True, the valley of the Tyro- 
 |i;ron, and that between Acra and 
 Moriah, have been greatly filled up 
 with the rubbish accumulated from the 
 repeated desolations of nearly eighteen 
 centuries. Yet they are still distinctly 
 to be traced." p. 414. Filled with 
 earth by the Asmoneans, and "greatly 
 filled up with rubbish," &c., and still 
 
 " distinctly to be traced ;" Acra still 
 separated by a broad valley from Mo- 
 riah ! 
 
 4 See distinct mention of this "broad 
 valley" between his Acra and Moriah 
 in Bib. Res. i. pp. 392, 3, and p. 433, 
 note 1. " Moriah is separated from 
 Acra by the valley which runs from 
 the Damascus gate," 393 ; and again, 
 " the ground descends eastward from 
 the Latin convent to the same church, 
 (i. e. Holy Sepulchre), and then again 
 by a still steeper declivity from the 
 church to the street along the valley 
 between Acra and the area of the 
 great Mosk" And elsewhere he tells 
 us that " all the western entrances of 
 the mosk are reached by an ascent, 
 and some of them at least by steps," 
 p. 394. This does not look like the 
 valley being filled up, and the two 
 hills united. The words of the histo-
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 267 
 
 From this comparison then, if it be not rather a con- 
 trast, it will be sufficiently clear that the Acra of Dr 
 Robinson does not at all answer to the description of the 
 Jewish historian, whose authority is not to be questioned, 
 for he is writing of localities with which he was perfectly 
 familiar. 
 
 Again, I never could find any traces of the valley which 
 Dr Robinson calls the Tyropseon; that which separated 
 between Zion and Acra. Indeed, he himself seems to have 
 had some difficulty in doing so ; his first attempt was 
 altogether unsuccessful 5 . He afterwards satisfied himself 
 that he had discovered it in a "depression or shallow 
 Wady (still easily to be traced) coming down from near 
 the Jaffa Gate" in an easterly direction, until it joins an- 
 other Wady, and " then continues obliquely down the slope, 
 but with a deeper bed, in a southern direction, quite to 
 the Pool of Siloam and the Valley of Jehoshaphat. This 
 is the ancient Tyropaeon 6 ." 
 
 rian are: " Over against this (Acra) 
 there was a third hill, naturally lower 
 than Acra, and parted formerly from 
 the other by a broad valley. However, 
 in those times when the Asmoneans 
 reigned, they filled up that valley with 
 earth, with the view of joining the city 
 to the temple. They then took off part 
 of the height of Acra, and reduced it to 
 be of less elevation than it was before, 
 that the temple might be superior to it." 
 J. W. v. iv. 1. Dr Robinson has mis- 
 translated this in order to avoid the 
 obvious difficulty; omitting the word 
 "formerly," and inserting the word 
 " partly," p. 415 ; i. e. Josephus says 
 " it had been formerly separated, but 
 was filled up." Dr Robinson, " it was 
 
 separated in Josephus' time, and had 
 been only partly filled up." Again, 
 professing to follow Josephus he says : 
 " They threw earth into this valley, 
 intending to connect," &c. ; and again 
 omits the words "formerly separated," 
 p. 410. Is this honest ? Dr Lightfoot, 
 following Josephus, says that "Acra 
 had been much levelled by the Asmo- 
 nean family in the time of their reign ; 
 and the valley betwixt well raised and 
 filled up with earth," &c. Prospect of 
 the Temple, cap. i. This surely is 
 what any candid reader would gather 
 from Josephus. Reland concludes so 
 likewise. 
 
 5 Vol. i. p. 353. 
 
 6 p. 383.
 
 268 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 Now, however " easy to be traced" this valley may be, 
 I must confess that I could never discover it, during four- 
 teen months 1 residence in Jerusalem, although I must have 
 crossed it almost every day. 
 
 There is a street which runs down from the Jaffa 
 Gate, almost in a direct line through the bazaars, to the 
 enclosure of the mosk. Here, if anywhere, this valley 
 must be looked for 1 . Its course is at first immediately 
 under the steep brow of Mount Sion, which rises on the 
 right hand, once precipitous, now slanted off by ruins ; but 
 on the other side, i.e. on the left hand, there is not the 
 slightest appearance of a rise, as a valley would require ; 
 the whole ground north of Zion declining equally towards 
 the east; so that every street running from south to north 
 is completely level every street passing from west to east, 
 a steep declivity 2 . 
 
 Now when it is remembered that this valley was a 
 marked feature in the topography of ancient Jerusalem ; 
 in the first instance dividing, as it would seem, two cities 
 one from another, and ever afterwards presenting a distinct 
 line of separation between the two hills of the incorporated 
 city, it seems scarcely credible that the accumulation of 
 rubbish and such like accidental causes should so far have 
 obliterated it, as to leave no distinct traces behind. 
 
 1 And there Dr Robinson finds it, 
 p. 388. Writing of Zion he says : 
 " Its northern part or brow is just 
 south of the street which leads down 
 directly east from the Jaffa gate, along 
 the bed of the ancient Tyropaeon." 
 There is positively not the slightest 
 appearance of a valley here. 
 
 8 Dr Robinson attempts to alter the 
 ground here, and to make a declivity 
 from the Latin convent to the south- 
 
 east, in order to form the bed of his 
 Tyropteon. In the passage imme- 
 diately following that quoted, he says : 
 " In the street leading north below the 
 Pool of Hezekiah, and also in that 
 along the bazaars, this ascent is less 
 perceptible." There is no ascent : the 
 streets are completely level, and run 
 along the eastern brow of what he calls 
 Acra, on which, as he says, " the church 
 of the Holy Sepulchre stands." p. 391.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 269 
 
 But nothing has yet been said of the Pool of Hezekiah, 
 which, if rightly placed by Professor Robinson, would bring 
 that part of the modern city, and so the Holy Sepulchre, 
 within the ancient walls; which could scarcely have passed 
 between the Pool and the Sepulchre. 
 
 The following is the Professor's notice of the Pool of 
 Hezekiah : " The Reservoir, now usually so called, h'es 
 some distance north-eastward of the Jaffa Gate, just west 
 of the street that leads north to the Church of the Holy 
 Sepulchre 3 ." 
 
 Now, first, it will be necessary to correct a mis-statement 
 in this passage, which is quite unaccountable. So far from 
 this Pool being " usually called" by the name here given to 
 it, it may be questioned whether there are fifty persons in 
 Jerusalem who would know it by that name. The Professor 
 himself tells us in a passage immediately following that 
 just cited, that " the natives now call it Birket el Hum- 
 mam, from the circumstance that its waters are used to 
 supply a bath in that vicinity." I enquired diligently of 
 the most learned Jews, of the most intelligent Greeks, of 
 native Christians and Mahommedans, and never in one in- 
 stance did I receive the name which Dr Robinson so con- 
 fidently gives it. The Pool of the Bath, or the Pool of 
 the Holy Sepulchre, are the only names by which they 
 know it. 
 
 On what authority then does Dr Robinson rest ? It is 
 singular that with so strong a prejudice against "monkish 
 traditions," especially if they happen to be "comparatively 
 recent 4 ," he should be found to attach weight to a tradition 
 which, above all others in Jerusalem, is "monkish" and 
 
 3 p. 487- 
 
 4 The silence of Dr Robinson to 
 the date of this tradition, cannot help 
 
 striking one as a very suspicious cir- 
 cumstance. He does not usually deal 
 so with generally received traditions.
 
 270 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART ir. 
 
 " comparatively recent." Quaresmius, a monk, and superior 
 of the Frank Convent at Jerusalem at the beginning of 
 the seventeenth century, appears to be the first writer who 
 dignified this pool with the name which Dr Robinson has 
 adopted for it ; and he speaks with great hesitation. It 
 was commonly known as the " Pool of the Holy Sepulchre ;" 
 he thinks that this is the pool spoken of hi Isaiah xxii. 9, 
 and believes that allusion is made to it in 2 Chron. xxxii. 30 J . 
 With such an origin this tradition was handed down by 
 the Latin monks, and received from them by English tra- 
 vellers, until it found its way at last into a modern plan 
 of the city, though in a somewhat corrupted form 2 . It 
 was not so much as mentioned by the writers of the middle 
 ages; and but for a passage in Josephus, I should conclude 
 it to be of later date, for I could discover nothing in its 
 structure to denote any great antiquity 3 . 
 
 The Chronicles of the Crusades are very explicit in their 
 account of the fountains and pools on which the inhabitants 
 of Jerusalem were dependent for their supply of water in 
 that thirsty land. They severally enumerate those most 
 celebrated, but one undertakes to give an account of all. 
 He mentions the position of four very clearly, three of which 
 still exist, the fourth has disappeared ; but this of Dr Robin- 
 son has no place in his list ; indeed, he virtually denies all 
 
 1 His words are : " Intra civitatem 
 esse alteram piscinam celebrem, prater 
 Probaticam, quae est a latere occiden- 
 tali (Oriental! ?) castelli, parumque ad 
 Aquilonem inclinans, ab eoque distal 
 centum gressus, et a glorioso Christi 
 Sepulchro ducentos circiter, et ab eo 
 communiter piscina S. Sepulchri dici- 
 
 tur De hoc piscina arbitror loqui 
 
 Dominum (Eaa. xxii. 9) illis verbis, 
 Et congregastis aquas piscina; infe- 
 
 rioris Ad eamdam credo fieri al- 
 
 lusionem illis verbis 2 Paral. xxxii. 30, 
 Ipse est Hezechias," &c. Elucid. 
 terra sanctae, Lib. vi. cap. viii. p. 4. 
 
 2 It is marked in Mr Catherwood's 
 very excellent but truly monkish plan, 
 as " the pool of Ezekiel." 
 
 3 The large stones which Dr Ro- 
 binson heard of may have belonged to 
 any other building.
 
 CH. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 271 
 
 knowledge of its existence, for he says, " besides these four, 
 there is no mention of any other pools in or about the city 4 ." 
 Yet its situation agrees so well with the Amygdalon or 
 almond-pool mentioned by Josephus 5 , which I have shewn 
 reason to believe was without the second wall, that I am 
 disposed to conclude that it is noticed by that writer. It 
 probably owed its origin to Herod the Great, and may have 
 been designed for the supply of his palace, from which it 
 would not be far distant 6 ; and if this be so, the silence of 
 the writer in question must be accounted for either by its 
 being disused in those tunes, or not improbably filled with 
 rubbish. 
 
 Some of the writers above referred to do indeed speak 
 of the Pool of Hezekiah ; and however clear it may be that 
 they were mistaken, yet I think it would have been more 
 candid in Dr Robinson to inform his readers that his pool 
 had a rival which certainly could show a much earlier title 
 to this dignity, especially as he does refer to the passages 
 rather than leave them to conclude that his monkish tradition 
 was as ancient and undisputed as they would argue it to be 
 from the fact of its being so confidently received by one 
 who objects to traditions of the 13th century as compara- 
 tively recent, and is so very suspicious of those which date 
 as far back at least as the commencement of the fourth ! 
 
 There existed formerly near the church of St Ann, 
 within the St Stephen's gate, on the eastern side of the city, 
 a large pool celebrated by all the writers of the age of the 
 
 4 " In Jerusalem autem vel circa, 
 piscinas alia non leguntur." Mar. 
 Sanutus, Lib. in. Pt. 14, cap. x. He 
 had mentioned Siloam, one above that ; 
 one by the Temple called by him the 
 Sheep -pool, and now Bethesda ; and 
 one by the church of St Ann, of which 
 
 see the text forward. 
 
 5 See above, p. 262. 
 
 6 Josephus mentions a gate in the 
 north wall of Zion, "by which water 
 was brought into the Hippicus" pro- 
 bably from this pool. v. vii. 3.
 
 272 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 Crusades 1 , and supposed at least by the latter to be the 
 " Inner Pool " made by Hezekiah, and celebrated in scrip- 
 ture history. There seem to be insuperable objections to 
 this tradition, which will be stated in a subsequent chapter ; 
 nor does it appear to be of sufficient antiquity to demand 
 much respect ; but it has been mentioned here to shew what 
 very slender authority there is for the claims of Dr Robinson's 
 pool, when so late as the 14th century it was not so much 
 as mentioned, and the name which he assigns it given to 
 another. 
 
 Having now endeavoured to dispose of all the arguments 
 which have been adduced by Dr Robinson in support of his 
 theory of Acra, or the Lower city, and the Tyropseon, and 
 stated what appear to me insuperable objections to its re- 
 ception, it will be incumbent on me to attempt a proof of 
 that which I have to propose. 
 
 If the course of the valley of the Tyropaeon can be ascer- 
 tained, the position of Acra will be easily determined. 
 
 Now there is one and only one remarkable and well-de- 
 fined valley passing entirely through the city, to which there 
 is frequent allusion in the Professor's topographical notices 2 , 
 as commencing near the Damascus gate, and running in a 
 southern direction to the Pool of Siloam. He indeed places 
 "the ancient hills of Zion and Acra on the west of this 
 broad valley, and on the east the lower ones of Bezetha and 
 
 1 Gesta Dei, p. 573 ; Will. Tyr. 
 viii. 4, fin.; Jac. dc Vit. c. 63. Ma- 
 mi us Sanutus (1321), Lib. in. Pt. 
 14, cap. x.; Brocardus (1283), c. 10. 
 These passages are referred to by Dr 
 Robinson, note 1, on p. 490, but not 
 a word about Hezekiah. He merely 
 says, '* it was called piscina interior, 
 and is now apparently destroyed." 
 
 8 See p. 345 : from the Jaffa gate 
 he " descended to the Damascus gate." 
 Again, p. 353, looking for the Tyro- 
 l>;i mi, he finds no valley or depression 
 " before reaching the declivity stretch- 
 ing down to the Damascus gate." But 
 see note 4 on p. 266 above, and B. R. 
 p. 383.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 273 
 
 Moriah ; " but this position will be found untenable, if it has 
 not been proved so already. The fact is, what he calls 
 Bezetha is the Acra of Josephus, and this " broad valley 
 running down from the Dasmascus Gate to the Pool of Si- 
 loam 3 " is the Tyropseon. I proceed to the proof of these most 
 important points in the topography of ancient Jerusalem. 
 
 It must never be forgotten that Jerusalem was originally 
 two distinct cities united together by David. The interme- 
 diate space, or the valley of the Tyropason, inclosed with 
 walls to effect this union, is called in Scripture Millo, and 
 elsewhere both in Scripture and in Josephus "the suburb 4 ," 
 as belonging strictly to neither part of the city, but usually 
 comprehended by the Jewish historian with Acra under the 
 common name of the Lower City. 
 
 In his description of the temple we have the following 
 
 3 p. 393. It is singular how inad- 
 vertently he adopts almost the very 
 words of Josephus in describing the 
 Tyropaeon. " Now the valley of the 
 cheesemongers, as it was called, and 
 was that which distinguished the hill 
 of the upper city from that of the lower, 
 ca6ij/cei juex/" 2i\a>aju. : extended as 
 far as Siloam," v. iv. 1. Had he been 
 speaking of Dr Robinson's imaginary 
 right-angular valley, he could hardly 
 have used this language : it would then 
 either terminate at this " broad valley" 
 running from north to south, which he 
 makes it join (see above, p. 267), or 
 bend round to Siloam. 
 
 4 For Millo, see above, p. 22, note 
 2. It is identified with the Tyro- 
 paeon by Brocardus, who is followed by 
 Adrichomius and others. Lightfoot 
 (" vir de geographia sacra optime meri- 
 tus," as Reland calls him,) in a com- 
 ment ort a passage of Josephus, which 
 
 18 
 
 will be presently quoted, says, " These 
 suburbs that he meaneth were indeed 
 that part of the city which is in Scrip- 
 ture called Millo, which was the valley 
 at the west end of Mount Moriah in 
 which Jerusalem [i. e. Acra] and Zion 
 met and saluted each other; replenish- 
 ed with buildings by David and Solo- 
 mon in their times, (2 Sam. v. 9, and 1 
 Kings xi. 27), and taken in as part and 
 suburbs of Zion, and so named always 
 in after times." And again : " Millo, 
 which was an outer place and the sub- 
 urbs of Zion, distinguished and parted 
 from Zion by a wall, yet a member of 
 it, and belonging to it." Josephus 
 rather makes it belong to Acra ; though 
 it is true that in the passage in ques- 
 tion " he maketh Acra as another city 
 from the suburbs." In Scripture, Millo 
 appears to be called once " the city of 
 David." See 2 Chron. xxxii. 5, in 
 the Hebrew.
 
 274 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART H. 
 
 full and very clear account of the gates of the outer court on 
 the western side : 
 
 " In the western quarter of this outmost bound there 
 were four gates; the first leading to the king's palace, the 
 valley being filled up for the passage; two others led into 
 the suburbs ; and the other into the other city, having many 
 steps down into the valley, and many up again to the pitch 
 or coming up 1 ." 
 
 Now if we can discover the situation of the first men- 
 tioned of these four gates it will throw considerable light 
 upon the question under discussion ; for that the suburbs lay 
 between the first and fourth gate, is sufficiently evident from 
 Holy Scripture. Nor can any reason be assigned for their 
 being taken by Josephus in any other than the order in 
 which they stood. 
 
 In the account of the placing of the porters, under the 
 first temple, we read that " To Shuppim and Hozah the lot 
 came forth westward, with the gate Shallecheth, by the 
 causeway of the going up ; " and again, " at Parbar west- 
 ward four at the causeway, and two at Parbar 2 ." Now this 
 causeway, without all doubt, could be none other than that 
 mentioned among the great works of Solomon, as " the ascent 
 by which he went up unto the house of the Lord 3 ." 
 
 1 Ant.xv.xi.fi. 'Evkrolv earire- 
 pioiv /n'fiirri TOV ire/)i/3oAou iruXaiTea- 
 trapes tyeirratrav. % /nil/ els TO fia- 
 ffiXeta Tsivovtra, TIJS ev fiearto (ftdpayyot 
 eh SioSov dveiXtj/j.fievrjv, ui Si dvo elv 
 Ti> irpoatrreiov, ij \oiirtj <5i eis TJJ/ a\- 
 
 \1)ll -JToXlV. K.T.\. 
 
 ' 1 Chron. xxvi. 1, 18. 
 
 3 1 Kings x. 5, and 2 Chron. ix. 4. 
 Lightfoot says : '' The word ' Shallech- 
 eth,' by which name this gate was first 
 
 called in the time of Solomon, doth 
 
 signify ' a casting up.' Now this 
 
 gate is said, in 1 Chron. xxvi. 16, to 
 have been by ' the causeway going up,' 
 which going up is that renowned ascent 
 that Solomon made for his own passage 
 up to the temple. And the causeway 
 is that that Joseph us meaneth, when 
 he saith, 'a gate led to the king's house 
 from the temple, the valley betwixt 
 being filled up for the passage,' which
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 275 
 
 I have already declared my conviction that this is dis- 
 tinctly to be seen at this day 4 , and is traversed by the street 
 which leads down from the bazaars to the southernmost gate 
 of the western wall of the mosk, immediately without which 
 is the Cadi's office, or Mekheme ; and it is a singular fact, 
 that the very street which Dr Robinson represents as follow- 
 ing the bed of the valley of the Tyropaeon 5 is carried along 
 the ridge of an artificial mound! for the mound is clearly 
 artificial, and not accidental, as he imagines 6 . About half-way 
 between the bazaar and the Haram there is a path southward, 
 by a very steep descent to the bed of the valley, down which 
 it leads between prickly pears, to a small gate in the city- 
 wall seldom opened 7 , and so to the Pool of Siloam; while 
 nearer to the mosk there is an equally steep descent to the 
 north, into a street which follows the same valley up to the 
 Damascus gate. 
 
 By this causeway the aqueduct from the pools of So- 
 
 was a very great work, for the valley 
 was large and deep." Vol. i. p. 1055, 
 fol. ed. 
 
 4 See above, p. 22, Part i. cap. i. 
 
 5 See above, p. 268, note 1. 
 
 8 Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 393. In 
 passing along this valley" (viz. that 
 from the Damascus gate) "through the 
 present street toward the south, appa- 
 rently just before coming to the Tyro- 
 paeon, one crosses over a small rise of 
 ground. This is probably rubbish, 
 the accumulation of ages, though the 
 houses in the vicinity prevented us 
 from ascertaining whether it extends 
 quite across the valley. It is also pos- 
 sible that this mound may serve to 
 carry the aqueduct from Solomon's 
 pools into the area of the mosk ; which 
 is every where higher than the bottom 
 
 of this valley." This last conjecture 
 is correct, as appears above ; but the 
 existence of the Tyropaon south of 
 this causeway running down from the 
 west, is purely imaginary. The west 
 extremity of the causeway joins the 
 north-east angle of Sion, which is a 
 rock. Besides, how could the aque- 
 duct cross such a valley here, so as to 
 reach the causeway ? No valley nor 
 traces of one are to be seen. 
 
 7 Towards the latter end of the long 
 summer of 1842 it was opened, and a 
 guard stationed there ; but merely for 
 the purpose of facilitating the intro- 
 duction of water to the city from the 
 Bir Eyout. When the rains came it 
 was again built up. It is marked in 
 many plans as the Dung-gate. 
 
 182
 
 276 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 lomon, after skirting the eastern brow of Zion, crosses the 
 bed of the Tyropaeon to the mosk, while deeper still is a 
 large sewer which traverses the whole of Zion, and dis- 
 charges itself into an immense chamber beneath the bed of 
 the valley, near the covered arcade which conducts to the 
 baths 1 . 
 
 The palace of Solomon may have occupied the same 
 site on the north-east angle of mount Zion, where stood 
 the palace erected by the Asmoneans, and afterwards oc- 
 cupied by Agrippa 2 ; and the causeway conducted from 
 this palace to that gate of the temple, known by the name 
 of " Shallecheth," " the gate of the casting up, or embank- 
 ment 3 ." 
 
 And now having fixed this gate, as Dr Robinson himself 
 also does 4 , opposite to Zion, we must look for the other 
 
 1 I am indebted for these interest- 
 ing discoveries to the worthy consul- 
 general of Prussia, Her Von Wilden. 
 bruck, who, during his visit to Jerusa- 
 lem in 1842, was attended by a very 
 intelligent cawass of the Pasha, who 
 communicated to him the fact about 
 the aqueduct, and shewed him its 
 course down the causeway: I after- 
 wards engaged the services of the same 
 man to conduct me about the city, and 
 give me further information on these 
 points. A full account of the aque- 
 duct from the pools will be given be- 
 low, cap. iii. The sewer was disco- 
 vered near the castle of David by Mr 
 Johns, architect of the Jews' Society, 
 in digging for the foundations of their 
 church. It was 40 feet below the sur- 
 face of the ground, (rubbish interven- 
 ing,) partly cut through the rock and 
 partly built, broken in in several places. 
 
 From the bazaars it is still in use. 
 
 2 Joseph. Ant. xx. viii. 11. 
 
 8 "So, saith Kimchi (Michol in 
 it is rendered by the Chaldee 
 Paraphrast in the sense of j"T3 /{tfiT-" 
 Lightfoot, Vol. i. p. 1055. He further 
 says, that in the time of Herod's temple 
 it was called the Gate of Coponius, 
 probably from Coponius, general of the 
 horse and ruler of Judaea under Cyre- 
 nius governor of Syria, who arrived 
 about the time of the finishing of 
 Herod's temple. 
 
 4 Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 412. "We 
 are informed, that on the western side 
 of the temple area were four gates ; one 
 leading over the valley to the royal 
 palace (on Zion)," &c. He suggests 
 that this passage was by the bridge, 
 the remains of which he fancied that he 
 discovered : but the language of Jose- 
 phus implies an embankment, such as
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 277 
 
 three north of this, two leading " to the suburb," and one 
 "into the other city." The only notice which Dr Robinson 
 takes of this remarkable passage, which is fatal to his theory, 
 is in the words, " two conducting to the suburb (or new city), 
 on the north, and the remaining one leading to the other 
 city. By this ' other city ' can be meant only the Lower 
 City, or Acra 5 ." Now, not to insist upon the facts that 
 the historian places the two gates into the suburbs next in 
 order to that by the causeway, and that he never in a 
 single passage calls Bezetha the suburb, but always "the 
 new city 6 ," and that it had no existence when the temple 
 was built ; it is obvious to remark, that as Bezetha lay 
 upon the north side of the temple, it could by no possibility 
 be approached from its western gates, which are here in 
 mention : and it was so far from being united to the tem- 
 ple, or having gates leading into it from the temple, that it 
 was separated from it by the fortress of Antonia, and a deep 
 trench 7 . Besides which, the tower of Antonia, which lay at 
 
 that of Solomon clearly was. See 
 above, p. 274, and much more fully in 
 the next chapter. 
 
 5 Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 412. With 
 a want of consistency of which one is 
 sorry to have so often to complain in 
 this author, he afterwards makes these 
 three gates lead into the lower city, and 
 thus denies what he asserts in the text 
 above. Bib. Res. ii. p. 69 : " Three 
 gates led from it (the lower city) to the 
 temple." He is evidently sorely per- 
 plexed at this troublesome passage of 
 Josephus, but will not acknowledge it. 
 No doubt " the suburb" was part of 
 the lower city ; and this last passage 
 is so far correct, but he ought to be 
 consistent. 
 
 8 " This new-built part of the city 
 
 was called Bezetha in our language, 
 which if interpreted in the Grecian lan- 
 guage may be called Casnopolis, (the 
 new city)." J. W. Lib. v. 4. 2. It 
 was properly a suburb before Agrippa 
 enclosed it, although I am not aware 
 that it is ever so called by the historian. 
 7 Dr Robinson himself tells us, p. 
 432, that the Antonia, which (folio wing 
 Josephus) he places "on the north side 
 of the area of the temple ;" i. e. between 
 Bezetha and the temple, was "sepa- 
 rated from the hill Bezetha on the 
 north by a deep artificial trench, lest it 
 should be approachable from that hill." 
 See again, 433, &c. Yet here he makes 
 it to be approached by two gates from 
 the western side of the temple !
 
 278 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 the north-west angle of the temple-court 1 , and probably gave 
 its name to Acra, was without doubt comprehended in the 
 Lower City. Now if " by this other city," in this passage 
 of Josephus, can be meant only the Lower City or Acra, as 
 Dr Robinson himself grants, is it not plain that the north- 
 ernmost of these western gates must have led into that city, 
 as the order of the historian would lead us to conclude ? 
 We must then look for "the suburb" west of the temple, 
 and for the two gates leading to the suburb, in the inter- 
 mediate space between the fortress Antonia and the 
 causeway. 
 
 And in this conclusion we are again confirmed by the 
 language of Holy Scripture, with reference to the por- 
 ters. The gate next Shallecheth is the Parbar gate, i. e. 
 " the gate of an outer place," or " the gate of the suburb 8 ; " 
 and there is an incidental allusion to this same gate in the 
 
 1 Dr Robinson would have me say 
 north, which makes the case stronger. 
 He says (i. p. 433) that " the rock on 
 which the fortress stood could not have 
 been further west than the western line 
 of the temple-area ; for here ran, and 
 runs, the valley which separated Beze- 
 tha and Moriah from Acra." Here 
 again he joins Bezetha to Moriah, and 
 separates Acra from it, contrary to 
 Josephus. It would appear from some 
 passages that the whole of the north 
 wall of the temple enclosure was not 
 covered by Antonia. See below, next 
 chapter. 
 
 8 "The word Parbar admitteth of a 
 double construction : for it either sig- 
 nifies "Q s )73> an outward place, as 
 many of the Jews do construe it ; or it 
 concurs with the signification of the 
 word 'parvar,' (which differs but one 
 
 letter from it, and that very near and 
 of an easy change) which betokeneth 
 'suburbs,' both in the Hebrew text, 
 2 Kings xxii. 11, and in the Chaldee 
 tongue, as David Kimchi averreth 
 there." Lightfoot, Vol. i. p. 1056, 
 where he shews it to have been next 
 to Shallecheth. This learned author 
 places Zion north of Acra, which is 
 a source of endless confusion with him. 
 This is the more to be regretted, as 
 with accurate data his learning and 
 laborious research might have led to 
 important results. He was misled, 
 like the Rabbies, by a misunderstand- 
 ing of Psalm xlviii. 2, which the 
 Chronicles of the Crusades, Sandys, 
 Quaresmius, &c. ought to have cor- 
 rected : but he does not seem to have 
 consulted modern books of travels, 
 &c.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 279 
 
 book of Kings, where the suburbs are again mentioned. It 
 is said of Josiah that "he took away the horses that the 
 kings of Judah had given to the sun, at the entering in of 
 the house of the Lord, by the chamber of Nathan-melech 
 the chamberlain, which was in the suburbs 3 " The other 
 gate into the suburb, and that into the Lower City, would 
 appear to have a common name in Scripture, derived from 
 the "house of Asuppim," or treasure-houses of the temple, 
 which extended between them, and united them ; and there- 
 fore although that next to Parbar " did lead also into the 
 suburbs as well as this, as is apparent from Josephus, 
 yet is it not called by the same name Parbar : the reason 
 of this may be given, because it bare a name peculiar and 
 proper, suitable to that singular use to which it was designed, 
 or to that place where it was set, rather than suitable to that 
 place whither it gave passage 4 ." 
 
 The observation, that the street which led to the " other 
 city " descended by a flight of stab's from the gate of the 
 temple, and then ascended to the city, may suggest the 
 objection that the valley that separated Acra from the 
 temple had been filled up 5 . I answer that it was the 
 hill of Acra which had been united to the mount of the 
 temple, and not that part of the Lower City, opposite to 
 the northernmost gate on the western side of the area, 
 which was bounded, as it still is, by a deep valley, except 
 at the north-west angle, in which quarter I presume that 
 the junction was effected. The filling up of the valley 
 
 3 2 Kings xxiii. 11. See Lightfoot, 
 Vol. i. p. 1056. 
 
 See Lightfoot, Vol. i. pp. 1056-7. 
 
 5 See above, p. 274, and notes. The 
 words of Josephus are, /3o6/u<rt n-oX- 
 XaTs KaTia -re eis TT\V <f>apayya iei- 
 
 \ffj.[Levi), Kal dir& TauTjjs dvta iraXiv 
 eirl Ttji/ jrp6<rf3a<riv. Who can doubt 
 that this is the same (f>dpa-y men- 
 tioned, in the earlier part of the same 
 passage, which see at p. 274, note 1 ; 
 i. e. the Tyropaeon ?
 
 280 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 would seem to have been part of the same work as the 
 demolition of the fortress and the lowering of the height 
 of Acra, and it was a work of immense labour, and oc- 
 cupied a long space of time 1 : I think that the traces of 
 it remain to this day plainly visible, in a ridge which 
 slopes down from the traditionary site of the house of 
 Herod to the outer inclosure of the mosk, and which is 
 crossed by the "Via Dolorosa," as it approaches the se- 
 raglio, or the house of Pilate. I presume then that the 
 rock thrown down from Acra is the substratum of this 
 sloping ridge, which is certainly a remarkable feature, and 
 that it is here that "the broad valley which formerly 
 separated between Acra and Moriah was filled up by the 
 Asmoneans, with a view to join the temple to the city ; " 
 and this would be of itself a sufficient proof that the hill 
 so connected with Moriah cannot be Bezetha, as Dr Ro- 
 binson takes it to be ; for it has been already remarked, 
 that Bezetha was so far from being united to Moriah by 
 an artificial mound, that it was separated from it by a 
 deep-dug trench 2 ! 
 
 It will have been seen already that Dr Robinson places 
 Acra due west of Moriah : and in another passage he dis- 
 tinctly says, "Moriah was apparently at first an elevated 
 mound of rock, rising by itself upon this ridge, over against 
 the eastern point of Acra 3 ." I trust that sufficient proof 
 has now been given that this position is untenable, not only 
 from the fact that his Acra will not answer to the con- 
 ditions required of that described in Josephus, but by the 
 fact, that west of Moriah lay " the suburbs," sometimes 
 
 1 Vid. Joaephud, Ant. Lib. xm. 
 cap. vi. si-ct. 7- 
 
 5 See above, p. 278, and more fully 
 in the next chapter. 
 
 3 Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 393.
 
 CH. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 281 
 
 indeed comprehended with Acra under one common appel- 
 lation, but sometimes also distinguished from it by a peculiar 
 name. 
 
 This must be remembered, or otherwise it will be impos- 
 sible to reconcile those passages which speak of parts of " the 
 Lower City," or "Acra," (for the names are often used inter- 
 changeably) west of the temple, with those which have been 
 now considered 4 . The real question is, whether the hill were 
 to the west or to the north-west of Moriah. 
 
 If the argument from the gates and the mound be not 
 sufficient to prove the latter, it may perhaps be that the fol- 
 lowing additional considerations will determine the point. 
 
 The second wall which " encircled the northern part of 
 the city reached as far as Antonia." But Antonia was at the 
 north of Moriah, and it was not until he had taken the second 
 wall that Titus could bring his engines against the tower 
 itself. And in his account of Bezetha, or the new city, 
 Josephus expressly speaks of the high part of the old city 
 lying north of the temple ; the overflowing of which occa- 
 sioned the new city to be formed 5 ; and it is remarkable 
 that Dr Robinson himself is obliged to bring great part of 
 this hill into the old city, that the wall encompassing it may 
 reach Antonia 6 . So that in fact the ancient city, according 
 
 4 Passages might be adduced to 
 prove that Acra lay south of the temple, 
 for sometimes the Tyropason down to 
 Siloam is comprehended under this 
 name. 
 
 5 Bell Jud. v. iv. 2. TOUTO [TO 
 TP'LTOV TCIXOS] Tfj Trpotricriardeiarri iro- 
 Xei jre/jie'Otj/cej' 'Ay p fair as, tjirep fiv 
 wdaa yvfitn}' ir\r\Qei yap virep'xeo/jie- 
 vt), KOTO fiiKpov efceZp-jre -rtov Trepifio- 
 \tai> Koci TOV iepov TO irpotrdpKTia 
 ir/ooe TW \6<f>ta <rvp.tro\i^ovTf eir' OUK 
 
 6\iyov irpoij\6ov Kai -reraproit Trept- 
 oiKT)6ijvai \6<pov, os /caXeiTai BeeOa 
 KeL/jLevoi f*ev dvTiKpv TJJS 'Avraivia? 
 diroTefi.v6ii.evo? oe opvyfiaTi /3a0ei. 
 
 8 p. 462. " The second wall," he 
 says, "sweeping round to the valley 
 between Acra and Bezetha, somewhere 
 in the vicinity of the present Damascus 
 gate, either followed that valley down 
 to the corner of Antonia, or else per- 
 haps took the same direction across the 
 high ground of Bezetha ; although the
 
 282 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PABT II. 
 
 to this writer, instead of consisting of two hills separated by 
 an intermediate valley, would comprehend only one entire 
 hill, (Mount Zion) divided from Acra (not a hill, but "the 
 continuation or rather termination of a broad ridge or swell 
 of land ") by a Tyropseon which does not exist ; and then 
 another broad valley, and great part of the hill Bezetha, 
 which Josephus teUs us was not enclosed until the time of 
 Agrippa ! Where then, it will be asked, is Bezetha, or 
 rather the hill included in Bezetha? for the new city was 
 very extensive, and encompassed Acra on three sides. I 
 answer, exactly where Josephus places it north of the 
 temple, and answering to his description in every respect. 
 There is a hill distinct from Acra, not mentioned by Dr 
 Robinson, lying between it and the valley of the Kedron, 
 covered to this day with ruins and cisterns, and bearing 
 evident traces of having been thickly inhabited. The highest 
 point of this hill is nearly north-east of the summit of Acra, 
 now without the city walls, and planted with oh'ves; while 
 the south, or lower part, is within the walls, and reaches 
 down to the trench now known as the " Pool of Bethesda," 
 of which much more will be said below. The hill of Acra 
 does not slope down to the valley of the Kedron, the skirt 
 of Bezetha, on which stands the church of St Ann, being 
 interposed. 
 
 In approaching the city from the north by the Damascus 
 road the two hills are so distinctly marked, that it is im- 
 possible to mistake them, and the correctness of the Jewish 
 historian's language is most clearly proved ; for the hill Beze- 
 tha does most completely " overshadow " Moriah from this 
 
 whole of this latter hill certainly was 
 not included by it." The first hypo- 
 thesis cannot be admitted, because the 
 
 fortress was not in a valley, but on 
 a hill.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 283 
 
 quarter 1 . Pursuing this road, and drawing near the walls, 
 you enter the valley of the Tyropaeon, having Acra on your 
 left. " Its western side, near the gate of Damascus, is very 
 steep, as are also the northern and southern sides in this 
 quarter. Indeed, the northern wall of the city runs along 
 its northern brow ; and the rock on the outside is there 
 precipitous, with a wide and deep trench at its base, cut 
 through the solid rock 2 ." This hill is continued down to 
 the present seraglio, the site of the old Antonia, and there 
 is joined to Moriah; a street runs at its base along the 
 valley, and meets the Via Dolorosa at a large ruined bath, 
 from whence it is continued, still along the bed of the valley, 
 to the causeway so often mentioned. 
 
 There is however one objection to this hypothesis, the 
 only one that I am aware of, and it shall be honestly stated ; 
 viz. that this hill is higher than Mount Moriah, whereas 
 Josephus says that the height of Acra was reduced by 
 
 1 Bell. Jud. Lib. iv. cap. v. sect. 8. 
 " But the hill Bezetha was separated, 
 as I said, from Antonia; and being 
 higher than all, it was joined to part of 
 the new city, and alone overshadowed 
 the temple towards the north." How 
 much more would this be the case when 
 it was covered with buildings than it 
 is now ! 
 
 The very faithful sketch of my 
 friend, who has been so good as to 
 illustrate this volume, was made before 
 he had studied the topography of Jeru- 
 salem, and will, I hope, render this 
 somewhat dry and obscure discussion 
 more intelligible and more interesting. 
 
 2 Bib. Res. p. 392. This is of 
 course the description of his Bezetha. 
 The east side is no less steep, but 
 
 rather more so than the other three : 
 so that it entirely answers the descrip- 
 tion of Josephus. See above, p. 11. 
 1 have little doubt that Dr Robinson 
 is right in the conjecture that this hill 
 and that which covers the cave of Jere- 
 miah once formed one ridge, of which 
 the intervening portion has been cut 
 away by art. Viewed from the north- 
 west angle of the present city-walls, 
 it still appears one hill ; and I think 
 that it was probably excavated as a 
 quarry for some of the later city-walls; 
 as I am not aware that the grotto is 
 mentioned earlier than the 16th century, 
 and the stone exactly resembles that of 
 which the present walls are constructed : 
 the second wall probably encompassed 
 it,and so I haverepresented it in my plan.
 
 284 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 the Asmoneans so as to become lower than Moriah 1 . But 
 first, in addition to all other difficulties, this same objection 
 applies to Dr Robinson's Acra in a much greater degree; for 
 it is not true that this his Bezetha "is nearly or quite as 
 high 2 as his Acra," although his hypothesis obh'ged him to 
 affirm it, having first, of course, induced him to suppose it, 
 that he might at least appear consistent with Josephus ; and 
 next, I am not at all sure that the language of Josephus re- 
 quires this construction. The object of the Asmoneans was to 
 remove the annoyance of the fortress, the original Acra, 
 which stood in a commanding position at the north-west of 
 the temple ; and the result of their labours was, that the 
 temple out-topped all the buildings in its neighbourhood, but 
 not necessarily the whole hill and all the buildings upon it 3 . 
 The fact is, that unless Josephus is allowed some latitude, 
 and we are permitted to resolve this difficulty in some such 
 manner as this, we are reduced to the alternative of sup- 
 posing that Moriah is not correctly placed ; for there is not 
 a hill in the neighbourhood which is not higher than that 
 now occupied by the mosk of Omar: and then we have 
 to seek new postulates before we can advance a single 
 step in the topography of Jerusalem ; for this point is com- 
 monly assumed, and allowed by general consent, as one of 
 the very few data on which we may build. 
 
 We may now return to the point from which we set out, 
 and endeavour to trace the course of the second wall. Let 
 
 1 J. W. v. iv. 1. 
 
 3 Bib. Res. note 1, p. 345. 
 
 3 Rubbish does wonders in Jeru- 
 salem, and it will do something, but I 
 fear not enough, here. The ruined 
 church, said to occupy the site of the 
 house of Simon the Pharisee, stands 
 
 near the top of this hill, and is now 
 below ground, and surrounded on all 
 sides with heaps. Heads of gateways 
 are level with the present street, &c. 
 More will be said of this levelling of 
 the hill when 1 come to speak of An- 
 tonia, in the next chapter.
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 285 
 
 us then suppose the gate Gennath in the northern wall of 
 Zion somewhere near the entrance to the bazaars from the 
 west, and the second wall commencing here to run in a 
 northerly direction parallel to the westernmost of the three 
 arcades which compose the bazaar, and to the street which 
 is continued down to the Damascus gate, and a little to the 
 left of this line. It will be carried along a sloping ground, 
 which is a disadvantage; but the Tyropseon must be crossed; 
 and since Acra is north of Zion, the wall must run in that 
 direction along the declivity to the upper and more shallow 
 part of the valley, near the Damascus gate. The disadvan- 
 tage would be obviated in some measure by artificial con- 
 trivance, and "the broad wall 4 " and the "gate of Ephraim," 
 or "the valley-gate, 5 " are probably to be looked for in this 
 part : while it is not unlikely that those two chambers con- 
 structed of large stones, still to be seen near the Damas- 
 cus gate, aided to strengthen the wall in this its weakest 
 and most assailable part ; it here reached the hill of Acra 
 round which it was carried until it met the wall of the 
 fortress of Antonia. 
 
 It is singular that the language of Josephus alone, apart 
 from all other considerations, induced a friend, who has been 
 before mentioned, to draw the wall within a few feet of 
 this Hue, which we afterwards found evidence to believe it 
 had taken. 
 
 In that part of Mount Zion where I have placed the 
 gate Gennath, there is a dip in the hill, so marked that 
 in passing from south to north, by the street which runs 
 through the centre of the Jews' quarter, from near the 
 Zion gate, you have little or no descent at all to the 
 
 Nehem. iii. 8 ; xii. 3. 
 
 Id. ii. 13 ; iii. 13 ; xii. 39. I think they are the same.
 
 286 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 bazaars : from any other point west of this there is a steep 
 declivity. Near this there is a favourable position for the 
 gate Gennath, and for the commencement of the second 
 wall; and near this there is a tradition of a gate leading 
 into Zion, marked still by two columns, reverenced by pil- 
 grims as that through which St Peter passed to the 
 house of St Mark. I would not attach much importance 
 to this fact taken alone; but as a link in a chain of evi- 
 dence it is worth something. Again, immediately without 
 the bazaar, on the west, is a sudden rise to Zion, near the 
 top of which is to be seen the head of an old gateway, 
 so much choked up with rubbish that the key-stone is 
 nearly on a level with the street ; it bears marks of anti- 
 quity in its structure, and in the size of the stones, which 
 are much worn by exposure. It appears to have formed 
 a round arch, and probably might be excavated with suc- 
 cess, if permission could be obtained: I attempted to get 
 behind it in a dyer's shop, but it is all blocked up. If 
 this were a city-gate at all, it belonged to the second wall, 
 not to the first, and must have been very near the angle. 
 Let us proceed further towards the north. 
 
 On the 18th of December, 1842, I was walking over 
 the ruins of the hospital of the knights of St John, when 
 on looking down from the top of one of the chambers, 
 among some prickly pears on the south side of this building, 
 I discovered a solid and compact mass of masonry of a to- 
 tally different character from any I had before seen in Je- 
 rusalem. The workmanship was much better, and the stones 
 much whiter and harder than those used in the hospital or 
 in any modern building. On a closer examination I found 
 it to be the pier of a gateway, with the spring-course 
 of the arch still entire. The mass had never been disturbed 
 on the inside, i. e. on the north ; whereas on the south side
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 287 
 
 there was every appearance of a wall having been re- 
 moved the mass being now supported by stones of another 
 character, very clumsily inserted. The pier may be eight or 
 nine feet deep, and fourteen or sixteen high from its present 
 base : but its present base is level with the roof of the 
 bazaar, which is about the same height from the ground. 
 Corresponding with this pier, about ten feet to the north, 
 is a wall of much later date, and a spring-course of an 
 arch answering to the other, but constructed of much 
 smaller stones, of an entirely different character. I should 
 judge from this that the ancient mass had been turned 
 to account in a later building, now ruined, and had formed 
 one side of a vaulted room. The stones are not large, 
 varying from two to three feet long, but the construction 
 very solid. An attempt was afterwards made to effect an 
 entrance from the bazaar to examine the lower part, but as 
 usual, without success. A frequent inspection of this singular 
 and venerable pier left little doubt on my mind that it 
 belonged to a gateway of the second wall, although I can 
 scarcely hope that this meagre account will be sufficient to 
 bring the reader to the same conclusion. Following the 
 wall still towards the north, at the Via Dolorosa we come 
 to another traditionary gateway, marked in the plans as 
 the " Porta Judicii ;" and then at the Damascus gate, where 
 the wall would bend to cross the Tyropseon, we have the 
 two chambers of Cyclopean architecture noticed by Dr 
 Robinson. 
 
 Now without venturing to hope that this cumulative 
 evidence will work the same conviction in the minds of 
 others that it has in my own, I think I may safely affirm, 
 without fear of contradiction, that no other course for the 
 second wall can be shewn, which has so much to be said 
 in its favour, and so little against it ; and it has above all
 
 288 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 this advantage, that it satisfies every demand of the wall 
 of Josephus. It has a northern and a southern part 1 , it 
 has for some distance a circular course 2 , and it starts from 
 a point in the ancient wall of Zion some distance from the 
 Hippie tower. 
 
 And now where does it leave the church of the Holy 
 Sepulchre? In the angle formed by the first and second 
 wall "nigh unto the city," and "without the gate,' 1 pro- 
 bably in a " place where there were gardens 3 ," for the gate 
 of Gennath (i. e. " the gate of the gardens*"} led into this 
 quarter ; and where we know there were tombs ; for the 
 monument of John the high priest was in the angle which 
 was described by that fact 5 : and it is surely a wonderful 
 confirmation of the Christian tradition, that these circum- 
 stances, incidentally recorded by a Jewish writer with a to- 
 tally different view, should all concur hi shewing, not merely 
 the possibility, but even a probability, of its truth. If " un- 
 designed coincidences" are worth anything in such arguments, 
 the Holy Sepulchre is justly entitled to the full benefit of 
 these, which it is impossible for scepticism itself to suspect. 
 
 1 J. W. v. viii. 2. 
 
 a Ibid. v. iv. 2 : KVK\ovu.evov TO 
 
 8 John xix. 20, 41 ; Heb. xiii. 2. 
 
 * So Milman takes it to mean : I 
 think with great probability. Hist, of 
 the Jews, in. 16. See Buxtorf's 
 Rabbin. Lex. voce .TOJ 
 
 * This most important fact is proved 
 by the following passages in the fifth 
 book of the Jewish War, vi. 2; vii. 3 ; 
 ix. 2 ; xi. 4. " The monument men- 
 tioned was no doubt a tomb, (as Herod's 
 monument, Helena's monument, the 
 Fuller's monument, were all tombs). 
 This shews that there were tombs in 
 
 this part that they were the tombs of 
 some distinguished persons, such as 
 that of the high priest, and of Joseph 
 of Arimathea, which were handsome 
 monuments, and probably enclosed in 
 gardens. The few houses that stood 
 in this part were probably private 
 villas of such great individuals, with 
 which their gardens were connected, 
 and in which they had their private 
 monuments." J. R. It is perhaps 
 worth remarking, that there were many 
 such gardens on the corresponding 
 part outside the new wall, when Titus 
 commenced his attack. J. W. v. 
 iii. 2.
 
 CH. J.~] THE HOLY CITY. 28.9 
 
 If the attempt which has now been made to determine 
 the position of Acra and the course of the second wall 
 has been successful, we are justified in the conclusion, that 
 the tradition relating to the Holy Sepulchre is not only 
 not invalidated by the consideration of its locality, but 
 much confirmed ; since the probability is great, that a fic- 
 titious site would have been fixed far enough away from 
 the ruins of the ancient city, to obviate those apparently 
 strong objections which only a diligent examination of the 
 Jewish historian proves to be insufficient: for the ruins 
 in the time of Constantino 6 would plainly mark the extent 
 of the old city, and prevent any such mistake as Dr Ro- 
 binson's theory supposes. Imposture would most likely have 
 found the site without the range of the third wall also, in 
 order to be as safe as possible, while, on the other hand, 
 the intelligence which determined that its situation within 
 the third wall was no objection to its identity, would con- 
 clude that its location within the second wall was so ; and 
 the historical knowledge implied in the former conclusion, 
 would form a strong presumption in favour of accurate in- 
 formation with reference to Calvary. Besides which, it 
 deserves to be considered, that the very name assigned to 
 the place where our Lord suffered would tend to preserve 
 the memorial of the site among the natives ; and to sup- 
 pose that the site was lost, is to suppose nothing less than 
 that the very name of a peculiar feature in the topogra- 
 
 6 Eusebius, writing about A. D. 320, 
 says : " To this very time indeed the 
 remnants of the conflagration which 
 
 19 
 
 took place in various parts of the city 
 are obvious to their sight who travel 
 thither." Theophania, p. 242.
 
 290 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 phy of Jerusalem had irrecoverably perished; which does 
 not appear to have been the case with any other hill, or 
 with any valley in the neighbourhood. It is inconceivable 
 that, while Mount Zion and the Mount of Olives, and the 
 Valley of the Kedron, retained their distinctive appellations, 
 that hill which the Christian population would not fail to 
 regard with the deepest interest at least if we may not 
 say reverence, should have lost its name a name, be it 
 remembered, universally received in our Saviour's time, and 
 the memorial of which was preserved in the writings of the 
 Evangelists 1 . The Christian Church, as we have seen, had 
 never been absent from Jerusalem for more than a few years 
 at the utmost, probably not more than two 2 ; and would any 
 Christian who had once known the hill of Calvary fail to 
 identify it after ever so long a period, however accident or 
 design might have altered its character ? It must be remem- 
 bered, too, that the fact of this part of the new city being 
 thinly inhabited 3 would cause that its features would under- 
 go little or no alteration by the overthrow of Jerusalem 4 ; 
 
 1 Dr Robinson dwells on this as the 
 most satisfactory kind of tradition, but 
 does not apply it here. Having slurred 
 over the " fathers of the Church and 
 the hosts of monks," he proceeds: 
 " But there is in Palestine another 
 kind of tradition, with which the mo- 
 nasteries had nothing to do, and of 
 which they have apparently in every 
 age known little or nothing. I mean 
 the preservation of the ancient names 
 of places among the common people. 
 This is a truly national and native tra- 
 dition, not derived in any degree from 
 the influence of foreign convents or 
 masters, but drawn in by the peasant 
 with his mother's milk, and deeply 
 
 seated on the genius of the Semitic 
 languages. The Hebrew names of 
 places continued current in their Ara- 
 mean form long after the times of the 
 New Testament, and maintained them, 
 selves in the mouths of the common 
 people," &c. &c. Vol. i. pp. 375, 6. 
 How strange if the most interesting 
 and important place in all Jerusalem 
 should form an exception to this rule ! 
 That Golgotha and Calvary should be 
 no more known in the beginning of the 
 fourth century ! 
 
 * See above, pp. 1289. 
 
 3 See above, p. 263. note 7. 
 
 4 St Cyril of Jerusalem says of the 
 place, "Though it now be adorned, and
 
 CH. I.] THE HOLY CITY. 291 
 
 and the very attempt to obliterate the memorial of our 
 Lord's resurrection, would be to perpetuate the tradition 
 of the site. And it matters little whether the temple of 
 Venus, which was erected over the spot with this design, was 
 the work of Adrian or no, if the tradition of the design was 
 authentic. It avails nothing to urge that Eusebius merely 
 ascribes it to impious men, while later writers specify the 
 founder of JElia 5 ; because even if it were demonstrable that 
 Adrian had no hand in it, the fact itself would not be affect- 
 ed, that the idol was set up to desecrate and to obliterate 
 the site. 
 
 Yet it is very far from improbable that this was done 
 by the direction, or at least with the sanction of Adrian, 
 especially if the renegade Aquila retained any influence in 
 his councils after his apostacy from the Christian faith 6 ; and 
 we have the testimony of a writer contemporary with Euse- 
 bius to a similar pollution of the mount of the Lord's house 
 under the same emperor 7 . 
 
 And should any be disposed to question the probability 
 of the Holy Sepulchre being regarded with reverence be- 
 fore the time of Adrian, considering such veneration as a 
 symptom of later superstition and corruption, it must be 
 remembered that, right or wrong, the Christians of the 
 apostolic times were certainly in the habit of treasuring 
 up the relics of the saints and martyrs 8 ; and the same 
 
 that most excellently, with royal gifts, 
 yet it was before a garden, and the 
 tokens and traces thereof remain." 
 Cat. xiv. 5. 
 
 6 Yet Dr Robinson insists on this 
 as if it were a matter of the last conse- 
 
 7 The writer is the author of the 
 Jerusalem Itinerary, A.D. 333. Speak- 
 ing of the temple-area he says, " Sunt 
 ibi et status Hadriani. Est et non 
 longe de statuis," &c. 
 
 8 See e. g. the account of the mar- 
 
 quence. See Vol. n. pp. 73, 74. ! tyrdom of St Polycarp, in the letter of 
 
 6 See above, p. 132. the church of Smyrna. 
 
 192
 
 292 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 fond feeling would lead them much more to preserve the 
 memorials of their Saviour's Passion and Resurrection, as 
 they did we know of his miraculous Nativity 1 . So that 
 if the erection of the idol shrine was later than Adrian 2 , 
 the greater chance would there be of a correct tradition of 
 these sites, as mere tradition would have less to do with the 
 preservation of them religious veneration more. 
 
 With this strong presumption in favour of a right con- 
 clusion, we find the Holy Sepulchre placed exactly where 
 the impugners of the tradition, in accordance with the sacred 
 writers, fix its situation, with reference to the ancient city- 
 walls, as far as their course can now be ascertained 3 . Under 
 these circumstances the tradition would require the very 
 strongest arguments to disprove its veracity, such arguments 
 as certainly never have been, and I am persuaded never 
 will be produced; unless indeed, as has been anticipated 4 , 
 the demolition of the Holy Sepulchre itself should prove 
 that the supposed cave is nothing more than a mass of 
 
 1 Justin Martyr, A.D. 150, Dial, 
 sect 78, speaks of the Cave of the 
 Nativity at Bethlehem, in a manner 
 which implies that it was well known ; 
 and Origen, A.D. 230, cont. Celsum, 
 i. 51, states that pilgrimages were then 
 made to it. 
 
 2 As Dr Robinson wishes to make 
 it. 11. 9. 
 
 8 So Clarke writes, that Golgotha 
 was without the city, and very near to 
 one of its gates, (Vol. n. p. 552), and 
 the tomb of Joseph in a garden" in 
 the place where our Saviour was cru- 
 cified ; and then, with strange incon- 
 sistency, he removes them far apart, 
 marking the place of Crucifixion on 
 Mount Sion, without the gate of Da- 
 vid, and the place of burial in the deep 
 
 Valley of Hinnom, and on the opposite 
 side ! Dr Robinson writes : " If it be 
 asked, Where then are the true sites 
 of Golgotha and the Sepulchre to be 
 sought ? I must reply, that all search 
 will probably be in vain. We know 
 nothing more from the Scriptures than 
 that they were near each other, without 
 the gate, and nigh to the city, in a fre- 
 quented spot." Vol. ii. p. 80. 
 
 4 Dr Clarke, some years after his 
 visit, learnt with peculiar satisfaction 
 of the total destiuction of the Church of 
 the Holy Sepulchre by fire ; expecting 
 that thus the imposture would be un- 
 masked. He was however disappointed, 
 as the Holy Sepulchre alone escaped 
 unharmed in the midst of the con- 
 flagration. See above, p. 241.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 293 
 
 masonry. At present the native rock is so entirely incrusted 
 within and without with marble as to be wholly invisible ; 
 and thus the appearance of the Sepulchre itself furnishes 
 another objection to its identity with the place of our Lord's 
 sepulture : and I shall not be ashamed to avow my sym- 
 pathy with those who have felt regret at the transforma- 
 tion 5 ; a feeling which I hope is not inconsistent with ad- 
 miration for those who " did what they could " to honour 
 the spot so consecrated ; and refused " to offer to God of 
 that which cost them nothing." 
 
 But granting that the adornment was in bad taste, and 
 that the marble case of the cave would be better away, 
 it were rash to deny the existence of the rock within tho 
 case, because we cannot see it 6 . The great thickness of 
 
 5 Sandys applies the lines of Ju- 
 venal with reference to the fountain of 
 JEgeria : 
 
 Quanta prestantius esset 
 Numen aquae, &c. 
 
 And there is much justice in Dr Clarke's 
 remark, see note 6, though his usual 
 flippant tone is distressing. I would 
 rather express my feelings in the ele- 
 gant and touching language of Lord F. 
 Egerton : 
 
 Oh ! for that garden in its simpler guise, <Stc. 
 Pilgrimage. Stanza 21. 
 
 A beautiful little poem, which only 
 wants less reason and more faith to 
 make it perfect. 
 
 6 Yet this is the sum of Dr Clarke's 
 argument. Vol. n. p. 544. " There 
 are no remains whatever of any ancient 
 known sepulchre that, with the most 
 attentive and scrupulous examination, 
 we could possibly discover. The sides 
 consists of thick slabs of that beautiful 
 breccia vulgarly called verd-antique 
 
 marble All that can therefore now 
 
 be affirmed with any shadow of reason, 
 is this, that if Helena had reason to 
 believe she could identify the spot 
 where the Sepulchre was, she took 
 especial care to remove every existing 
 trace of it.... The place may be the 
 same pointed out to her; but not a 
 remnant of the original Sepulchre can 
 now be ascertained." Dr Robinson is 
 so satisfied with the conclusiveness of 
 his arguments against the site, that he 
 thinks it superfluous to examine the 
 Sepulchre. See Vol. n. p. 80, n. 1. 
 He only " looked in for a few mo- 
 ments" upon the church, once on Easter- 
 day, when he " could not enter the Se- 
 pulchre:" and what he then saw " ex- 
 cited in his mind a feeling too painful 
 to be borne, and he never visited the 
 place again." What authority he has 
 for the assertion, that " even the monks 
 themselves do not pretend that the 
 present Sepulchre is anything more
 
 294 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 the walls, and the form of the interior, which does not 
 at all correspond with the ground-plan of the exterior build- 
 ing, would form a presumption in favour of an irregular 
 cave within, while nothing short of infatuation could have 
 led an impostor, contrary to the plain letter of Scripture, 
 to assign the Sepulchre to a building of his own erection, 
 while so many caves in the neighbourhood of the city of- 
 fered themselves to his choice. It has been urged as a 
 general objection to the sacred localities in Palestine, that 
 "nothing is done without grottoes 1 ;" so that fictitious sites 
 were always fixed to caves : it would be strange indeed if 
 the Holy Sepulchre, which is so plainly declared to be a 
 cave, should prove an exception to this rule! 
 
 But the testimony of Eusebius is conclusive as to the 
 existence of a cave, and such a cave as that which is now 
 shewn ; for it can hardly be supposed that a writer of that 
 date would speak so confidently as he does in the follow- 
 ing passage, unless the fact on which he was insisting had 
 been generally known and universally received. His de- 
 scription is as follows : " The grave itself was a cave which 
 had evidently been hewn out ; a cave that had now been 
 cut out in the rock, and which had experienced (the recep- 
 tion of) no other body. For it' was necessary that it, 
 which was itself a wonder, should have the care of that 
 corpse only. For it is astonishing to see even this rock, 
 standing out erect and alone on a level land, and having 
 only one cavern within it ; lest had there been many, the 
 miracle of Him who overcame death should have been ob- 
 
 than an imitation of the original," I 
 should be curious to learn. Vol. i. 
 pp. 30, 1. 
 
 1 See Maundrell, under April 19, 
 and Robinson's Bib. Res. n. p. 79, 
 
 who quotes Maundrell in note 1. " As 
 if," observes Mr Newman, " some 
 might not be true, and some false ; the 
 latter imitations of the former." Pref. 
 to Fleury, p. clxii. note k(end).
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 295 
 
 scured 2 ." Such is the testimony of a bishop of Palestine 
 who lived at the time when the Sepulchre was recovered, 
 and who is regarded as a credible witness of facts, and 
 not over credulous ; it is moreover an incidental reference 
 of the most unsuspicious character, and such as would gene- 
 rally be considered most satisfactory, for he is speaking 
 on another subject, and introduces mention of this quite 
 incidentally, not at all with a view to establish the iden- 
 tity of the spot, but as an argument for the truth of the 
 Resurrection. 
 
 The Sepulchre itself may be described as a " grotto above 
 ground," consisting of two chambers, whereof the outer one x 
 is said to have been built by Helena, while the inner one 
 is the very cave hewn out of the rock, where was the 
 tomb of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ 8 . The very 
 spot where the Holy Body lay is now covered with marble 
 to protect it from injury ; the removal of which would 
 probably show a sarcophagus such as are seen in other 
 ancient tombs, excavated in the native rock, and only large 
 enough to admit the body. The tomb was designed by 
 Joseph for his own burial, so that it had but one recep- 
 tacle 4 ; and as it had known no occupant before, so we may 
 
 3 Theophania, p. 199. I am in- 
 debted to the kindness of Dr Tattam 
 for this and other important and in- 
 teresting passages from this long lost 
 work of Eusebius, which was recovered 
 by him. The quotations are from Pro- 
 fessor Lee's translation. 
 
 3 St Cyril, in commenting on Cant. 
 ii. 14, says, " The cleft of the rock' 
 he calls the cleft which was then at 
 the door of the salutary Sepulchre, and 
 was hewn out of the rock itself, as it 
 is customary here, in the front of sepul- 
 
 chres. For now it appears not, the 
 outer cave having been hewn away for 
 the sake of the present adornment ; for 
 before the Sepulchre was decorated by 
 royal zeal, there was a cave in the face 
 of the rock." Cat. xiv. 9. 
 
 4 St Matthew calls it " his own 
 new tomb, which he had hewn out in 
 the rock," xxvii. 60. Dr Clarke might 
 be describing the Holy Sepulchre itself 
 where he writes of that which he would 
 substitute for it, as " the identical tomb 
 of Jesus Christ." Vol. n. p. 554:
 
 296 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PABT II. 
 
 be well assured that it would know none after it had been 
 so honoured, but would be preserved inviolate by its be- 
 lie ving owner, who would provide himself another resting- 
 place, probably in the same sacred garden ; indeed, there 
 are still shown at a small distance from the Holy Sepulchre 
 two tombs in the rock 1 , called the tombs of Joseph and 
 Nicodemus ; which certainly bear marks of antiquity, and 
 serve further to prove the existence of sepulchral excavations 
 in this part in ancient times. 
 
 On the whole, then, it would appear that no objections 
 have yet been stated of sufficient cogency to overthrow a 
 tradition so ancient and well authenticated as that under 
 consideration; and that there are in fact much greater 
 difficulties in the way of its rejection than of its reception. 
 Apart from the antecedent probability 2 of a right conclu- 
 sion in the case of those who in the reign of Constantine 
 were employed to recover the site of the Holy Sepulchre, 
 it has now been seen that, whether we examine the argu- 
 ments which tend to shew that the received site was within 
 the ancient city, they appear wholly inconclusive and in- 
 sufficient for the purpose ; or whether those relating to the 
 
 " The large stone which once closed 
 its mouth had been, perhaps for ages, 
 rolled away. Stooping down to look 
 into it, we observed within a fair 
 sepulchre, containing a repository upon 
 one side only, for a single body: where, 
 as, in most of the others, there were 
 two, and in many of them more than 
 two." He could not have described 
 more clearly the received Sepulchre to 
 which he objects ! So before, he de- 
 scribes the subterranean chambers in 
 the same neighbourhood, as " hewn 
 with marvellous art, each containing 
 
 one, or many repositories for the dead, 
 like cisterns carved in the rock upon 
 the sides of those chambers. The doors 
 were so low, that to look into any one 
 of them it was necessary to stoop, and 
 in some instances to creep upon hands 
 and knees," pp. 549, 50. Nothing can 
 be more exact, only that now the Holy 
 Sepulchre is not subterranean. 
 
 1 The reader is referred to the Plan 
 for this and other traditionary sites. 
 
 2 So strongly stated by Mr New- 
 man. Preface to Fleury, civ vii.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 297 
 
 character of the tomb itself, all the phenomena are most 
 satisfactorily accounted for by the statements of Eusebius 
 and other early writers. And as it has never been denied 3 
 that the present site is the same as that of which they 
 write, it will be unnecessary to adduce later testimonies. " The 
 main authority for the present site of the Holy Sepulchre 
 is Eusebius, and the warrant for its preservation or re- 
 covery is the pagan temple raised over it by Hadrian, 
 which became a lasting record of the spot 4 ." And since 
 in the time of this emperor " the crucifixion and burial of 
 our Saviour was almost in the memory of man," we may 
 conclude, with the sceptical Dr Clarke, that " this powerful 
 record of the means used by the pagans to obliterate the 
 rites of Christianity, seems to afford decisive evidence con- 
 cerning the locality of the tomb, and to place its situation 
 beyond the reach of doubt 5 ." 
 
 And it is worthy of remark, that neither Eusebius, nor 
 any of the writers of that century, imply any difficulty in 
 ascertaining the locality. They all speak as if it had been 
 a well-known fact that the fane of Venus covered the Holy 
 Sepulchre. The only difficulty was to clear it from the 
 heaps which had been raised over it 6 ; and the expressions 
 
 3 Yet there is a passage of Dr 
 Robinson (Bib. Res. n. 65) which, if 
 it means any thing, implies a doubt 
 even of this ! 
 
 4 Mr Newman, Preface to Fleury, 
 p. clvi. note f. 
 
 8 Clarke's Travels, Vol. 11. p. 540. 
 
 6 So far is it from being true that 
 " the balance of evidence would seem 
 to be decidedly against the probable 
 existence of any previous tradition," 
 that I am persuaded ;m impartial rea- 
 der would find it impossible to avoid 
 
 the conclusion, from the language of 
 Eusebius and others, that such a tradi- 
 tion did exist. It is taken for granted 
 throughout. And this explains why 
 St Helena is nowhere said to have 
 acted in consequence of any known tra- 
 dition. " Divine suggestion" is never 
 said by the earlier writers to have 
 guided her to the spot, as is implied, 
 but simply to have disposed her or her 
 son to recover it, while the diligent 
 enquiry among the ancient inhabitants, 
 is only mentioned by later writers.
 
 298 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 of astonishment which the success of the undertaking called 
 forth would be amply justified by the state of complete 
 preservation in which it was found after so long an inter- 
 val, especially as they might not unreasonably have feared, 
 that the concealment of the spot had been preceded or at- 
 tended by an attempt at the destruction or defacement of 
 the holy cave. Whether it be a reasonable argument against 
 the existence of such a tradition that " no pilgrimages were 
 made to it" before, covered as it was by an idol temple, 
 is for the consideration of those who urge it 1 ; but can any 
 devout believer bring himself to suppose that the "many 
 Christians who came up to Jerusalem from all parts of the 
 earth before the age of Constantino, to behold the accom- 
 plishment of prophecy in the desolations of the city, and 
 to pay their adorations on the summit of the Mount of 
 Olives 2 ," would be indifferent to the scene of the Crucifixion 
 and Resurrection? They would without doubt enquire for 
 this sacred spot, and be pointed to the idol-temple which 
 had been erected to pollute it ; while the continued oppo- 
 sition of the civil magistrate, breaking out in frequent per- 
 secutions, would make them despair of all attempts to recover 
 it, until the conversion of Constantino and the pious zeal 
 of his venerable mother brought about this happy consum- 
 mation. The Holy Sepulchre was recovered as soon as cir- 
 cumstances allowed of it. 
 
 I proceed now to notice other sacred localities about 
 the Holy Sepulchre, which stands in the centre of a cir- 
 cular building covered with a handsome dome, left open 
 at the top, in order that the tomb may stand under the 
 open heaven. 
 
 Neither Eusebius, nor St Cyril, nor 
 St Jerome, who would be best informed, 
 say & word about it. B. R. Vol. n. 
 
 pp. 76, and 14, 15. 
 1 Bib. Res. 11.78. 
 3 Ibid. p. 77, from Eusebius.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 299 
 
 Immediately opposite to the entrance of the cave, which 
 is on its eastern side, is the door of the Greek church, 
 which probably occupies the site of the basilica erected by 
 the Emperor Constantine 3 . It is the finest church in Jeru- 
 salem, excepting only the magnificent church of St James, 
 attached to the Armenian convent on Mount Zion. It was 
 erected in the year 1809, after the fire which completely 
 destroyed all the buildings connected with the Sepulchre, 
 while that alone remained uninjured amid the general confla- 
 gration 4 . The church is of large dimensions, surmounted by a 
 cupola of considerable altitude, and is adorned, as the oriental 
 churches mostly are, with handsome chandeliers and strings 
 of lamps alternated with ostrich-eggs, hanging in festoons 
 from the ceiling ; the screen which separates the place of the 
 holy Table from the church is handsomely carved, as are the 
 pulpits and the patriarch's thrones, which are immediately 
 without the screen on either side. The screen is adorned with 
 paintings of the saints, and surmounted by a cross. There is 
 a cloister running completely round the church without, form- 
 ing the means of communication between the various chapels 
 and the sacred localities, common to ah 1 the Christians. 
 
 The church of the Franciscans is a comparatively mean 
 building, to the north of the Holy Sepulchre, called the 
 Church of the Apparition ; the Armenians worship in one of 
 the galleries of the rotunda ; the Syrians have a small chapel 
 in the thickness of the wah 1 to the west of the Sepulchre ; 
 while the Copts have their altar in a small erection scarcely 
 large enough to admit the officiating priest, at the west of 
 
 3 Euseb. Vit. Const, in. xxxvi. 
 
 4 See the account of this fire above, 
 page 241. The escape of the Holy 
 Sepulchre on this occasion, is a strong 
 argument for a cave. How otherwise 
 
 can we account for the fact, that it 
 sustained not the slightest injury ? even 
 the silk hangings and the paintings 
 were unscathed by the flame.
 
 300 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 the cave itself. There are also apartments in the neighbour- 
 hood of the respective chapels, assigned to the monks of these 
 several churches, who wait continually on their ministry 
 at the sacred places, and live immured as it were within 
 the walls ; while other chapels, commemorative of events con- 
 nected with our Saviour's Passion, in various parts of the 
 building, occupy the remainder of the sacred enclosure, which 
 is of considerable extent. 
 
 The entrance is from a paved court on the south side, 
 through the westernmost of two handsome door-ways, with 
 an architrave in bas-relief representing our Lord's triumph- 
 ant entry into Jerusalem. The first object that attracts 
 attention within the building is the stone of unction, in the 
 vestibule. Here the pilgrim may turn to the left into the 
 round church which encircles the Holy Sepulchre, or to the 
 right into the south cloister without the Greek church, 
 which has been lately noticed. Proceeding a few paces 
 down this cloister, he finds on the right a flight of eighteen 
 steps leading up to the chapel of the Holy Golgotha, and 
 if he be an Oriental he will put off his shoes from his 
 feet, and approach with reverential awe the scene of his 
 Lord's last Passion, and draw near on bended knees to 
 the very spot of the crucifixion. If he be an Englishman 
 or American, the attendant priest will not look for such a 
 deportment ; he will expect nothing more than a look of 
 indifference, or at most of idle curiosity ; and will be pre- 
 pared for sceptical objections : he will even look for an ex- 
 pression of incredulity, and an apparent predetermination 
 to disbelieve. It is sad to think that a person in Frank 
 habit kneeling at Calvary and the Sepulchre of Christ, 
 and offering up his devotions at these sacred spots, vene- 
 rated by Christians of all nations for fifteen hundred years, 
 should be as it were a monster to those who witness it :
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 but such is the fact. And what then will the curious tra- 
 veller see ? He would observe that the stairs by which he 
 ascended to this platform are cut for the most part in the 
 solid rock, and that the floor of the chapel is formed by 
 levelling the same. At the east end of the north side of 
 the double chapel he will see a platform raised about a 
 foot and a half from the floor 1 , covered with white marble, 
 and under the altar of the orthodox he will observe a hole 
 in the marble communicating with a deep bore in the solid 
 rock, in which he will be told that our Saviour's cross was 
 erected. Near this on his right he will see another incision 
 in the marble, showing a fissure in the rock, said to have 
 been occasioned by the earthquake which occurred at the 
 time of the crucifixion 2 . If he examine it minutely, he 
 will perceive that " the insides do testify that art had no 
 hand therein, each side to other being answerably rugged, 
 and there where inaccessible to the workmen 3 ." The conti- 
 nuation of this cleft may be seen in the chapel of the Fore- 
 runner, below Golgotha, where were shown formerly the 
 tombs of the first two Frank kings of Jerusalem Godfrey 
 
 1 Sandys says this platform is " ten 
 feet long and six broad." Dr Clarke 
 must either have observed very super- 
 ficially, or have been greatly mistaken 
 in the facts, when, in speaking of 
 " the modern altar," he said, " This 
 they venerate as Mount Calvary, the 
 place of crucifixion ; exhibiting upon 
 this contracted piece of masonry the 
 marks or holes of the three crosses, 
 without the smallest regard to the space 
 necessary for their erection." Vol. n. 
 p. 546. This is untrue. They shew 
 only one bore in the rock under the 
 altar. The Greek pilgrim's " Guide to 
 the Holy Places," which omits nothing, 
 
 makes no mention of any other, nor did 
 I ever see or hear of more than one. 
 The tradition is, that the penitent thief 
 was on the right, the impenitent on the 
 left, and that the rock rent between 
 him and our Saviour ("a figure of 
 his spiritual separation," writes San- 
 dys). This cleft is at the extreme 
 right of the platform, and no room for 
 the cross beyond it. But this is not 
 pretended by the monks. 
 
 2 It is said to have been rent at the 
 feet of the centurion, and to have pro- 
 duced the exclamation, Matt, xxvii. 
 54. 
 
 8 Sandys' Travels, p. 12J.
 
 302 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 and his brother Baldwin. They were destroyed by the fire 
 in 1808. 
 
 The tradition relating to the place of Crucifixion would 
 appear to be as old as that relating to the Holy Sepul- 
 chre ; for although there is perhaps room to doubt whether 
 we have distinct notice of it in Eusebius, yet St Cyril, 
 only a few years later, makes mention of it in many pas- 
 sages, and delivered the greater part of his Catechetical 
 Lectures in the church erected over the spot 1 , which was 
 not at first comprehended under the same roof with the 
 Martyrium of the Resurrection 2 . He speaks too of the rent 
 in the rock as ascertained in his day, at that particular 
 spot 3 ; not as if that were the only rent, but that its prox- 
 imity to the Place of Crucifixion invested it with peculiar 
 interest. 
 
 It has been objected, very unreasonably, that the Place 
 of Crucifixion is too close to the Sepulchre to allow of its 
 being the true site. Had it been further distant a stronger 
 argument would have been advanced : for we are expressly 
 told that " in the place where he was crucified there was 
 
 1 " He was crucified for our sins 
 truly : shouldest thou be disposed to 
 deny it, the very place which all can 
 see refutes thee, even this blessed Gol- 
 gotha, in which, on account of him 
 who was crucified on it, we are now 
 assembled" (Cat. iv. 10) ; " one never 
 can weary of hearing concerning our 
 crowned Lord, and least of all in this 
 most Holy Golgotha. For while others 
 only hear, we have sight and touch 
 too :" and presently, " Thou seest this 
 spot of Golgotha!" &c. Cat. xm. 
 22, 23. The latter lectures were de- 
 livered in the Church of the Resurrec- 
 
 tion. See Cat. xviii. 33, ( 14) ; xx. 4 
 8 William of Tyre (Lib. vm. cap. 
 iii.) says, that before the entrance of 
 the crusaders it was a small oratory 
 without the range of the Church of the 
 Resurrection, but that when they had 
 obtained the city with a strong hand, it 
 was much enlarged and strengthened, 
 and comprehended under the same 
 roof. Gest. Dei per Francos, p. 748. 
 
 8 " This Holy Golgotha, rising on 
 high, and showing itself to this day, 
 and displaying even yet how because 
 of Christ the rocks were then riven." 
 Cat. xm. 39, (19).
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 303 
 
 a garden, and in the garden a new sepulchre, &c. 4 " Nor 
 is it necessary to suppose that the Crucifixion was in the gar- 
 den it was probably a public place without the city-wall ; 
 and the traveller in Syria and Palestine will see nothing 
 forced in the conception that the garden-fence might have 
 passed between the two sites 5 . 
 
 Descending from Golgotha, and passing down the cloister 
 towards the east, we come to a wide staircase leading down 
 by twenty-nine steps to a chapel of the Armenians, where 
 they show the throne of St Helena ; and then by thirteen 
 more into the cave where the Cross of our Lord is said to 
 have been discovered. Here the rock overhangs the chapel, 
 which is formed in its cavity. 
 
 The Invention of the Holy Cross, which is comme- 
 morated in the English calendar on May 3rd, would seem 
 to be historically connected with St Helena's visit and the 
 recovery of the Holy Sepulchre; and a writer who is least 
 disposed to admit the reality of the discovery, is forced 
 to acknowledge, that " notwithstanding the silence of Euse- 
 bius, there would seem to be hardly any part of history 
 better accredited than the alleged discovery of the true 
 Cross 6 ." 
 
 Something has been already said concerning the silence 
 of Eusebius, which seems to be taken for granted without 
 sufficient reason ; but even granting this, the terms em- 
 
 4 John xix. 41. 
 
 8 I would mention Jaffa especially 
 as a case in point. Here the gardens 
 come up very near the walls, having 
 wide public thoroughfares passing 
 through them. Damascus, Tripoli, 
 and Beirout, will furnish other ex- 
 amples. Dr Robinson says that the 
 place of crucifixion " was probably 
 
 upon a great road leading from one of 
 the gates. And such a spot would 
 only be found upon the western or 
 northern sides of the city, on the roads 
 leading towards Jaffa or Damascus." 
 (Vol. ii. p. 80). And exactly in such 
 a spot is the place now shown. 
 
 6 Robinson's Bib. Res. Vol. n. pp. 
 15, 16, and again p. 76.
 
 304 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n 
 
 ployed in Constantino's letter to Macarius 1 , which he has 
 preserved, " are more suitable to denote the Cross than 
 the Sepulchre ; and the strong expressions of his amaze- 
 ment and awe are more suitable to the discovery of the 
 former than the latter; a discovery which was certainly 
 reported and generally believed a few years later 2 ." The 
 first distinct mention which we find of the Holy Cross is 
 by St Cyril of Jerusalem, in his Catechetical Lectures, 
 (A. D. 347), where he refers to it as one of many wit- 
 nesses to our Lord's Crucifixion. But he testifies not to 
 its discovery 3 , but to its existence ; and in language which 
 would imply that it had been known for many years, for 
 it had been in his days "distributed piece-meal to all the 
 world 4 ." 
 
 The circumstances connected with the discovery are to 
 be gathered from the writings of the fathers who flourished 
 at the close of the fourth, and the opening of the fifth cen- 
 tury, who write of it as of a well-known and generally re- 
 ceived story, with such variations as are to be expected, when 
 an event of a marvellous character is reported by various 
 authors in various countries far removed from the scene of 
 its occurrence 5 . 
 
 St Ambrose is the first extant writer who gives a de- 
 tailed account of the undertaking, and ascribes it to St 
 
 1 See this subject discussed above, 
 Part i . chap. ii. Constantino speaks of 
 the recovery of " the token of the 
 
 Saviour's most holy Passion'" 
 
 " buried under the earth many years" 
 
 surpassing all human calculation 
 
 and all amazement." Phrases of which 
 Mr Isaac Taylor says that they " clearly 
 imply the Invention of the Cross." 
 Anc. Christ Part vn. p. 296; New- 
 
 man's Pref. to Fleury, p. cxlvi. and 
 note c. 
 
 2 Ibid, cxlvii. 
 
 8 Except perhaps in his letter to 
 Constantius, 351 ; the genuineness of 
 which is disputed by some learned 
 writers. 
 
 * Cat. iv. 10 ; x. 19 ; xiii. 4, quoted 
 by Mr Newman as above. 
 
 8 Ibid. p. rli.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 305 
 
 Helena. In his discourse upon the death of Theodosius 6 , 
 he takes occasion to eulogize the mother of Constantine, and 
 relates the success of her endeavour to possess herself of the 
 Holy Cross. His narrative, divested of the flowers of oratory, 
 is simple enough, and contains no account of any miracles 
 unless the very preservation of the wood deserves to be so 
 considered 8 . This father, in argument with St Chrysostom, 
 relates the discovery of three crosses, and that the cross of 
 our Lord was distinguished by the title affixed to it by Pilate 9 ; 
 not by the restoration of a sick person to health, or of a 
 dead corpse to life, as we find in later writers 10 . 
 
 6 S. Ambrosii Oral. Funeb. de 
 obitu Theod. Imp. Works, p. 137- 
 Edit. Paris. 1529. 
 
 7 Eusebius speaks of miracles 
 wrought at the Holy Sepulchre, but 
 does not connect them with the disco- 
 very of any site. It is unfair of Dr 
 Robinson to attempt to discredit the 
 sacred localities by mention of the 
 miracle, because, taking for granted 
 that the miraculous part of the story 
 was false, yet an interval of seventy- 
 five years and many hundred leagues, 
 in an age when printing was unknown, 
 allows ample room for the intervention 
 of erroneous statement, apart from frau- 
 dulent design. He says, " The alleged 
 miracle, which attended her discovery 
 of the true Cross, serves at least to show 
 the degree of ready credulity with 
 which the search was conducted." Vol. 
 ii. p. 76. 
 
 8 Yet why should it? Mr New- 
 man refers to the recovery of the coffin 
 of Bp. Coverdale in our own day, as a 
 case in point. (Pref. to Fleury, p. 
 clxx.) The interval would be about 
 the same. But many parallels might 
 be adduced if this were not sufficient. 
 
 20 
 
 9 So St Chrysostom (A.D. 394), 
 and St Ambrose (A.D. 395), (the pas- 
 sages are given in the Appendix), 
 Paulinus and Sulpicius Severus (A. D. 
 400), narrate the restoration of a 
 corpse to life. Rufinus (400), Socrates, 
 Sozomen and Theodoret (about 440), 
 speak only of a sick woman restored 
 to health. St Ambrose, who is fol- 
 lowed by later writers, adds moreover, 
 that a further search was made for the 
 nails : two were recovered, of which 
 one was converted into a bit for a horse, 
 while the other was set in a crown and 
 presented by Helena to her son Con- 
 stantine; which, Theodoret says, was 
 handed down to his successors as a 
 precious heir-loom. 
 
 10 Perhaps it is right " to draw a 
 line between the earlier testimony and 
 the evidence which follows at a later 
 date. It would seem impossible but 
 that the original story would receive 
 a colour or an exaggeration when taken 
 up as a matter of popular belief, and 
 that in countries far removed from the 
 scene to which it belongs." Newman's 
 Pref. to Fleury, p. cli.
 
 306 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 St Helena would appear to have been guided in this 
 case, as in the case of the Holy Sepulchre, by the received 
 and continuous tradition of the native Christian Church, 
 which reported that the instrument of our Lord's cruci- 
 fixion had been cast aside, in the hurry of the preparation 
 of the Passover 1 , into a pit near the place of execution ; 
 which she caused to be examined, and three crosses were 
 actually discovered: and however strange or startling the 
 fact may appear, it is better to suspend the judgment, if we 
 are not satisfied with the evidence, than to impute so great 
 a crime as imposture and fraud to men who, for ought we 
 know to the contrary, may have been eminent saints 2 . It 
 seems scarcely credible that the search would have been com- 
 menced at all without some reasonable prospect of success, 
 grounded on a probable tradition : and the desire to recover 
 such a relic, if possible, was not unnatural, and quite in 
 accordance with the spirit of the age, which however was 
 satisfied with the possession and legitimate use of such me- 
 morials, and did not exalt them into dols for St Ambrose 
 expressly declares that when " she found the title, she adored 
 the King, not the wood ; for that is the error of the Gentiles, 
 and the vanity of the wicked. But she adored Him who 
 hung on the wood, (whose name was) written in the title 3 ." 
 
 1 Observe : The death of the two 
 malefactors was hastened in conse- 
 quence ; our Lord's burial in the neigh, 
 bouring tomb, because it was " nigh at 
 hand;" and the postponement of the 
 embalming, all prove that the proceed- 
 ings were hurried. See St John xix. 
 31, 32, 42. 
 
 8 " If the discovery was not really 
 made, there was imposture in the pro- 
 ceeding : an imputation upon the 
 
 church of Jerusalem, nay, in the event' 
 on the whole Christian world, so heavy 
 as to lead us to weigh well which is the 
 more probable hypothesis of the two, 
 so systematic and sustained a fraud, 
 or the discovery of a relic, or, in human 
 language, an antiquity, three hundred 
 years old." Newman's Pref. to Fleury, 
 p. cl. 
 
 8 " Invenit ergo titulum, regem 
 adoravit, non lignum, utique quia hie
 
 CH. 1.] THE HOLY CITY. 307 
 
 It is not my intention to notice the other traditionary 
 sites within the Church of the Holy Sepulchre 4 , because the 
 three which I have dwelt upon at length are incomparably 
 the most important, and belong to an age much antecedent 
 to that which is claimed for most of the remainder. Indeed, 
 the most probable account of these chapels and oratories 
 would appear to be, that they were first fixed by devotion, 
 merely with a view to commemorate such circumstances at- 
 tending that awful scene 5 as the sacred evangelists were 
 inspired to record, without any idea of identifying the spots ; 
 and that the simplicity of pilgrims in later ages has assigned 
 the transactions to these particular localities. In the former 
 view, they may still be not without their use to one who is more 
 intent on turning to good account a visit to these sacred scenes, 
 than disposed to ridicule and despise feelings which he cannot 
 understand or appreciate. The same may be said of other 
 traditionary sites in and about the Holy City ; and for him- 
 self, the writer will not hesitate to avow that he never passed 
 up "the Dolorous Way" without looking with deep interest 
 at the " Church of the Flagellation," the " arch of the 
 Ecce Homo," and the "Impression in the Wall 6 ;" or that 
 he even felt it a pleasure to sojourn and a privilege to suf- 
 fer in the house of Saint Veronica, not because he attached 
 
 Gentilis est error, et vanitas impiorum. 
 Sed adoravit ilium qui pependit in 
 ligno scriptus in titulo." St Ambrosii 
 Orat. Funeb. ut sup. 
 
 4 The reader will find them all 
 marked in the very accurate Plan copied 
 from one made on the spot by a Rus- 
 sian artist. 
 
 5 As " the Calvary" so frequently 
 seen in Roman Catholic countries 
 especially in the Tyrol and Southern 
 Germany. 
 
 6 These will all be found in the Plan 
 of the City, corrected from Dr Robin, 
 son's, which was itself an improvement 
 on Mr Catherwood's. 
 
 202
 
 308 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 much importance to the traditions in question 1 , but for 
 reasons, which need not be explained, in which he hopes 
 that many of his readers would sympathise ; nor does he 
 envy the man who could pass by in disgust these and 
 such-like mementos for this at least they are and re- 
 turning home, not only feel, but write, " enough of such 
 absurdities! 2 " He is not aware that the view here advo- 
 cated is in the slightest degree superstitious if it be, he 
 humbly trusts that such superstition will not be visited more 
 severely than the extreme of irreverence. 
 
 1 If any think that the more in- 
 telligent pilgrims, in what will be con- 
 sidered the darkest ages, placed confi- 
 dence in the minor traditions, let the 
 following passages undeceive him. St 
 Jerome speaks thus of a tradition which 
 happens to be mentioned by the Bor- 
 deaux pilgrims as early as 333 : " Sim- 
 pliciores fratres inter ruinas templi et 
 altaris, sive in portarum exitibus quae 
 Siloe ducunt, rubra saxa monstrantes, 
 Zachariae sanguine putant esse polluta. 
 Non condemnamus errorem, qui de odio 
 
 Judaeorum, et fidei pietate descendit." 
 Comment in Matt. xxiv. Works, Vol. 
 iv. pp. 112, 113. Ed. Bened. And 
 much later, in the age of the crusaders, 
 " Haec intra urbem a fidelibus vene- 
 rantur. Flagellatio Jesu Christi, atque 
 coronatio, ac derisio, et caetera quas 
 pro nobis pertulit : sed non facile ubi 
 fuerunt nunc dignosci possunt, cum 
 praesertim civitas ipsa totiens postea 
 destructa atque deleta sit." Gesta 
 Francorum, p. 573. 
 3 Bib. Res. i. 344.
 
 ADDITIONAL NOTE ON CHAP. I. PART II. 
 
 SINCE the foregoing chapter was finished I have had an opportunity 
 of seeing Dr Robinson's rejoinder 1 to that section of Mr Newman's 
 Essay on Miracles, relating to the topography of Jerusalem, which has 
 been more than once referred to in the notes. I have found nothing 
 in the additional remarks of the Professor which requires me to alter 
 a single line of what I have already written on the subject, but 
 some undesigned concessions which tend to confirm the views which 
 have now been set forth ; and it is on this account that I here notice 
 them. 
 
 On the personal arguments I would merely remark, that the 
 cause of truth and charity would probably not have suffered materi- 
 ally had they been more sparingly used on both sides, in this as in 
 other controversies ; and certainly the readers would not have been 
 less edified. 
 
 I proceed to points of more general interest. And first, I would 
 quote a passage parallel to some which have been already given in a 
 note above, in which the writer reiterates the assurance that the original 
 bias of his mind was in favour of the traditionary site of the Holy 
 Sepulchre. " If I had a partiality of feeling, it certainly was in favour 
 of finding the true site in the traditionary one ; for I went to Jeru- 
 salem prepossessed with the idea, that such, after all, might be the 
 actual state of the case 2 ." It is right, of course, that his arguments 
 should have the benefit of this repeated declaration; but it is at once 
 evident from this language that the probabilities were nearly balanced 
 in his mind ; and I cannot help thinking that an undue suspicion of 
 traditionary evidence and a horror of "monkish superstition" turned 
 the scale, and that he was actuated from the first by a desire to 
 disprove the credibility of the received sites. Without some such 
 previous disposition it seems difficult to account for the fact, that from 
 
 1 Published in a periodical entitled in Part I. No. 3, pp.154 202. 
 Bibliotheca Sacra, edited in New York 2 p. 157- 
 
 by Dr Robinson. The paper is found '
 
 310 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 the moment of his entering Jerusalem the grand features of its topo- 
 graphy were looked for where they could not exist consistently with 
 the hypothesis of the present sepulchre being the true one that on 
 his failing to discover any traces of the Tyropaeon where he expected 
 to discover it, he had no misgivings as to the course which he had 
 marked out for it no suspicion that that large and well defined val- 
 ley which then forced itself on his observation 1 , of which he so often 
 speaks, commencing near the Damascus gate and stretching down to 
 the pool of Siloam so bisecting the city might possibly be the very 
 valley of which he was in quest; and that the dissimilarity of his 
 Acra from that described by Josephus, which has already been fully 
 stated, did not occasion him any perplexity. It surely is not unreason- 
 able, considering the language of Josephus, that "the Essayist" or 
 any one else should " seem to consider Acra as an isolated hill, and 
 speak of the wall as either traversing the hill, or as inclosing it 2 ." 
 And we have a fair ground for hesitating to receive a description so 
 contrary to Josephus as is that of Dr Robinson, who informs us again 
 that "instead of being isolated, Acra is merely the south-eastern end 
 or point of the long swell which forms the high ground on the north- 
 west of Jerusalem, and sinks down gradually towards the temple, as 
 it enters the city." 
 
 And I am glad to find a confirmation of my own observations on 
 the comparative height of this ground and Zion, sufficient at least for 
 the argument, in the language of a correspondent and disciple of Dr 
 Robinson, who, in speaking of the ruined tower of Tancred in the north- 
 west angle of the walls, presumes that its site is " the highest in the 
 city 3 ." Now if the second wall traversed the highest part of this ridge, 
 which, as Dr Robinson remarks, "rises somewhat higher than the 
 north-west part of the city itself 4 ," could the historian with any pro- 
 priety have described Zion as the upper city, and its mount as "much 
 more lofty" than Acra? 
 
 I am glad to find that the tradition of the Pool of Hezekiah is placed 
 on its right basis in the paper under review : but I appeal to the ex- 
 tracts which I have already made from the Researches in proof that 
 
 1 Vol. i. p. 353; and see above, p. 
 272, note 2. 
 
 2 Bibliotheca Sacra, p. 189, note 1. 
 All writers who notice the language 
 of Josephus do the same. Let the 
 names of Reland, Lightfoot, and Rau- 
 
 mer, suffice as examples. The essayist 
 errs in good company, if error it be. 
 See above pp. 264-5. 
 
 3 Bib. Sac. p. 30, in a communi- 
 cation from Mr. Woolcott. 
 
 4 Bib. Res. i. p. 351.
 
 CH. I. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 311 
 
 too great importance was there attached to this modern tradition, cal- 
 culated, if not designed, to produce a false impression on the mind of 
 the reader. The Professor now writes, " I am not aware that any such 
 tradition exists, or ever has existed, hi respect to this pool, except on 
 the lips of the monks;... the native name is Birket el-Hummdm, Pool 
 of the Bath 5 ." But I must deny that " no unprejudiced reader would 
 fail to remark" that "in connecting this reservoir with Hezekiah he 
 was guided solely by its correspondence, in position and character, to 
 the scriptural accounts of the pool constructed by that monarch 6 ." 
 Whether this correspondence is so very obvious, will be seen in a sub- 
 sequent chapter. 
 
 Another statement of the Researches on which I have had occasion 
 to remark is negatived in the later publication, viz. that which relates 
 to the four gates which led from the outer court of the temple on the 
 west side, one into the upper city, two into the suburbs, and the fourth 
 into the lower city. It will be remembered that once hi his larger 
 work Dr Robinson disposes of this difficult passage by simply observing 
 in a parenthesis, that these suburbs are identical with "the new city 
 on the north," which was shewn to be impossible; in this paper (as 
 indeed elsewhere in the Researches) he makes three of these gates lead 
 into the lower city 7 , virtually conceding what has been argued at length, 
 that some part of the lower city west of the temple had the distinct 
 designation of "the suburbs." I would here add to what has been 
 above said on this subject, that the division between Acra proper and 
 Millo, or the suburbs, was perhaps marked by the wall built by the 
 Asmoneans to cut off the garrison in Acra from the market 8 . 
 
 I would wish that the author had refrained from a repetition of 
 the very inaccurate statement that even in our Saviour's time "the 
 population had spread beyond the walls" on the west quarter of the 
 old town, and that "here were already extensive suburbs, which the 
 third wall was afterwards built to protect 9 ," because he must know 
 
 5 Bib. Res. i. p. 196. 
 
 6 I do not speak of the impression 
 made on myself, who must be pre- 
 sumed prejudiced, but on others, who 
 certainly were not so. 
 
 7 Bib. Sac. p. 188. See above p. 
 274. 
 
 8 Ant. xin. v. 11. 
 
 9 Ibid. p. 195, note 4. The argu- 
 
 ment from the nature of the ground 
 in this quarter adduced in this same 
 note, weak as it is in itself is surely 
 sufficiently answered by the Monu- 
 ment of John the high priest, and the 
 sepulchral excavations still to be seen, 
 to which allusion has already been 
 made.
 
 312 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 that he can only prove that the city had overflown on the north side 1 , 
 and it has been already shewn that the west quarter of the new city 
 was thinly peopled. It would surely be well to pause before he charges 
 others with " an attempt to cast dust in the reader's eyes," until he 
 has asked himself whether he had the same intention in such passages 
 as these, with which his book abounds, and which "have the appear- 
 ance at least of deliberate misinterpretation," but of which we may 
 charitably hope that " not only the suppressio veri, but also the sugyestio 
 falsi*," was quite unintentional. 
 
 I cannot but regret that the Professor has thought right to reiterate 
 his accusation against Bishop Macarius and the church at Jerusalem 3 , 
 which has been already quoted 4 , and need not to be repeated ; and to 
 which I recur only to notice an apparent inconsistency, which had 
 occurred to my mind before, but on which I had forborne to remark. 
 If the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre and the blessed Cross were "a 
 work of pious fraud," " a well laid and successful plan of the bishop and 
 his clergy," with what propriety can he elsewhere say that " it would 
 seem not improbable that Helena was the prime mover in searching 
 for and discovering the sacred Sepulchre, and that through her repre- 
 sentations her son was induced to undertake the erection of the church 8 ." 
 It is equally difficult to imagine how a person in her position could 
 be "interested 8 " in any bad sense in such an undertaking, and to sup- 
 pose that she should lend herself to the ambitious projects of others; 
 and I will add, that the sneer at the pious octogenarian convert and 
 pilgrim might well have been spared. It must surely be a most miserable 
 system in which Dr Robinson has been brought up, which can allow 
 him even to imagine the possibility of such flagrant wickedness in the 
 
 1 As Dr R. himself writes, Bib. 
 Sac. p. 193. 
 
 8 pp. 202 (note), 198 and 200. The 
 words within commas (but not the re- 
 servations) are merely a sample of the 
 unseemly phrases (apart from strictly 
 personal reflections) which Dr Robin- 
 son is not ashamed to use of Mr New- 
 man. One may regret some expressions 
 in this last-named author's critique, 
 but there is nothing virulent in its 
 tone. 
 
 3 Bib. Sac. p. 170. 
 
 * See above, p. 255, note 4. 
 
 5 Bib. Res. n. pp. 14, 15, repeated 
 in the Bib. Sac. p. 184. See the same 
 admission Bib. Res. n. p. 76. How- 
 ever, in his later essay " he is not sure 
 that this admission is not too broad." 
 It is very difficult to deal with such 
 shifting concessions and retractions, 
 which are so frequent. 
 
 6 Dr Robinson says that "the lo- 
 calities were assigned and the tra- 
 ditions brought forward by a credulous 
 and unenlightened zeal, well meant in- 
 deed, but not uninterested." Bib. Res. 
 i. 372.
 
 CH. I.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 313 
 
 rulers of the Early Church, or to speak of such characters as St Helena 
 in the terms which he employs. Besides, one would have thought 
 that the very fact of a bishop of Caesarea the rival see according to 
 his hypothesis being so actively engaged in the undertaking, and 
 lauding it in such terms as he does, would have been an obvious 
 answer to silence even those who wished to believe such shocking 
 calumny. 
 
 I would only further remark on the repetition of the very perplexing 
 argument in support of the theory of the " Gate Gennath " being near 
 the Hippie tower, because it is a point of great importance. "The 
 Gate of Gennath must have been near to the tower Hippicus on the 
 north-west part of Zion." " It must have been east of Hippicus, be- 
 cause the third wall began at that tower ; it could not have been far 
 distant, because that part of Zion was then high and steep 7 ." I must 
 again repeat that it is quite beyond my comprehension to imagine 
 what imperative necessity there could have been to place a city-gate at 
 the top of a precipitous rock of thirty cubits high, which must infalli- 
 bly have endangered the lives of all who were rash enough to attempt 
 the exit. I really should have thought such a position absolutely im- 
 possible, even if the royal palace had not been here to prevent it. 
 
 I will take this opportunity of making a further remark on an 
 expression of Josephus relative to Acra, which I forgot to do in the 
 discussion above ; and I thank Dr Robinson for reminding me of it. 
 The Jewish historian describes the figure of this hill as a'/^i/cuoTo?, 
 an expression as to the exact meaning of which the learned are not 
 agreed, at least in this connexion. It properly describes the form of 
 the moon in the middle of its second or third quarter, commonly 
 called " gibbous," greater than half, less than full 8 ; Dr Robinson, wish- 
 ing to turn this to account also for his Acra, gives a sense quite dif- 
 ferent to that which other writers have done : he supposes it may mean 
 nothing more than that Acra was "sloping on both sides," i.e. "was 
 a ridge running down into the city 9 !" an explanation which is either 
 repeated or contradicted it is not clear which in the subsequent pub- 
 
 7 Bib. Sac. Pt. i. p. 186, and note 
 3. The remaining argument in this 
 note is also fully answered in the pre- 
 ceding chapter. 
 
 8 I copy from the learned Reland. 
 Suidas ad vocem Tei-pouc-riis scribit 
 
 CSSe Tearcrapas TJ/S (re\i/J/>}S fj.op<j>dv. 
 
 'ApTlTOKO? yap, flOVOeiClj?, d[l(f>iKVpTOS, 
 
 jcai Trai/o-Afivos. See more to the pur- 
 pose, Palestina, p. 852. 
 9 Bib. Res. i. 410.
 
 314 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 lication 1 . Now, without waiting to insist on the great difficulty there 
 would be to account, on this supposition, for the opposition implied 
 in the description of Zion, which Josephus says was "more direct" 
 than Acra, it will surely be more fair to allow the author to explain 
 himself, which he seems to do very clearly in two passages which 
 have been above referred to, in one of which he speaks of the wall of 
 Acra running in a circular course, in another of a northern and southern 
 part of the same ; in the former giving the curve of the moon, in the 
 latter the base of its illuminated segment ; then its opposition to the other 
 hill will be plain enough, and entirely consistent with fact, the latter 
 being nearly a square, the former quite of a gibbous form ! 
 
 1 Biblioth. Sacra, Vol. i. p. 189, note 1, (end.)
 
 of Mount Moriah fn 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE JEWISH TEMPLE AND THE FORTRESS ANTONIA. 
 
 To pass from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to the 
 opposite hill of Moriah. My plan here will be to describe 
 the present features of the Temple-mount, as far as possible 
 from my own observations as confirmed by others, and then, 
 by comparing the notices of ancient writers with existing phae- 
 nomena, to endeavour to contribute something towards the 
 elucidation of this most difficult subject : happy if I can suc- 
 ceed in clearing away some rubbish, in order to facilitate the 
 operations of future labourers on the same ground.
 
 316 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 I proceed to a survey of the enclosure of the great 
 Mosk, the general appearance of which has been already de- 
 scribed, and I shall prefer to use the language of others 
 rather than my own, for reasons which will be presently 
 obvious 1 . 
 
 El Haram es Sherif, "the noble sanctuary," occupies 
 an area contained within four unequal sides nearly opposite 
 to the four cardinal points. " The length of the east wall 
 is 1520 feet, of the south wall 940 feet, of the west 
 wall 1617 feet, and of the north 1020 feet ; and the walls 
 stand at right-angles only at one point, the south-west 
 corner." " The Mosk of Omar occupies the middle space, 
 nearly, between the southern and northern walls ; " but is 
 " exactly one-third, or 320 feet, nearer the western than 
 the eastern wall." It stands on an " extensive platform 
 measuring 450 feet from east to west, and 550 feet from 
 north to south, paved in part with marble," rising " in gene- 
 ral about 15 or 16 feet above the area," and approached 
 " by three flights of stairs on the western side," " on the 
 north side two, on the south side two, on the east side 
 one." 
 
 The mosk itself "is octagonal in form, each side mea- 
 suring 67 feet ; its dome is covered with lead, and sur- 
 mounted by a tall gilt crescent." " Under this dome is a 
 
 ' I am here much indebted to a 
 paper in Mr Bartlett's " Walks about 
 Jerusalem," contributed by Mr Cather- 
 wood with his usual kindness -. and I 
 take this opportunity of expressing 
 my thanks to that gentleman for his 
 courtesy to me, and my regret that, 
 while availing myself 90 largely of his 
 observations, I am obliged to differ so 
 widely from hid deductions and con- 
 
 clusions. This letter will be found 
 from p. 161 to 178 of the book in ques- 
 tion, with plans and illustrations, all 
 extremely interesting; and the re- 
 ferences are to this. Mr Catherwood 
 visited the Mosk daily for six weeks 
 in 1838, and was assisted in his survey 
 by two other architects then at Jeru- 
 salem, Messrs. Bonomi and Arundel. 
 Walks, 161, 164.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 317 
 
 remarkable limestone rock, which occupies the greater part 
 of the area beneath [the dome], and appears to be the natural 
 surface of the rock of Mount Moriah." "It is irregular 
 in its form, and measures about 60 feet in one direction, 
 and 50 in the other. It projects about 5 feet above the 
 marble pavement of the mosk, which is itself 12 feet above 
 the general level of the enclosure." " At the south-east cor- 
 ner of this rock is an excavated chamber, irregular in form j 
 its superficial area being about 600 feet, the average height 7. 
 
 In the centre of the rocky pavement is a circular slab 
 
 of marble, which being struck, returns a hollow sound, clearly 
 showing that there is a well or excavation beneath." 
 
 " Proceeding southward from the platform of the Mosk 
 of Omar, at the distance of 350 feet" is the " porch of 
 Mosk el-Aksa, which occupies the remaining space of 280 
 feet, extending to the southern wall of the great enclosure 
 
 the entire breadth being 180 feet . . . Attached to 
 
 the south-west angle of this building is the Mosk of Abu- 
 Bekr . . . upwards of 200 feet in length and 55 in breadth" 
 . . . and at right angles with this again, the Mosk of the 
 Mogrebins, 200 feet in length, and at the opposite end of 
 this edifice, on the edge of the wall, is the small Mosk of 
 Omar, 85 feet in length. 
 
 Beneath this Mosk of el-Aksa is a vaulted passage 
 or corridor, which was the only part of the precincts of 
 the mosk which I was able to explore during my stay at 
 Jerusalem 3 . This avenue is composed of two aisles, with a 
 
 2 I was introduced to it through a 
 hole in the southern wall of the ex- 
 terior enclosure, (which was stopped 
 up soon after my second visit) by Mr 
 Woolcott, an American missionary 
 
 from Beirout, whose description I 
 follow, as contained in a communi- 
 cation made to Dr R., published in 
 his Bibliotheca Sacra, Part i. p. 17, 
 &c. It was seen by Maundrell, Jour-
 
 318 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 row of columns in the middle, approached from the court 
 of the haram at the north by a door in the eastern aisle. 
 The entrance from the haram is " immediately to the left 
 of the main entrance" to El-Aksa, and down "a flight of 
 stone steps." It is arched with stones, and each aisle, ex- 
 clusive of the columns, about 19 feet in width ; the whole 
 width of the area being 42 feet, and its length 280 feet 1 . 
 Towards the southern end there is a descent of several feet 
 by steps in the western aisle ; when the visitor finds himself 
 before a double gateway of noble dimensions, supported by 
 two Corinthian columns of marble, with highly decorated 
 capitals. Some of the stones in the side walls are as much 
 as 13 feet in length and bevelled. 
 
 Within the area of the haram the subterranean vaults 
 at the south-east next demand attention 2 . The descent to 
 these is from a small mosk in the angle of the wall, and 
 they consist of fifteen rows of square pillars, from which 
 spring arches supporting the platform. These vaults at 
 present extend about 320 feet towards the west, while to 
 the northward their width varies from 100 to 200 feet: 
 and they are closed up, both to the north and west, by 
 walls of more modern date than the architecture of the 
 pillars and arches. The roots of the olive-trees on the 
 platform above " have struck through the arches and in 
 some instances taken root again below. The ground . . . 
 rises rapidly from the south-east towards the north and 
 west, so that the height of the southern arches is 35 feet, 
 
 ney, p. 100 ; is referred to in the Bib. 
 Res. I. 446, 447 ; and described briefly 
 by Mr Catherwood, Walks, pp. 169, 
 170. 
 
 1 The width is given by Mr Wool- 
 cott, the length supplied by Mr Cather- 
 
 wood, Walks, 1. c. It is the same 
 length as the mosk above it. 
 
 2 Here I follow Mr Catherwood 
 again, Bib. Res. i. 448 ; and Walks, 
 170.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 319 
 
 while the northern ones are but 10 feet high. The whole 
 substruction appears to be of Roman origin." 
 
 One further observation will suffice for the survey of 
 the interior. It relates to the north-west angle of the en- 
 closure, and is of the utmost importance 3 . This inner angle 
 is formed "by the rock being cut perpendicularly to an 
 extent of 20 feet in some parts," while within the area also, 
 towards the mosk, " a considerable portion of the rock has 
 been cut away 4 ." 
 
 To proceed now to a circuit of the exterior walls, com- 
 mencing on the east side, above the Valley of Jehoshaphat 5 . 
 Here are observed at the north-east and also at the south- 
 east corner of the area several courses of large stones, 
 evidently of ancient masonry, "one at the north-east mea- 
 suring 24 feet in length, by 3 in height, and 6 in breadth," 
 and some at the south-east varying " from 17 to 19 feet 
 in length by 3 or four feet in height, while one block at 
 the corner is 7^ feet thick 6 ." On this side there is nothing 
 else to remark but the Golden Gate, "the external front 
 and arches of which are evidently of Roman origin ;" while 
 in the interior " a central row of noble Corinthian columns 
 and a groined roof once formed a stately portico of Roman 
 workmanship. It is situated nearly 300 feet north of the 
 middle of the present enclosure 7 ." It has been presumed 
 to be of the same age and style as the gate already noticed 
 under the Mosk el-Aksa 8 . 
 
 3 Catherwood, Walks, 174, 175. 
 
 4 Bartlett, ib. 156. 
 
 5 For the exterior I follow Dr 
 Robinson, and trust implicitly to his 
 " measuring-tape," which I believe is 
 pretty correct (much more so than his 
 deductions from it) ; but 1 never had 
 
 the curiosity to test its accuracy. 
 
 6 Bib. Res. i. 422, 423. 
 
 * Bib. Res. i. 437, 438, embodying 
 a statement from Mr Bouomi the ar- 
 chitect. 
 
 8 Mr Catherwood, writing of the 
 gateway under El-Aksa, says : " This
 
 320 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 On the south side of the outer enclosure, at a distance 
 of 325 feet from its south-west, and 630 from its south-east 
 corner 1 , the modern city-wall starts off from the wall of 
 the haram at a right angle, at the precise point where the 
 ancient double gateway under the Mosk el-Aksa is found, 
 which is actually divided by this wall, so that one-half is 
 included, the other excluded, from the modern city. Part of 
 the ornamented capital may be seen appearing from the 
 mass of modern masonry, by which the entrance has been 
 blocked up ; and the curious traveller may have a view of 
 the corridor by climbing up to the iron grating in the same 
 wall, which the accumulation of rubbish will enable him to 
 reach without difficulty 2 . Here a rude pile of Saracenic 
 buildings abuts upon the wall of the mosk, from one of 
 the lower apartments of which, approached from within the 
 city, my stealthy entrance was effected. " This mass of 
 
 buildings are merely offices connected with the 
 
 mosk 3 ." 
 
 In this same southern wall of the haram, a little to 
 the east of this gateway, "are three Roman arches, walled 
 up, about 25 feet high and 14 broad, entering apparently 
 into the three western intervals ... of the vaults. Further 
 east, near the end of the wall, is a Saracenic arch closed 
 
 gateway is apparently of the same age 
 and style as the Golden Gateway," p. 
 170. But in p. 173 he is more con- 
 fident, and says " it is evidently of the 
 same architecture, and connected with 
 the same general design." I prefer 
 
 1 Biblical Res. i. 395, compared 
 with 419, where he gives the breadth 
 of the south wall as 955, being 15 
 feet more than Mr Catherwood, (see 
 above, p. 316.) But, to avoid con- 
 fusion, I follow the Bib. Res. and will 
 
 the language of the former passage. explain more fully below my reasons 
 
 He examined the Golden Gateway j for doing so. 
 
 within, and found its length to be ! Woolcott, Bib. Sac. i. 18, 19. 
 
 about 70 feet by a breadth of 25 j :> Catherwood, Walks, p. 169. 
 
 feet.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 321 
 
 up, and about the same size 4 ." There is nothing more to 
 be remarked on the south side. 
 
 We come now to some interesting remains at the south- 
 west corner of the area of the mosk to which much 
 importance has of late been attached viz. " several large 
 stones jutting out of the western wall, which at the first 
 sight seem to be the effect of a bursting of the wall from 
 some mighty shock or earthquake;" but, on further in- 
 spection, " the courses of these immense stones, which seem 
 at first to have sprung out of their places in the wall, hi 
 consequence of some enormous violence," are found to " oc- 
 cupy, nevertheless, their original position." They have in 
 fact "the appearance of having once belonged to a large 
 arch : their external surface is hewn to a regular curve ; 
 and being fitted one upon another, they form the com- 
 mencement or foot of an immense arch, which once sprung 
 out from this western wall, in a direction towards Mount 
 Zion, across the valley of the Tyropaeon." The traveller 
 to whom we owe this very accurate description of the an- 
 tiquity, is convinced that "this arch could only have belonged 
 to THE BRIDGE which, according to Josephus, led from [the 
 south] part of the temple to the xystus on Zion;" of which 
 much more will be said presently 5 . " The traces of this arch 
 are too distinct and definite to be mistaken. Its southern 
 side is 39 English feet distant from the south-west corner of 
 the area, and the arch itself measures 51 feet along the wall. 
 Three courses of its stones still remain ; of which one is 5 
 feet 4 inches thick, and the others not much less. One of 
 the stones is 20^ feet long, another 24 1 feet, and the rest 
 in like proportion." And besides these stones connected with 
 
 4 Woolcott, ut sup. p. 23. 5 See below, p. 336. 
 
 21
 
 322 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 II. 
 
 the arch, there are at this south-west corner other " huge 
 blocks;" and "the corner-stone now next above the surface 
 of the ground measures 30 feet 10 inches in length, by 61 
 feet broad; and several others vary from 20 ^ to 24-^ feet 
 long by 5 feet in thickness 1 ." 
 
 At present I am only engaged in a survey, and pass on 
 to the next object of interest towards the north, the Wailing- 
 place of the Jews 2 , where we find a fragment of which " the 
 stones are of the same dimensions, and the wall of the same 
 character, as in the parts already described 3 ." 
 
 Further still towards the north, we reach the southern- 
 most entrance to the haram from the west, approached by 
 the causeway across the Tyropseon from the north-east 
 angle of Zion, which has been so frequently mentioned 4 . 
 From this point towards the north, " the western wall is 
 mostly hidden by the houses of the city," but "there are 
 on this side four entrances," (including that which has now 
 been noticed) "to which streets lead down to the city 5 ." 
 And " the principal entrance ... is through the deserted 
 bazaar 6 ," of which mention was made above: the one most 
 to the north is in the neighbourhood of the seraglio, which 
 stands on the north side of the north-west angle of the 
 haram, and which next claims attention. 
 
 This building, "probably occupying in part the site of 
 the ancient fortress Antonia 7 , rests upon a precipice of rock, 
 which formerly swept down abruptly, and has obviously 
 
 ' Bib. Res. 424, &c. Compare 351. 
 
 * Bib. Res. Vol. i. pp. 422, 3 ; and 
 compare 350, 351. 
 
 8 Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 423. Compare 
 p. 350 ; and see a very correct drawing 
 of this and the ruined arch, in Mr 
 
 Bartlett's book, pp. 154 and 150. 
 
 4 See above, Part i. ch. i. and Part 
 ii. ch. i. p. 275. 
 
 8 Bib. Res. i. 420, 21. 
 
 6 Catherwood, p. 166. 
 
 7 Bib. Res. i. 420.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 323 
 
 been cut away to form the level below, which also bears 
 marks of having been scarped 8 ." This rocky precipice rises 
 to a height of upwards of 20 feet, as was seen in the in- 
 terior survey 9 . 
 
 Immediately east of this large building is an entrance 
 to the area of the mosk from the north, and a second at 
 no great distance. Beyond this, " on its northern side, the 
 area is skirted for nearly half its breadth by the deep pool 
 or trench usually caUed Bethesda, and vaults connected with 
 it 10 ." "The pool measures 360 English feet in length, 103 
 in breadth, and 75 in depth to the bottom; besides the 
 rubbish which has been accumulating in it for ages. It was 
 once evidently used as a reservoir." 
 
 On the western side of the south-west angle " two 
 lofty arched vaults extend in westward, side by side, under 
 the houses which now cover that part. The southernmost 
 of these arches is 12 feet in breadth, and the other 19 
 feet." Notwithstanding the accumulation of rubbish within 
 and before them, " yet 100 feet may be measured within 
 the northern one, and it seemed to extend much further. 
 This gives the whole work a length of at least 460 feet, 
 equal to nearly one half the whole breadth of the enclosure 
 of the mosk; and how much more we do not know 11 ." 
 This, Dr Robinson conjectures, is the ancient fosse of the 
 fortress of Antonia. Its eastern end is close to the city 
 wall, leaving only a narrow way to the haram from the St 
 Stephen's gate. This brings us again to the north-eastern 
 corner of the enclosure, and to the massive stones of ancient 
 masonry in the corner, with which I began the survey of 
 
 8 Bartlett, p. 156, represented in a 
 drawing, p. 108. 
 
 9 See above, p. 319. 
 
 10 Bib. Res. i. 420. 
 
 11 Ib. i. 434. See his arguments, 
 
 Bib. Res. i. 432436. 
 
 212
 
 324 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 the exterior. I am now to endeavour to reconcile these phse- 
 nomena with the ancient records of Josephus and others. 
 
 And here we are met at the outset by a most strik- 
 ing contrast between the ancient and the modern area ; the 
 length of the latter exceeding its breadth, as we have seen, 
 "by 573 feet, or more than one half 1 ,'' whereas, accord- 
 ing to the united witness of Josephus and. the Talmud, the 
 former was a complete square 2 . It is of course easy' to 
 account for this by supposing that these ancient authorities 
 were mistaken; and so we may dispose of any historical 
 testimony whatever. But let us see whether there is any 
 reason to believe that the Jews knew anything at all of 
 the matter, as does seem probable at first sight. It hap- 
 pens that they not only give the form, but the dimensions 
 also. Josephus tells us it was a stadium square, and the 
 Talmud 500 cubits 3 . Now making full allowance for the 
 acknowledged " uncertainty which exists as to the length 
 of the Jewish cubit," let us grant that it "may be taken 
 at 1 feet (as is often done);" and then, with further 
 allowance for our own ignorance and round numbers, let us 
 suppose that the testimony of Josephus is not irreconcile- 
 able with that of the Talmud. " The rabbinical specifica- 
 tion of 500 . cubits or 875 feet, if reckoned only from 
 portico to portico, would not vary very materially from 
 the results of [modern] measurements 4 " in the breadth of 
 the area, which gives 955 feet. But this breadth is de- 
 termined on both sides by boundaries which are not liable 
 
 1 Bib. Res. 1.431. 
 
 8 Josephus, Ant. xv. xiv. Light- 
 foot, Prospect of the Temple, cap. ii. 
 
 8 Lightfoot ut sup. This learned 
 author most justly remarks, that " this 
 
 every side the square, is so agreeable 
 to the number of Ezekiel, that that 
 helpeth to confirm and justify this pro- 
 portion and account." See Ezek. xlii. 
 20 ; xlv. 2. 
 
 number of five hundred cubits upon j 4 Bib. Res. 430, 1.
 
 the site ct'the 
 ANCIENT TEMPLE 
 
 and the 
 TUR RIS /INTO HI A 
 
 A.B.C.D El EammorAmi of the Great Mosk 
 
 A . E. F. D SaBtfar* fart <imtf>inl /;> the Church anil Hospitals ofJiifiiniarv 
 E.B.C.F . An-tt ofthi-Jrwixh Temple ahinit loocFf.rgu,tre. i.e.4oooinciraat 
 E.C K.LM.N.C.F,Thfle?i>/>/i- mvii iiidiiding Aiitoniji nbinit fiiioo FtinnmipiLSS 
 l.C.hana-85O,GK-40O, KL-7&0.Lit-7i(>, MN-60O , NC-66O , CF-1OOO, FE-1OOO. 
 ii.ii.ii.il, Fi'iir H-,'.ir/.7Ti firfniiinv f,i tin- Hunan 
 t>. ('mils Office or Mckhane 
 
 c.c.c, Tlirec corner towers c-f Antonio, so cubits high 
 d. .'>. E. corner tower ot'Antftniii 7i> titbits high, 
 ivmmaiulijig the War of the. whale Temple
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 325 
 
 to material change, viz. the Valley of Jehoshaphat on the 
 east, and another marked valley on the west ; for so says 
 Josephus, writing of the southern portico, " it reached in 
 length from the east valley to that on the west ; for it was 
 impossible that it should extend any further 5 ." Now deduct- 
 ing 875 feet the supposed value of 500 Hebrew cubits 
 for the breadth of the area within the porticos, from 955 
 feet, the ascertained width from valley to valley unchange- 
 ably marked by nature, exactly 80 feet will be left for 
 the porticos on either side, and these porticos according to 
 Josephus were 30 cubits wide each ; about 90 feet alto- 
 gether, shewing a difference of only 10 feet 6 ! I ask if 
 it be not a most gratifying result, that the comparison 
 thus instituted shews so close an agreement of existing 
 phaenomena with the Jewish measurement, as nearly as we 
 can approximate to it? I confess it surpasses my most 
 sanguine expectations ; and I think that such a result should 
 dispose us to attach some weight to their other observa- 
 tions on the same subject, because, if they were accurately 
 informed on this point, it was not likely that they would 
 have fallen into great error on the other; for if the autho- 
 rities for this assertion trusted only to their eye, and yet 
 guessed so near, could they have imagined that the court 
 was square if it had been oblong, as at present? 
 
 It is necessary to insist on the credibility of these ac- 
 counts, because a gentleman whose opinion is worthy of 
 some consideration as a professional man, thinks that he 
 has discovered within the present enclosure satisfactory evi- 
 dence that the court of the ancient temple was co-exten- 
 
 8 Ant. xv. c. xi. 5. ov yap fjv ex- 
 Telvai Trpocrui'Tepto Svva-ruv. 
 
 6 I suppose Josephus to have reck- 
 
 oned by the common cubit, best known 
 to the Romans, generally reckoned at 
 1A feet.
 
 326 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 sive with it; and as this evidence is found at the north- 
 west and south-east angles of the area, its establishment as 
 fact would determine the question against Josephus and the 
 Talmud. I have been anxious to shew that they were pro- 
 bably not writing at random or in the dark, and that 
 consequently the arguments must be very strong indeed to 
 justify us in setting aside their testimony. 
 
 What are the arguments ? The perpendicular rock at 
 the north-west, and the raised platform at the south-east 
 angle. Of the former of these he says, that "the cutting 
 away of the rock must of course be of the time of Solo- 
 mon. It could need no repair, and is the only work 
 (connected with the temple) that can with absolute cer- 
 tainty be referred to that monarch 1 ." And of the latter, 
 "the whole substruction appears to me to be of Roman 
 origin, and in connexion with the Golden Gate, and the 
 one beneath the El-Aksa, together with the ancient bridge, 
 to have formed a connected plan of foundation and ap- 
 proaches to the great Temple of Herod 2 ." Reserving for 
 future consideration the question whether one of these re- 
 mains might not admit of a satisfactory explanation on an- 
 other theory, I will beg leave to presume for a time that it 
 can, and will proceed to another point of deep interest. 
 
 Supposing the Jewish account to be in the main cor- 
 rect, and the temple-area to have been nearly a square 
 of from 900 to 1000 feet, how are we to account for the 
 present aspect of the haram, whose length exceeds its 
 breadth more than one half, and at which end has the 
 addition been made? Dr Robinson has accounted for the 
 
 1 Catherwood (in Bartlett's Walks), estimate of Josephus should be so low. 
 
 p. 175. I regret that this gentleman's 
 
 2 Ib. p. 171.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 327 
 
 difference by an ingenious hypothesis, that the fortress of 
 Antonia covered the whole north side of the temple, and 
 that the space formerly occupied by that fortress was taken 
 into the court of Adrian's idol-temple, and is now included 
 within the haram : and this hypothesis he thinks is sup- 
 ported by the remark of the Jewish historian, that the 
 circuit of the temple, including the Antonia, was six stadia 3 ; 
 and it is obvious that his view would most satisfactorily ex- 
 plain the meaning of this obscure passage 4 . 
 
 But there is, unfortunately, one insuperable objection at 
 least to this theory, which must have escaped the writer's 
 notice, or he could not have passed it over without some 
 attempt at explanation. It is obvious, from numerous pas- 
 sages, that the whole of the north wall of the temple was 
 not covered by the fortress in question. When Ponipey 
 had been received into the city by the Roman faction, he 
 proceeded to force the temple, which was occupied by the 
 adverse party of Aristobulus. To effect this he pitched his 
 camp within the city on the north part of the temple, 
 where it was most practicable ; but even on that side there 
 were great towers, and a ditch had been dug in which a 
 bank was raised with great labour, and the ditch filled up, 
 though but poorly, by reason of its immense depth, and on 
 this the engines were placed, and the wall battered, until 
 a breach was effected through which the temple was taken 5 . 
 Again, when Cestius had set fire to Bezetha at the be- 
 ginning of the Jewish war, and had attempted for five 
 days, without success, to effect his entrance into the upper 
 
 3 Joseph. Bell. Jud. v. v. 2. 
 
 4 See Bib. Res. i. 430, &c. he says, 
 
 "This conjecture is supported by 
 
 various facts, while it is, so far as I 
 
 know, contradicted by none" 432. 
 
 5 Ant. xiv. iv. 2, 3. ...jrd\iv...T< 
 Hfv aXAa irdirra ov<rav icrxvpdv, fiovto 
 Of TIO fiopeitu fie pet. <j>av\u><i
 
 328 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 city, he diverted his attack to the temple, and sought to 
 break into it at the northern quarter, the Jews being in 
 possession of Antonia. He was repulsed by the Jews from 
 the cloisters ; when the soldiers undermined the wall, and 
 prepared to set fire to the gate of the temple 1 . Further, 
 when Titus had taken the outer wall of the city, the 
 Jews " divided into several bands, and courageously defended 
 the wall ; John and his faction fighting from the tower of 
 Antonia, and from the northern cloister of the temple* ;" 
 which would have been unnecessary, or rather absurd, if the 
 whole space of Antonia, with its deep fosse, had been inter- 
 posed between them and the enemy. 
 
 Besides this, although I cannot allow so much weight 
 to the perpendicular rock at the north-west angle as is 
 attached to it in the passages lately quoted 3 , yet as a link 
 in a chain of argument, for the identity of the northern 
 bound of the temple-court with that of the present mosk, 
 it is fairly entitled to some consideration ; for if not con- 
 nected with the Jewish temple, it is certainly difficult to 
 imagine when, and by whom, and with what object, so great 
 a work was effected. 
 
 Another difficulty is suggested by the position of what 
 is commonly called the Golden Gate. This gate, which is 
 generally allowed to have belonged to Herod's Temple, is 
 conjectured by Dr Robinson to be of the era of Adrian, 
 
 peiare icai /JaOeia, ev-rot aTroA a/u/3a- 
 vovaa. TO ifptiv, \t6ivip irfpifiii\ta Kitp-ri- 
 
 puiy trdvu TeTi\i<Tfi.evov no/UTTfj'ios 
 
 <5i efftoOev ffTpa-roireSfueTai, Kara TO 
 fiopetov TOV lepov fifpo?, oOev r\v CTTI- 
 fi.a\ov' duevTriKeaav&k KOI evravOa 
 fieydXoi Trupyoi, ical Ta^tpot Se 6pta- 
 PVKTO, Kal fiaOeia trtpiei\ero <f>dpayyi 
 
 .... /uoAts TrXtifrOe/ffjjs TOV rd<ppov 
 Std /3a6os direipov . . . /caTtj/ua<r<re TO 
 lepov TOIS -TreT/oo/SdXots, K. T. X. 
 
 1 Josephus, J. W. n. xix. 6. See 
 above, Ft. i. chap. ii. 
 
 * Ibid. v. vii. 3 ; for other proofs 
 see Ant. xiv. xv. 14; xvi. 1, 2; J. W. 
 n. iii. 1, and v. ix. 1. 
 
 a See above, p. 326.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 329 
 
 and to have conducted to his idol-temple ; but this is, as 
 far as I know, pure conjecture, without any authority what- 
 ever, as is also the idea, which it is adduced to confirm, 
 " That the walls of the area were at this time rebuilt, at 
 least in part 4 ." " This gate is situated nearly 300 feet north 
 of the middle of the present enclosure," or 1045 feet from 
 the south, and 483 from the north extremity 5 ; and if it 
 belonged to the court of the temple, would be without the 
 square, according to the theory under review. 
 
 Once more : those very ancient stones near the St 
 Stephen's gate, which appear to have occupied an angle of 
 a Jewish wall 6 , and never to have been disturbed from their 
 original position, seem clearly to determine the direction of 
 the northern and eastern walls of the temple-area; for it 
 has been shown that they could not belong to the fortress 
 of Antonia. And lastly, the deep fosse at the north does 
 answer so exactly to the description 7 of the trench which 
 separated the temple from the opposite hill, that in the face 
 of such evidence I cannot do otherwise than conclude that we 
 have here the northern boundary of the temple-area. 
 
 But let us give Josephus and the rabbies another 
 chance, and now consider what objections there will be to 
 cut off a space from the southern end of the present enclo- 
 sure, so as to reduce it to about 1000 feet. Many will 
 doubtless occur to the reader's mind. The large stones in 
 the south-east angle, the large substructions within the same, 
 
 * B. R. i. 437. 
 
 5 438, compared with 395. 
 
 6 p. 423 ; see above, p. 22. 
 
 7 See note 6, p. 327. This is under- 
 stood to be described by Strabo, in 
 his short account of the taking of the 
 temple by Pompey : t/v yap irei-peo^es 
 
 euep/ces epuua ... T<i<ppov XttTo^ufjTTji/ 
 
 J^Cc6o9 UCV fj*COlTCC TTOOWI', *7rXcET0S O 
 
 irevTSKovTa KOI SiaKoariwv CK Si TOO 
 \i6ov TOV XoTo^tjOe'i/TOS eireTrupyeoTO 
 TO Tei^os TOW iepov. /caTeXa/3eTO Se 
 .... TrXt/peocras TJJW Tafppov, Kal eiri- 
 /SoXaii/ TOS <5ta/3a0pas. Lib. xvi. p. 723.
 
 330 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 the vaulted passage under the Mosk el-Aksa, and, last not 
 least, the remains of the massive arch at the western ex- 
 tremity. Can anything be said against such a string of pal- 
 pable facts running throughout ? Let us see. First, I grant 
 that the evidences of an angle of Jewish architecture are 
 quite as distinct at the south-east as at the north-east corner, 
 nor do I think that any architect, however experienced, could 
 discern between their respective dates ; but I can account for 
 such an angle at this extremity apart from the temple 
 which I cannot do at the other. 
 
 Let it be remembered that the first or old wall which 
 encompassed Zion was joined to the eastern cloister of the 
 temple, at Ophel 1 , which " is the remainder of the ridge 
 (on which the temple stood) extending south from Moriah 
 to Siloam, between the deep Valley of Jehoshaphat on the 
 east, and the steep but shallower Tyropaeon on the west," 
 " descending rapidly to the south 2 ." Now " the south-east 
 corner of the enclosure . . . impends over the Valley of Je- 
 hoshaphat, which is at this point about 130 feet deep 3 ; J1 and 
 " which here actually bends south-west around the corner 4 ," 
 so that " the wall on the south . . . was apparently built, not 
 on the brow of a valley, but on the side of a declivity, 
 which descended steeply for a time, and then ran off in a 
 more gradual slope, forming the ridge of Ophel 5 . 11 So then 
 had it been the temple-wall which made its angle here, it 
 is evident that the first or old wall must have joined the 
 south portico of the temple, not the east, as Josephus ex- 
 pressly affirms. The conclusion is unavoidable, that this is 
 
 1 See above, Pt. i. chap. ii. 
 - Bib. Res. i. 394. 
 
 3 Ibid. 420. 
 
 4 429. This bend of the Kedron 
 had escaped my observation ; but I 
 
 thank Dr Robinson for the remark. It 
 forces the wall to bend, and proves 
 that it must have been the first wall, 
 and not the temple-wall. 
 8 B. R. p. 421.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 331 
 
 an angle of the first wall, which having been joined to the 
 south extremity of the eastern portico of the temple about 
 500 feet north of this ancient fragment, had been continued 
 south to this point 6 , and then " bent" with the valley to- 
 wards the west, running " on the side of the declivity " until 
 " a more gradual slope " allowed it to descend the " ridge 
 of Ophel." But now if this account of the wall be satisfactory, 
 it may be thought that the subterranean works extending 
 from this point, probably to the western extremity, form a 
 train of argument against my hypothesis connected as links 
 in a chain, which render it altogether untenable. On the 
 contrary, it is this very concatenation which to my mind 
 renders the explanation so very much more easy, than an 
 equal number of unconnected single facts would have been. 
 We have already heard the opinion of an intelligent archi- 
 tect who has minutely examined every part, that the three 
 works in mention are of Roman origin, and formed a con- 
 nected plan 7 . His view of that plan has been also stated; but 
 on this I must beg leave, in deference to the rabbies, to 
 differ from him, and will proceed to state what appears to 
 me a much more satisfactory view. 
 
 The Emperor Justinian built a large church at Jeru- 
 salem, which he dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, and of 
 which we have a very full description from a contempo- 
 rary writer, who speaks as an eye-witness. It is a subject 
 of regret that his account of the site is not more definite : 
 he merely says it was situated on one of the highest hills 
 in Jerusalem. This difficulty however is obviated by a 
 general tradition altogether consonant with existing pheno- 
 mena ; for " there is nothing in the subsequent history nor 
 
 6 I think "the great tower that j large stones belonged to it. See 
 lieth out," which was in Ophel, stood i Nehem. iii. 26, 27. 
 at this south-east angle, and that the ' 7 See above, p. 326.
 
 332 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 in the modern topography of Jerusalem which in the least 
 corresponds to his description, except the present Mosk 
 el-Aksa, at the southern extremity of the enclosure of the 
 haram 1 ;" and it is a happy circumstance that all agree on 
 the only point on which the language of Procopius is at 
 all ambiguous 2 ; for with what justice it can be said that 
 his account " of the construction of this edifice is not very 
 clear, and borders somewhat on the fabulous," I must 
 leave the reader to judge when he has perused it 3 ; to me 
 it ' seems one of the most minute, graphic, and intelligible 
 architectural descriptions imaginable, worthy of an author who 
 was accustomed to write on such subjects. 
 
 " He represents" the church "as placed upon the loftiest 
 hill of the city, where there was not space enough to allow 
 of the prescribed dimensions, so that they were obliged to 
 lay the foundation on the south-east, at the bottom of the 
 hill, and build up a wall with arched vaults in order to 
 support that part of the building 4 ." But this will give a 
 very inadequate view of the matter, without further details 
 from the original author. It was then, says the histo- 
 rian of St Sophia at Constantinople, an incomparable edi- 
 fice, differing from all other buildings in Jerusalem in this, 
 that whereas they were built on even ground on the crest 
 
 1 Bib. Res. I. p. 439. I cannot help 
 thinking that the very brief notice 
 taken of Procopius's most minute de- 
 scription of this church, both here and 
 at p. 451, ii. 29, 30, and the attempt 
 to disparage its authority, shews that 
 the Professor felt it might somewhat 
 militate against his theories ; and it is, 
 in truth, rather inconvenient for them. 
 
 * I am not quite sure that this ad- 
 mission is not unjust towards the au- 
 thor. His words, 'iva 6pyu%ctv TOIS 
 
 lepevoi 6e'/iis, seem, I think, plainly 
 to point to the "Mount of Offence," 
 which is just, as would be required, 
 south-east of this site. If this con- 
 jecture be correct, the spot is most ac- 
 curately determined, for the Mosk el- 
 Aksa is exactly north-west of the above- 
 mentioned mount. 
 
 8 The original is too long for in- 
 sertion here, but is given in an Ap- 
 pendix. 
 
 4 Bib. Res. 438,9.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 338 
 
 or on the sloping sides of the hills, this had only one part 
 based upon the solid rock, while the remainder was sus- 
 pended in the air by means of arched substructions, rising 
 with the rock until they reached the pitch of the hill, where 
 they were joined to the ground of the sacred enclosure, (rip 
 TOV TCfjievovs <)a(f)ei). It was a work of immense labour, 
 and the architects having to contend against the natural dif- 
 ficulties of the site, despised the ordinary resources of art, 
 and had recourse to strange and unheard-of expedients. 
 They hewed out immense rocks (Trerpas} from the large 
 quarries in the neighbouring mountains, and having cut them 
 skilfully on the spot, conveyed them to their destination in 
 the following manner. They constructed wagons equal in 
 size to the stones, and placing one stone on each wagon, 
 they yoked to each forty of the imperial bullocks, selected 
 for their strength, and thus dragged the stone on the wain. 
 But the roads to the city being impracticable for such wagons, 
 they levelled the mountains to allow of their access, and thus 
 the church was built of the dimensions required by the em- 
 peror. It was of so great width that timber could not be 
 found suitable for the roof." But this difficulty was likewise 
 overcome, and a particular description is given of the means ; 
 which is not to our purpose. Columns were now required 
 answerable to the beauty of the sacred enclosure, and a quarry 
 of marble was most seasonably and unexpectedly discovered. 
 The buildings were thus adorned with colonnades within and 
 without, especially the cloisters which surrounded the building 
 on all but the eastern side. There was however a cloister 
 along the fourth side, called Narthix, entered from near the 
 door of the church, adorned with similar columns, forming 
 a wonderful vestibule (avXrj 5 ), the gates of which were so mag- 
 
 5 Qupitt fi.erav\oi, "janua a vestibule ferens in atrium." Lexicon.
 
 334 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 nificent as to prepare the spectator for the wonders of the 
 interior, the propylaeum being an arch of immense height 
 supported by two columns. Advancing forward by this ves- 
 tibule, the visitor came to two semicircular buildings facing 
 one another on either side of the church : they were hos- 
 pitals built by the emperor, one for pilgrims, the other for 
 poor invalids. The historian may well add that these build- 
 ings cost a considerable sum. Now when we remember that 
 the Mosk el-Aksa " is universally regarded by oriental Chris- 
 tians, and also by Frank catholics, as an ancient Christian 
 Church, once dedicated to the Virgin," that "earlier tra- 
 vellers" as well as later " describe it in the same manner," 
 and that " Mr Bonomi, whose judgment as an artist cannot 
 well be drawn into question, remarks expressly that the 
 structure is similar in appearance to those raised in the early 
 ages of Christianity ';" I suppose there can be but one opinion 
 that the Mosk el-Aksa is the church of Justinian; and I 
 apprehend that they who read the above outline of the very 
 minute account left us of that church, will think that it 
 does not deserve to be thrown on one side as " not very 
 clear," and that it no more " borders on the fabulous " than 
 the modern descriptions of it, which have been already re- 
 ferred to, to which it answers so exactly, that I am convinced 
 that a comparison of the two descriptions will make the 
 identity so clear, that it will be useless to insist on it. I 
 would merely observe that the present buildings around the 
 mosk are probably remains of the hospitals, modernised 
 and debased, and that the (renews) or sacred precincts, 
 would afford space for the " many side buildings " which 
 "very probably" formed the palace of the Frank kings, 
 during their reign in Jerusalem ; for I agree with Dr Ro- 
 
 1 Bib. Res. nt sup.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 335 
 
 binson in thinking that the buildings were once " more ex- 
 tensive than the present Mosk el-Aksa 2 ;" for who that com- 
 pares the account of the foundations of the enclosure of 
 Justinian, with the description which has been given of the 
 substructions at the south-east and south of the area of the 
 haram, can suppose that it admits of a question that they 
 are identical ? Further, have we any right to presume that 
 these vaults were " probably only repaired " by that em- 
 peror, and are to be referred " partly to Herod, or, with 
 greater probability, to a still earlier date 3 ; " without a hint 
 from this, or any other historian, to imply that any such 
 works existed here before 4 , and with the decided opinion of 
 three intelligent architects, that they are all of the same date? 
 
 The gateway, fiowever, demands further and distinct 
 notice, because it is quite true that Josephus speaks of a 
 gateway in the southern wall of the temple-court, and much 
 such a gateway as this described by Procopius ; for I must 
 understand the writer to speak of a double gateway in the 
 centre, and not, as the learned Lightfoot does 5 , of two gate- 
 ways equally removed from the angles, and from each other : 
 and if " there can be little question that this now existing is 
 the ancient gate mentioned by Josephus, in the middle of the 
 southern side of the temple-area 6 ," the Byzantine historian 
 must have been ill informed, although he lived at the time, 
 and writes as if he had accurately studied the subject. 
 
 But if Josephus is to be our guide and I for one am 
 ready to follow him implicitly then this could not be the 
 
 2 Bib. Res. i. p. 443. 
 
 3 Ibid. i. 451,452. 
 
 4 Or rather I should say with this 
 historian's plain declaration against it : 
 for it was altogether strange (irapd&oa 
 KOI SXeos dyvwra). Procopius, de 
 
 JE&if. Just. Lib. v. ch. 6. 
 
 5 Joseph. Ant. xv. 14. " iruXas 
 KOTO jueVov." See Lightfoot, Prospect 
 of the Temple, cap. vi. 
 
 6 Bib. Res. i. 451.
 
 336 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 gate which he mentions, for this simple reason, because this 
 is so far from being " in the middle of the southern side," 
 as that was, that it is almost one-third nearer to its west- 
 ern than to its eastern extremity, according to Dr Robin- 
 son's own showing 1 . Instead then of presuming that "it 
 may have been erected, or at least decorated by Herod, 
 and perhaps rebuilt by Adrian, or at the same time with 
 the church under Justinian?" I think it may safely be 
 concluded that it owes its origin altogether to this last- 
 named emperor ; and is the very gateway mentioned by Pro- 
 copius, supported by the two columns still standing, and formed 
 an entrance, not to the Temple, but to the buildings erected 
 by him in connexion with his Church of Saint Mary, or New 
 Church, as it was designated by the natives 3 , " to the area 
 of which there was an ascent by a flight of steps 4 ," probably 
 through this very corridor ! 
 
 But the ruins at the south-west angle still remain, and if 
 " this arch," as Dr Robinson imagines, " could only have 
 belonged to THE BRIDGE, which, according to Josephus, 
 led from [the south] part of the temple to the xystus on 
 
 1 Thus : " The breadth at the south 
 end is 955 feet," p. 419. The point in 
 "the wall of the area of the great 
 mosk south side," where this gate is 
 found at the junction of the two walls, 
 is "630 feet west of the south-east 
 corner," p. 395 ; leaving only 325 feet, 
 shewing a difference of 305 feet ! 
 
 3 p. 451. 
 
 8 I am really sorry that I cannot 
 allow Mr Woolcott, who was so kind as 
 to introduce me to this interesting relic, 
 and for whom I have a very sincere 
 esteem, to indulge his imagination any 
 longer in these vaults ; and the reader 
 will sympathise with me, when he reads 
 
 the following passage : " As I walked 
 through the broad aisles, in a stillness 
 broken only by the sound of my own 
 footsteps, it was a thrilling thought, 
 that I was treading one of the avenues 
 through which the tribes had passed to 
 the temple. I seemed to see the throng 
 of worshippers, and to hear their chant, 
 ' I was glad,'" &c. Bibl. Sac. Pt. i, 
 p. 19. Is it not a pity that so much 
 sentiment should be thrown away on 
 imaginary sites connected with the 
 Hebrew worship, and none at all re- 
 served for Christian antiquities ? 
 
 4 Bib. Res. i. 440, and the refer- 
 ences there in note 3.
 
 CH. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 337 
 
 Zion, ... it proves incontestably the antiquity of that portion 
 of the wall from which it springs 5 ;" in other words, that 
 the ancient area must have extended as far south as the 
 modern. Now I grant this fragment to exhibit distinct 
 traces of an ancient arch ; but must this arch necessarily 
 have belonged to a bridge ? is there no other means of ac- 
 counting for its situation? 
 
 If it did belong to such a bridge as Dr Robinson sup- 
 poses, it must have been a most stupendous work 350 feet 
 in length, and at least 51 feet in width 6 and composed of 
 huge stones! stretching across the deep bed of the Tyro- 
 paeon (still deep, though it "has doubtless been greatly 
 filled up with rubbish ") to the " abrupt precipice of rock, 
 from 20 to 30 feet high, lying over against it 7 ;" and it 
 does seem to me quite inconceivable, that Josephus gene- 
 rally so minute in detail should pass over, without a word 
 of description or admiration, such an astonishiag performance, 
 in the passages where the bridge is referred to ; and that no 
 traces of its western termination can be now discovered. 
 
 But there is a much greater difficulty in the way of the 
 reception of this hypothesis, amounting in my mind to an 
 absolute impossibility 8 . This ruin is nearly, if not quite, 
 
 8 Bib. Res. i. 425. Dr Robinson 
 is very positive on the subject. He 
 says again : " The existence of these 
 remains of the ancient bridge seem to 
 remove all doubt as to the identity of 
 this part of the enclosure of the mosk 
 with that of the ancient temple," p. 
 426. And again : " Here then we have 
 indisputable remains of Jewish anti- 
 quity, consisting of an important portion 
 of the western wall of the ancient 
 temple-area. They are probably to be 
 referred to a period long antecedent to 
 
 22 
 
 the days of Herod!" 427- Lower 
 down he refers them to Solomon or his 
 successors, p. 427. 
 
 6 p. 425. 7 p. 390. 
 
 8 Bib. Res. i. 460. See his Plan 
 from Mr Catherwood : according to 
 which, " The distance from the south- 
 east corner of the haram to the eastern 
 wall of El-Aksa is about 475 feet; 
 while from the same corner to the 
 western side of the vaults now open to 
 visitors is only about 320 feet." Ib. 
 p. 448.
 
 338 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART ii. 
 
 level with the present bed of the Tyropseon, on the east 
 side of the valley ; on the west side of which rises " the 
 precipitous natural rock of Zion," "from 20 to 30 feet 
 high," the present base of which stands on a steep ridge 
 of at least an equal height above the bed of the valley 1 . 
 This ridge is now covered with prickly pears, and appears 
 to be formed in great part from rubbish thrown down from 
 the height above. Now whether " Solomon and his suc- 
 cessors," or any others " at a period long antecedent to the 
 days of Herod," could have constructed such an arched 
 bridge as this must have been, which, springing from so 
 low a level on the east, would reach the very much supe- 
 rior elevation on the west I must leave it to architects or 
 antiquaries to determine ; I can only say, it must have been 
 very unlike any bridge I ever saw, and must have looked 
 exceedingly awkward ; and some architects, it seems, " do not 
 suppose arches were in use in the time of Solomon, however 
 far back the mere invention of the arch may go 2 ." 
 
 Can, then, any other account be given of these stu- 
 pendous stones ? and does their appearance agree in general 
 character with any described by ancient historians, or by 
 modern explorers ? Perhaps the answer will have suggested 
 itself already to the reader. The grand substructure already 
 described from Procopius may help us to solve the diffi- 
 culty. Dr Robinson himself is of opinion, that " the ranges 
 of vaults," commencing from the east, " extended not im- 
 
 1 I have really no wish to exagge- 
 rate ; but I feel confident that the top 
 of the perpendicular rock of Zion, 
 on the west, can be little short of 80 
 feet higher than the spring-course of 
 the arch on the east ! Mr Bartlett's 
 sketch opposite to p. 150 gives a very 
 good idea of their relative height, but 
 
 the section on that page makes the 
 bridge level, which would have landed 
 the passengers in the Tyropseon, at the 
 foot of the precipice ! ! How could an 
 artist fail to see this? 
 
 8 Catherwood, Bartlett's Walks, 
 p. 178.
 
 CH. H.J 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 339 
 
 probably quite to the western wall of the enclosure, where 
 are now said to be immense cisterns;" and I will not only 
 allow him this, but further take liberty to join another ar- 
 cade at the western extremity, in order to bring in that 
 arch the ruins of which he has so accurately measured, and 
 so ably described! And in this I shall be borne out by 
 Mr Catherwood and his brother architects, who assign them 
 all one date, and one general plan ; and in some measure 
 also by Mr Woolcott, who, in describing the colonnade under 
 El-Aksa, adopts language which would as well apply to the 
 fragment before us, had it been seen in a perfect state. " The 
 arches are of hewn stone, and are the noblest I have seen 
 in the country," and in the side walls were two stones " each 
 thirteen feet in length, and bevelled 3 ." He indeed concludes 
 that these foundations are Jewish, and Dr Robinson is of 
 opinion that the bevelled stones are a peculiarity of Hebrew 
 achitecture, but the architects saw no traces of Jewish ma- 
 sonry 4 here, and are agreed hi the fallacy of the last hypo- 
 thesis, which I should have thought that no intelligent traveller 
 could have long entertained 5 . 
 
 I think that a further objection to the Jewish origin 
 of these substructures will be found in the silence of the 
 Jewish historian. The stupendous works of Solomon which 
 he mentions were on the east side, where no vaults have 
 
 3 Bib. Res. Pt. i. pp. 19, 20. 1 have 
 not the slightest doubt that the uo-av- 
 Tes airras eirnTTa/nei/tos of Procopius 
 refers to this very bevelling. 
 
 4 Mr Bonomi writes, " These noble 
 substructions consist entirely of Roman 
 arches of large dimensions and admi- 
 rable workmanship, probably of the 
 age of Herod." Bib. Res. i. 447. 
 
 5 Bib. Res. i. pp. 423, 424. Mr 
 Catherwood says, " What proof of 
 
 antiquity is to be seen in this [i.e. 
 bevelled stones] I am at loss to con- 
 jecture," 178. It has been seen above 
 that he refers the passage to a Roman 
 origin, and the same date as the vaults, 
 the ruined arch, and the Golden Gate. 
 But even granting a Jewish origin to 
 the huge bevelled stones, why may 
 they not have been taken from the old 
 ruins to be used in later buildings ? 
 
 222
 
 340 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 been discovered indeed, his language seems to imply that 
 the space within the walls was filled up with earth 1 : and 
 since " no mention is made of Herod having had any- 
 thing to do with massive walls of the exterior enclosure 2 ," 
 and the works in question must be ascribed to the Roman 
 period, it is evident that they must be posterior to the 
 temple. And lastly, the very striking similarity, both in 
 conception and execution, between the large vaults in the 
 south-east angle of this enclosure and those immense cis- 
 terns which still exist at Constantinople, a fact which I 
 have not seen noticed, do seem to me an unanswerable 
 argument for the Byzantine origin of the former, and, with 
 all due deference to professional men, I venture to express 
 my conviction, that, independently of the surprising histori- 
 cal coincidence, there is no date to which their architecture 
 could be referred with greater probability than to that of 
 Justinian 3 . 
 
 One difficulty may occur to the minds of some readers, 
 which demands consideration ; it is this : What could in- 
 duce this emperor to hang his church and hospitals on the 
 hill-side, when the whole space of the temple-enclosure lay 
 unoccupied, close to the north of the appointed site? Now 
 if I could suggest no solution of this difficulty, I do not 
 think that it could be allowed to prevail against the clear 
 testimony of Procopius, that thus they were built; but I 
 
 1 Josephus, J. W. v. v. 1. 
 
 8 Bib. Res. p. 418. See again, pp. 
 427, 452. I am scarcely prepared 
 altogether to admit this either. Jo- 
 M-plius seems to say the contrary. 
 
 3 The cisterns at Constantinople 1 
 have seen and examined. The vaults 
 at Jerusalem I judge of by Mr Gather- 
 wood's sketch (Bartlett's Walks, p. 
 
 170.) I could fancy it a view in the 
 former were the columns round instead 
 of square. This difference may per- 
 haps be owing to old materials having 
 been found ready at hand at Jerusa- 
 lem, which would account for the 
 bevelling, even if it did indicate Jewish 
 masonry ; as it does not.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 341 
 
 trust I can offer an explanation which will be in great mea- 
 sure satisfactory. Let the denunciations of our Lord be 
 considered 4 ; let it be remembered that his words were 
 not yet fully accomplished in the view of the Christians of 
 those days, who were, as we shall presently see, looking 
 for their literal verification by the gradual operation of the 
 prophetic word. Was it likely that such an emperor as 
 Justinian would venture to interfere with 1 a site which would 
 be connected with such awful associations in his mind and 
 in the minds of his advisers ? Besides which, the attempt 
 of the apostate Julian to set up the ruins of former deso- 
 lations in the spot which they had before occupied, had 
 been so strangely visited 5 , that even if the predictions just 
 mentioned had not been sufficient to deter from such en- 
 croachment, this example might well have led to the idea 
 that the ground within the ancient enclosure was accursed. 
 
 It has been shown above that there is some reason 
 to believe that the temple-area did extend to the northern 
 limits of the haram will it be granted that there is at least 
 no irrefragable proof that it extended to the southern boun- 
 dary of the same ? that it is perhaps as possible that the 
 Talmud may be right, as that this last conjecture is well 
 grounded? as probable that an addition has been made at 
 the south as at the north? 
 
 Let us next cut off from the south, as before from the 
 north, such a space as will serve to square the width, as 
 already determined by the two valleys to the east and west, 
 and try the results. 
 
 The Golden Gate, which, according to the former theory, 
 fell without the square 6 , will now be found exactly in the 
 
 * See Matt. xxiv. 2 ; Luke xiii. 35 ; 
 xix. 44. 
 
 5 See above, Pt. i. chap. iii. 
 8 See above, p. 329.
 
 342 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 centre of the east side. That there was a gate to the east 
 we know, not indeed from Josephus, but from the rabbles ; 
 and its name we know. It is supposed to be called "the 
 King's Gate 1 ," in Holy Scripture, as the cloister in this 
 quarter was designated " Solomon's Porch 2 ," from being built 
 on the stupendous foundations laid by that monarch. 
 
 But the architecture is Roman, supposed by an artist 
 to be of the same date as the works which I have as- 
 cribed to Justinian 3 . I am in a fair way to be crushed 
 beneath the weight of my own argument. That its archi- 
 tecture is decidedly Roman, I cannot hesitate to admit. 
 But it is indisputably of the same period as the Roman 
 remains on the south. Let it be remembered that this 
 gateway is blocked up without, so that while its general 
 character is sufficiently distinct, its details are in great mea- 
 sure concealed. " Its exterior .... presents two archways 
 of Roman character, resting on capitals of the same work- 
 manship, filled up with Saracenic masonry, and presenting 
 a singular piece of patch-work." So that it is quite obvious 
 that we can but conjecture what it would be, "supposing 
 this masonry were removed 4 ." Under these circumstances 
 I hope it will not be very presumptuous to suggest whe- 
 ther it may not belong to an earlier date than those 
 other remains with which it has been associated, or whether 
 its general agreement with them will be valid to overthrow 
 the whole argument, which is not yet quite finished. I 
 shall advance another step when I have endeavoured to 
 ascertain the date of this gateway. It has been ascribed 
 
 1 1 Chron. ix. 18, and Lightfoot, 
 " Prospect of the Temple," cap. iii. 
 In later times it was called Shushan. 
 He thinks it was not in the middle, 
 but refers to no authority for its posi- 
 
 tion, nor am I aware that there is any. 
 
 8 Lightfoot, ubi sup. cap. viii. 
 
 8 See above, p. 319, note 8. 
 
 4 Catherwood, Walks, pp. 171, 172, 
 (with illustrations.)
 
 CH. H.J 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 343 
 
 by Dr Robinson to the Emperor Adrian, without any war- 
 rant, for Jt is not at all clear that he touched the outer 
 enclosure, nor is any authority whatever pretended for it 5 . 
 Mr Catherwood, as has been said, with much greater pro- 
 bability, supposes it to belong to the age of Herod 6 , but 
 I would suggest whether it may not date from a period 
 between the two, and have been constructed during the time 
 of Agrippa, in whose days these extensive works about the 
 temple were brought to a close, which had been rendered 
 necessary by damages done to the buildings, when we know 
 that the eastern cloisters materially suffered 7 , and which had 
 occupied above 18,000 men for some years. 
 
 If we now cross over to the western side of the en- 
 closure which we are examining, we are met with a singular 
 fact. It will be remembered that in ancient times there 
 were four entrances to the outer court from this quarter, 
 " one leading into the upper city, the valley between being 
 filled up for the passage, two into the suburbs, and one into 
 the other city 8 ." There are now four gates on this side 
 of the haram 9 . The southernmost of these is approached 
 by a causeway carried across the valley of the Tyropseon. 
 And I have no doubt whatever that this same causeway 
 is to be understood in those passages of Josephus where 
 "the bridge" is mentioned; and that having in that pas- 
 sage, already so frequently quoted, explained what kind 
 of bridge it was, he used the best word he could find to 
 describe it in other passages where he had occasion to speak 
 of it, rather than interrupt his narrative by a long peri- 
 
 4 Bib. Res. i. 437 and 477. 
 
 6 See above, p. 319. n. 8. 
 
 7 See Josephus, Ant. xvu. x. 2, 
 and Jewish War, 11. iii. 3; and com- 
 
 pare xx. ix. 7- 
 
 8 See above, p. 274. 
 
 9 Catherwood, Walks, p. 165. Ro- 
 binson, Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 421.
 
 344 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 phrasis, which this precaution had rendered unnecessary. 
 But it will be well to examine the passages more closely. 
 
 O v 
 
 The bridge is first mentioned in the account of Pompey's 
 operations at Jerusalem. Before that general entered the 
 city, Aristobulus and his party had " seized upon the temple, 
 and cut off the bridge which stretched from it to the city, 
 and prepared for a siege 1 ." The Romans were then forced 
 to proceed again regularly to the siege of the temple on 
 the north; "the part towards the city being rendered pre- 
 cipitous by the interruption of the bridge*." Notwithstand- 
 ing the ambiguity of the original, it seems to be fairly 
 deducible from this passage that the bridge was on the 
 west or city side; but this is all we gather from this context. 
 In the next passage its position is most clearly given in 
 describing the situation of Agrippa's Palace, called the House 
 of the Asmonaeans. " This house," he says, " was above 
 the xystus, at the extremity of the upper city, and a bridge 
 joined the temple to the xystus 3 ." Subsequently we learn 
 that it was at the southern part of the outer temple, where 
 was a gate opening on the bridge; and elsewhere the 
 xystus and the bridge and the tower of Simon are brought 
 together 4 . This tower of Simon was probably part of " the 
 
 1 Td iep&v KaTaXafjL^dvovffi, Kal Trjv 
 reivovarav air' OUTOW ye<pvpav eis TI\V 
 ir6\ii> fKKotyav ets tro\iopKtav ev-rpe- 
 Tri%6/jievoi. Ant. xiv. iv. I. Com- 
 pare B. J. 1. vii. eli TO Iep6i> dvexw- 
 pci Kai Trjv ffvvdirTOuaav aw' auTov 
 rtji/ ye<pvpai> diroKoi//ai;T6, K. T. \. 
 
 3 direppioyei ydp Kal -rd Trp&s TJJV 
 iroXii/, T) yf<pvpav dvaTeTpafi.ft.ei/rty 
 e<f>' ou Sifjye IIo/iMrtjios. Ant. ut sup. 
 The meaning of the last four words is 
 very obscure. Hudson's translation 
 has ' intcrrupto ponte qua partc dege- 
 
 bat Pompeius," which is not very in- 
 telligible; Whiston has "the bridge 
 on which Pompey had gotten was 
 broken down." Does he use "had" 
 for " would have" ? In any case it 
 does not give the sense of the original. 
 3 Bell. Jud. n. xvi. 3. "aifxtj 
 ydp ijv etrdvia TOU fcvffTov ir/ods T& 
 Trepav Tr/savta irdXeais, Kal ye<pvpa 
 Tta v<rTtj> Td lepov (ruv^iTTei/." The 
 xystus, as is plain from the context, 
 was a place for public assemblies. 
 
 * "IffTUTO KOTO TO TTjOOS OUOTIW fliepOt
 
 CH. II. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 345 
 
 house of the Asmonaeans," but whether or no, it is certain 
 that this last-named palace was above the xystus, at the 
 western extremity of the bridge that led to the temple from 
 the upper city. But the passage from the southern part 
 of the temple to the palace on Zion was formed by the 
 filling up of the valley*, or by the causeway, as it is called 
 in Scripture 6 , terminating in the gate Shallecheth, the gate 
 of the Embankment, according to Lightfoot 7 . Therefore the 
 bridge and the causeway are identical. Again, the north 
 wall of Zion, as it approached the temple, passed the xystus, 
 and was joined to the council-chamber 8 , so that it must have 
 run in the same line with the bridge, which also joined 
 the xystus. But it is surely very unlikely, to say the 
 least, that this old wall, besides making an angle, contrary 
 to the words of Josephus 9 , should be carried down a pre- 
 cipitous rock of 20 or 30 feet, as it must have been had 
 it crossed the valley near Dr Robinson's bridge, (where 
 the xystus must have stood, if his view be correct,) un- 
 less indeed it was carried over, or rather down the bridge, 
 which perhaps, as it was composed of such very large 
 stones, might have borne it; but then it would have been 
 
 TOV I^wOev lepov. Tai/Ty yap virep TOV 
 u<rroi rjcrav Trv\ai, Kai ye(pvpa trvv- 
 diTTOvara Tto iepto TTJJ> dvta Tro\iv." 
 B. J. VI. vi. 2. icaTot TOV u<7Toi> e 
 ov Kai TTJV ye<f>vpav Kai TOV Si/xwvos 
 irvpyov, K.T. \. ; ibid. viii. 1. 
 
 5 T/ <pdpayyo? els SioSov aTreiXtjju- 
 /ue'i/tjs." See above, p. 274. n. 1. 
 
 6 See 1 Kings x. 5, inbjj. Nehe- 
 miah iii. 31. 1^7%. 
 
 7 See above, p. 2J4, note 3, and 1 
 Chron. xxvi. 16. 
 
 8 See above, Pt. i. chap. iii. It 
 is perhaps worth remarking that the 
 Mekheme, or Cadi's Office, the modern 
 j8ou\jj or fiovXewriipiov of Jerusalem, 
 stands at the extremity of this cause- 
 way, nearest the haram. The site of 
 Antonia and of the palace of Herod 
 the garrison of the Roman legion left 
 there by Titus are now occupied by 
 the Turkish garrison. The coinci- 
 dences are singular. 
 
 9 SiaTeivov eiri TOV va"rov \ey6- 
 p.evov, eireiTO TTJ (3ov\y ffvvdiTTOv STTI 
 Ttjv ecrirepiov TOV lepov VTodv dirijp- 
 Ttei-o. De Bell. Jud. v. iv. 2.
 
 346 THE HOLY CITY. [ 
 
 PART H. 
 
 most manifestly inconvenient as well as very difficult to cut 
 off such a bridge; and the silence of Josephus would be 
 still more unaccountable, as the work must have been far 
 more worthy of our admiration than any which he has 
 mentioned. It is beyond belief that he should, neither in 
 his account of the first wall, nor in any mention of the 
 bridge (not even of its being cut off) relate the wonderful 
 fact of the wall being carried across it for 360 feet, or down 
 such a precipice, if such was really the case. 
 
 The old wall must have crossed the TyropSBon, even 
 according to Dr Kobinson's idea of the direction of the 
 latter 1 . What can be more likely than that it was carried 
 along the causeway? but how then could the passage be 
 cut off? Is it not conceivable that, with a view to the 
 fortification of the temple, the Jews might contrive to cut 
 a deep trench in the embankment, passable in peaceful 
 times by what would answer the purpose of a drawbridge 
 in modern warfare, or at least by some contrivance short 
 of Cyclopean architecture, and that the wall was carried 
 by a single arch over this chasm? This would reconcile 
 all the passages in which the bridge is mentioned, and satisfy 
 the strictest sense of the word in our language ; but I con- 
 sider it much more likely that there was no literal bridge 
 at all, but that the communication was " cut off " (e/c/co^ai/, 
 a7ro/co\|/ai/re9,) or interrupted (avareTpa/ji/uLevr}^), for the 
 occasion, by a detachment of Jewish engineers. 
 
 But now would this causeway have joined the temple- 
 enclosure at all, seeing we have contracted the latter towards 
 the south? Or shall we not be in the same predicament 
 with this gate Shallecheth, as with the Golden Gate ac- 
 
 1 It ran eastward along the northern I to the western side of the temple-area, 
 brow of Zion, and so across the valley ' Bib. Res. i. p. 439.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 347 
 
 cording to the other hypothesis? Not in any view. The 
 exact square would give us for the area 955 feet towards 
 the south, from the rocky angle at the north-west; the 
 latest plan 2 gives the distance from this point to the cause- 
 way as exactly 900 feet. But I can afford to be liberal, 
 and will therefore state that in Dr Robinson's Plan the 
 distance is very nearly 1000 feet. If the kind reader thinks 
 I have been too generous, and that my theory is in danger, 
 he may be quite comfortable. It is demonstrable that the 
 temple did extend further north and south than it did east 
 and west; unless Dr Robinson and all other writers are 
 mistaken, who reckon the rabbinical square within the por- 
 ticoes 3 . Let it be observed, that on the south of the temple- 
 area was the Royal Porch of Herod the Great. This dif- 
 fered from the other cloisters in this, that whereas they 
 were composed of a double piazza of 30 cubits width, this 
 was a treble colonnade, in which the side aisles were the 
 usual width of 15 cubits 4 each, while the centre had an 
 additional width of 421 cubits over and above the other 
 three sides. Taking then the cubit of Josephus, as I have 
 done throughout, at a foot and a half, we shall have 63J^ 
 feet to add to the south of the area, which will give us 
 1018^ feet, leaving 18 feet to the south of the causeway, 
 according to this most unfavourable calculation. 
 
 But if not for my own sake, yet for the poor Jews, I 
 would prefer to take the former statement, in order to bring 
 in their " Wailing-place," a little more to the south. Not but 
 that it is quite possible (considering how long they were pro- 
 
 8 Mr Bartlett's Walks, p. 55. Mr 
 Catherwood's Plan makes it about 950. 
 Considering his superior advantages it 
 would be perhaps safer always to fol- 
 low his measures about the haram. 
 
 8 Bib. Res. i. p. 430, 1. See above, 
 pp. 324-5. 
 
 4 Joseph. Ant. xv. iv. Light- 
 foot's Prospect of the Temple, cap.
 
 348 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 hibited access to the Holy City) that they may be mistaken 
 in ascribing to these stones, in their present situation, such 
 high antiquity ; but yet I think it is not improbable that 
 they do water with their tears the stones that formed the 
 south-west angle of their fathers' temple 1 . 
 
 I hope I do not forget that theorists are in great dan- 
 ger of being blinded to difficulties which are very obvious 
 to others, when I say that I am not aware of more than 
 one serious objection to this hypothesis. Lightfoot tells us, 
 from the rabbies, that the Holy House occupied the north- 
 ern part of the sacred enclosure 2 ; but admitting that it 
 occupied the site of the present mosk, and that the bounds 
 of the area have now been rightly determined, it must have 
 been much to the south. Now I will not seek to evade 
 the difficulty by moving the temple further north, because 
 I firmly believe that es-Sakhrah (the Rock) does mark 
 the site of the Most Holy Place, as Christians, Jews, and 
 Mahommedans, all agree. If the authority of this one rabbi 
 be so weighty (of which I am not competent to judge) as to 
 overbear all the arguments which have been here adduced, 
 I must give up the point ; and I shall do so with the greater 
 grief, because I cannot fall back on the old theory, since 
 the passage in question militates against that with equal 
 force; for not only does he say that " the greatest space 
 of the mount was on the south," but he adds, " the least 
 westward," while obviously, according to Dr Robinson, the 
 least would be on the north, if the other story of tlie square 
 be at all correct. 
 
 1 It is difficult to state the exact 
 distance of these stones from the north 
 or south extremity. But Dr Robinson, 
 in the two passages where he mentions 
 them, says only that they are "con- 
 
 siderably south of the middle" of the 
 area on the west. Bib. Res. i. pp. 350, 
 425. They are just south of the cause- 
 way, below, in the valley. 
 
 3 Prospect of the Temple, cap. iii.
 
 CH. II.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 349 
 
 I will venture then to suggest a solution with much de- 
 ference. The rahbies all with one voice place Zion north 
 of the temple, at least so says Lightfoot, who has suffered 
 himself to be misled by them 3 . If all err on a point of 
 such importance in the topography of the Holy City, it is 
 possible that one may be inaccurate on another. Perhaps 
 even the mistaken position of the Holy House was grounded 
 on the truth that it stood nearest to Mount Zion, and pro- 
 ceeded on the error that Zion lay to the north. If this be 
 anything more than fancy, the correction of the first error 
 would turn all in my favour. Thus, the Holy House lay 
 more towards Zion, but Zion was to the south, therefore the 
 Holy House lay more to the south ; and that it was so situ- 
 ated, would seem very likely from a passage in Josephus, 
 where he says, that in the course of enlarging the temple- 
 area they moved back the wall on the north*, which would 
 of course add to the space in that quarter ; while the very 
 nature of the ground would confirm this view, since it would 
 be much more simple to extend the area northward, where it 
 was comparatively plane, than southward, where was a deep 
 declivity. 
 
 It may be some recommendation to the view here given, 
 and be thought to entitle it to some consideration, if I state 
 that after revolving the subject in my mind at intervals 
 for nearly three years, with such advantages as an exact 
 knowledge of the localities could not fail to afford, I have 
 been able to reconcile the various facts of history and to- 
 pography only by this theory : but I had no idea of the 
 strength of the argument until I came to test it in this 
 chapter. To myself it appears so convincing, that I marvel 
 
 3 Prospect of the Temple, cap. v. et 
 alibi passim. 
 
 res oe <col TO icoadK- 
 
 TIOV -relxps, TOOTOVTOV 
 
 ocrov u<rrepov etrel^ev o TOV traitTo? 
 
 Itpou TrepifioXos. Bell. Jud. V. v. 1.
 
 350 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART ii. 
 
 that it was not obvious at once ; but the statement of Mr 
 Catherwood, and the perusal of the chapter in Procopius, were 
 the two keys which opened to me the whole subject. 
 
 I proceed now to the Antonia. To collect the scattered 
 notices of Josephus may serve a good purpose, and assist 
 future travellers in their investigations of this interesting 
 subject. 
 
 This historian does not mention the original builder of 
 this tower, but refers it generally to the Asmonean princes. 
 Its original name was Saris 1 ; until Herod, having greatly 
 enlarged and beautified it, changed its name to Antonia, in 
 honour of his friend Mark Antony 2 . It combined the strength 
 of a castle 3 with the magnificence of a palace, and was like 
 a city in extent; comprehending within its walls not only 
 spacious apartments, but courts, and even camping grounds 
 for soldiers. It was situated on an elevated rock, to the 
 north of the temple-enclosure, or more strictly to the north- 
 west, with four towers at its angles, of which that to the 
 south-east was the highest, and commanded a view of the 
 whole temple. It communicated with the northern and 
 western cloisters of the temple, at the angle of the area, 
 by flights of steps for the convenience of the garrison 4 ; 
 being the fortress of the temple, as the temple was of the 
 
 1 Of this name Prideaux says, " It 
 was called Boris, from Birah, which 
 word among the eastern nations signi- 
 fies a palace or royal city ; and in this 
 sense it is often used in those scrip- 
 tures of the Old Testament which were 
 written after the Babylonish captivity, 
 as in Daniel, Ezra, Chronicles, Nehe- 
 miah, and Esther, which shews it to 
 have been borrowed from the Chal- 
 dxans, and from them brought into 
 the Hebrew language." ubi sup. 
 
 3 Ant. xv. xi. 3. Bell. Jud. r. iii. 
 
 3 ; v. 4 ; V. v. 8. Prideaux (in arm. 
 107) after Lightfoot, and both pro- 
 fessing to follow Josephus, ascribe it 
 to Hyrcanus, the son of Simon ; but I 
 cannot find any warrant for this. 
 Lightfoot's reference, copied by Pri- 
 deaux, is wrong, as usual. 
 
 8 It is commonly called <ppoupiov 
 in Josephus, but elsewhere otK/ooVoXis, 
 Ant. xv. xi. 4 : in Holy Scripture, TTO- 
 pe/K/3o\tj. Acts xxi. 34, 37 ; xxii. 24. 
 
 * Ka-ra/Sa'o-ets in Josephus. dva- 
 i, Acts xxi. 35, 40. It was by
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 351 
 
 city. It was defended towards Bezetha by a deep trench, 
 so as to prevent its foundations from being assailed in that 
 quarter. The temple-enclosure, which was of itself 4 stadia 
 in circuit, was 6 stadia including Antonia 5 . Thus much we 
 have by way of description. From incidental allusions we 
 gather a few more particulars, which it will be useful at 
 least to note 6 . Titus had hoped that if he made himself 
 master of this commanding post, he should gam the temple 
 without more fighting ; and when he had carried it, some of 
 his soldiers did actually chase the Jews into the enclosure 
 of the temple 7 . Yet for all this he had still to make regular 
 advances against the outer enclosure 8 . When in occupa- 
 tion of Antonia, and during the time that these operations 
 were going forward, he would watch then* proceedings from 
 the tower 9 . 
 
 Now to endeavour to get some light from these vari- 
 ous hints. I presume, first of all, that Baris or Antonia 
 occupied a position near to the site of that tower which 
 Antiochus Epiphanes built in Jerusalem, overhanging and 
 commanding the temple 10 , and that the Baris or Antonia of 
 the Jewish War is equivalent to the Acra of the Antiqui- 
 ties and of the Maccabees, by which name that tower built 
 by Antiochus is always designated 11 ; and that it was this 
 fortress which gave its name to the hill on which it stood, 
 and to that part of the city which surrounded it on three 
 sides 12 . It is no valid objection to this hypothesis that the 
 
 these stairs that the chief captain had 
 descended to the court of the temple, 
 to rescue St Paul, verse 32. 
 
 5 Compare Ant. xv. xi. 3, with 
 Bell. Jud. v. v. 2. 
 
 6 Bell. Jud. v. vi. 2 ; vi. i. 5. 
 
 7 vi. i. 7, 8. 
 
 9 vi. ii. 5; iii. 1. 
 
 10 Joseph. Ant. xn. vii. 
 
 11 I think this word dupa. must 
 occur fifty times in the book of Mac- 
 cabees, always applied to this tower. 
 
 18 I am glad to find that Reland is 
 of this opinion also. Sub voce Jeru- 
 
 ii. 7. i salem.
 
 352 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART ir. 
 
 tower is said, in the book of Maccabees, to have stood in 
 the city of David ' ; for it is very uncertain what part of 
 the city is to be understood by that term in the book of 
 Maccabees, while it is manifest that the temple-mount is 
 perpetually called "Mount Zion 2 ;" and this tower is expressly 
 said to have stood on the " hill of the temple*" Besides, 
 Josephus, whose language is probably more accurate, dis- 
 tinctly says that this tower was in the lower city, on a 
 high place which overlooked the temple 4 ; nor can any other 
 position so well reconcile all we read concerning the an- 
 noyance occasioned to the Jews by the occupation of this 
 tower by a Macedonian garrison 5 . 
 
 But it may be objected that this tower was demolished 
 by Simon, and the very hill on which it stood was levelled 6 . 
 So Josephus says, but the author of the book of Macca- 
 bees gives an entirely different account. According to this 
 earh'er writer, Simon was so far from destroying the tower, 
 that after he had taken it by blockade, and entered it in 
 triumph, and purified it of its pollutions, " he made it 
 stronger than it was, and there he dwelt himself with his 
 
 1 1 Mace. i. 33; ii. 31 ; xiv. 36. 
 
 * 1 Mace. iv. 37, 60 ; v. 54 ; vi. 48, 
 61. Dr Robinson has erred from not 
 remarking this, and supposes that the 
 book of Maccabees places their fortress 
 on Zion, which it does not 
 
 8 xiii. 52. 
 
 4 Ant. XII. v. 4. TJI/ iv rfj Karw 
 iroXei opKoSofiritrev dxpav. tji/ yap u\]/n- 
 Xrj Kai \nrepKfifievn TO lepdv, K. T. X. 
 
 6 e. g. " It was a place to lie in wait 
 against the sanctuary." 1 Mace. i. 36. 
 Judas while purging the sanctuary was 
 obliged to detach a party to keep them 
 in check, iv. 41. See again, vi. 18, 
 and xiv. 30. 
 
 6 This passage, which is entirely 
 mistranslated by the very inaccurate 
 Whiston, runs thus in the original : 
 e(ciroXtojOKj<ras i xal riii>...aKpav, eis 
 
 t()f/)os auTrfi/ /coOeiXev (cal TOVTO 
 
 Troti/ffas, dpitrTov eSoKei Kai cvft<pepov 
 cleat, (cat TO opo's e<p' 10 Tr\v axpav 
 elvai avveftaive, <ca0eXeti>, cJira> tn//j- 
 
 XoTepov jj T() iep6v (cat Tra'i/res 
 
 irpo<Tf$a\6vTes KaOtjpovv T& opoy 
 
 K<ii Ka-ri'iyayov eis e6a<pos KOI Tre&iviiv 
 XeioTrjTa. cai TO XOITTOI/ ^ei^ev 
 dtrdvTwv (al. a-jrav) T& it/xli', T>} oV/oas 
 (fat TOW opovs e(f>' (Z ijv dvi]priu.eviov. 
 Ant. xiii. vi. 6.
 
 CH. II. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 353 
 
 company 7 ." I do not think that these two accounts are 
 irreconcileable. It appears very likely that the scarping of 
 the rock at the north-west of the haram, and the cutting 
 it perpendicular at that angle to the depth of 20 feet, 
 is to be referred to this time 8 ; so that the rock in ques- 
 tion, which rose perhaps higher than its present level in 
 the direction of the temple, was much reduced ; for the 
 labour of so many willing workmen, engaged incessantly 
 night and day for three years and a half, must have ac- 
 complished a work of considerable magnitude. Probably 
 some buildings on the northern quarter of the tower were 
 left standing, or if not, a fortress was soon erected there 
 in which Simon dwelt, and which was afterwards occupied 
 by Aristobulus 9 , and used as a state prison by Alexandra 10 . 
 It served now as a garrison for the Jewish troops, yet 
 was so contrived as to be a defence to them in time of 
 war, by cutting off the communication with the temple. Two 
 flights of steps led down from the height of the precipice 
 to the cloisters below ; by destroying that part of the 
 cloisters connected with the stair-case the approach was cut 
 off. And this was done on two occasions : first, when 
 Florus was intending to possess himself of the temple 
 through Antonia, the Jews, we read, immediately got upon 
 those cloisters of the temple that joined to Antonia, and 
 
 7 1 Mace. xiii. 52. Compare xiv. 
 37. " He placed Jews therein, and 
 fortified it for the safety of the country 
 and of the city." Josephus, Ant. xiii. 
 vi.7. 
 
 8 Josephus says of Antonia, " Se- 
 SO/J.IJTO 6' inrep ireTpa-: irevrriKoirraTrii- 
 ^ous fjiev \i\ffo^ -irfpiKpqvov oe iracrtjs." 
 J. W. v. v. 8. I think Prideaux must 
 be right, when he says : " These 50 
 
 23 
 
 cubits are not to be understood of the 
 side next the temple, but of the other 
 sides off from it, upon the brow of the 
 mountain, on which the temple stood, 
 where this rock, from the valley beneath 
 up to the top whereon the castle was 
 built, was 50 cubits high." Connex. 
 (ann. 107, note.) 
 
 9 Joseph. J. W. i. iii. 3. 
 
 10 Ibid. v. 4.
 
 354 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 cut them down; and as soon as the cloisters were broken 
 down he gave up the attempt. The second occasion was 
 that already referred to. Titus did not reckon upon such 
 an obstinate defence of the Jews, and did not expect that 
 they would have recourse to such expedients as burning 
 their temple. When he took Antonia, the Romans pursued 
 the Jews down the steps by which they had retreated to 
 the temple, and the battle was continued there for several 
 successive days 1 , until the Jews, with desperate resolution, 
 "set fire to the north-west cloister which was joined to 
 the tower of Antonia, and afterwards broke off 20 cubits 
 more of that cloister 2 , nor ceased from the work of de- 
 molition until the tower was parted from the temple. When 
 this was done, nothing remained but to form an inclined 
 plane down the precipice by overthrowing the massive 
 foundations of the tower, while the works were pressed 
 forward on other quarters of the outer area 3 . 
 
 It would seem probable that a greater part of the for- 
 tress was attached to the northern than to the western side 
 of the area, not only from the present appearance of the 
 rock which extends, I believe, much further on the north 
 than on the west side of the angle, but also from the lan- 
 guage of Josephus, who generally speaks of its situation as 
 at the north 4 , although in some passages he is more definite 5 . 
 I imagine then that the Antonia extended about as far east 
 as the present seraglio, about 400 feet further west than the 
 western boundary of the haram, and covered a hill which 
 rises in this quarter, and is probably part of the same rock 6 ; 
 
 1 See J. W. vi. i. 7, 8. 
 8 Ibid. vi. ii. 9. 
 
 3 See above, Part i. cap. ii. 
 
 4 Ant. xv. xi. 4: KUTO T^V fio- 
 peiov ir\evpdv, J. W. I. xxi. 1 : TO 
 lepov Kal TO ftopeiov eir' avroo rppovpiov. 
 
 s KOTO ytoviav fiev Svo trrowv etceiro 
 rd TOV irptoTov lepov, TO Te irpoy 
 ecnrepav, Kal TO TTp6<i apKTOv. J. W. 
 v. v. 8. 
 
 6 If instead of following the Via 
 Dolorosa at this point, the traveller
 
 CH 
 
 . II.] THE HOLY CITY. 355 
 
 while northward it crossed the present Via Dolorosa, em- 
 bracing the "Arch of the Ecce Homo," and the " Church 
 of the Flagellation," and probably reached even so far as 
 the " Palace of Herod ; " and it is an interesting fact that, 
 without any thought whatever of these traditionary sites in 
 laying out my plan, having regard simply and solely to the 
 language of the Jewish historian, I was absolutely compelled 
 to include them. With regard to the fosse, I fear that can- 
 not be discovered ; but more will be said of this when I 
 come to speak of the waters of Jerusalem. 
 
 I shall have done with Antonia when I have merely 
 noticed one remark of Josephus, which is to me wholly 
 unintelligible on every hypothesis, but which I dare say 
 has some satisfactory meaning. In speaking of the prodi- 
 gies which preceded the destruction of Jerusalem, he men- 
 tions that the " Jews, by demolishing the tower of Antonia, 
 had made their temple four-square ; while they had it written 
 in their sacred oracles, that then should their city be taken, 
 as well as their holy house, when once their temple should 
 become four-square 7 ." To what oracle or to what act of 
 the Jews this most perplexing observation relates I am en- 
 tirely at a loss to imagine ; for we read nothing of their 
 demolishing the tower of Antonia during the siege, nor 
 can I comprehend how this could have made the temple 
 four-square. One remark suggests itself, which may serve 
 as a solution, unless some future writer should be more suc- 
 cessful in finding a satisfactory explanation for this myste- 
 rious passage. 
 
 This remark is introduced by the historian after the 
 description of the burning of the cloisters connected with 
 
 coming from the west takes a small 
 street which continues in the same line 
 towards the area of the mosk, he rises 
 
 by a very steep ascent to the hill 
 mentioned in the text. 
 
 7 Ibid. vi. v. 4. 
 
 232
 
 356 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 the Antonia, which however did not completely break off the 
 fortress from the temple; the Jews still continued for some 
 longer time the work of burning and demolition, until this 
 was effected. From this it would appear that it was a work 
 of difficulty to disconnect the two, which it would have been 
 if part of the fortress was built into the temple-square at 
 the angle where they were joined. The stairs descending into 
 the cloisters must necessarily have been projected into the 
 enclosure, and possibly guard-rooms and other chambers for 
 the troops. If this were so, the destruction of that portion 
 of the castle would have the effect described by Josephus of 
 making the area a complete square, which had been before 
 interrupted by this projection ; and this is the only possible 
 method which I can imagine for the elucidation of his lan- 
 guage, which does appear to me to be in general most 
 remarkably accurate. 
 
 And this will, I think, be further seen, if before taking 
 leave of the subject which has been discussed in this chap- 
 ter, we consider another expression which has sometimes 
 been much misunderstood. After his account of the western 
 gates of the temple-enclosure, with which the reader will 
 be by this time familiar, he remarks "that the city lay 
 over against the temple in the manner of a theatre 1 ." 
 Now if we suppose that he spoke of the general appear- 
 ance of the city and temple as they existed in his time 
 rather than in Herod's, no comparison could possibly be 
 more happy, as a glance at the plan will shew. Let the 
 form of an ancient theatre be remembered, let the temple- 
 area be regarded as the stage the city surrounding it on 
 three sides as the tiers of seats for spectators, sloping down 
 from all quarters (except the south) in the direction of 
 
 1 dvriKpv ydp rj irdXis fKei-ro TOV lepou OeaTpoetSrjs oucra. Ant. XV. xi. 5.
 
 CH. II. J THE HOLY CITY. 357 
 
 the temple. Bezetha on the north Acra on the north- 
 west then the eastern declivity of the Tyropseon to the 
 west separating between Acra and the upper city or 
 Zion on the south-west, and the space filled up by the 
 ridge of Ophel to the south. The exactness of the language 
 in this as in other passages is to me perfectly astonish- 
 ing, and I do think that this author, to whom the Christian 
 church is perhaps more largely indebted than to any un- 
 believing historian, has not been appreciated as he deserves ; 
 I am convinced that, in almost every case where he has 
 been charged with mis-statement, our ignorance rather than 
 ,his knowledge is in fault. With fair allowance for ori- 
 ental hyperbole in his descriptive accounts of works of art 
 rather than of nature, he is, as far as my experience goes, 
 a most invaluable guide. 
 
 Before concluding this chapter I would remark on an 
 objection which some devout minds may possibly feel to a 
 theory which would go to prove that any part of the ancient 
 temple can still be identified. Such an hypothesis may be 
 thought to interfere with the predictions of our blessed 
 Lord, which have been already referred to, and therefore 
 the objection deserves, as do all objections prompted by 
 reverence, the most tender consideration ; and I would hope 
 that the following beautiful passage from Eusebius on this 
 very subject, will serve to allay any undue apprehensions, 
 and to set the matter in its true light. 
 
 Having discoursed on the words " Behold, your house is 
 left unto you desolate 8 ," on which he remarks that " it is 
 right that we should wonder at the fulfilment of this pre- 
 diction, since at no time did this place undergo such an 
 entire desolation " as shortly followed this denunciation ; 
 
 * Luke xiii. 35.
 
 358 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 and that "to those who visit these places the sight itself 
 affords the most complete fulfilment of the predictions ; " he 
 thus proceeds to notice another prophecy of our Lord : 
 "Walking by the side of the temple, and his disciples 
 pointing out to him the greatness and beauty of the same, 
 He answered and said, 'Behold, see ye not all these things? 
 I say unto you, stone shall not be left here upon stone 
 which shall not be thrown down 1 .' The Scriptures do more- 
 over shew that the whole building and the extreme orna- 
 menting of the temple were indeed thus worthy of being 
 considered miraculous; and for proof of this there are 
 preserved to this time some remaining vestiges of these 
 its ancient decorations. But of these ancient things the 
 greatest miracle of all is the divine word, declaring the 
 foreknowledge of our Saviour, which fully announced to 
 those who were wondering at the buildings the judgment 
 that ' there should not be left, ' in the place at which 
 they were wondering, ' one stone upon another which should 
 not be rased.' For it was right that this place should 
 undergo an entire destruction and desolation, on account 
 of the audacity of the inhabitants ; because it was the resi- 
 dence of impious men. And just as the prediction was 
 are the results in fact remaining : the whole temple and 
 its walls, as well as those ornamented and beautiful build- 
 ings which were within it, and which exceeded all description, 
 having suffered desolation from that time to this! With 
 time too this increases; and so has the power of the word 
 gone on destroying, that in many places no vestige of their 
 foundations is now visible! which any one who desires it 
 may see with his own eyes. And should any one say that 
 a few of the places are still existing, we may nevertheless 
 
 1 Matth. xxiv. 2.
 
 CH 
 
 ..] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 359 
 
 justly expect the destruction of these also, as their ruin is 
 daily increasing; the prophetic word daily operating by a 
 power which is unknown. I know too (for I have heard it 
 from persons who interpret the passage differently) that this 
 was not said on all the buildings, but only on that place 
 which the disciples, when expressing their wonder upon it, 
 pointed out to him : for it was upon this that He spoke the 
 prophetic word 2 ." Thus far Eusebius. For myself I look for 
 the accomplishment of the prophecy in its widest and most 
 literal sense ; and expect that if there be still one stone left 
 upon another, which at least is not certain, the mighty 
 though silent operation of that wonder-working word will in 
 due time bring it down : and who can tell whether, before 
 the time of the end, some second Julian may not renew the 
 attempt to rebuild the Jewish temple, which antichrist alone 
 shall rear 3 , and whether this attempt may not result in the 
 destruction of such portions of it as remain ? 
 
 2 Theoph. B. iv. c. 18. Lee's Trans. 
 
 3 St Cyril foretold the defeat of 
 
 Julian's attempt, from his interpre- 
 tation of 2 Thess. ii. 4. 
 
 The Golden Gat?
 
 ADDITIONAL NOTE ON THE TEMPLE-AREA. 
 
 I HAVE followed Dr Robinson's measurements, as far as possible, 
 throughout the foregoing chapter, both because he appears to have 
 taken much pains with them, and because it was chiefly his theory 
 with which I had to deal, and it therefore seemed right to take 
 him on his own ground. But that writer has been called upon, 
 among other corrections of greater consequence, to alter his mea- 
 surements of the south wall of the haram. This he has done in a 
 magazine of which he is the editor 1 ; but as the Biblical Researches 
 are in the hands of many who may probably never see the Ame- 
 rican periodical, it would have been obviously inconvenient to adopt 
 its corrections throughout the discussion: and they are noticed here 
 rather to prevent cavil, than for their intrinsic value. 
 
 It appears that "the original pencil notes of the author" of the 
 Biblical Researches make the distance from the south-east angle of 
 the haram to the right angle formed by the junction of the city 
 wall with that of the haram on the south side, "570 feet instead 
 of 630 feet, as stated in the Researches ; " and that " Messrs. Wool- 
 cott and Tipping found it, on careful measurement, to be 550 feet; 
 and further, by like measurement both within and without the city, 
 they ascertained that the whole length of the southern wall of the 
 haram, as nearly as it can be measured, is 915 feet, instead of 955 
 feet, as given by Professor Robinson, making a difference of 40 feet. 
 
 The consequences of these corrections supposing them so indeed 
 will be, first, that the rabbinical specification, as above given, will 
 exceed this measurement by 50 feet instead of 10 only; and next, 
 that the double gateway will have 650 feet of the wall to the east 
 instead of 630, and 365 feet to the west, instead of 325, as by the 
 former calculation. But even thus it will not answer to the ac- 
 count given by Josephus of the gate to the south of the outer 
 temple, that was in the middle, and this will still have 185 feet more 
 on one side than on the other: while the former variation will tend 
 further to prove, what I have endeavoured to establish, that the 
 temple-area could not have extended so far in this direction, the 
 breadth here being too contracted to agree with the rabbinical com- 
 
 1 See Bibliotheca Sacra, Part i. p. 23, and compare Bib. Res. i. 395.
 
 CH. II.] THE HOLY CITY. 361 
 
 putation as determined by the opposite valleys (which, it will be ob- 
 served, converge rapidly as they approach the south) and must there- 
 fore be measured more towards the north, where the valleys are further 
 apart, or even along the northern wall of the present haram, where "the 
 breadth is some yards greater than on the south 2 ." 
 
 Thus then if these corrections in any way affect the hypothesis 
 of the preceding chapter, they will only tend to confirm it ; how 
 they "will help Dr Robinson's argument," as Mr Woolcott has re- 
 marked, I am at a loss to conjecture. 
 
 When I suggested above a reason for supposing that the site of 
 Solomon's temple had been neglected by the Christians prior to the 
 Saracenic conquest, I was not aware that the uniform testimony 
 of all writers, Christian and infidel, might be quoted for the fact, 
 and that one of the former had stated the very same reasons. Not only 
 have we no mention of any Christian church having occupied the 
 site of Solomon's temple, (which might itself be considered decisive 
 evidence against it, considering how distinct are the notices of the 
 churches of Jerusalem during the Christian period,) but all authors 
 agree in declaring that on the capture of the sacred city by the 
 khalif Omar, the sacred rock was covered with filth, which he him- 
 self began to clear away 3 . But the language of Eutychius, patriarch 
 of Alexandria, concerning the cause of this neglect, is very remarkable. 
 He says 4 , " When the Greeks embraced the Christian faith, Helena the 
 mother of Constantino built churches at Jerusalem. But the Sakhrah 
 and the parts about it were then covered with ruins, and were so 
 left. Indeed they had cast earth on the rock, so that it became a 
 large dunghill, and was altogether neglected by the Greeks, who did 
 not reverence it as the Jews had done. Neither did they build any 
 church upon it ; because our Lord Christ had said in the Holy Gospel, 
 ' Behold, your house shall be left unto you desolate ;' and again, ' There 
 
 2 Bib. Res. i. 419. Mr Catherwood 
 
 3 See above, Part i. cap. 4, Cap- 
 
 gives the southern wall 940 feet, and tore of Jerusalem by Omar, and for 
 
 the northern 1020 feet. Bartlett's | a collection of the Mahometan tra- 
 
 Walks, p. 174. He probably measured i ditions, see History of the Temple at 
 
 within the court. If so, his number Jerusalem, pp. 175, &c., also Elma- 
 
 at the south would so nearly agree cinus, Hist. Sarac. p. 28, Lugd. Bat. 
 
 with Dr Robinson's, allowing ten feet j 1625. William of Tyre, Hist. i. ii. 
 
 for the walls, that I could hardly doubt 
 the accuracy of the professor, not- 
 withstanding the joint testimony of 
 Messrs. Woolcott and Tipping. 
 
 p. 630. 
 
 4 Eutychii Annales, Arab, and Lat. 
 Oxford, 1658, 4to. Vol. n. pp. 286, 
 289.
 
 362 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 shall not be left one stone upon another which shall not be cast down 
 and laid waste.' On this account the Christians had left it in ruins, 
 and had built no church upon it." 
 
 This direct testimony in confirmation of the antecedent probability, 
 will, I trust, serve to corroborate the view above given, viz. that the 
 church and hospitals of Justinian were built entirely without the en- 
 closure of the ancient temple, and consequently that the present boundary 
 of the haram to the north must be identical with that of the temple- 
 area in this quarter. And it is surely a strange and improbable hy- 
 pothesis of Dr Robinson, which should have been noticed before, that 
 in the enclosure, as restored by Adrian, "the former area of the 
 fortress Antonia might have been included quite to the deep fosse, as 
 it exists at present ; while perhaps a portion of the southern part of 
 the ancient area was left out 1 "; for there is no historical evidence 
 whatever for the restoration of the outer walls of the area at that time ; 
 and if there had been, we might still have required some probable 
 reasons to explain this new arrangement. But the premises have 
 been fully considered already, and shewn to be untenable; and the 
 position of the Golden Gate, which seems to have given rise to the 
 conjecture, has been also explained. 
 
 1 Bib. Res. i. 438; compare p. 440, and n. I.
 
 The Cave of St. James. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 ANTIQUITIES WITHOUT THE CITY. 
 
 THE object proposed in the present chapter is an eluci- 
 dation of some antiquities chiefly without the walls of Jerusa- 
 lem; for which object I shall beg the reader to accompany 
 me first to the mount of Olives, and then descending again 
 into the Valley of Jehoshaphat, to make the circuit of the 
 city, following as nearly as possible the course of Titus' wall 
 of circumvallation, and pausing at such objects of interest as 
 occur in the way. 
 
 Leaving the tower of Antonia, which was examined in 
 the last chapter, and passing for the present without notice 
 the large reservoir under the northern wall of the haram,
 
 364 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 commonly known as the pool of Bethesda a tradition which 
 must be reserved for after consideration we quit the city 
 by the gate of " our Lady Mary", (Bab Sitty Miriam) as the 
 natives term it, more commonly known to the Franks as 
 the St Stephen's Gate. 
 
 It is an unhappy circumstance that the site of the proto- 
 martyr's suffering was found for many years without the 
 Damascus Gate, because, but for this fact there would be 
 little difficulty in fixing it to the neighbourhood of this, which 
 now bears his name : since it is obviously more probable 
 that in a popular tumult he would be thrust out at the near- 
 est gate, and not conducted through a great part of the city. 
 The accusation and apology took place in the temple ; the 
 martyr was no doubt hurried through the eastern gate, and 
 forthwith stoned. But it is utterly impossible to evade the 
 fact of a change in the tradition, as Quaresmius has attempted 
 to do 1 : and what is more provoking is that the empress 
 Eudoxia had erected a large church to the memory of this 
 saint, at the supposed place of his martyrdom, without the 
 Damascus Gate, as early as the fifth century, which was 
 standing when the crusaders beleaguered the city at the close 
 of the eleventh century. 
 
 Descending now into the Valley of Jehoshaphat by a 
 zig-zag path of steps down the steep declivity, the dry bed 
 of the torrent Kedron is passed by a bridge of one arch, 
 a few paces beyond which is the chapel of St Mary on the 
 left, and the garden of Gethsemane on the right 2 , between 
 
 1 See Dr Robinson's Biblical Res. 
 i. pp. 475, 6. 
 
 8 The reader will, I trust, excuse my 
 saying anything on the subject of this 
 garden in such a work as the present. 
 One who has felt some lines in the 
 
 " Christian Year" (3rd Sunday in 
 Advent and Monday before Easter) 
 on the very spot, will be pardoned for 
 considering it too solemn a subject for 
 scepticism or controversy. Should it be 
 felt that the same remark would apply
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 365 
 
 which the most direct path ascends to the church of the 
 Ascension which crowns the centre of the three summits of 
 the mount Olivet, 2400 feet above the level of the Medi- 
 terranean sea. 
 
 The tradition which marks this as the scene of the last 
 act of our Saviour's earthly ministry, has lately sustained a 
 severe attack, and has been defended with great ability. I 
 will endeavour to exhibit impartially the present state of the 
 question, and will subjoin one or two remarks which may 
 perhaps assist to its further elucidation. 
 
 It has been urged then, with much vehemence, that what- 
 ever may become of other traditions relating to the sacred 
 events transacted in and about Jerusalem, this tradition at 
 least " is unquestionably false ; since it is contradicted by the 
 express declaration of Scripture 3 ," which states that "Jesus 
 led out his disciples as far as to Bethany, and blessed them, 
 and while he blessed them, he was parted from them and 
 carried up into heaven 4 :" whereas the summit of mount Olivet 
 is scarcely half-way between Jerusalem and Bethany. 
 
 To this it is replied 5 , that St Luke elsewhere, in the 
 
 almost with equal force to other lo- 
 calities, my only defence is that the 
 vindication of the ancient church seems 
 to require that some notice should be 
 taken of the objections which have 
 been raised to her most venerable tra- 
 
 parently without any thought of this 
 have remarked on "the dispropor- 
 tionate hugeness of their venerable 
 trunks to the thin foliage above." Bart- 
 lett's Walks, p. 105. 
 
 3 Bib. Res. i. 375 ; n. 77. 
 
 ditions. It may however be allowed j 4 Luke xxiv. 50, 51. 
 
 to notice one argument against the an- j 5 Essay on Miracles (prefixed to 
 
 tiquity claimed for the olive-trees in Vol. i. of Mr Newman's translation of 
 
 the garden. It is urged that Titus cut Fleury's Ecclesiastical History), p. 
 
 down all the trees about Jerusalem. ; clvii. note g. and an additional note 
 
 Josephus does not say so. The trees j at the end. On the argument of this 
 
 to the north of the city were cut down, 
 ( J. W. v. iii. 2), the others only strip- 
 ped of their branches, (ibid. vi. viii. 
 1.) It is singular that travellers ap- 
 
 last, however, and the reply to it, it 
 does not seem necessary to remark, 
 for reasons which will appear in the 
 sequel.
 
 366 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 Acts of the Apostles, after recording the ascension, declares 
 that the disciples returned from mount Olivet, " which 
 is from Jerusalem a sabbath-day's journey 1 :" that a tra- 
 dition cannot be said to contradict Scripture, "which does 
 but take one text instead of another," and contradict a point 
 of Jewish antiquities, viz. the length of a sabbatical journey : 
 that if the church of the Ascension falls short of the dis- 
 tance specified, the village of Bethany exceeds it, according 
 to the most probable computations : that the theory of 
 Bethany being the name not only of the village, but of a 
 district which extended over a portion of Olivet, reconciles 
 the two texts : whereas to deny that our Lord ascended 
 from Olivet is to run counter to the obvious meaning of one 
 of them : and that this theory has the authority of Lightfoot 
 and many others. 
 
 The main answer accorded to these arguments is 2 , that 
 " all this exhibits the skilful controversialist, rather than the 
 experienced and candid interpreter of Scripture," and " seems 
 to be little more than a mistaken endeavour to bend the 
 truth of the gospel for the support of a legend of the church," 
 and the site is declared, with greater assurance than before, 
 to be "unquestionably, prima facie, wrong," and "in contra- 
 diction to the express statement of Scripture," and " the 
 testimony of Scripture is conclusive that tradition in this 
 case had selected a wrong spot." 
 
 Yet the candid reader may be disposed to think that the 
 defence does deserve something better than such treatment ; 
 and he will perhaps be confirmed in this opinion on finding 
 that some such explanation is absolutely necessary to recon- 
 cile other seemingly conflicting passages of Holy Scripture, 
 on a subject not at all connected with this question. 
 
 1 Acts i. 12. * Biblioth. Sac. Vol. i. p. 177, et seq.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 367 
 
 But before proceeding to this, it may be well briefly to 
 state what it is that invests this question with its chief im- 
 portance, and makes this tradition so prominent an object of 
 attack and defence. It is this : before the Holy Sepulchre 
 had emerged from the obscurity in which it had been involved 
 by the efforts of the church's enemies, while the idol fane as 
 yet excited the horror and forbade the devotions of the pious 
 pilgrims, the place of the Ascension on Mount Olivet was even 
 then regarded with veneration, and there can be no room for 
 doubt that the munificence of St Helena did in this case only 
 perpetuate the existing tradition. But if it can be proved 
 that this tradition, whose origin is lost in the antiquity of 
 the Ante-Nicene period, is palpably false, this fact will serve 
 greatly to weaken the force of traditionary evidence in 
 general, and of that relating to the Holy Sepulchre in 
 particular, which it is assumed only dates back to the time 
 of Constantino 3 . The grounds of this last assumption have 
 been already examined; a word may here be said on the 
 a priori argument. 
 
 If it be entitled to any weight, may it not with equal 
 fairness be pleaded in behalf of the church as against it ? 
 If it should appear that the impugners of these ancient 
 traditions have fallen into error on points materially affect- 
 ing the topography of the old Jerusalem that, they have e.g. 
 misplaced hills and valleys and walls and castles and bridges 
 and such like if further they should be convicted of having, 
 either inadvertently or designedly, misrepresented plain his- 
 torical facts, may not this be admitted as a proof that they 
 are not altogether infallible, not worthy of implicit confidence ; 
 but that there may be something more to be said in behalf 
 
 3 It is adduced with this simple 
 view several times by Dr Robinson, 
 
 in both the works above referred to.
 
 368 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 of the sacred localities than they have declared, or than 
 others have yet discovered ? 
 
 Next, with regard to the alleged mistake in' fixing the 
 two traditions perpetuated by the churches of St Helena at 
 Bethlehem 1 and on mount Olivet; there is one remark which 
 will apply to both, and is not altogether without weight. The 
 gospel of St Luke was certainly received as canonical in the 
 third century. It is at least probable that the laborious com- 
 piler of the Hexapla was not altogether ignorant of its 
 contents ; the same may be said of Eusebius, and the learned 
 translator of the Vulgate, in the fourth century, not to men- 
 tion the clergy and people of the church at Jerusalem, one 
 of whose deacons, as we have seen, had the Holy Scriptures 
 by heart 2 . Now these all with one consent received the tra- 
 ditions in question, and did not reject the gospel of St Luke : 
 they must then have had some way of reconciling the scrip- 
 ture statement with the prevailing traditions. It is certainly 
 easy to say that the fathers here mentioned were " not ex- 
 perienced interpreters" of Scripture, (although, if they were 
 not, it was not at least for want of practice) ; but is it so 
 easy to imagine what should induce those who originated the 
 traditions to fix on a palpably wrong site if they did fix it 
 at all ? If it were so very obvious that the ascension took 
 place at Bethany, why did they not select a spot in that 
 village ? How could they be so rash as to assign it to the 
 summit of mount Olivet, if it were "unquestionably, prima 
 
 1 It would be going too far out of 
 the way fully to notice the objections 
 to the cave of the Nativity at Bethle- 
 hem in this work. They are uiged for 
 the same purpose as those against the 
 church of the Ascension; but it is 
 granted that " the objections are not so 
 strong," " the results not so decided." 
 
 8 It ought to be remembered too 
 that we read the same of many of the 
 monks of mount Olivet and others. 
 They were much commended for it. 
 Ignorance of the holy Scriptures was 
 not considered a virtue in those days, 
 as many seem to imagine.
 
 CH. HI.] THE HOLY CITY. 369 
 
 facie, wrong," and " contradicted by the express declaration 
 of Scripture?", 
 
 To proceed now to the main point. On the occasion 
 of our Blessed Lord's triumphant entry into Jerusalem on 
 Palm Sunday, we are informed by two of the evangelists 
 that " when he had come near to Jerusalem, to Bethphage 
 and Bethany, to the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his 
 disciples 3 ," &c. These words undoubtedly imply progress to 
 the place from whence he sent. Yet he had passed the last 
 day and night at Bethany, according to a third evangelist 4 ; 
 and with what propriety could it be said that he had come 
 thither on the Sunday morning, if he had passed the Sabbath 
 there ? and, further, how can we account for the mention of 
 Bethphage ? The fourth evangelist seems to make all clear 5 . 
 He writes, " When they drew near to Jerusalem, and had 
 come to Bethphage to the Mount of Olives," &c., and makes 
 no mention of Bethany whatever. It is easy to imagine that 
 an objection might be framed to these passages, on account 
 of their inconsistencies. I know not what experienced and 
 candid interpreters of Scripture would reply ; but the most 
 satisfactory answer which would occur to me would be this. 
 That the village of Bethany gave its name to the eastern 
 slope of Mount Olivet, at the foot of which it was situated, 
 whereas the western slope was called by the name of Beth- 
 phage ; and that our Lord may be supposed to have sent 
 his disciples, not from the village of Bethany before he set 
 out, but on his progress to Jerusalem, when he had advanced 
 to that point where the two districts joined, as two of the 
 
 3 Mark xi. 1. Luke xix. 29. 
 
 * John xii. 1, &c. 
 
 s Matt. xii. 1, &c. I may be al- 
 lowed to mention that this solution is 
 the only one that satisfied me, after 
 
 24 
 
 some perplexity, on the spot; when I 
 am not all aware that I had any thought 
 of the traditionary site of the Ascen- 
 sion, which never occurred to me as a 
 difficulty.
 
 370 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 evangelists imply, or where Bethany ended and Bethphage 
 began, as the last-cited intimates. This explanation would 
 reconcile the four evangelists. 
 
 Next, if the objector should attempt to bring the two 
 passages of St Luke in opposition one to another, and state, 
 that in his gospel he fixes the Ascension to Bethany, whereas 
 in the Acts he appears at least to assign that event to a 
 point of Mount Olivet much nearer to Jerusalem; I cer- 
 tainly could not honestly answer that in the latter passage, 
 "it is only said, that the disciples returned from Mount 
 Olivet, not that he ascended from it 1 ," because I should be 
 afraid to be met by the fresh objection, that Mount Olivet 
 is of some considerable extent 2 , and that to say that it is 
 from Jerusalem a sabbath-day's journey appears unmean- 
 ing, except it be taken to signify a particular part of the 
 mountain. Neither, again, should I think it right to extend 
 the sabbatical journey fifteen furlongs, so as to reach the vil- 
 lage of Bethany, because although it be true that one very 
 respectable authority may be quoted for this opinion 3 , yet 
 
 1 Bib. Res. i. p. 375. note 1. 
 
 2 Josephus in one passage says 
 that Mount Olivet is five stadia from 
 Jerusalem. Ant. xx. viii. 6. But 
 elsewhere he says that Titus ordered 
 two legions to encamp six stadia from 
 the city on the Mount of Olives. J. 
 W. v. ii. 3. These passages do not 
 contradict one another. He evidently 
 measures from two different points. It 
 is therefore scarcely candid of Dr 
 Robinson to represent Josephus as 
 saying that the summit of the moun- 
 tain is five furlongs distant from Jeru- 
 salem, Biblio. Sac. 178, n. 3 ; for it is 
 certain Josephus cannot mean that ; 
 or how could the legions have been 
 six stadia distant from the city on the 
 
 same mountain ? Josephus does not 
 even say that their camp was on the 
 summit of the mountain so the sum- 
 mit may have been more than six 
 furlongs distant, but could not be less. 
 Havercamp, who supposes, as do most 
 writers, that Acts i. 12 is intended to 
 designate the spot of the Ascension, 
 imagines that in Ant. xx. viii. 6, 
 Josephus intends the base of the moun- 
 tain, and that our Lord ascended from 
 the summit, three stadia higher up, 
 making in all eight stadia, which he 
 takes to be the distance specified, a 
 sabbath-day's journey. Vid not, in 
 loc. This I think nearly correct. 
 
 3 This is Buxtorf (quoted by Dr 
 Robinson in the note above referred to),
 
 CH. Ill 
 
 I 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 371 
 
 many more quite as respectable state it at something con- 
 siderably less; and in such cases it is fair to take, not 
 the extreme, but the computation of the majority, which 
 would fix the spot somewhere near to the summit of the 
 mountain. I should reply then as to the former objection, 
 by the theory of a district, as well as a village, named 
 Bethany, (as in the case of parishes in England,) extending 
 to the summit of the Mount of Olives 4 ; and suggest whether 
 St Luke may not here have adopted the mode of expression 
 used by St Matthew in the former case; omitting mention 
 of the district which had been traversed, and specifying that 
 at which they had arrived ? 
 
 Whether it was by this or some other method that 
 the ancient fathers of the Church reconciled the two pas- 
 sages of Holy Scripture, and explained the position of the 
 Church of St Helena, it is of course impossible to say; for 
 the inconsistency of the tradition with the language of the 
 gospel, which is now represented as so very obvious, was a 
 discovery reserved for this generation, and seems not to have 
 occurred to earlier critics ; and on this account, as well as 
 
 who states it at 2000 paces two Ro- 
 man miles. The various computations 
 are given by Mr Newman, Essay, p. 
 clviii. note. The great majority of au- 
 thorities vary from five to eight stadia, 
 and the Church of the Ascension falls 
 between these. 
 
 4 Where Professor Robinson re- 
 iterates his charge of want of fairness 
 against Mr Newman, in the note re- 
 ferred to above, was he aware that he 
 was misrepresenting Lightfoot in the 
 strangest manner for the support of 
 his own theory, in saying that this 
 author does not extend the district of 
 Bethany to the summit of Mount 
 
 Olivet ? In order not to run the risk 
 of doing so myself, I will simply quote 
 the Chorographical Index prefixed to 
 his works, sub voce Olivet. " The 
 foot of it was five furlongs from Jeru- 
 salem, saith Josephus. The top of it, 
 Acts i. 12, called a sabbath-day's 
 journey, which was about eight fur- 
 longs, or a mile ; and was the place, 
 according to the latter sense of our 
 author, where the tracts of Bethphage 
 and Bethany met. Here our Saviour 
 ascended, and here he got upon the ass 
 when he rode into Jerusalem." All 
 this is proved by references to Light- 
 foot which see. 
 
 242
 
 372 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 from the foregoing considerations, I hope I shall not incur 
 the very serious charges preferred against another writer, if 
 I venture to profess my belief in the existing tradition, reserv- 
 ing none the less, as I trust, the deepest reverence for the 
 Bible. 
 
 A very few words may suffice for the description of this 
 ruin, for at present it is nothing more. Instead of a church 
 there is now a mosk near this site, the keeper of which 
 holds the keys of a small portal giving entrance into a paved 
 court of some extent, open to the sky, around which are 
 ranged the altars of the various Christian churches, while the 
 centre is occupied by a small circular building, surmounted 
 by a cupola. Within is a Mahommedan niche of prayer, and 
 before this is the rock on which the simple faith of Chris- 
 tian pilgrims have discovered the impress of our Saviour's 
 foot; and although I trust that those who were assembled 
 around that stone on the afternoon of Holy Thursday, in 
 1842, to commemorate the Ascension of our blessed Lord, 
 were guilty of no unpardonable incredulity in hesitating to 
 receive this as an undoubted fact ; still the ancient story 
 did not invest the rock with less interest, or dispose them 
 to quarrel with those many thousands of pious Christians 
 who, from the earliest ages of the Church, have been able 
 to feel satisfied that such is the case. 
 
 Descending now to the Valley of Jehoshaphat, by a 
 more circuitous path, we pass the Cave of the Creed, a 
 curious vaulted chamber, in ruins, beneath the surface of 
 the ground, apparently sunk in the rock, and plastered ; 
 oblong in form, with six niches on each side, facing one 
 another, where the apostles are said to have assembled to 
 compose the Creed. Further down the mountain-side is 
 pointed out the spot where our Lord wept over the city, 
 and foretold its destruction ; and the pilgrim who will betake
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 373 
 
 himself to that spot alone, and with this thought in his 
 heart, and the Bible in his hand, and with a true view of 
 the desolations of Jerusalem before his eyes, and there 
 peruse the Lamentations of the Prophet Jeremiah, or the 
 79th and 80th Psalms, or the Discourses of our Blessed 
 Lord here referred to, will perchance find that the desig- 
 nation of these localities, however fanciful, is not without 
 its use. Between this spot and the valley is the Jewish 
 burial-ground, the appearance of which will furnish a com- 
 ment on the words, "they shall bury in Tophet till there 
 be no place 1 ;" the graves being here so close together that 
 the stone slabs which cover them are almost joined one to 
 another, so as to form a kind of pavement of considerable 
 dimensions. 
 
 Having reached the brook Kedron, and proceeding down 
 the left of its dry bed, the first objects that attract attention 
 are four sepulchral excavations below the south-east angle 
 of the haram, but on the opposite side of the valley, cut 
 in the precipitous rock, which here skirts the torrent for 
 some distance. They have been often described 2 . Two of 
 them are chambers cut in the rock, the others are mo- 
 numents cut out from the rock, a passage being left around 
 them. The columns and ornaments sculptured on the latter 
 show a mixture of Doric, Ionic, and perhaps Egyptian ar- 
 chitecture; while one of the former, which is called the 
 Tomb of St James, is a more pure specimen of the Doric 
 order. This excavation occupies a middle place between 
 the monolithic monuments; it consists of an ante-chamber, 
 with two columns in the front, giving entrance to the se- 
 pulchral vault, which is reported to have afforded a hiding- 
 
 1 Jerem. xix. 11. 
 Tophet. 
 
 Not that this is 
 
 3 See a minute description in Bib. 
 Res. i. 518, &c.
 
 374 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 place to the apostle St James, during the period which in- 
 tervened between the betrayal and resurrection of our Lord. 
 The monument to the south is now commonly marked as 
 the Tomb of Zachariah, that to the north as the Pillar or 
 Tomb of Absalom. The entrance to the fourth the Tomb 
 of Jehoshaphat is from the passage which surrounds the 
 last-named monument. It now only exhibits a handsome pedi- 
 ment, above the surface of the ground. 
 
 Various are the conjectures as to the date of these 
 monuments, and conflicting the traditions as to whom they 
 are to be assigned. I was struck, at the first sight of 
 them, by their resemblance to some of the excavations in 
 Wady Moosa, as represented in illustrations ; and the fact of 
 this resemblance is confirmed by travellers who have exa- 
 mined both 1 . But in the uncertainty that at present exists 
 as to the date of the latter, this does not throw much light 
 upon the subject. I have no theory to propose, but I should 
 be glad, if it were in any way possible, to connect one of 
 these monuments with him whose name it bears. 
 
 In the sacred narrative of the death of the favourite, 
 but rebellious son of David, we read : " Now Absalom in 
 his life-time had taken and reared up for himsef a pillar, 
 which is in the king's dale : for he said, I have no son 
 to keep my name in remembrance ; and he called the pillar 
 after his own name ; and it is called unto this day, Absalom's 
 Place 8 ." The king's dale has been identified with that 
 
 1 Dr Robinson remarks this; and 
 his testimony has been confirmed to 
 me by many travellers. He attempts 
 to connect them by an ingenious hypo- 
 thesis, which however I fear cannot 
 
 Walks, p. 123. 
 
 '-' 2 Samuel xviii. 18. It is a curi- 
 
 ous name DI^Jt'lN T lit. "the 
 T : - - 
 
 hand of Absalom," as Josephus and 
 
 stand. Mr Bartlett, an architect, I | tne LXX. translate it. Commentators 
 
 believe is disposed to consider these 
 at Jerusalem "as far more ancient." 
 
 are not agreed as to the import of this 
 name. The word T seems to be used
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 375 
 
 part of the Valley of Jehoshaphat near which, the king's 
 gardens were situated, not without sufficient warrant. It is 
 probable that a monument erected with the design here 
 mentioned would be constructed in the most substantial man- 
 ner, to render it as durable as possible ; and it would appear 
 that this pillar was in existence when Josephus wrote his 
 Antiquities ; for in his account of the same event he relates 
 that the pillar in question was "in the king's dale, two 
 furlongs distant from Jerusalem 3 ;" language which infers a 
 definite knowledge of the locality. Whether Absalom in- 
 tended it as a sepulchral pillar, is not clear. The Jews, 
 who from the time of Benjamin of Tudela 4 at least, have 
 regarded this monument as the Pillar of Absalom, in order 
 to show their horror at the rebellious conduct of this un- 
 natural son, have been in the habit, from time immemorial, 
 of casting a stone and spitting as they pass by it. If I 
 may not be permitted to believe that the orders of archi- 
 tecture 5 exhibited on this monument may possibly have been 
 known in the East ages before they were introduced into 
 Greece, may I be allowed to submit whether the character 
 
 in the same sense, i. e. for a monument, 
 in 1 Sam. xv. 12, and Isaiah Ivi. 5, 
 
 where it is joined with Dl# " because, 
 perhaps, in such monuments the name 
 was usually written. The Phoenician 
 monuments, it should seem, had sculp- 
 tured on them the form of a hand 
 raised up on an arm, and on this the 
 inscription was engraven." Lee's 
 Lexicon, sub voce T where he refers 
 to authorities. In connexion with this 
 it may be remarked that the Jews have 
 still some curious superstitions with 
 reference to the hand ; figures of which 
 are rudely drawn on the walls of their 
 
 houses, and their Purim cakes have 
 frequently this form. 
 
 3 Ant. vn. x. 3. The original 
 passage runs thus : "Eo-rjj/ce S' 'Apeird- 
 Xw/uos ei; Trj KotXdSi TTJ ftaa'tXiKy 
 (rrtjXtjv XtOpu fj.apfj.a.pivov Svo vraSiov? 
 dwe'^ova'av J.epo<ro\v/A(ev, ijv irpoori- 
 yopevtrev Idiav -fcelpa. 
 
 * Travels, pp. 36, 37- Edit. Asher. 
 
 5 Viz. Ionic columns on the side, 
 with an architrave of triglyphs and 
 Doric ornaments. It would be diffi- 
 cult, I apprehend, to say to what 
 order the upper part belongs. This is 
 masonry.
 
 376 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 and ornament of this mass of rock may not have been 
 altered at a later period, in conformity to the taste of the 
 tune? and whether it may not originally have formed the 
 pedestal of Absalom's Pillar? 
 
 An incident connected with the excavated Tomb of 
 Jehoshaphat, which I cannot connect with that king 1 , may 
 close the notice of these remarkable antiquities. An in- 
 telligent member of the United Chaldean Church, who had 
 been educated in the Propaganda at Home, visited Jeru- 
 salem, on his return to his native country, as a missionary 
 of that Society, in the whiter of 18423. In exploring 
 the inner chamber of this Tomb he lighted on a Hebrew 
 roll containing the Pentateuch. It was very beautifully 
 written on skins, and reminded me much of the Synagogue 
 Roll, found among the Jews of Cochin, and presented by 
 Dr Buchanan to the Cambridge University Library. The 
 MS. had been injured by damp, which may have had the 
 effect of reducing the parchment to its original state of lea- 
 ther, as it had disunited the various skins. I only saw some 
 damaged portions, which were in every respect similar to the 
 Cochin MS., nor did the skins appear to have been at all 
 prepared. It was taken by the superior of the Latin Con- 
 vent, who intended, I believe, to present it to the Vatican. 
 The discovery produced a considerable sensation among the 
 Franks in Jerusalem; but the general opinion of those best 
 skilled in the practices of the Jews did not attribute much 
 importance to it, or ascribe a very high antiquity to the 
 manuscript. It appears that the rolls used in the syna- 
 gogues are required to be so perfect, that the most minute 
 error completely vitiates the whole volume. On the detec- 
 
 1 Because he " was buried with his 
 fathers in the city of David his fa- 
 
 ther." 1 Kings xxii. 50, and 2 Chron. 
 xxi. 1.
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 377 
 
 tion of such imperfection, or on its becoming unfit for fur- 
 ther use through age or accident, the MS. is replaced by a 
 perfect copy, and the condemned roll is reserved to be buried 
 with one of the rabbies 2 . The supposition therefore was, that 
 the Jews, whose burying-place is immediately above this an- 
 cient tomb, had deposited a body in this chamber, with this 
 book of the law, but as to the date of the transaction no- 
 thing could be determined with any degree of certainty. The 
 story may be interesting as illustrating a Jewish practice, 
 and an examination of the undamaged part of the roll might 
 lead to some further results. 
 
 At the Pillar of Absalom an arch is thrown across the 
 bed of the Kedron, from which a pathway leads up the 
 almost precipitous side of the mountain by the south-east 
 angle of the haram to the city. By still following the 
 brook, we are brought to the " Fountain of the Virgin," 
 in the contracted part of the valley, on the right-hand 
 side. This fountain will introduce the very interesting and 
 difficult subject of the waters of Jerusalem, which, I fear, 
 must prove a mystery to antiquarians, until it is permitted 
 to carry on excavations at Jerusalem on a very extensive 
 scale. 
 
 There is a singular agreement among all authors, sacred 
 and profane, on this fact, that the Holy City had an abun- 
 dance of water within its circuit, while the neighbourhood was 
 scantily supplied, or rather altogether arid 3 ; and it has been 
 often remarked, that while the besiegers have frequently been 
 reduced to the last extremity by drought, there is no instance 
 
 8 I take all this on trust ; and can- 
 not vouch for its truth from my own 
 knowledge. 
 
 3 So Strabo, evroi fiej evvdpov CK- 
 TOS oe irai>TeXu> di\f/rip6v, XVI. p. 723. 
 
 Again, ait-ro fi.ev evvSpov, TTt\v Sk KVK\U> 
 \<apav X OI/ X wir/oof Ka ' 1 avuSpov. Other 
 testimonies will be found below, and 
 in the accounts of the various sieges 
 in the former Part.
 
 378 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 on record of the besieged having been distressed by thirst 1 , 
 although they have many times suffered most severely from 
 famine. This paradox is perfectly inexplicable ; for to judge 
 from the observations of later travellers, one would imagine 
 that the very contrary must have been the case. For what 
 is the fact ? only two fountains have been noticed, until very 
 lately, in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, and both these 
 without the walls, while it is plain that the aqueduct from 
 the pools of Solomon could never have served the besieged, 
 as it must always have been visible where it crossed the 
 Valley of Hinnom, and would probably be cut off by them- 
 selves at some distance from the waUs, lest it should be made 
 available to the enemy during the siege. 
 
 But the subject well deserves a particular investigation. 
 And I proceed to notice the fountains, pools, and aqueducts of 
 Jerusalem, in the hope that I may throw some little light on 
 this obscure and perplexing question. 
 
 To begin with the Fountain of Siloam. Its position has 
 been already described ; but its character demands a fuller 
 notice. The descent to the spring is one of the most pic- 
 turesque pieces about Jerusalem. It is effected by a flight of 
 steps, much worn by the natives, cut through the rock, which 
 is wildly irregular. There are twenty-six steps, making the 
 depth about 25 feet, for the steps are deep. Here is a cave 
 in the rock, of no great dimensions, roughly hewn, into which 
 the water flows from beneath the lowest step. Many earlier 
 
 1 See Robinson's Bib. Res. Vol. i. 
 p. 479, and Raumer's Palestine, p. 
 329, 2nd Ed. The observations of 
 both on the siege by Titus are very 
 just; and it is a most remarkable case, 
 considering how crowded the city then 
 was. The latter author notices, that 
 the language of Josephus on the 
 
 abundance of water with which the 
 Romans were supplied from Siloam 
 during the siege, is probably only a 
 boast to deceive the Jews; (see J. W. 
 v. ix. 4.) as Dio says the legions suf- 
 fered dreadfully from thirst, and had 
 to bring bad water from a great dis- 
 tance. Dio, LXVII. iv.
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 379 
 
 writers who mention this fountain, agree in witnessing to its 
 irregular flow 2 , though they differ much as to the stated 
 periods ; a variation which may be readily explained by the 
 fact, that the intervals vary according to the season, and 
 other accidental causes, which have not yet been determined. 
 The fact itself is indisputable, and is not one of the least 
 mysterious circumstances connected with this extraordinary 
 fountain. The taste of the water is very peculiar, and never 
 to be mistaken when once known an important circum- 
 stance, which the reader is requested to bear in mind. It 
 is scarcely " brackish ; " it is best described by an old writer 
 as "insipid 3 ;" but the villagers of Siloam drink thereof 
 and their flocks, and do not find it unwholesome, but the con- 
 trary. From the chamber there is a channel cut in a ser- 
 pentine course, 1750 feet long, to convey the water to the 
 Pool of Siloam, which will next demand attention. To reach 
 it we ascend again to the bed of the Kedron, and pass 
 round the point of Ophel, a distance of 1355 feet. The path 
 
 2 It does not seem necessary to re- 
 peat the testimonies which have been 
 lately given. The curious reader may 
 consult Dr Robinson's Bib. Res. Vol. 
 i. pp. 493508. 
 
 3 William of Tyre, viii. 4, "nee 
 sapidas nee perpetuas habet aquas." If 
 the waters have undergone no change, 
 tastes must strangely differ. Josephus 
 pronounces the water "sweet" (y\u- 
 Kflav), J. W. v. iv. 1 ; one of the 
 historians of the Crusades as " bitter " 
 ("gustae amarus"), Gesta Dei per 
 Francos. 573 ; another, " tasteless," 
 " non sapidas ;" and a modern writer, 
 ''brackish!" Bib. Res. I.e. Sweet 
 bitter tasteless brackish ! A travel- 
 ler in the 17th century calls it sweet ; 
 
 and gives, in addition, an illustration, 
 which will convey a good idea of the 
 taste. He says, " if you were to drink 
 it blindfold, you would think it was 
 nothing else than milk and water." 
 Journey to Jerusalem in 1669, Lon- 
 don, 1672. Nor is the variation less 
 striking as to the quantity, than as to 
 the quality of the water. Josephus 
 states it to be abundant (Tnjyrjv iro\- 
 \T)i>), the writers of the middle ages 
 small (fons modicus, &c.) W. T. 1. c. 
 It should be observed, that Dr Robin- 
 son, pp. 507, 8, proposes to make this 
 " the Pool of Bethesda," and the ir- 
 regular now, " the troubling of the 
 waters by the angel !"
 
 380 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 leads under the village of Siloam, hanging on the steep side 
 of the Mount of Offence, chiefly composed of chambers exca- 
 vated in the rock, once the receptacles of the dead, now 
 the abodes of the villagers and their cattle ; below in the 
 expanding bed of the valley is a verdant spot, refreshing to 
 the eye during the heat of summer, while, all around is 
 parched and dun. These are the gardens of the villagers, 
 cultivated in terraces composed of soil which has either been 
 washed down by the rains, or brought from a distance, and 
 watered from the pool, to which we must now proceed. Turn- 
 ing to the right, round a sharp angle of rock, we enter the 
 mouth of the valley of the Tyropaeon, and passing under the 
 precipitous rock, which has a small channel for the water cut 
 in its base, we soon arrive at the Pool of Siloam. 
 
 Here there is a descent through a chasm in the rock 
 to a small basin at the end of the channel, by which all 
 the water not drawn off at the fountain is conveyed to 
 this point. The pool itself is a small tank 1 just without the 
 fissure, of an oblong form, remarkable for nothing but some 
 fragments of marble columns projecting from its sides, pro- 
 bably the remains of a church 2 ; the water is confined in this 
 or in the rocky basin, and drawn off, as occasion requires, to 
 irrigate the gardens beneath. 
 
 There is every appearance of there having existed for- 
 merly a much larger reservoir than the present, immedi- 
 ately to the east of it, confined at the lower end by a 
 substantial wall of masonry, which now forms a dry bridge, 
 at the south end of which is the ancient tree said to mark 
 the spot of Isaiah's martyrdom. This larger hollow is now 
 
 1 Dr Robinson gives it 53 feet long, 
 18 feet broad, and 19 deep. Bib. Res. 
 i. p. 497 ; where, and at pp. 341, 2, will 
 be found a most minute description. 
 
 2 The building was still standing, 
 but converted into a mosk, in Sandys' 
 time, (1611). Travels, p. 147-
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 381 
 
 filled with soil and cultivated ; but earlier travellers 3 confirm 
 the opinion which its appearance would suggest, and notice 
 a second pool in this spot. 
 
 The next fountain which I shall mention is one within 
 the city, near the area of the Great Mosk, known only by 
 report until very lately, when an enterprising traveller under- 
 took to explore it ; and the company to whom he related 
 the adventure in the small shed built over the mouth of 
 the well by which he affected his perilous descent, will not 
 easily forget the thrilling sensations which his narration pro- 
 duced. 
 
 This fountain is used to supply a bath, which has been 
 briefly noticed above as existing near one of the western 
 entrances to the haram. The present mouth of the well is 
 on the roof of the buildings attached to the bath, and is 
 found to be about 20 feet above the level of the street. 
 Dr Robinson had in vain sought permission to explore this 
 well, but the reports which he had heard of it 4 excited the 
 curiosity of a countryman of his who was at Jerusalem in 
 the winter of 18412, and he resolved at all events to de- 
 scend 5 . Having endeavoured, without success, to induce the 
 keeper of the bath to assist him in the undertaking, he pre- 
 vailed on two peasants of a neighbouring village to aid him 
 in it. This was in the month of January. At the dead of 
 
 3 See Bib. Res. i. 498. Sandys 
 speaks of it as dry in his time ; " con- 
 taining not above half an acre of 
 ground, now dry in the bottom." p. 
 146. 
 
 4 Bib. Res. i. 508, &c. 
 
 5 This was Mr Woolcott, an Ame- 
 rican Congregational missionary at 
 Beirout, who has been already quoted. 
 The narrative was published in Ame- 
 
 rica, in 1842, in a First Supplement 
 to the Bib. Res. ; a copy of which Mr 
 Woolcott was kind enough to send 
 me, and afterwards in Part I. of the 
 Biblio. Sacra, p. 24, &c. With these 
 I refresh my memory of the most 
 graphic description of the adventurer, 
 at the well's mouth, which made me 
 shudder.
 
 382 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 night, attended only by a servant-lad, and furnished with 
 candles and matches, a measuring-rule, moreover, and a com- 
 pass, forth he sallied, equipped as for an aquatic excursion. 
 Arrived at the well's mouth, he tied a cord round his body, 
 and was lowered through the aperture by these fellahs, who 
 had kept their appointment, but would, without doubt, have 
 let the rope slip, and left their employer to his fate on the 
 slightest alarm. However, he survived to tell the tale, an 
 outline of which shall here be given. 
 
 The entrance to the well is not quite two feet square, 
 but a few feet lower down it expands and becomes about 
 12 feet square, and is apparently hewn in the rock. His 
 first adventure in this aerial journey was meeting the leathern 
 bucket which had been tied at the other end of the rope 
 as a counterpoise. It was " streaming at a dozen aper- 
 tures, and for the rest of the way he was under a cold 
 shower-bath, and could with difficulty keep his light with- 
 out the circle of it." The well was 821 f ee t deep, and 
 the water about 41. On arriving at the bottom, the vi- 
 brations of the rope, before he could get a footing, ex- 
 tinguished his light, and he was left in total darkness. He 
 had observed in his descent four arched recesses in the 
 rock opposite to one another, and lower down, 6 feet 
 above the water, a door-way leading into an arched cham- 
 ber, which he contrived to reach, and here he refitted for 
 his further voyage. The matches were dry, and other 
 candles soon illuminated the darkness. The excavated cham- 
 ber in which he found himself, was only 3 or 4 feet in 
 height, 15 long by 10 broad, and did not seem to be 
 constructed with any reference to the water. Opposite to 
 this chamber he discovered a passage which formed the wa- 
 ter-channel. He had taken the precaution of bringing with 
 him an india-rubber life preserver, which he found useful
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 383 
 
 in his further explorations. He now descended into the 
 water, and entered the passage, and soon passed another 
 excavation in the rock, of which he could make nothing. 
 The passage beyond this was 2 or 3 feet wide, and 
 about 5 feet high, covered with stones laid transversely, 
 but very irregularly ; in some places were fragments of 
 polished marble shafts, and in one place the end of a 
 granite column had sunk obliquely into the passage. The 
 bottom of the channel was not flat, but grooved, and the 
 passage not straight, though its general course was direct; 
 and " the cutting so uneven as to suggest the thought 
 that advantage might have been taken of a natural seam 
 or fissure in the rock." Having followed this passage 80 
 feet, he was stopped by a bason or well of unknown depth, 
 on the opposite side of which the wall shut down to the 
 water, and presented another obstacle, even could the water 
 have been passed. Unhappily he was obliged to return 
 without any more satisfactory result. His exit is amusingly 
 characteristic of cool intrepidity. He had barely breathing 
 room or space for his candle between the surface of the 
 water and the roof of the passage ; and one would think 
 must have felt rather uncomfortable in such a position; 
 but he first measured the passage with his rule, then illu- 
 minated it with his spare candles, and having taken a last 
 fond look, left them burning there, and returned to the 
 well to prepare for his ascent. The rope was still there, 
 and the natives above. The signal was given, and he 
 again found himself swinging in mid-air, and in darkness, 
 the candle which he had reserved having been extinguished 
 as before. "His descent had been uniform, but he was 
 necessarily drawn up at intervals, which caused a greater 
 vibration. He spun around the dark vault, striking against 
 one side and another," and was not sorry to find him-
 
 384 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 self again " beneath the open heaven." It is deeply to be 
 regretted that this daring exploit was not attended with 
 better success. Its results are very unsatisfactory to Mr 
 Woolcott himself. He does not imagine that this excava- 
 tion was originally a well : the artificial recesses and cham- 
 bers in the rock he thinks are against it. It more nearly 
 resembles some of the sepulchral excavations without the 
 city. The direction of the passage he cannot positively 
 determine, as he had injured his compass in the descent. 
 He thinks it runs eastward in the direction of the haram ; 
 but if so, it stops short of the enclosure 44 feet 1 . The pas- 
 sage may extend further, the water descending into a lower 
 gallery ; if so, it could only be explored when the water is 
 very low. Two English travellers were anxious to attempt 
 this at the end of a dry summer, but no one could be pre- 
 vailed on to aid the undertaking, and it was abandoned. 
 At that time it was necessary for a man to descend to the 
 well, in order to bring the water from a distance to sup- 
 ply the bath, as the floor of the chamber was then dry. 
 A close cross-examination of this man elicited that the 
 water proceeded from an immense reservoir beneath the 
 haram, but it did not appear that he had penetrated so 
 far. It must be remarked that the water is identical in 
 taste with that of Siloam. 
 
 The next fountain I have not seen noticed, and, so far 
 as I know, its existence has not been hitherto known out 
 of Jerusalem. I had heard of a constant and abundant 
 well of water within the precincts of the Church of the 
 Flagellation, close to the seraglio, which supplies the Fran- 
 ciscan monastery during the dryest summer. I visited it 
 
 1 The distance of the well from the wall of the haram was found to be 124 
 feet, and he penetrated underground only 80.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 385 
 
 on March 13th and 14th, 1843, and obtained the following 
 additional particulars from the monk who had the charge 
 of the premises. The church is very ancient, but had fallen 
 into ruin until the Franciscans, about a year and a half 
 before my visit, had procured a firman for its restoration 2 . 
 In the course of the repairs an immense quantity of water 
 was required, and the well in question was exhausted, and 
 cleaned out. In two days it was full again, although it 
 was towards the end of the dry season, before any rain 
 had fallen. When I saw the well there were in it between 
 eight and nine feet of water, which completely filled a cavity 
 in the rock, and came up into its mouth, which was also 
 bored through the rock. The water was almost within 
 arm's reach of the opening, and remarkably clear. The 
 cavity I learnt extends some distance east and west; but 
 as I was disappointed in seeing the man who had been 
 employed to cleanse it, I could not ascertain its nature so 
 exactly as I wished. 1 tasted the water there could be 
 no mistake it was the " water of Siloam ! " 
 
 Thus then we have at these three different points three 
 fountains, without any apparent connexion one with ano- 
 ther, all supplied with this peculiar water, utterly unlike 
 any I remember to have tasted in that neighbourhood or 
 elsewhere. I am strongly disposed to conclude, from this 
 fact, that there must be a connexion, but how it is very 
 difficult to determine. 
 
 The existence of immense reservoirs under the temple- 
 
 2 See Maundrell, under date April 
 8. He states that it had been " used 
 as a stable by the son of a certain Bassa 
 of Jerusalem." When he was there, 
 1696, it was a weaver's shop. In con- 
 firmation of the former part, it may be 
 
 25 
 
 noticed that Anselm (circ. 1509) says of 
 this church, "De ilia Capella fecerunt 
 (Sarrauni) stabulum jumentorum." 
 Descrip. Terr. Sane, apud Canis. Thes. 
 iv. p. 792.
 
 386 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 area, is a theory which still requires ocular proof, but is 
 so supported by ancient tradition, that I think it cannot 
 reasonably be doubted. Among the other works of Simon 
 the Just, the son of Onias, about the temple at Jerusalem, 
 in the reign of Ptolemy Soter of Egypt, we read, " In 
 his days the cistern to receive water, being in compass as 
 the sea, was covered with plates of brass 1 ." During the 
 reign of Soter's successor, Philadelphus, Jerusalem was visited 
 by Aristeas, who has left us a full account of this cistern, 
 or rather series of cisterns, beneath the sacred precincts; 
 and although the account may appear to "border some- 
 what on the fabulous," yet, making considerable allowance 
 for hyperbole both in this and the former passage, it may 
 be admitted as evidence to the existence of large reservoirs 
 in the neighbourhood of the temple ; and there is one very 
 singular coincidence, manifestly undesigned, between this and 
 the fore-cited passage, which is worthy of remark 2 . He 
 states that " a powerful natural spring gushes out copiously 
 and unceasingly from within, and is received into subter- 
 ranean reservoirs, the extent of which is surprising and be- 
 yond description, to the circumference of five stadia about 
 the temple. They are connected by numberless pipes 
 through which the waters flow from one to another. There 
 
 1 Ecclus. 1. 3. 
 
 * U&CLTOS ie a'i/e(c\er7TTos ea-ri arv- 
 <rra<ris, a> ai> KOI Trr/yf/v efftoQeu tro- 
 \\ippvTo\i <pv(riKws eirippeovai)?' e-rt Se 
 0au/xa<rt(i)i/ (cat doitjyrJTajj; vTro$o")(eiiav 
 uTrapXpvTiov VTTO yijv, KaBiot dirtfpai- 
 vov, irevre (TTaSiwv KVK\66ev TT/S KOTO 
 T(J iepov Ka-rafto\fjs. KOI CKaa-Tov rov- 
 Ttav avpiyya? dva.pidfi.ovs, xad' Va- 
 O-TOI/ fiepoi eavTft avvair-rovrtov Ttav 
 pevfiaTtav. Kat Trdvra -ravra /xe/aoXi- 
 flouarOai KUT' c(5a</)ous Kai TOV Toi~)(ov. 
 
 etrl 81 TOVTtov Ke~^6ff6ai iro\v TL TrXij- 
 9os Kovlai, ems evepywi yeyevi\fievuiv 
 liirdvTuiv elvai Se irvKvd rd <r-rop.aTa 
 TTpoi TI}V f)d(riv, dopaTiav exovra TOIS 
 Tratri, irXiJj; auTois olv CCTTI XetToD/oyio. 
 Aristeas de Leg. Div. Translat. p. 
 112. Havercamp's Joseph. We shall 
 see that he had aural demonstration. 
 
 For the Jewish traditions see Light- 
 foot, Prospect of the Temple, xxiii. 
 and elsewhere ; of which more will be 
 said below.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 387 
 
 are above frequent hidden apertures to these depths, known 
 only to those employed at the sacrifice, through which the 
 water gushing out with force, washes off all the blood of 
 the numerous victims. The reservoirs have their floors 
 and sides cased with lead, and are covered over with a 
 quantity of earth." It is. highly probable that the lead of 
 Aristeas is intended by the brass of Ecclesiasticus, with 
 which Onias had cased the "cistern, which was in compass 
 as the sea ;" a work which would be fresh in the memory 
 of the Jews at the period of his visit. And there is an 
 incidental remark in this curious passage which may serve 
 to explain the silence of Josephus, which is certainly a per- 
 plexing difficulty. The secret of these extraordinary water- 
 works, it appears, was known only to the officiating priests. 
 It may have been a point of religion with the Jews to 
 maintain reserve on this subject, especially in the circum- 
 stances under which Josephus was writing. That the idea 
 of such a fountain was prevalent among the Romans, is 
 evident from the language of Tacitus in his account of the 
 siege by Titus 3 . His description proves that they were 
 aware that the city was not entirely dependent on the hea- 
 vens, but was furnished with a large natural spring and 
 artificial reservoirs for retaining its water. In conformity 
 with this, we learn from Josephus, that the temple was 
 so abundantly supplied, that notwithstanding the multitudes 
 that had been shut up within its precincts, first during the 
 civil commotions, and afterwards during the siege, yet the 
 Romans, on their occupation thereof, still found it unex- 
 hausted, and would not grudge a draught to the Jews who 
 had escaped 4 . Next we have a testimony of like import 
 
 :i ' Pons perennis aquae, cavati sub 
 terra monies; et piscinae cistemseque 
 
 servandis imbribus." Hist. v. xii. 
 
 .1. W. vi. vi. 1. 
 
 252
 
 388 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 from the Bordeaux pilgrim 1 , and another which serves to 
 connect the tradition of the Jewish Temple with that of 
 the Mosk of Omar. It belongs to the period of the deso- 
 lation of the former ; indeed, to the attempt of Julian the 
 Apostate to rebuild it 2 . The story may have been em- 
 bellished, but the outline is probably correct. It runs thus. 
 In preparing the foundations for the building, a stone of 
 the lowest course was displaced, which discovered the en- 
 trance to a cavern hollowed in the rock ; a labourer was 
 lowered into it by a cord, and found water half way up 
 his thigh ; on feeling about with his hands, he found on a 
 column, rising some way above the water, a book wrapped 
 in a cloth, which proved to be the Gospel of St John. 
 He does not appear to have explored further. The fre- 
 quent religious ablutions of the Moslems demand a large 
 supply of water in the neighbourhood of their mosks, and 
 the numerous handsome fountains of the best ages of Sara- 
 
 O 
 
 cenic architecture, not only within the sacred enclosure, but 
 in the neighbouring streets of the city, all which are now 
 dry, still bear witness to the fact, that subsequent to their 
 conquest there was an abundance of water in Jerusalem. 
 Again, when the crusaders, who had suffered so dreadfully 
 from thirst during the siege, had taken the city, they found 
 within the precincts of the mosk a most copious supply of 
 water 3 , although an infinite number of men and cattle had 
 
 1 " Sunt in Hierusalem piscinae 
 magnae duae ad latus templi, id est 
 ini.-i ad dexteram, alia ad sinistram 
 quas Salomon fecit;" and again a little 
 below : " Sunt ibi et excepturia magna 
 aqua? subterraneae et piscinae magno 
 opere aedificatae, et in aede ipsa ubi 
 templum fuit, quod Salomon tedifica- 
 vit." Itin. Micros, p. 152. Besides 
 
 these he mentions the two without the 
 temple. See below, p. 401, n. 2. 
 
 8 Philostorgiusapud Photium, vu. 
 xiv. 
 
 8 " Reperiebantur et aquae, cujus 
 maximam in obsidione passi fuerant 
 penuriam ingentes copies." William 
 of Tyre, vm. xxiv. p. 761.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 389 
 
 been shut up in the city ; which cattle we learn were 
 brought to the mosk to be watered 4 ; and we further read 
 of large cisterns beneath and about the area, supplied in 
 part with rain-water it is true, but no doubt mainly de- 
 pendent on the perpetual fountains of which we have read 
 above 5 . In addition to this chain of evidence, we have at 
 the present day a local tradition extending back it is im- 
 possible to say how far, describing these cisterns in language 
 which might appear to be borrowed from the book of Ec- 
 clesiasticus, or from the narrative of Aristeas above cited, 
 but which in the mouths of Moslems reminds one rather of 
 the Arabian Nights. The man in the employment of the 
 bath has been already quoted ; we find another at the Foun- 
 tain of the Virgin, declaring that this water also comes down 
 from the fountain beneath the mosk 6 ; and these individuals 
 do but represent the current opinion of the natives. 
 
 In the description which has been given of the Mosk 
 of Omar by the artist who explored it, we have read 7 of 
 the excavated chamber in the Sahkrah, "in the centre of 
 whose rocky pavement is a circular slab of marble, which 
 being struck returns a hollow sound, clearly shewing that 
 there is a well or excavation beneath." This however he was 
 not permitted to explore. Again, in the western porch of 
 
 4 Albert. Aquen. Hist. Uierosol. 
 vi. xxii. Gesta Franc, p. 280. 
 
 5 So William of Tyre, vui. iv. 
 749. " Qui autem intus erant praeter 
 aquarum pluvialium, quam habebant, 
 uberitatem maximam, fontes etiam a 
 partibus deductos exterioribus et aque- 
 ductis invectos, in piscinas duas maxi- 
 ma; quantitatis quae circa templi ambi- 
 tum exterius tamen sed infra urbem 
 continentur recipiebant, quarum altera 
 usque hodie probatica piscina reputa- 
 
 tur," &c. The author cited in the last 
 note (4), speaks of " cisternam regiam, 
 qua ante fores ejusdem Palatii, in 
 modum lacus amplitudinem et magni- 
 tudinem cavatione continet," &c. This 
 he says was covered over ; it contained 
 rain-water, and many fugitives were 
 drowned in it. 
 
 Bib. Res. i. 507. 
 
 7 Mr Catherwood, in Walks, &c. 
 p. 167.
 
 390 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PAKT II. 
 
 the mosk is a well, which he conjectures may communicate 
 with the fountain from which the bath is supplied 1 ; all which 
 appearances serve to corroborate the statements just noticed, 
 which would further seem to derive a strong and striking 
 confirmation from the language of Holy Scripture itself, 
 where the prophet Ezekiel in his allegorical vision was shewn 
 a stream of water issuing forth from under the threshold 
 of the temple, which is apparently alluded to by the prophet 
 Zechariah, and in the Revelation of St John 2 . 
 
 From all these testimonies I think we are forced to con- 
 clude there is under the haram an abundant fountain of 
 living water; but whether the main spring is there it is more 
 difficult to determine. I am disposed to believe that it is not? 
 but that the water is brought to the reservoirs by an aque- 
 duct, the tradition of which was early lost, as the effects 
 within the temple were exactly such as if the fountain-head 
 had been there. Let us now endeavour to find some traces 
 of the aqueduct. I presume then that the water in the well 
 near the haram has escaped from this aqueduct that the 
 fountain near the Church of the Flagellation may be, if not 
 the main channel, yet an offshoot from it, which furnished a 
 supply of water to the fortress Antonia, and its predecessors ; 
 for the garrison in the original Acra, though often besieged, 
 and at length reduced by famine, are never said to have 
 been inconvenienced by thirst, and so with Baris and Antonia. 
 It would even appear that we may hear something of this 
 aqueduct still higher up. Among the native traditions of 
 Jerusalem is one to this effect, " that there is a spot near the 
 Damascus gate, without the city, where in a still time, by 
 putting the ear near to the ground, the trickling or murmur 
 
 1 Walks, 166, note. 
 -' Ezek. xlvii. 111 ; Zech. xiii. 
 1; xiv. 8; Rev. xxii. 1. I am in- 
 
 debted for this suggestion to Reaumur's 
 Palestine, p. 333.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 391 
 
 of a subterranean water-course can be heard 3 ." The Da- 
 mascus gate, it will be remembered, is at the upper part of 
 what I shall now venture to call the Tyropseon, or "the 
 valley which extends down (/cafl^Vei) from the Damascus 
 gate, along the west side of the haram 4 ," and two of the 
 fountains which have been mentioned are on the left side of 
 this valley. It would be a matter of considerable interest to 
 discover any early notices of a fountain or aqueduct in this 
 quarter, and I think that Scripture will furnish us with both ; 
 or at any rate with a conduit and a well or pool, with which 
 we may be able to connect a fountain. 
 
 The present Damascus gate has been presumed to occupy 
 nearly the position of the "gate of Ephraim 5 " in the walls 
 after the captivity, and this last would appear to be identical 
 with "the valley-gate,' 1 from the fact of the two being never 
 mentioned together, but as it seems interchangeably 6 . But 
 "the gate of the valley" was "before the dragon well," 
 
 3 Dr Robinson mentions having 
 heard this common report himself at 
 Jerusalem, which was afterwards con- 
 firmed by Mr Woolcott. Biblioth. 
 Sacra, Pt. i. 28. There is an extra- 
 ordinary coincidence between this tra- 
 dition and the proof given to Aristeas 
 of the truth of the water-story above 
 related ; he writes, neTreioyiei/os tie 
 cai aiiTOS TTJV Tfov inroSo'xeiujv K.O.TO.- 
 trKvi]v $i}\ioata, Ka6aJs errto'TtoTJji'. Trpo- 
 nyayov yap ir\eov OTaSiutv Teaadptav, 
 6<c TTJy iroXeeos" Kai Trpos Tiva TOTTOV 
 eneXevare TIS (caTaKuv^ai/Ta, trvvaKOVtrai 
 TOW yivofievou \j/6<f>ov TJJS dTraimjo-eajs 
 Tiav uSaTtoV <i'<rre <rvfi.(f>ave? /JLOI yeyo- 
 vevai TO jueyeOos Ttav dyyeitav, /ca6uis 
 SeStiXu-rai. Aristeas, loc. cit. 
 
 4 Dr Robinson, 1. c. It is very 
 remarkable how this writer in every 
 
 mention of this valley translates Jo- 
 sephus's description of the Tyropaeon, 
 which will not at all apply to his ima- 
 ginary rectangular substitute. 
 
 6 See Bib. Res. i. 473, and Biblioth. 
 Sac. Vol. i. p. 191, 2 ; and above, Part 
 ii. chap. i. 
 
 6 See Nehem. ii. 13, for the valley- 
 gate ; but there is no mention of the 
 Ephraim gate in the account of the 
 building of the walls ; while on the 
 contrary, in xii. 39, we have the gate of 
 Ephraim evidently near the same place, 
 and no mention at all of the valley- 
 gate, in the description of the dedi- 
 cation of the walls. The propriety of 
 both names is obvious. The other 
 passages, where these names are men- 
 tioned, throw no light on the subject.
 
 392 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 which, therefore, if the premises are correct, will be some- 
 where without the Damascus gate. As this is the only 
 mention of the dragon well in Scripture, we cannot test 
 the accuracy of the conclusion by any other passage from 
 the sacred records; but Josephus will in some measure 
 enable us to do so. There can be little doubt that his 
 "Serpent's Pool 1 " is the same with the "Dragon Well" 
 of Nehemiah, and this adjoined the monuments of Herod, 
 which were evidently without the third wall, on this northern 
 quarter of the city. This notice will confirm the result above 
 stated, and give a pool or a well, and possibly a fountain, 
 without the Damascus gate, between it and the head of the 
 Valley of Jehoshaphat, where we shall find that the monu- 
 ments in question were situated 2 . 
 
 But where can we find an aqueduct to connect this water 
 with the fountains about the temple ? In two of the sacred 
 books we read, that when the three Assyrian captains were 
 sent by Sennacherib against Jerusalem, " they came and stood 
 by the conduit of the Upper Pool, which is in the highway 
 of the Fuller's Field 3 ." Again, the position of the Fuller's 
 Field, it is true, is nowhere determined by Scripture, but 
 Josephus will help us to its situation ; at least, he speaks of 
 a Fuller's Monument as a well-known topographical feature, 
 and it seems natural to connect the Fuller's Monument with 
 the Fuller's Field. This was at the corner tower 4 , at the 
 north-east angle of the wall of Agrippa, where the Valley of 
 Jehoshaphat bends round from the north to the east; and 
 
 1 Joseph. J. W. v. iii. 2. TWV 
 
 ' \\i>n mi // i'i//n ('MM-, a vpoa-el^e rg TWV 
 'O<f>euiv eiriKa\ovfjLi>ri Ko\v/j.ptjdpq. 
 
 3 Compare with the passage last 
 referred to, v. xii. 2, and see Bib. Res. 
 Vol. i. p. 635, note 6, in the former 
 
 part of which Dr R. fixes it to this 
 vicinity. The latter part I do not 
 understand. 
 
 3 2 Kings xviii. 17, and Isa. xxxvi. 
 2. Compare Isa. vii. 3. 
 
 4 J. W. v. iv. 2.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 393 
 
 the monument was apparently inclosed in this outer wall. 
 This position of the Fuller's Field is further remarkably con- 
 firmed by the following observation. It would not be doing 
 undue violence to the language of Scripture, to imagine that 
 when it is said that the Assyrian host " stood by the conduit 
 of the Upper Pool," &c., this language is intended to denote 
 the place of their encampment; especially as we find the 
 state-ministers of Hezekiah going forth to confer with the 
 officers of Sennacherib in that place. Now "the camp of 
 the Assyrians " was well known by tradition in the time of 
 Josephus. It was then included in Bezetha, and Titus en- 
 camped there when he had taken the outer wall. It was 
 situated near the Kedron, at the north-east of the new city, 
 having the Fuller's Monument on one side, and on the other 
 the Monument of Herod 5 , which last we saw was close to the 
 Serpent's Pool. Thus then is the " Upper Pool " of Isaiah 
 identified with the " Dragon Well" of Nehemiah, the " Ser- 
 pent's Pool" of Josephus ; and an aqueduct or " conduit" is 
 shewn to have been carried from it in what direction is left 
 apparently to conjecture. But the nature of the ground, no 
 less than the mysterious sounds near the Damascus Gate, 
 would point to the valley of the Tyropaeon as its probable 
 course, while the fountains above described, on the side of 
 the valley, afford a strong confirmation to this hypothesis. 
 
 This aqueduct was formed by Hezekiah, and is alluded 
 to more than once in Holy Scripture as a great work of that 
 king 6 . In the summary of his acts, in the second book of 
 
 5 J. W. v. vii. 3, and xii. 2. 
 
 6 The mention of a conduit in con- 
 nexion with this pool in the time of Ahaz 
 the predecessor of Hezekiah, isa. vii. 
 2, would seem to intimate that the work 
 was commenced by him ; or the con- 
 
 duit which conveyed the waters from the 
 fountain to this ifpper pool may be in- 
 tended in these passages. But it will ap- 
 pear below that it was from this pool 
 that Hezekiah derived his supply of 
 water, which is the only material point.
 
 394 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 Kings, we are told, "how he made a pool and a conduit, 
 and brought water into the city l ;" and the prophet Isaiah 
 alludes to the same works where he says to the Jews, " Ye 
 gathered together the waters of the lower pool .... ye made 
 a ditch (or reservoir) between the two walls for the water 
 of the old pool 2 ." Here the " lower pool" is identical with 
 the reservoir 3 " between the two walls," and is so called in 
 opposition to the " upper pool," in the passage above cited, 
 from which the waters were derived, and which is here 
 designated as the " old pool," with equal propriety. There is 
 also a much later reference to these same works in the book 
 of Ecclesiasticus, where it is written, among the praises of 
 Hezekiah, " He fortified his city, and brought in water into 
 the midst thereof; he digged the hard rock with iron, and 
 made wells for waters 4 ." 
 
 I have reserved for fuller consideration the passages in 
 the Second Book of Chronicles relating to these same works, 
 because then* language is much more definite, and may per- 
 haps appear at first sight to militate against the theory. We 
 there read, among Hezekiah's other defensive preparations, 
 " He took counsel with his princes and his mighty men to 
 stop the waters of the fountains, which were without the 
 city ; and they did help him. So there was gathered much 
 people together, who stopped all the fountains, and the brook 
 
 1 2 Kings xx. 20, the same words 
 as are used in the three passages above : 
 
 2 Isaiah xxii. 9, 11. A comparison 
 of this passage with the historical 
 notice of the preparaflons against Sen- 
 nacherib's invasion, 2 Chron. xxxii. 
 3 6, can leave no doubt that the 
 same works are referred to in both pas- 
 sages. 
 
 3 I take the liberty of substituting 
 the word "reservoir" for "ditch," that 
 it may not be confounded with the 
 
 aqueduct. The word is JTlpD a col- 
 lection or gathering together here, of 
 waters, as in Genesis i. 10. In Exodus 
 vii. 19, the authorised version renders 
 it " pools." See again Levit. xi. 36. 
 
 4 Ecclus. xlviii. 17.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 395 
 
 that ran through the midst of the land, saying, Why should 
 the kings of Assyria come and find much water?" And 
 these operations are again alluded to in the summary of his 
 acts : " This same Hezekiah also stopped the upper water- 
 course of Gihon, and brought it straight down to the west 
 side of the city of David 5 ." Now it is at once granted, that 
 if this language be taken to describe the course of Hezekiah's 
 conduit, and if by the City of David Mount Zion is to be 
 understood, then the theory above proposed, however strongly 
 supported, must fall to the ground ; because the course which 
 has been there marked out for the aqueduct is to the east, 
 and not to the west of Mount Zion. But is it certain that 
 Mount Zion must be intended by the City of David? In 
 the books of the Bangs there can be no doubt that they are 
 synonymous 6 , but in the books written after the Captivity, 
 the City of David seems to be taken, if not in a different, at 
 least in a wider acceptation 7 ; and if the 48th Psalm dates 
 before the Captivity, an equivalent expression in the second 
 verse must clearly be referred, not to Zion, but to the other 
 division of the city 8 . We have seen above that Millo is so 
 
 5 2 Chron. xxxii. 3, 4, 30. Might 
 not verse 30 be rendered thus : " He 
 stopped the upper outflow of Gihon, 
 and directed it down westward, to the 
 
 city of David," HIIUD ."RSD 1 ? 
 , T T? : - T - : 
 
 TH "V}T> instead of " to the west of 
 
 the city ?" Might it not then mean that 
 the water was guided west of its former 
 course, so as to be brought to the city 
 of David ? The text will snew that I 
 do not consider this necessary for 
 my theory ; but propose it merely as 
 another solution, which will allow " the 
 city of David" to be taken in its most 
 restricted sense. 
 
 6 See 2 Sam. v. 7 ; 1 Kings viii. 1 ; 
 and the parallel passages in Chroni- 
 cles. 
 
 7 Dr Robinson supposes the whole 
 city to be called by this name; and 
 labours at some length to prove it in 
 his Biblioth. Sac. Vol. i. p. 197, &c. 
 I think that he misunderstands the 
 expression in Nehemiah and Macca- 
 bees. He takes the Acra of the 
 Macedonians to be on mount Zion, 
 a position which appears to me quite 
 untenable. See last chapter. 
 
 8 This verse, from its importance 
 in this and other questions, demands a
 
 396 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 called in one passage in Chronicles 1 ; in the book of Nehemiah 
 the name is apparently given to Ophel 2 ; and it has been 
 already remarked, that in the books of Maccabees, Moriah is 
 usually so designated 3 . Further, "the tower" (Acra), which 
 is said to have occupied "the hill of the temple 4 ," is con- 
 stantly placed " in the City of David 5 ." From these facts 
 we must conclude that this name was used for "Acra," or 
 " the Lower City," by the Jews after the captivity ; and if 
 so, may we not suppose that they had some warrant for this 
 designation in their canonical books ? May we not believe 
 
 fuller consideration. It has been ob- 
 served above, Pt. n. c. i., that a mis- 
 understanding of it has led many Jew- 
 ish writers to believe that Mount Zion 
 was north of the temple, and that they 
 led our learned Lightfoot astray. Pro- 
 spect of the Temple, passim. The 
 original is somewhat obscure. 
 
 Our Authorised Version renders it : 
 " Beautiful for situation, the joy of the 
 whole earth, (is) mount Zion, (on) the 
 sides of the north, the city of the great 
 king;" the sense of which, even with 
 the two prepositions supplied, is not 
 very clear. The learned Reland seems 
 to suggest the right interpretation, 
 though he does not adopt it. He re- 
 marks (Pal. p. 847), that "the Hebrew 
 says only ' mount Zion the sides of 
 the north,' &c. mentioning, as it were, 
 the two principal parts of the city, 
 ' mount Zion' or ' the upper city,' and 
 ' the northern parts,' (rd trpovdpKTia 
 HI'/KI) as Josephus speaks, i. e. what- 
 ever is north of Zion." He supposes 
 the two together to make up "the city 
 of the great king:" it would seem 
 more natural to take these last words 
 as in opposition to the second member 
 
 of the sentence, which would give the 
 sense of our Prayer-book version : 
 " The hill of Zion is a fair place, and 
 the joy of the whole earth : upon the 
 north side lieth the city of the great 
 king," &c. This is the sense adopted 
 by Poole (Syn. Crit. in loc.), who cor- 
 rects Kimchi and Aben Ezra, as Light- 
 foot should have done, from books of 
 travel, &c. He gives the following as 
 the Versio Tigurina : " Mons Sion, in 
 cujus Aquilonari latere urbs magni 
 regis est, elegans est regio, et gaudium 
 universae terra." 
 
 1 2 Chron. xxxii. 5. See above, p. 
 273. n. 4. 
 
 2 In iii. 15, the reference is not so 
 clear; but in xii. 37, it will be re- 
 marked that the procession on its way 
 from the fountain gate (identified with 
 Siloam, in ii. 14, and iii. 15) to " the 
 water-gate," (supposed, generally, to 
 be the south gate of the temple; see 
 iii. 26, and viii. 1, 3, 16,) "went up 
 by the stairs of the city of David." 
 
 8 See above, p. 350 ; 1 Mace. iv. 37, 
 38, 60; vi. 48,51,62; vii. 33. 
 
 4 1 Mace. xiii. 52. 
 
 5 1 Mace. i. 33 ; ii. 31 ; xiv. 36.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 397 
 
 that the word is used in this sense by Ezra, in the passage 
 under consideration? If so, the course marked out for the 
 aqueduct along the Tyropaeon will exactly answer to the de- 
 scription which is there given ; and this conclusion is con- 
 firmed by this fact, that the reservoir which Hezekiah made 
 to receive the water conveyed to it by this aqueduct, is 
 clearly placed by the language of Holy Scripture at the end 
 of this valley, viz. at the Pool of Siloam. The reservoir, or 
 " lower pool," into which " the waters of the old pool " were 
 received, was made " between the two walls ;" a position not 
 at all defined hi this context, but which is more than once 
 mentioned in other passages, in a way that must have marked 
 the spot very determinately to a Jewish reader at the time 
 when the books were written, and which will, I trust, lead 
 us to a right conclusion. When the city was " broken up " 
 after the long siege by the army of the Chaldeans, in the 
 days of Zedekiah, we are told that the besieged "fled by 
 night, by the way of the gate, between two walls, which is 
 by the king's garden 6 ;" and this most precise language is 
 repeated no fewer than three times. These are the only 
 passages except that in Isaiah in which this remarkable ex- 
 pression, " between the two walls," occurs. Without then 
 stopping at present to enquire into the meaning of the words, 
 I would ask, can it admit of a doubt that the situations are 
 identical ? and that the Pool of Hezekiah is to be looked for 
 near this gate, wherever it was? and if we should find a 
 " king's pool," with a gate, not far from the king's gardens, 
 must we not at once be convinced that this, and none other, is 
 the reservoir alluded to by Isaiah? Now we do actually 
 find this in the book of Nehemiah first alluded to briefly 
 
 6 2 Kings xxv. 4; comp. Jerem. xxxix. 4, and lii. 7, the words are:
 
 398 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 in his nocturnal survey, where we have mention of " the 
 gate of the fountain," and "the king's pool 1 ;" and after- 
 wards much more clearly in the account of the rebuilding of 
 the walls : " The gate of the fountain repaired Shallun, . . . 
 he built it and covered it, and set up the doors thereof, and 
 the locks thereof, and the bars thereof, and the wall of the 
 pool of Siloah, by the king's garden 2 " The pool between 
 the two walls, and the gate by the king's garden, between 
 the two walls, might be almost thought to be brought to- 
 gether designedly here ; so very clear and satisfactory is 
 the language : and the gardens which have been mentioned 
 as existing at the present day, below the Pool of Siloam, 
 are thus invested with peculiar interest, as there can be no 
 question that they occupy the very position of the royal 
 gardens mentioned in these passages 3 . 
 
 One word may now be added concerning the " two 
 walls." It was shewn above, from an incidental notice of 
 Josephus 4 , that there was a wall drawn from the pool of 
 Siloam along the eastern ridge of Mount Zion, above 
 the valley of the Tyropseon. The main wall was con- 
 tinued past Siloam, round the point of Ophel, and the space 
 between the two walls must evidently have been much con- 
 fined at the mouth of the Tyropseon, and consequently the 
 gate and the pool would be very clearly designated by this 
 peculiarity, that they were " between the two walls." 
 
 I think that no doubt can now remain as to the dis- 
 puted point of the Pool of Hezekiah for I have attempted 
 
 1 Nehem. ii. 14. 
 
 2 Ibid. iii. 15. 
 
 3 It is a singular fact that the same 
 is the case with Solomon's gardens of 
 Etham, below the noted pools. They 
 are still cultivated as gardens, still 
 
 known by the same name Etan. Eccles. 
 ii. 5, 6 ;' and Josephus, Ant. vm. vii. 
 3. See more below. 
 
 4 Above, p. 105, and Josephus, J. 
 W. v. vi. 1.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 399 
 
 to determine it from Scripture alone ; and I further venture 
 to hope that an additional reason has now been shewn for 
 the sense attached to " the city of David," in the passage 
 bearing on the subject. 
 
 There is still remaining, however, one point of great dif- 
 ficulty, upon which no observations which I have been able 
 to make, and no remarks which I have seen, afford the 
 slightest satisfaction. I mean the connexion between the 
 Fountain of the Virgin and the waters about the haram, 
 supposing such connexion to exist, as the tradition of the 
 natives, no less than the identity of the taste, renders very 
 probable. Why should the water have been brought at all 
 to this point, and thence continued through the rock to the 
 pool of Siloam, and not rather have been carried down direct 
 from the temple? I fear I can offer no satisfactory solu- 
 tion of this difficulty ; and the only hint that I can throw 
 out for the assistance of others is this, that there seems to 
 have existed a pool here even from the time of Solomon 5 , 
 which that king may have connected with the temple 6 , so 
 
 5 Josephus, J. W. v. iv. 2. 
 
 8 It is plain that a great quantity 
 of water must always have been re- 
 quired for sacred purposes in the tem- 
 ple. Is it not likely that Solomon may 
 have turned the brook Kedron into the 
 sacred precincts from the east, and 
 brought it out again at the Fountain of 
 the Virgin ? Dr Robinson says, " The 
 water is apparently brought hither by 
 some unknown, and perhaps artificial 
 channel." Bib. Res. i. p. 342. And 
 again, p. 507, he asks, " Was there 
 perhaps originally a small and failing 
 fountain here, to which afterwards other 
 waters were conducted from the tem- 
 ple ?" In 1 Kings i. 45, and 2 Chron. 
 xxxiii. 14, the Chaldee identifies Si- 
 
 loam with Gihon, which is the name 
 of the Nile. Gen. ii. 13. One reason 
 for this is said to be that the source 
 of Siloam, like that of the Nile, is ob- 
 scure. Reland's Palest, p. 859. He 
 quotes Theodoret, Qusest. n. in 1 
 Kings. 'JZiriov6fia.<rav Se Kal TOV 2t- 
 
 \ixifi FtjoJf eirei3i <cat aw-ros e 
 
 d<t>avwv efceuriv virov6p.u>v (oanrep o 
 NelXos. The rabbles give the same 
 explanation. I would further observe, 
 that if this water be supposed to pro- 
 ceed from the overflowings of the re- 
 servoirs under the mosk enclosure, the 
 irregular flow would be easily explained 
 by the quantity consumed at the bath, 
 in the haram, and about the Church of 
 the Flagellation. Dr Robinson throws
 
 400 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 that when Hezekiah had brought his aqueduct so far, he 
 may have been able to continue it by the old channel to a 
 point so near its destination, and so have found it unneces- 
 sary to bore a new conduit, except through that part of the 
 ridge of Ophel between the present Fountain and Pool. 
 
 To recapitulate very briefly. The upper spring of Gi- 
 hon once had its issue on the north side of the city, not 
 far from the tombs of the kings. Its water was originally 
 received into a pool called the Serpent's Pool, out of which it 
 flowed, probably down the Valley of Jehoshaphat. In order 
 to divert it from the uses of the enemy, and make it avail- 
 able to liis own people in case of siege, Hezekiah stopped the 
 upper fountain, and brought the water of the upper pool by 
 an aqueduct down the valley which bisected the city, as far 
 as the temple, where it supplied the reservoirs prepared by 
 himself or former kings, and then flowed off by an old channel 
 to the Fountain of the Virgin, and was continued through a 
 new bore to the Pool of Siloam, otherwise called the " Lower 
 Pool," and the " King's Pool," being in fact the veritable 
 "Pool of Hezekiah." 
 
 A few words must now be said on two pretenders to 
 that honour, one near St Ann's Church, on the east of the 
 city, supported by the chroniclers of the crusades ; the 
 other near the Jaffa gate at the west of the city, which 
 
 out a hint to the same effect, p. 507 ; 
 and again obstructions in the aqueduct 
 caused by the ruins of the city would 
 account for a variation which has been 
 noticed above in the ancient and modem 
 observations on the quantity of the 
 water. In continuation of this hypo- 
 thesis, it may be noticed that the rab- 
 bles had an idea that the overflowing 
 of the reservoirs under the temple, 
 which were continually replenished 
 
 from without, was carried off by a sub- 
 terraneous channel to the Pool of So- 
 lomon. See Lightfoot's Chorograph. 
 Inq. cap. v. sect. 5 ; where a few most 
 important hints for the elucidation of 
 the subject are thrown out. May not 
 the channel by which Omar was con- 
 ducted to the site of the temple have 
 been this identical aqueduct? See 
 above, p. 203.
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 401 
 
 can only shew the much later tradition originated by Qua- 
 resmius, and adopted by Dr Robinson. 
 
 As the former of these pools must have been without 
 the walls of the old city, and exactly at the weakest part 
 of the temple-enclosure, where the hostile armies so fre- 
 quently encamped, it is highly improbable, considering the 
 object of Hezekiah, that he would have formed a pool in 
 a situation so very convenient for the besieging army; nor 
 am I aware that any early authority can be shewn for 
 placing Hezekiah's Pool in this quarter. It was here that the 
 earlier Christians found "the Pool of Bethesda;" and this 
 tradition deserves a further notice. Josephus teaches us to 
 look for two pools in this quarter 1 . The one forming the 
 fosse of the temple, described also by Strabo, the other 
 forming the trench of Antonia ; Struthius was the name of 
 one or both. 
 
 That these are the two pools, or rather the double-pool 
 near the temple, described in the Jerusalem Itinerary of 333 2 , 
 there can be little doubt ; for although the author does not 
 fix them to the north of the temple-area, as neither does 
 Eusebius nor St Jerome 3 , in the same century, yet all these 
 writers agree in their testimony to these pools being the 
 Sheep-Pool, which we know was found by later writers in 
 this situation ; nor do we read of any other pools which 
 would answer the description. 
 
 It has been remarked by critics that St John, by his 
 
 J. w. v. xi. 
 
 8 it 
 
 Interius vero civitatis sunt pis- 
 cinae gemellares, quinque porticus ha- 
 bentes, quae appellantur Betsaida, (lege 
 Bethesda). Ibi aegri multorum an- 
 
 masticon of Eusebius writes, "Beth- 
 esda, piscina in Hierusalem, quae voca- 
 batur TrpopaTiKij, et a nobis interpre- 
 tari potest pecualis, haec quinque quon- 
 dam porticus habuit, ostendunturque 
 
 norum sanabantur." Itin. Hierosol. gemiui lacus," &c. 
 p. 152. j Euseb.) 
 
 3 St Jerome translating the Ono- I 
 
 26
 
 402 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 use of the present tense in speaking of Bethesda, intimates 
 that it had survived the destruction of Jerusalem, and was 
 still well known when he wrote his gospel, at the close of 
 the first century, which would form a strong presumption 
 for its continued preservation until the time of Constantine. 
 The pool is placed by this evangelist in the "sheep-market 1 ," 
 (CTTI Ttj TrpoftaTiKrj), but many commentators are of opinion 
 that the word gate should be supplied in this passage instead 
 of market, and it is certain that a "sheep-gate" is spoken of 
 in Scripture, but a " sheep-market " never. Now Nehemiah 
 will lead us to fix the " sheep-gate " on the north of the 
 temple 2 ; the traditions of the Jews will further give us not 
 only a "gate," but a large supply of water for the sacred 
 services on this quarter 3 ; and Josephus, whose mention of 
 the pools was lately referred to, also speaks of a northern 
 gate to the outer temple 4 . This gate, which led to Bezetha, 
 would be east of Antonia, between it and the pool, where 
 two gates are now found ; and I am strongly of opinion that 
 the vaulted passages at the west of the present pool, noticed 
 in the last chapter, both communicated with the fosse of An- 
 tonia and formed a passage to the gate, by a bridge over 
 the arches. That it was in this part that Cestius first, and 
 Titus afterwards, made their attack upon the outer temple 
 on the north, may be inferred from the impossibility of fill- 
 ing such a trench as that which at present exists, and pro- 
 
 1 John v. 2. 
 
 * See Nehem. iii. 1, 32. 
 
 3 Lightfoot, Prospect of the Tem- 
 ple, cap. vi. The name of the gate 
 seems doubtful from him. For the 
 baths in this quarter, see the same 
 work, cap. xxix. 4, and cap. xxxi. 
 
 4 J. W. n. xix. 5, where Cestius 
 assails the northern wall of the tem- 
 
 ple, and the soldiers prepare to fire the 
 gate. Here it is evident that the ap- 
 proach to the wall of the outer court was 
 easy ; no mention is made of filling in 
 the trench. See again, vi. ii. 7, where 
 banks are raised against the northern 
 wall ; and iv. 1, the foundations of the 
 northern gate are undermined.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 403 
 
 bably did exist at that period ; for the tradition is continuous 
 from the time to which it has been already brought down. 
 Unhappily, one of the " twin-pools," viz. that by the church 
 of St Ann, has now completely disappeared, but its position 
 may be very accurately determined by the language of 
 Christian writers, and the precise place which the fosse of 
 Antonia must have occupied 5 . 
 
 The water in one of these pools was of a peculiar red 
 appearance, which might perhaps be accounted for by the 
 cement with which it was lined, but was taken by earlier 
 writers to exhibit the signs of the use to which it was for- 
 merly put for washing the entrails of the victims which had 
 been offered in sacrifice 6 . Whence they derived their sup- 
 ply of water it is difficult to say. The existing pool, though 
 of an enormous size, was cased up to the top, as is evident 
 
 5 It is. sometimes said to be "ante 
 Ecclesiam Stse Annae;" elsewhere, "ad 
 latus Ecclesiae." Brocardus is more 
 exact : " Intrantibus portam vallis ad 
 sinistram occurrit juxtaviam Probatica 
 Piscina, ad dextram vero contra earn, 
 via intermedia, est piscina grandis 
 valde, qua dicebatur piscina interior, 
 hanc fecit Hezekias," &c. Descrip. 
 Ter. Sane, apud Canisii Thes. Vol. 
 iv. p. 18. Anselm (circ. 1509) is still 
 more accurate, and these two authors 
 will enable us to determine its posi- 
 tion with a great degree of certainty. 
 After speaking of the church of St 
 Anna, he says : " Non remote ab hac 
 JEcclesia, versus domum Pilati, habe- 
 tur alia piscina grandis," &c. It had 
 water then which he supposed to be 
 brought from the pools of Solomon. 
 The other pool was then dry. 
 
 6 "Aquam autem habent ea? pisci- 
 nas in modum coccini turbatam." Itin. 
 
 Hieros. p. 152. St Jerome translating 
 Eusebius, Onom., says of the " gemini 
 lacus, quorum unus hybernis pluviis 
 adimpleri solet ; alter mirum in modum 
 rubens, quasi cruentis aquis antiqui in 
 se operis signa testatur. Nam hostias 
 in eo lavari a sacerdotibus solitas 
 ferunt, unde et nomen (irjOo/JaTi/of) 
 accepit." William of Tyre does not 
 mention the peculiarity of the colour, 
 but says, " Usque hodie probatica pis- 
 cina reputatur, in qua olim immola- 
 titiae lavantur hostias," &c. vin. iv. 
 p. 749. It is a most remarkable con- 
 firmation of this that Lightfoot, with- 
 out any thought of Bethesda, shews 
 from the Rabbies that the entrails of 
 the victims were washed in a bath- 
 room, where there was a constant 
 supply of water, at the north of the 
 outer temple. Prospect of the Tem- 
 ple, xxxi. 
 
 262
 
 404 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 from its present appearance ; and the vaulted channels were 
 similarly provided for a full supply. Eusebius and St Jerome 
 say that one of the pools was usually filled with rain-water, 
 which would perhaps imply that the other was supph'ed from 
 a spring; and a later authority informs us that such was 
 actually the case 1 . Indeed, even so late as the 17th cen- 
 tury a countryman of our own 2 saw a small stream flowing 
 into the Pool of Bethesda, on the northern side, which must 
 have heen supplied by a fountain, and to this present day 
 there are frequent wells among the ruins about the church 
 of St Ann, containing water which there are no buildings 
 to receive or collect, and the natives have a tradition of 
 large subterranean cisterns in this quarter. All this would 
 countenance the idea that a branch of the aqueduct was car- 
 ried in this direction for the supply of these reservoirs, and 
 the excavation in the Church of the Flagellation was not im- 
 probably a part of it. 
 
 The name given to one or both these pools by Josephus 
 is Struihius ; and the received interpretation of this word is 
 remarkably confirmatory of the tradition, although there can- 
 not be any intentional coincidence. It appears that Struthium 
 is the name of a root the ashes of which form a strong alkali, 
 much used in making soap ; and the corresponding Hebrew 
 word is translated " soap " in the only passages in which 
 it occurs in the Bible 3 . "Bethesda," it is now generally 
 
 1 See the quotation from William 
 of Tyre, above, p. 389, n. 6. 
 
 8 "...into which a barren spring 
 doth drill, from between the stones of 
 the northward wall, and stealeth away 
 almost undiscerned." Sandys' Travels, 
 p. 149. The most probable account of 
 this small spring is that, on the filling 
 up of the other pool, which took place 
 
 before Sandys' visit, the water forced 
 a passage for itself through the ground 
 to the Birket Israil. 
 
 3 Jeremiah ii. 22, and Mai. iii. 2. 
 JTH2, is the Hebrew word. " Boritt, 
 i. e. herba fullonum : puta a-rpovQiov, 
 aut saponaria. Talmudici in locum 
 Jerem. ii. 22, dicunt, ' Nitrum et borith, 
 t. e. Cimolia (or Kimolia) et asleg ad
 
 OH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 405 
 
 agreed, signifies " the house of effusion or washing," and it 
 is highly probable that the Greek word used by Josephus 
 was intended as a translation of this Hebrew name, consider- 
 ing that the identity of situation is proved by independent 
 arguments. 
 
 On the whole, then, it would appear that the tradition 
 which marks the Birket Israil as the " Pool of Bethesda " 
 has much to be said in its favour, and I am not aware of 
 any arguments against it. The five porches have long since 
 disappeared; they may have formed a bath-room on some 
 part of the pool, which was devoted to such as sought the 
 benefit of those miraculous virtues with which the waters 
 were gifted, apparently at uncertain intervals, by the descent 
 of the angel ; as there were other chambers for various pur- 
 poses adjoining the pool, with cisterns and fountains supplied 
 from its waters, which were probably derived from the upper 
 pool by the aqueduct of Hezekiah, and were received first 
 into the large pool which is now filled up, from whence they 
 flowed to the Pool of Bethesda, by those covered channels 
 the ruins of which are still to be seen. 
 
 The Birket el Hummam, as has been shewn above, has 
 little to be said in proof of its connexion with Hezekiah, 
 and is unnoticed by Christian writers until comparatively 
 recent times 4 , nor is there the slightest evidence of its ever 
 having had any connexion with a fountain. It was probably 
 always supplied, as at present, from the large receptacle with- 
 out the city, now called the "Pool of Mamilla 5 ," which "lies 
 
 lavandam vestem maculatam.' 
 est Persicum aslengi. Arabes vocant 
 Condus. Graeci a-rpovBiov unde cr-rpov- 
 0icu/. Romani radiculam et herbam 
 lanaicam, quia ut Plinius auctor est, 
 lavandis lanis succum habet, mirum 
 quantum conferens candor} etmollitiae." 
 
 Bochart. Geogr. Sac. Part u. ch. xiv. 
 p. 455. "Nihil fere excepta radice 
 Struthion est." Pliny apud Bochart. 
 
 I. c. See also Poole's Synopsis, ad loc. 
 
 4 See above for a fuller account, Pt. 
 
 II. chap. i. p. 269. 
 
 4 Yet I am not aware of any earlier
 
 406 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 in the basin forming the head of the Valley of Hinnom, about 
 seven hundred yards W.N.W. from the Jaffa gate." The 
 waters collected by this pool immediately flow off through a 
 sluice at the bottom into the " rude conduit " which conveys 
 it into the Pool of the Bath, and the character both of the 
 pools and of the aqueduct are strongly against the antiquity 
 which has lately been claimed for them ; for not only is 
 the latter utterly insignificant, whereas the conduit of Heze- 
 kiah was obviously a large and important work, but the 
 former does not at all resemble the ancient pools, one of 
 which we shall presently be called to examine. Besides 
 which, the intentions of the king could never have been 
 answered by the works in question, supposing them to be 
 his, as the Upper Pool and the aqueduct must always have 
 been visible and available to the besieging army. Lastly, I 
 am not aware that there is any authority from ancient writers 
 for calling the upper part of the Valley of Hinnom by the 
 name of Gihon, which is identified by Jewish and early 
 Christian writers with Siloam 1 , to which we will now return, 
 in order to examine another well of living water in its im- 
 mediate neighbourhood. 
 
 This is the Bir Eyub, the well of Job, at the point 
 where the three valleys of Jerusalem, viz. Hinnom, Kedron, 
 and the Tyropseon, meet at the south-east of the city, between 
 the Mount of Offence and the Hill of Evil Counsel. This 
 is properly a well cut through the rock at the lower part, 
 and built above with solid masonry. It is 125 feet deep, 
 and the quantity of water varies with the season. In the 
 rainy season it frequently overflows, but I was not so happy 
 
 notice of this outer pool than William 
 of Tyre, who seems to describe it as 
 " Lacus Patriarch, quod est juxta 
 
 veins c.-i-ui i u-ri un i in vpelunca qua? cog. 
 
 m>, inn, urn Leonis." viu. ii. p. 747- 
 
 1 See above, p. 399, n. (j, and Re- 
 land's Palestine, p. 859.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 407 
 
 as to witness this phenomenon during the two winters of 
 my sojourn at Jerusalem. But on one occasion, after an in- 
 terval of some days without rain, the appearance was as if 
 a strong current were flowing through the well, the water 
 of which was sparkling with the rapidity of its motion. This 
 well is supposed to be identical with the Enrogel of Scrip- 
 ture, which must certainly have been in this neighbourhood 2 . 
 If such is really the case, its disappearance at various inter- 
 vals from the annals of history must be accounted for by 
 the supposition of its being stopped from time to time in 
 order to conceal it from the enemy 3 . Its connexion with 
 Nehemiah, by whose name it is also called 4 , is not so obvious; 
 nor does any probable reason for its modern appellation ap- 
 pear in history. But if we adopt the name of the Jewish 
 Itinerary of the 16th century 5 , supported as it is by the 
 tradition of the Greek Christians, who call the well by the 
 name of Joab, not of Job 6 , we may well connect it with a 
 passage in the scripture narrative. Enrogel was the scene 
 of Adonijah's attempt on the kingdom, at the close of his 
 father David's life 7 , and Joab was the most noted of his 
 partizans ; and this may have given occasion to call the well 
 after the son of Zeruiah, celebrated as the captain of the 
 host during the long reign of king David. 
 
 8 Josh. xv. 7, 8 ; and xviii. 16, 17. 
 
 3 William of Tyre and others of 
 the earlier chroniclers of the crusades 
 knew nothing of it ; but he and they 
 say plainly that the besieged had stop- 
 ped all the fountains about the city. 
 vni. iv. p. 749. 
 
 4 This name does not appear earlier 
 than the close of the 16th century, ac- 
 cording to Dr Robinson, B. R. i. 491. 
 
 5 Bib. Res. ibid. 
 
 6 So the 1lpo<TKvvi]Tdpiov writes it : 
 irriydStov TOV 'Iom/3. p. 84. 
 
 7 1 Kings i. There is an interest- 
 ing notice of this well in the very 
 curious " History of the Temple at 
 Jerusalem," (to which reference has 
 been made above, Pt. i. chap, iv.) 
 p. 141 of the translation. On p. 140 
 may be found a reason for the name 
 of the Fountain of the Virgin, different 
 from that assigned by Christians, and 
 quite as probable. The overflow of 
 the well of Job in winter is noticed, 
 and the writer says that flour-mills were 
 turned by the water.
 
 408 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 It is difficult to account for the abundant supply of 
 water in this well. I was strongly persuaded from the first 
 that it does not rise here, but merely flows through it; and 
 its appearance, as above described, confirmed me in this 
 opinion. Had the water been identical in taste with that of 
 Siloam, it might easily have been connected with the Foun- 
 tain of the Virgin ; but such is not the case. Nor does any 
 hypothesis suggest itself by way of solution but the follow- 
 ing, which I submit with great diffidence. Among Hezekiah's 
 other acts we are told that " he stopped . . . the brook that 
 ran through the midst of the land," and this would appear 
 to be a distinct work from that connected with Gihon, which 
 has been already considered l . This " brook " has been iden- 
 tified with the Kedron 2 . May there not have been another 
 fountain besides that of Gihon, whose water flowed down 
 the Valley of Jehoshaphat, and which it was necessary to 
 divert for the same purpose ? There is no memorial, so far 
 as I am aware, of any stream having flowed down the bed 
 of the Kedron ; but the writers of the middle ages believed 
 that its waters found a passage beneath the dry bed of the 
 torrent. The Church of the Virgin, by the Garden of Geth- 
 semane, is so far below the present level of the valley, that 
 the descent to it is by fifty steps, and their idea was that 
 this is really the bed of the valley, but that it has been 
 filled up by the ruins of the ancient city thrown down from 
 above 3 . Below this they imagined that the torrent found 
 its way, and Brocardus goes so far as to say that the mur- 
 mur of its waters might be heard when they had been in- 
 creased by the winter rains 4 . It may be remarked, in con- 
 
 1 2 Chron. xxxii. 4, 30. 
 
 y See Poole's Synopsis, in loc. 
 
 3 Bib. Res. i. p. 346, n. 1. 
 
 4 "Sub qua [scil. Ecclesia] etiam 
 
 torrens Cedron, aquis pluvialibus fac- 
 tus tumidior, hybernis mensibus de- 
 fluere consuevit." William of Tyre, 
 viii. ii. 747. ..." torrens Cedron, qui
 
 CH. III.1 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 409 
 
 firmation of this, that there is a tank of water below this 
 church, and another lower down the valley, near the Pillar 
 of Absalom 5 . The water in these reservoirs fails during the 
 summer, from whence it would appear that they are filled 
 from the brook when increased by the rains, but are not 
 fed with a constant supply, as is the case with the Bir Eyub, 
 which I imagine opens down to the main stream of the tor- 
 rent; which would satisfactorily account for its overflowing 
 occasionally during the rainy season. 
 
 There remains yet one more pool to be noticed, which 
 is situated in the Valley of Hinnom, up which we may now 
 proceed from the Well of Job. We here pass under Acel- 
 dama, or "the Field of Blood," on the left; a spot which was 
 likely to be preserved in memory by its distinctive name and 
 use, and the tradition of which reaches back as far as St 
 Jerome 6 . In its neighbourhood are many other tombs exca- 
 vated in the valley-side, in some of which may be seen 
 traces of painting, and inscriptions in Greek and Hebrew, too 
 much effaced by time to be clearly deciphered. This hill, 
 
 colligitur de superioribus partibus civi- 
 tatis versus aquilonem juxta Rama et 
 Anathoth, et (non) longe de Sepulchro 
 Dominae nostrae Sanctae Mariee auditur 
 ejus murmuratio sub terra descendens, 
 juxta natatoria Siloe sub monte Often- 
 sionis, in vallem Tophet sive Gehen- 
 non." Brocardi Des. Terr. Sanct. 
 apud Canisii Thes. Man. Vol. iv. p. 
 18. 
 
 5 Bartlett's Walks, pp. 122, 3. 
 
 6 For this and the tombs, see Bib . 
 Res. I. 523, &c. It should be re- 
 marked that this name was also given 
 to another parcel of ground in the 
 Valley of Jehoshaphat. It would have 
 
 prevented confusion if the burial-place 
 had been called "the potter's field," 
 (Matth. xxvii. 3, &c.) and the scene 
 of that awful event recorded in Acts i. 
 18, 19, " the field of blood." For they 
 are supposed to be distinct localities, 
 though both called by a common name, 
 which may explain an inconsistency 
 between Eusebius and St Jerome, of 
 which Dr Robinson does not fail to 
 take advantage. Biblioth. Sacr. Pt. u. 
 p. 17W. The scene of the second event 
 was shewn near Absalom's Hand. Sir 
 J. Maundeville, p. 112, (edit. 1727) 
 notices both. So also does Alaundrell, 
 under date April 6, pp. 101, 2.
 
 410 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 which Dr Clarke supposed was Mount Zion 1 , is commonly 
 marked as " the Hill of Evil Counsel," so designated from the 
 iniquitous bargain of the traitor Judas, said to have been 
 concluded in the country-house of Caiaphas, the ruins of which 
 are still shewn on its summit ; and it is a very singular fact 
 that Josephus, in his account of the wall of circumvallation, 
 does notice the monument of Ananus the high priest in this 
 neighbourhood, which Ananus is none other than " Annas, the 
 father-in-law of Caiaphas," and his assessor and adviser in 
 the awful crime here referred to 2 . The coincidence is very 
 curious; and had Josephus been a Christian historian of later 
 times, and a defender of the Ecclesiastical Traditions, he could 
 scarcely have escaped the suspicion of an attempt to connect 
 this family with the hill, in order to give some support to the 
 story in question. 
 
 Proceeding now up the Valley of Hinnom, we arrive at 
 the large pool, commonly called " Birket es-Sultan," marked 
 in modern plans as " the Lower Pool of Gihon," without any 
 warrant whatever. It is beyond all doubt an ancient pool, 
 as a comparison with the Pools of Solomon, south of Beth- 
 lehem, would prove. It is formed, as are they, " by the 
 erection of stone barriers across the valley, squaring the 
 rocky sides, and clearing out the soil 3 ;" and in this it differs 
 materially from the " Pool of Mamilla," " the sides of which 
 are built up with hewn stones laid in cement 4 ," as is also the 
 
 1 Simply from the fact of some of 
 them bearing the inscription THC 
 AFIAC CIQN. One would have 
 thought it did not require much eru- 
 dition to supply ITOAITHC, or some- 
 thing equivalent, effaced by time. 
 
 3 John xviii. 13. See again Acts 
 iv. 6; Joseph. J. W. v. xii. 2; and 
 Reland's Catalogue of the High Priests 
 
 in Whiston, Ant. xx. viii. 5, note. 
 These tombs were mostly in gardens, 
 attached to country-houses ; so that 
 Annas, one of his relatives, may be well 
 supposed to have had a country-house 
 on this hill. 
 
 3 Bartlett's Walks, p. 59. Com- 
 pare Bib. Res. i. 485. 
 
 4 Bib. Res. i. p. 484, &c.
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 411 
 
 " Pool of the Bath" within the city, a fact which is strongly 
 against their great antiquity. The Pool of the Sultan is 
 said by William of Tyre to have been celebrated in the 
 times of the kings of Judah 5 ; but as he does not refer to any 
 passages in Holy Scripture, it is impossible to determine what 
 was the Christian tradition at that period relating to the 
 pool. The earliest distinct notice which we have of it is in the 
 account of the rebuilding of the walls after the Babylonish 
 captivity, in a passage which also assigns the " Sepulchres of 
 David" to the part of Mount Zion above the pool, where 
 they are stiU found 6 . It has there no proper name given it, 
 being described merely as " the pool that was made." The 
 modern tradition which would make this the bath of Bath- 
 sheba, is worthy of no consideration; nor has any satisfactory 
 reason been assigned for its present native appellation, which, 
 however, would probably be supph'ed by an inscription on 
 the Saracenic fountain 7 at the south of the pool. This foun- 
 tain, which is now dry, appears to have been formerly sup- 
 plied by a branch of the aqueduct, which has already been 
 frequently alluded to, but which here demands a fuller notice. 
 
 It formerly conveyed the waters of three fountains from 
 the neighbourhood of Solomon's Pools to the Holy City. It 
 is now in ruins, but the water still runs as far as Bethlehem, 
 and the aqueduct may be traced along the steep mountain- 
 sides, throughout the whole of its winding course. The level 
 is preserved almost throughout, by following the natural 
 formation of the ground, not by artificial contrivance, nor is 
 the construction of the aqueduct at all remarkable for the 
 solidity of its masonry. It is in some parts composed of 
 earthen pipes, roughly covered with stones, but elsewhere 
 
 5 viii. ii. p. 747. 
 
 6 Nehem. iii. 16. 
 
 7 Reported to have been built by 
 
 Sultan Suleiman Ben Selim, A. D. 
 152026, from whom the pool may 
 derive its name.
 
 412 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 the channel is formed by casing the stones with cement. On 
 reaching the Valley of Hinnom, its waters were divided into 
 two courses, one of which, as has been observed, crossed the 
 valley below the Birket es-Sultan, while the other, after 
 skirting that pool on its west side, was carried over nine 
 low arches, which still remain in a state of decent repair 1 . 
 
 There is on this part of the aqueduct an Arabic inscrip- 
 tion, which will well introduce an inquiry into its history, 
 which has been hitherto much involved in obscurity. It is 
 to the following effect : " In the name of the most merciful 
 God, our Lord the Sultan, el-Melik en-Nassir, the Lord of 
 the Faith and of the Faithful, Mohammed, son of the Sultan 
 el-Melik el-Mansoon Kelaoon, ordered this blessed aqueduct to 
 be built." Unfortunately where the date was, the stone is 
 broken, but Sultan Mohammed, Ibn Kelaoon, one of the 
 Baharite dynasty in Egypt, reigned between 693 and 741 of 
 the Heg. (1294 1340, A.D.)* The first direct allusion to it 
 in Christian writers occurs about this time 3 , and it is most 
 improbable that, had it existed at an earlier period, it would 
 have been passed over by the chroniclers of the crusades, 
 who are so particular in their account of all that relates to 
 the waters of Jerusalem. Yet there is a much earlier notice, 
 which might be taken to refer to this part of the aqueduct 4 , 
 
 1 Its further course round Mount 
 Zion and along its eastern ridge with- 
 in the modern city, where it is still to 
 be traced under the foundation of the 
 buildings, until it crosses the Tyro- 
 paeon by the causeway, may be seen in 
 the Plan, and has been already in part 
 described. (See above, p. "275.) Messrs. 
 Woolcott and Tipping explored the 
 part within the city for 400 or 500 feet 
 along Mount Zion, but could not reach 
 the causeway. See Biblioth. Sacr. Pt. 
 
 i. pp. 31, 2. 
 
 * I am here indebted to Dr Schultz, 
 his Prussian majesty's worthy repre- 
 sentative at Jerusalem. 
 
 3 " The Itineraries of William of 
 Baldensel and Rudolph de Suchem." 
 (A. D. 13361350.) Rob. 1. c. 
 
 4 Adamnanus, circ. 697, i. 17, (cited 
 by Dr Robinson, p. 516, n. 2) mentions 
 an arched bridge of stone, crossing the 
 valley in this place.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 413 
 
 and which, independently of an ancient and well-authenticated 
 Jewish tradition, would dispose me to believe that the Sultan 
 here named did not originally build, but only restore the 
 aqueduct after it had continued some centuries in ruins. 
 
 The Jewish writers, in their records of the second temple, 
 with one voice relate that " in the way betwixt Hebron and 
 Jerusalem, is the Fountain of Etam, from whence the waters 
 are conveyed by pipes into the great pool at Jerusalem 5 " for 
 the uses of the temple. And there was towards the south of 
 the temple-area, a place called " the coming down of the 
 water 6 ," corresponding to the situation of the causeway, by 
 which the present aqueduct is carried to the haram. Now 
 Etam or Etham, Josephus tells us, was the name of that 
 place where the pleasure-gardens of the great king Solomon 
 were situated 7 ; and Holy Scripture would teach us to look 
 for the gardens in the neighbourhood of the pools, which 
 were constructed with a view to the gardens, as Solomon 
 himself informs us 8 . It is a most gratifying fact, that not 
 only has the name of this interesting locality been perpetuated 
 among the natives to this day, but the very spot is still 
 marked by gardens, the largest and most luxuriant that are 
 to be met with in the whole of the mountain-region of Judea. 
 The three Pools of Solomon, on the road to Hebron, which 
 need not be here described, are situated at the head of a 
 valley named Wady Etan, and the aqueduct, which derives 
 its supply of water from three tributary fountains, has its 
 
 5 See Lightfoot, Chorographical In- 
 quiry, cap. v. sect. 5, and Fragmenta 
 Topograph. cap. ii. sect. 1, and Pros- 
 pect of the Temple, cap. xxiii. 
 
 6 Prospect, 1. c. 
 
 ' Ant. vin. vii. 3. 
 8 Eccles. ii. 5, 6. " I made me 
 gardens and orchards, and I planted 
 
 trees in them of all kinds of fruits : I 
 made me pools of water, to water there- 
 with the wood that bringeth forth 
 trees." The distance of these gardens 
 of Etham from Jerusalem is stated by 
 Josephus at 50 furlongs, which exactly 
 coincides with the existing gardens.
 
 414 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 proper commencement below the lowest of these pools, from 
 whence it runs along the western side of Wady Etan to 
 Bethlehem. In the bed of the valley, below the aqueduct, is 
 another copious fountain, " Ain Etan," and around this foun- 
 tain are the gardens just mentioned 1 . 
 
 This remarkable and unlooked-for corroboration of the 
 Jewish tradition must compel us to believe that there was an 
 aqueduct from the Pools of Solomon to the Temple at Jeru- 
 salem during the later years of its existence. It need not 
 prove more than this, for the Talmudic descriptions of the 
 Holy House are obviously gathered from writings which date 
 from the latest period of its existence ; and there is not the 
 slightest intimation of such an aqueduct in the Sacred Records, 
 or in the Apocrypha. I am disposed to believe that this 
 work was originally planned and constructed by a Roman 
 procurator, whose name has obtained a bad notoriety in the 
 Christian Church ; for among other tyrannical acts, whereby 
 Pontius Pilate offended the prejudices and excited the indig- 
 nation of the Jews, it is mentioned that he expended the 
 sacred treasure called " Corban" on aqueducts, whereby he 
 brought water to the city from a distance of four hundred 
 furlongs 2 . Now if this language may be taken to refer to 
 the whole length of the aqueduct, as from the nature of the- 
 case I think it must, and not to the actual distance of its 
 commencement in a direct line from the city, then it will 
 very well describe the existing aqueduct, which must certainly 
 traverse nearly eight times the direct distance between its 
 commencement and termination : nor am I aware of any 
 historical notices or present traces of an aqueduct in any 
 
 1 Visited and fully explored by the 
 writer, Sept. 20, 1842, and April 29, 
 1843. 
 
 8 Joseph. .7. W. ii. ix. 4. The 
 
 words are icaTJJye Se dir6 TeTptKO<ri<av 
 vTaSiwv but some copies read Tpia- 
 Koaiiov, and others fiiaKoo-iiov. See 
 Hudson's Annot. in loc.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 415 
 
 other quarter which could be referred to Pilate, though it 
 seems probable that some remains of a work so large, and 
 comparatively so recent, should have continued to Christian 
 times. Might it not be that the final designation of this 
 supply of water to the temple was the governor's plea for 
 the application of the sacred fund to this undertaking ? 
 
 It has been already remarked, that in the event of a 
 siege this aqueduct could only have been a boon to the 
 enemy 3 , and hence it is probable that it would be cut off by 
 the besieged on the first outbreak of hostilities. This will ac- 
 count for its disappearance from history for so many centuries, 
 until it was restored by Sultan Mohammed at the commence- 
 ment of the fourteenth century, as the inscription testifies. 
 
 Before leaving this quarter, it will be well to take some 
 notice of the Tombs of David, which occupy that part of Mount 
 Zion immediately above the pool and aqueduct which have 
 last engaged our attention. That such was their position is 
 clear from the language of Nehemiah lately referred to, in 
 his account of the rebuilding of the walls 4 , where " the sepul- 
 chres of David and the pool that was made" are placed 
 together between " Siloah" and " the house of the mighty ;" 
 which last appears to have occupied the south-west angle of 
 Zion 5 , as " the armoury at the turning of the wall" was 
 situated at the north-west angle, and was afterwards con- 
 verted into the Hippie tower, and is still represented by the 
 Castle of David 6 . 
 
 3 See above, p. 378. 
 
 4 Nehem. iii. 1619. 
 
 5 The description determines it to 
 this neighbourhood, and I cannot help 
 thinking that the scarped rock on the 
 brow of Mount Zion at this angle, 
 noticed also by Dr Robinson, (Bib. 
 Res. i. 459), may have formed the 
 
 foundation of this strong-hold. 
 
 8 There can be no question that 
 " the armoury at the turning of the 
 wall," mentioned by Nehemiah, 1. c. 
 is " the tower" which king Uzziah 
 built " at the turning of the wall," 
 2 Chron. xxvi. 9; and since it must 
 have been near this spot, as is evident
 
 416 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 But the passage of Nehemiah further proves that the 
 Tomb of David was recovered after the Captivity, and from 
 this period we have occasional notices of it until near the 
 destruction of Jerusalem by Titus. It is plain that the 
 Chaldeans had no knowledge of its locality, or at least not of 
 the treasures which it was reputed to contain, or they would 
 not have abstained from the plunder. It was reserved for a 
 high priest to violate its sanctity, and to ransack its treasures. 
 Hyrcanus, the son of Simon the Maccabee, and his successor 
 in the princely and priestly dignity, is said to have spoiled it 
 of three thousand talents, which will account for the disap- 
 pointment of Herod the Great, who, when he had penetrated 
 these mansions of the dead, found nothing to satisfy his 
 cupidity, save some furniture of gold, and other precious 
 treasures, which he carried away 1 . Josephus adds that his 
 attempt to explore the inner recesses of the sepulchre, where 
 the bodies of David and Solomon were deposited, was de- 
 feated by supernatural agency, and that, in a fit of com- 
 punction for the desecration, he erected a white marble monu- 
 ment at the entrance to the sepulchres. Later still we have 
 an inspired testimony to the preservation of the tomb, where 
 St Peter decla'res of the prophet David, that "he is both 
 dead and buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto this day 2 ." 
 
 From this period it disappears from the notices of Jeru- 
 salem for many centuries, until it is again referred to by a 
 Jewish writer of the eleventh century. I am not aware that 
 the slightest traces are to be found of the tradition for these 
 thousand years; and this would form a strong presumption 
 against its preservation or recovery, unless the following may 
 
 from Nehemiah's description, there can 
 be little doubt that it was on this site 
 that Herod built his angular tower 
 Hippicus, as he converted the old Haris 
 
 into Antonia. 
 
 1 See Joseph. Ant. xin. viii. 4 
 and xvi. vii. 1. 
 
 2 Acts ii. 29.
 
 CH. HI.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 417 
 
 be admitted as a probable solution of the difficulty. It ap- 
 peared in the last chapter how little regard the Christians 
 paid to the objects of Jewish devotion in the city; even the 
 site of Solomon's Temple was neglected or insulted. Pro- 
 bably they would not regard with very peculiar interest the 
 Tomb of David, especially if the interest of the locality in 
 this view happened to be eclipsed by another, association of 
 more deep importance to Christians. Such does indeed seem 
 to have been the fact ; and indeed at this day the tradition 
 of the Tomb of David, though universally received among the 
 Christians, is not the tradition which attracts their affections 
 to the spot. The Jews and Mahommedans reverence it in this 
 view, the Christians connect it with important events in the 
 history of our Lord and his Church 3 . 
 
 From a very early period they have been taught, rightly 
 or wrongly, to regard a chamber in the pile of buildings 
 surrounding the tomb, as the upper room consecrated by the 
 institution of the perfecting Sacrament of our Redemption, 
 where also our Lord appeared to the assembled apostles after 
 his resurrection, and where the Holy Ghost descended visi- 
 bly on the believers on the day of Pentecost. It is related 
 by Epiphanius that this building, and a few others in its 
 vicinity, escaped destruction on the desolation by Titus, and 
 that this chamber was the church of the faithful after their 
 return from Pella. Epiphanius wrote towards the close of the 
 fourth century, and his testimony may at least be taken to 
 
 3 The HpocrKwij-rdpiov, or Greek 
 pilgrim's guide, mentions the following 
 events as having taken place here: 
 our Lord's last Passover, with the in- 
 stitution of the Holy Supper, and the 
 washing of the disciples' feet ; His ap- 
 pearance after the resurrection, and 
 the conviction of doubting Thomas ; 
 
 27 
 
 the gift of the Holy Ghost on the day 
 of Pentecost ; and the residence and 
 death of the Blessed Virgin. Other 
 accounts mention the burial of St Ste- 
 phen. The Greek work mentions, fi- 
 nally, the tombs of David, with un- 
 doubting faith, but does not dwell upon 
 it. pp. 83, 4.
 
 418 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 prove that the Christian tradition at that date assigned to 
 this church a far higher antiquity than to the Martyrium of 
 the Resurrection ; and therefore we may well believe that, 
 although the Bordeaux pilgrim, who visited Jerusalem while 
 Constantine's church was in the course of erection, makes no 
 express mention of the building, he intended it to be under- 
 stood in his notice of the blood-stained column on Mount 
 Zion, which St Jerome teaches us to connect with this church ; 
 while the intermediate reference to it by St Cyril is a strong 
 confirmation of the evidence to its high antiquity 1 . From 
 this time it is duly noted by all Christian writers among 
 the sacred localities of Jerusalem, but, as was observed, 
 simply for its association with those important incidents in 
 the history of the Christian Church which have just been 
 mentioned. 
 
 It is during the occupation of Jerusalem by the crusaders 
 that we find the notice of the Tomb of David, above alluded 
 to ; which may serve to connect it with this spot. The fol- 
 lowing remarkable story is told by Benjamin of Tudela. On 
 Mount Zion are the sepulchres of the house of David, and 
 those of the kings who reigned after him. In consequence of 
 the following circumstance, however, this place is hardly to be 
 recognized at present. Fifteen years ago one of the walls 
 of the place of worship on Mount Zion fell down, which the 
 patriarch ordered the priest to repair. He commanded to 
 take stones from the original wall of Zion, and to employ them 
 for that purpose, which command was obeyed. Two labourers, 
 who were engaged in digging stones from the very foundation 
 
 1 The references are given by Dr 
 Robinson, Bib. Res. i. 357, " 2, 3. 
 Even this writer says, " It is appa- 
 rently the same spot, and perhaps the 
 
 same building referred to by Cyril in 
 the 4th century, as the church of the 
 apostles, where they were said to be 
 assembled on the day of Pentecost."
 
 CH. III.] THE HOLY CITY. 419 
 
 of the walls of Zion, happened to meet with one which 
 formed the mouth of a cavern. They agreed to enter the 
 cave and to search for treasure, and in pursuit of this object 
 they penetrated to a large hall supported by pillars of marble, 
 encrusted with gold and silver, before which stood a table 
 with a golden sceptre and crown. This was the sepulchre of 
 David king of Israel, to the left of which they saw that of 
 Solomon, and of all the kings of Judah who were buried there. 
 They further saw locked chests, and desired to enter the hah 1 
 to examine them, but a blast of wind, like a storm, issued 
 forth from the mouth of the cavern, and prostrated them 
 almost lifeless on the ground. They lay in this state until 
 evening, when they heard a voice commanding them to rise 
 up and go forth from the place. They proceeded terror- 
 stricken to the patriarch, and informed him of what had 
 occurred. He summoned Rabbi Abraham el Constantini, a 
 pious ascetic, one of the mourners of the downfall of Jerusa- 
 lem, and caused the two labourers to repeat the occurrence in 
 his presence. Rabbi Abraham hereupon informed the patri- 
 arch that they had discovered the sepulchres of the house of 
 David and of the kings of Judah. The patriarch ordered the 
 place to be walled up, so as to hide it effectually from every 
 one to the present day. The narrator closes his account with 
 these words: " The above-mentioned Rabbi Abraham told 
 me all this."" This is a staggering assertion from one so 
 trustworthy as Benjamin of Tudela generally is 2 , and the cir- 
 cumstantiality and consistency of the narrative is remarkable 
 for a writer of that age. Without then attempting to deter- 
 mine the proportions of truth and fiction in this marvellous 
 story, I would offer the following observations. 
 
 - See a candid estimate of this writer by Dr Robinson, Bib. Res. in. 
 Appendix I. p. 7- 
 
 272
 
 420 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 Benjamin of Tudela says that in Ms day, soon after 
 A.D. 1160, "there was no building on Zion save one Christian 
 church, doubtless the Ccenaculum 1 ; " so that this must have 
 been the church which the patriarch was wishing to repair. The 
 stones for the work would of course be taken from that part 
 of the ruined wall of Zion nearest to the building. The nature 
 of the ground shews that the wall must have passed at no 
 great distance from the Ccenaculum, on this part of Mount 
 Zion 2 , while the language of Nehemiah, above adduced, fur- 
 ther proves that the wall of Zion passed near the sepulchres 
 of David on this same quarter. I may again repeat what has 
 been said of other sites, that these coincidences are very ex- 
 traordinary, if the traditions are nothing more than random 
 guesses, and that this agreement of the localities is, on this 
 supposition, still more "singular" than the "juxtaposition 
 of the two superstitions 3 ." 
 
 The account here given of its concealment of the tombs, 
 both before and after their accidental discovery in the 12th 
 century, would explain their disappearance from the annals 
 of history for so many centuries before 4 , and for the silence 
 of the chroniclers of the crusades after this period. The 
 earliest intimation of their alleged recovery by the Mahom- 
 medans is in the 15th century 5 , while the Minorites were still 
 
 1 Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 359, n. 1. 
 
 2 See Plan of Jerusalem for the 
 probable course of this wall. 
 
 8 Bib. Res. Vol. i. p. 357. 
 
 4 See two very curious notices of 
 the sepulchres of David, in Epipha- 
 nius advers. Hares. Lib. xi. p. 702, 
 and in the Paschal Chronicle, p. 155, 
 (quoted by Reland sub voce Gabaoth. 
 Palest, p. 770), which imply that some 
 few knew the entrance to them in those 
 times. 
 
 6 Dr Robinson dates the first notice 
 of the tombs, 1479. B. R. i. 358. But 
 Sir J. Maundeville, 132256, speaks 
 of David, Solomon, and his successors, 
 being buried in Mount Zion, in a man- 
 ner which may perhaps imply that 
 their sepulchre was known by tradition 
 in his day. p. Ill, ed. 1727. The Ma- 
 hommedan history of the temple at Je- 
 rusalem is silent on the point, although 
 it mentions all for which Jerusalem was 
 celebrated among the Moslems.
 
 CH. Ill 
 
 .] THE HOLY CITY. 421 
 
 in occupation of the church and convent of Zion, from which 
 they were subsequently expelled in the 16th century. What 
 the Mahommedans have to shew no Christian knows, but the 
 Sheikh of the " Tomb of David" does certainly profess to be 
 guardian of a chamber below ground, which is worth seeing. 
 The Latin monks still continue the practice of washing the 
 pilgrims 1 feet in the Ccenaculum on Maundy Thursday, in 
 commemoration of one of the passages in scripture history, 
 which they, in common with all the Christians of Jerusalem, 
 believe to have been transacted in this chamber. 
 
 There remains one other locality in this part on which 
 it will be necessary to observe very briefly, and that is the 
 town-house of Caiaphas the high priest, where our Lord was 
 judged. It stands between the tomb of David and the city- 
 wall, very near the Zion gate. It is now in the hands of the 
 Armenians, and is, as usual, adorned with legendary stories of 
 such a description as have served more than any arguments 
 to bring the ancient traditions into contempt with those who 
 have either no temper or no opportunity to qualify them- 
 selves, by a careful examination of evidence, for the delicate 
 task of separating truth from fiction ; a course which, although 
 it is not always easy or pleasant, yet seems to be due to those 
 who have not only preserved to us these comparatively un- 
 important particulars, but have been the appointed instru- 
 ments for handing down the precious deposit of Christian 
 faith committed to them for this end. 
 
 With regard to this particular tradition, it is more 
 unsatisfactory than any which has been hitherto examined, 
 because while it is certain that the memorial of the house of 
 Caiaphas was delivered down from high antiquity, yet the 
 tradition does not appear to have been permanently fixed by 
 any building until the time of the Crusades. That the site
 
 422 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 of the house of Caiaphas was known in this quarter, is at- 
 tested by the Bordeaux pilgrim, (A. D. 333), but that there 
 was no church on the spot in the 12th century, is apparent 
 from the language of Benjamin of Tudela already cited ; and 
 it is not until the 14th century that Marinus Sanutus, and 
 Sir John Maundeville about the same date, witness to the 
 existence of a chapel marking the spot 1 . 
 
 There is yet one antiquity without the walls at some 
 distance from this spot which deserves notice ; namely, the 
 " Tombs of the Kings," to the north of the city, on the 
 right of the Nablouse road. These excavations have been so 
 often described, and of t late so well delineated, that it will be 
 unnecessary here to enter into a minute account of them 2 . I 
 wish merely to make a few remarks on their probable origin, 
 which Dr Robinson has attributed to Helena 3 , whose monu- 
 ments, so celebrated in antiquity, must certainly have stood 
 at no great distance from this spot. It is very unfortunate 
 for this hypothesis that the only two features by which we 
 know that her sepulchre was distinguished, have entirely dis- 
 appeared. These were three marble pyramids, and a door 
 which opened by some mechanical contrivance : for however 
 extravagant the language of Pausanias undoubtedly is, yet 
 thus much at least must be concluded from it, if his state- 
 ment be worth anything ; and I cannot think that his notice 
 
 ' Itin. Hierosol. p. 162. " Paret 
 locus ubi fuit domus Caiphse," quoted 
 by Dr Robinson, Bib. Res. i. 359, 
 n. 2. Does this necessarily imply that 
 the house of Caiaphas was not still 
 in existence ? Marinus Sanutus, MI. 
 xiv. !( ; Sir J . Maundeville, p. 1 1 1 ; 
 both circ. 1320. 
 
 2 The reader is referred to Bib. 
 Res. i. 528, &c. for a description, ac- 
 companied with a good Plan, and for 
 the references ; and to Bartlett's Walks, 
 141, 143, for some very faithful sketches. 
 
 3 This theory, however, is not quite 
 new. It was started by Pococke and 
 adopted by Clarke.
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 423 
 
 of this single door could be intended to describe those many- 
 panelled doors of stone which separated between the cham- 
 bers in the Tombs of the Kings, and which do not appear to 
 have had any mechanism connected with them 4 . But this is 
 not the strongest objection to the theory. 
 
 Helena was the widowed queen of Monobazus, otherwise 
 called Bazeus, king of Adiabene. Having with her son Izates, 
 who succeeded to the throne, become a proselyte to Judaism, 
 she fixed her. residence at Jerusalem for purposes of devotion, 
 where, during the prevalence of the famine predicted by 
 Agabus, in the days of Claudius Caesar, she relieved the 
 poor by her unbounded liberality 5 ; and having resolved to 
 end her days there, she prepared her sepulchre during her 
 life, as was the custom of the times. But it is surely difficult 
 to imagine what could induce a widowed lady, self-exiled from 
 her home and family, to prepare for her private sepulture, 
 in a land of strangers, an extensive series of excavations, con- 
 taining not fewer than thirty receptacles for the dead ; and 
 although it is true that she shared her tomb, by accident, with 
 her son Izates, yet the language of Pausanias, representing it 
 as a single tomb 6 , would hardly have been used to describe 
 the numerous grottoes which are now under notice. I do 
 not think that the single argument adducible in support of 
 the hypothesis, can avail to set aside these weighty objections. 
 
 4 One of these was still hanging in 
 Maundrell's time. See Journey, under 
 March 28, p. 77. Their fragments are 
 scattered over the ground of the cham- 
 bers. 
 
 5 Joseph. Ant xx. ii. See Acts 
 xi. 28, and Euseb. H. . 1 1 . xii. 
 
 6 Josephus says, TWU 'EXe'i/jjs /xi/tj- 
 ueitov, (J. W. v. ii. 2, iv. 2,) obviously 
 
 with reference to the three pyramids 
 described in Ant. xx. iv. 3. So Eu- 
 seb ius mentions them, eio-eVt vvv crrrj- 
 \ai Siaffiaveis ev irpoao-xeiois deiKvvv- 
 TCLI TJ/S vvv AfXtas. But Pausanias, 
 who alone mentions the tomb properly 
 so called, always uses the singular 
 Ta'<os. See the passage in Bib. Res. 
 Vol. i. n. xxvii. p. 569.
 
 424 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 The argument is this : St Jerome, in his account of Paula's 
 journey to Jerusalem, represents that as she approached the 
 city, she had the mausoleum of Helena on her left ; and that 
 supposing she approached by the present Nablouse road, she 
 must have had the Tombs of the Kings to the left ; therefore 
 these are identical. But admitting the assumption that " the 
 great northern road at present is unquestionably the, same 
 that it ever was 1 ," still it is far from clear that Paula reached 
 the city by that route ; for even if St Jerome had designed to 
 recall the exact order of her progress, after the lapse of so 
 many years, which seems improbable, yet the abrupt break 
 in his narrative, immediately before her arrival at Jerusalem, 
 allows room for the supposition that she had visited other 
 localities after that last mentioned, and so leaves it uncertain 
 from what point she last came 2 . 
 
 What more probable account then may be given of these 
 remarkable excavations? They may still, I think, be al- 
 lowed to retain their old name, and be identified with the 
 "royal caves" of Josephus 3 , which must clearly have been in 
 this vicinity, and those "royal caves" were probably the same 
 as the monuments of Herod. For these caves were east of the 
 monuments of Helena, between them and the Fuller's monu- 
 ment, which last occupied the north-east angle of Bezetha. 
 
 1 I do not think this demonstrable, 
 but probable. 
 
 8 Gabaa, or "Gibeah of Benja- 
 min," whose site is not determined, is 
 the place last mentioned in connexion 
 with Judges xix. &c.,and then he pro- 
 ceeds: " Ad laevam mausoleo Helena 
 derelicto...ingressaestHierosolymam," 
 &c. St Hieron. Epist. Ixxxvi. Epi- 
 taph. Paula, ad Eustoch. Vol. iv. Pt. 
 ii. p. 673, Ed. Bened. Dr Robinson, 
 
 with strange inconsistency, places Gi- 
 beah where it certainly would not be 
 approached from the road in question. 
 If this town was where he places it, 
 (Bib. Res. n. 114) and Paula came 
 direct from thence to Jerusalem, as he 
 seems to suppose, the tombs of the 
 kings must have been left far on the 
 right. See his Plan of the Environs. 
 
 3 J. W. V. iv. 2. <nrri\ai<ov fiaai- 
 \UtSt9t
 
 CH. III.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 425 
 
 But Herod's monuments must have been some distance west 
 of the Fuller's monument, for the camp of the Assyrians was 
 interposed 4 : so that their situation may be supposed to cor- 
 respond with that of the " royal caves," as it certainly does, 
 very remarkably, with that of the " Tombs of the Kings ; " 
 while it is further obvious how entirely suitable these sepul- 
 chres would be to the magnificent ideas of the great Herod, 
 whose ambitious hope it was to be the founder of a dynasty 
 of kings ; and the style of the architecture would well agree 
 with the period of his reign. If this view be correct, the 
 monuments of queen Helena must have been west of the 
 caves, between them and the tower of Psephinus, which 
 occupied the north-west corner of the New City 5 . And 
 there is an area of native rock immediately to the right 
 of the road to Neby Samwil, where sepulchral excavations 
 may be seen, among which I am disposed to think that her 
 resting-place is to be sought. 
 
 Before leaving the Tombs of the Kings, it may be well 
 to mention another excavation immediately without the en- 
 trance to the court-yard of rock, through which they are 
 approached. I am not aware that the cave in question, 
 which is difficult of access, has been noticed by any tra- 
 vellers, nor can I throw any light on its uses. It is of 
 irregular form, much larger than any of the chambers in the 
 neighbouring tombs. The roof of rock is supported by an 
 unshapen mass of the same, which has been left standing ; 
 
 4 Above, pp. 16, 17. See Josephus 
 1. c. for the position of the royal caves ; 
 and for the monuments of Herod, J. 
 W. v. iii. 2; and xii. 2. In the latter 
 passage the historian uses the singular ; 
 but not to mention the plural in the 
 
 former passage, a single /ui/tj/ietoi/ is no 
 more inconsistent with many -rd<poi, 
 than a single rd<pos with many /KI>J- 
 /ueta. 
 
 5 Joseph. J. W. v. iv. 2, 3.
 
 426 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 and the ground, which is covered with loose stones, descends 
 rapidly within, i. e. in the direction of the valley. It oc- 
 curred to me whether this cave might not be in some way 
 connected with the Serpent Pool, which adjoined the monu- 
 ments of Herod, and whether the upper out-flow of the 
 fountain of Gihon might not have been stopped in this 
 place. But as I could not find sufficient data on which to 
 ground any probable hypothesis, it will be better to leave it, 
 in the hope that further investigation of this unexplored ca- 
 vern may lead to more satisfactory results. 
 
 I have now passed in review all the localities of import- 
 ance, whose memory is cherished by Christians for their 
 connexion with the gospel history, and have, I trust, made 
 it to appear that these traditions are entitled to more respect 
 than it is the custom of English and American travellers to 
 attach to them 1 , and that a distinction is to be drawn between 
 those which are derived from a remote antiquity, and those 
 which may be proved to have originated during the Frank 
 domination. I have endeavoured, moreover, to throw some 
 additional light on other antiquities in and around the Holy 
 City. In the course of the investigation I have been forced 
 to abandon many preconceived notions, and to re-examine 
 many former conjectures, and the result has certainly been 
 much more satisfactory to myself than I ever ventured to 
 hope ; nor am I aware of any objection to the theories pro- 
 
 1 An American Wesleyan traveller, 
 who "has bestowed especial attention 
 upon the very able and learned argu- 
 ment of Dr Robinson (on the subject 
 of the Holy Sepulchre), without, how- 
 ever, being able to adopt his conclu- 
 sions," speaks of " English travellers" 
 
 as " certainly the most incredulous and 
 anti-catholic in the world." Surely his 
 American brother will be justly in- 
 dignant at being robbed of the palm 
 which he has done his best to merit. 
 Travels in the Holy Land, by Dr 
 Olin, Vol. u. p. 277-
 
 CH. HI.] THE HOLY CITY. 427 
 
 pounded, except those which I have noticed and endeavoured 
 to remove. Full satisfaction on many of the points could 
 only be obtained by very extensive excavations in and 
 about the city. But although the scripture interest of the 
 questions involved would fully repay the trouble and ex- 
 pense of such undertakings, there is one great, but perhaps 
 not insurmountable obstacle : only a few months ago a 
 learned friend, deeply interested in the archaeology of the 
 City of David, and every way qualified to carry on the 
 investigation with success, thus writes : " The fanaticism of 
 the Mahommedans, lately raised anew from its slumbers, pre- 
 vents me from going freely about the interesting places of 
 the city." But the same authority which opens the mosks 
 of the Turkish capital to the curiosity of Franks, might 
 remove the obstructions at Jerusalem ; and a firman from 
 the Sultan might probably be procured, if applied for in a 
 proper manner. His Majesty the King of Prussia has con- 
 ferred an important benefit on one branch of history, by the 
 expedition sent to Egypt under the direction of Dr Lipsius, 
 with full permission of the Pasha. Would not the antiquities 
 of Jerusalem present a field equally worthy of royal munifi- 
 cence ? or would the Ottoman Porte prove more untractable 
 than the viceroy of Egypt ? The area of the Mosk of Omar, 
 of course, may not be violated it were vain to expect it, 
 and perhaps even wrong to ask it ; but much might be done 
 without trenching on the sacred enclosure, as this and the 
 two preceding chapters will have proved. Meanwhile I trust 
 that the reader will be able to rest in the conclusions which 
 I have endeavoured to establish, and for which some ground 
 of probability has been shewn ; and because, on a subject so 
 involved hi obscurity, it must needs be that many errors will 
 be committed before the whole truth is brought to light, I will
 
 428 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 add, not more or less for my own sake than for the sake of 
 others who have gone before me, that such errors ought not 
 to be deemed unpardonable, if they have arisen from no want 
 of candour or of diligence, and if they are honestly acknow- 
 ledged and corrected as soon as they are discovered. 
 
 Pool of SUoam.
 
 Aich of the Ecce Ho 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MODERN JERUSALEM AND ITS INHABITANTS. 
 
 THE Christian pilgrim who approaches Jerusalem for the 
 first time will probably be disappointed to find that his emo- 
 tions on the first sight of a city, associated in his mind from 
 his earliest infancy with all that is most sacred, are so much 
 less intense than he anticipated, and that he can look on 
 Mount Olivet and Mount Zion with feelings, certainly not of 
 indifference, but of much less painful interest than he imagined 
 possible, when he thought on them at a distance. The truth 
 is, the events transacted here are so great in every view, 
 that the mind cannot at once grasp them ; but is, as it were, 
 stupified by the effort. It takes time to realize the truth that 
 this is the home of Scripture History, the cradle of the Chris-
 
 430 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 tian Church. But the feeling of attachment to the Holy City 
 and its sacred localities will soon be formed, and will be deep- 
 ened by time, to a calm satisfaction, a peaceful resting 
 in it as the home of one's affections, which no other spot on 
 earth can impart. For there is a halo about Jerusalem, an 
 atmosphere which one drinks in, not only on the mountains 
 around, but even amid its crumbling ruins, which has an un- 
 told charm ; and he who shall have resided there for months 
 or years, and has known what it is to suffer in body and in 
 mind, amid the scenes of His sufferings, and has enjoyed the 
 solace of hearty affection from true friends, and a higher con- 
 solation still ; such an one alone can appreciate the privilege 
 of a residence there, and will not readily forget the parting 
 pang with which the last farewell was accompanied. 
 
 But I have to imagine the pilgrim approaching the city. 
 If he is journeying from the west, as most pilgrims do, he 
 will come in sight of the city about a mile from its gates, and 
 will have the least interesting view which it presents merely 
 a dull line of wall, with the Mount of Olives rising above. 
 He will perhaps have read of the desolate appearance of the 
 neighbourhood of the city : it is sometimes said to resemble a 
 city of the dead. Travellers who have so written must have 
 been singularly unfortunate in the time of their entrance ; for 
 on a bright evening, at any time of the year, nothing can 
 well be imagined more lively than the scene without the Jaffa 
 gate. It is then that the inhabitants, of whatever nation and 
 whatever faith, walk out " to drink the air," as they express 
 it, and the various companies may be seen sauntering about, 
 or reclining on the ground. Here will be seen members of 
 the two large families into which the Jews are now divided, 
 the Ashkenazim and Sephardim 1 , the latter easily distinguish- 
 
 1 Ashkenazim ; the Jews of Russia, dim ; the Jews of Spain and the shores 
 
 Germany, &c. See Gen. x. 3. Sephar- 
 
 of the Mediterranean.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 431 
 
 able from the former by their brighter and more intelligent 
 looks ; and here the Greek monks of the Great Convent, and 
 other native or foreign Christians, and groups of native women 
 and children sitting by the way-side, or amusing themselves 
 with the favourite exercise of swinging under the olive-trees at 
 the head of the Valley of Hinnom. The appearance of the 
 females indeed is somewhat spectral, for a white sheet thrown 
 loosely over their handsome dresses, and their yellow boots, 
 is all that is distinguishable ; but the merry laugh may be 
 heard among them, and, with the music of their " tinkling 
 ornaments," would serve to convince the stranger that they 
 were veritable daughters of Eve. He will see little of the 
 desolations of Jerusalem here : but let him enter the gates, 
 and the delusion which its compact and well-built walls, and 
 the appearance of its inhabitants, may have produced, will be 
 quickly dispelled. He no sooner enters the city than deso- 
 lation stares him in the face. The citadel on his right hand, 
 which shewed fair from a distance, is a ruin and patchwork 
 a Roman tower, with mediaeval additions and Turkish debase- 
 ments, erected on a massive foundation of Jewish architecture. 
 On his left he will have an open space covered with ruins, 
 and as he passes through the streets he will find scarcely a 
 house that is not a ruin, and in some parts huge hulks of 
 massive wrecks ; as for example, the Hospital of the Knights 
 of St John, and the so-called Palace of Helena. But indeed 
 this may be said of almost any eastern city. It is the peculiar 
 province of the Turks to lay waste what other ages have 
 built up. But let him examine more closely. He will find 
 traces of former greatness, and even grandeur, here and there. 
 Handsome Saracenic fountains, now dry ; some few traces of 
 Gothic architecture, more of Roman, and here and there frag- 
 ments of a Greek cornice or capital, lying neglected on the 
 side of the street, or built into modern hovels, without any
 
 432 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 regard to their proper position, and shafts of columns of costly 
 marbles jutting out from the walls in various parts, all attest- 
 ing its ancient greatness. Or let him repair to any spot 
 near the walls, where excavations may perchance be carrying 
 on for the erection of a new building, and he will see, many 
 feet below the present surface of the ground, massive stones 
 tossed about in the wildest confusion, and rubble to the depth 
 of forty or fifty feet on the summit of the hills, and of un- 
 told depth in the valleys beneath ; and he will easily believe 
 that he is in the oldest city in the world, which has undergone 
 more vicissitudes than any other in the annals of history. 
 
 But these are not the ruins of Jerusalem. Let him repair 
 to the Jews' quarter on Mount Zion, and there he will see 
 the living " stones of the sanctuary poured out in the top of 
 every street. The precious sons of Zion, comparable unto fine 
 gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of 
 the hands of the potter!" For, if the dwellings and the 
 synagogues of the Sephardim bear witness, as do their coun- 
 tenances, to a higher state of moral culture than he had been 
 led to expect, and if they are living in comparative security, as 
 subjects of the Turkish government, after having been hunted 
 like dogs from kingdoms which called themselves Christian, 
 yet are they but strangers in their own land, speaking a 
 foreign language, and subject to the caprice of foreign lords. 
 But the other section, the Ashkenazim, will exhibit all tho 
 symptoms of wretchedness which an acquaintance with their 
 European brethren had taught him to expect. The same 
 haggard and careworn expression of countenance, the same 
 anxious eye, an index of that " astonishment of heart," which 
 is the threatened curse of their unbelief. Their very presence 
 here is a memorial of the condition of their outcast brethren, 
 scattered abroad in every nation under heaven, and whose 
 representatives they are, and by whose alms they are supported
 
 CH. IV.J THE HOLY CITY. 433 
 
 in " the city of their fathers' sepulchres." Or if he can trust 
 his feelings, and consider it no desecration to intrude on a 
 scene of human sorrow with which he may not sympathize, 
 and which he cannot relieve, he may follow the steps of many 
 travellers to the Jews' Wailing-place, on the appointed day, 
 and there he will probably witness, among many cases of 
 carelessness and listless indifference, apparent instances of deep 
 mental agony 1 , for which he will know that nothing but the 
 Gospel can afford adequate relief; and he will surely join in 
 the petition of the third Collect for Good Friday with a deeper 
 meaning than before, and desire more earnestly than ever 
 that the attempts for their conversion, however and by whom- 
 soever made, may be crowned with perfect success. 
 
 Still these are not the ruins of Jerusalem. Let him turn 
 to the children of the " heavenly Zion," " the New Jerusalem," 
 " the mother of us all," and the First and Second Collects 
 for the Great Fast will come home with equal force. 
 
 Let us suppose him present in Jerusalem during the holy 
 week ; he will feel a curiosity to witness the ceremonies in 
 the Church of the Holy Sepulchre let him go by all means, 
 at least if he can go to mourn, not to mock or to triumph 
 over the scenes which will be there enacted. If he arrive at 
 the great gates of the Church about sunset, he will find them 
 closed for a few minutes while the Moslem guardian and his 
 attendants perform their devotions. A small window in the 
 door will allow him to watch their ceremony, and he may 
 learn a lesson of outward propriety and decorum from the 
 infidels, which he will look for in vain among the worshippers 
 within. On his admission, the first object which will excite 
 his astonishment and horror, will be the Turkish soldiers of 
 
 1 I was never at the Jew's Wailing- i been an unwilling spectator of one of 
 
 place on Friday, for reasons hinted at these paroxysms in a young Jew, in 
 
 in the text, but I remember to have one of the synagogues at Hebron. 
 
 28
 
 434 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART iv. 
 
 the garrison standing with their bayonets fixed, in various 
 parts of the sacred precincts, and about the Holy Cave itself. 
 If he enquire the reason of this dreadful profanation, he will 
 be informed that the Latins have requested it as a protection 
 against molestation from the Greeks ! The Latin ceremonies 
 in commemoration of this day, so startling to the English 
 traveller, have been frequently described, and will not here 
 be detailed 1 . It is true that the coldness of our northern 
 temperaments, and our inhabitude to a vivid picturing of the 
 realities of our Blessed Lord's life, render difficult any sweep- 
 ing opinion on so solemn a subject. Still, to state my own 
 individual feeling, when I remember that it is before infidels 
 as well as before Christians and these not merely men of 
 holy lives, but a mingled and lukewarm multitude I much 
 fear lest there be a deep savour of irreverence and idolatrous 
 show in these ceremonies, wherein the most awful scene that 
 the earth ever witnessed is annually acted on Mount Calvary 
 in a representation of painful reality. Far be my words from 
 prejudicing any who may hereafter assist at these rites ; and 
 if perchance the term idolatrous fall gratingly on the ears of 
 some, who "with keen faith and loving spirits" have followed 
 in this procession, and, " piercing beneath the symbols, have 
 seen nought but their Lord," be it remembered that there 
 are words and topics, full of meaning to the devout, which it 
 were profanation to cast unveiledly before the cold or profane ; 
 and if so with words, surely no less caution does reverence 
 prompt in acts of such awful import as that which we have 
 been considering. 
 
 Or again, let an unbeliever join the throng in the same 
 
 1 They are at this day exactly the 
 same as they were in Maundrell's 
 time, 1697. See under date Friday, 
 March 26, p. 72, &c. Sandys' account 
 
 is much shorter (p. 132,) but the cere- 
 monies were apparently the same. 
 (1611.)
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 435 
 
 church, on the Easter Eve of the Greeks, when the imposture 
 of the holy fire has been practised for centuries by the high- 
 est dignitaries of all the Christian communions in Jerusalem, 
 though it is now confined to the Greeks and Armenians 2 ; and 
 he will witness, not only the most deplorable and degrading 
 superstition in this exhibition, but a scene of wild confusion 
 and disorder " very unfit for that sacred place, and berter 
 becoming bacchanals than Christians 3 ." Not unfrequently on 
 this and other occasions in the tumultuous processions of the 
 rival communions, severe conflicts take place about the very 
 Sepulchre, and blood is shed on both sides. It is a heavy 
 penalty which the present generation of ecclesiastics are pay- 
 ing for the deceptions of former generations, that they cannot 
 discontinue with safety, nor retain without offence, this most 
 scandalous abuse of an ancient and significant ceremony. In 
 its original intention and use it appears to have been nothing 
 more than a very instructive representation of a great truth, 
 a parable in action relating to the Death and Resurrection 
 of our Lord. On Good Friday all the lamps which had 
 been kept burning at the sacred places throughout the year 
 were extinguished ; on the morning of Easter-day they were 
 relighted by fire brought from the Holy Cave. But the 
 figurative meaning has been lost sight of long ago in the pre- 
 tended miracle, which has been unhappily claimed by the 
 ecclesiastical authorities themselves : so that while all the re- 
 spectable members of the Greek community now at Jerusalem 
 make no scruple to acknowledge and deplore the imposture, 
 
 * This ceremony is first noticed, 
 among the westerns, by Bernhard the 
 monk, who visited Jerusalem circ. 
 A. D. 870. (Poujoulat, Histoire de 
 Jerusalem, Vol. in. p. 110.) Dosi- 
 
 it at the end of the same century. 
 Mouravieff's Plistory of Jerusalem, i. 
 p. 340. 
 
 3 The words are Maundrell's. See 
 under date Saturday, 'April 3. (p. 95.) 
 
 theus has preserved a Greek notice of 
 
 282
 
 436 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART II. 
 
 and are absolutely ashamed to take part in it ; yet they dare 
 not disavow it before the uninstructed multitude, lest they 
 should shake their trust in the verities of the Christian faith, 
 which have been confirmed to them by the authority of the 
 same teachers, on whose credit they receive this lying wonder 
 for a veritable miracle. It requires a larger measure of faith 
 than they can exercise to believe that if the Church take 
 care for the truth, Christ will take care for the Church ; but 
 that if it seek to support itself by a lie, it must not reckon on 
 the support of His Almighty arm ; and they are content to 
 look forward to a time, indefinitely distant, when the pilgrim 
 shall be sufficiently advanced in intelligence to allow of the 
 discontinuance of this mockery, without endangering those 
 great truths which they do truly hold 1 . 
 
 But among all the exhibitions of the Christians in the 
 Holy City, that which must most scandalize the infidels is their 
 shameful divisions, accompanied with jealousies and heart-burn- 
 ings, and not unfrequently attended with sanguinary quarrels 
 and acts of violence, which call for the interference of the civil 
 powers. The coloured Plan of the Church of the Holy Se- 
 pulchre is a picture of the religious dissensions which afflict 
 the Holy City, and present a perpetual stumbling-block to 
 Jews and Mahommedans one might almost say a standing 
 argument against the truth of the religion which they profess ; 
 for if the unity and harmony of the Church be a note of the 
 heavenly origin of the doctrine which it holds, the absence of 
 these must obscure the evidence and hinder the progress of 
 the gospel. The superstitious practices which have been men- 
 tioned are only obtruded on the notice of the Mahommedans 
 
 1 One part of this ceremony has 
 been discontinued for many years. A 
 dove used to be let fly from the Holy 
 
 Cave at the time of the giving of the 
 fire. The intention of this may be 
 imagined, and need not be written.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 437 
 
 occasionally, once or twice in the year, but the dissensions of 
 the various sects fill the Holy City with jarring discord through- 
 out the year. These disputes are carried to Constantinople, 
 and submitted to the decision of the Ottoman Porte, to be 
 ruled not according to the principles of justice and equity, 
 but as bribery, or private influence, or political interests, may 
 chance to prevail. One or two examples shall be given, which 
 will serve better than words to manifest the feeling that exists 
 between the rival churches. 
 
 The Greeks and Latins both enjoy the countenance of 
 powerful European monarchs, whence they derive an import- 
 ance at Constantinople, which, independent of this, they would 
 not possess : the Armenians make up by their wealth what 
 they lack in this respect, and are thus able to sway the 
 decisions of the Porte. The Syrians and Copts are too poor 
 and too insignificant to contend with these powerful rivals, 
 but being in communion with the Armenians, they are for 
 the most part identified with their interests and enjoy their 
 protection ; in return for which they are expected to submit 
 to such spoliation as their protector thinks right to exact. 
 The facts which shall now be mentioned, as a specimen 
 merely of what has been going forward for centuries, have 
 all occurred very recently. 
 
 The Armenians had possessed for some years a small 
 monastery in the neighbourhood of the Church of the Ascen- 
 sion, on the Mount of Olives. The Greeks disputed their 
 right to the locality, and obtained a verdict at Constantinople 
 for the expulsion of the Armenians, not for their own esta- 
 blishment in their place. On the arrival of the firman, they 
 assembled hi a body by night, and tumultuously attacked the 
 building, which they completely demolished, leaving the infi- 
 dels in undisputed possession of the sacred locality ! But the 
 faults are not all on one side.
 
 438 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 In the year 1842, the Greeks procured a firman for the 
 reparation of the magnificent Church at Bethlehem, which 
 had fallen into a state of miserable decay. The restoration 
 was affected at considerable expense, and with as much re- 
 gard to the original design as circumstances allowed. Among 
 ether repairs they restored the north transept, which is 
 allotted to the Armenians, and the steps which lead down 
 from their altar to the Holy Cave of the Nativity. Can it 
 Ije believed that the Armenians applied for, and procured a 
 firman to undo what the Greeks had done? 
 
 The lead on the dome which covers the Holy Sepulchre 
 at Jerusalem having become decayed through time, the 
 Greeks obtained permission to repair it. They actually laid 
 in a large quantity of lead for that purpose, and commenced 
 stripping the dome, when a counter-order arrived from the 
 Turkish capital, prohibiting, or at least suspending the work. 
 This obstruction had been interposed by the Latins, who have 
 now the miserable satisfaction of seeing the sacred building 
 fast falling to decay, with all the materials requisite for its 
 repair close at hand. 
 
 These instances will suffice to show the bitter hostility 
 which prevails among the various denominations of Christians 
 in the Holy City ; and they have been cited not in triumph, 
 but in sorrow, with the hope that the sad exhibition may 
 indirectly tend to the removal of such unhallowed strife from 
 around the sacred precincts consecrated by the birth and 
 death of the Prince of Peace. The ground of this violent 
 opposition, even to the necessary repairs of the sacred fabrics, 
 is the apprehension that the privilege of repair may result 
 in the recognition of an exclusive possessory right on the part 
 of the restorers. Thus the three most sacred sites have 
 been for centuries the 'grand points of contention among the 
 divided Churches, and the questions which these disgraceful
 
 CH 
 
 . IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 439 
 
 disputes suggested to our countryman, Maundrell, a century 
 and a half ago, force themselves upon the mind at this day. 
 " Who can expect ever to see these holy places rescued from 
 the hands of the infidels ? Or if they should be recovered, 
 what deplorable contests might be expected to follow about 
 them ? seeing even in the present state of captivity they are 
 made the occasion of such unchristian rage and animosity." 
 Nay, I would even go further, and avow a conviction, forced 
 upon me by such facts as these, and only confirmed by 
 time, that the Turks are, for the present, the best and safest 
 guardians of the holy places, and that until the Christians 
 have laid aside their animosities, the control of an infidel, 
 and therefore indifferent arbiter, will be necessary to restrain 
 within some bounds those vindictive feuds which, even though 
 kept in check, break out occasionally into acts of open and 
 even fatal violence. It were frightful to contemplate the 
 consequences of power being given into the hands of any 
 one of the Christian bodies which now divide the Sacred City. 
 Of these it will be well to furnish some particulars more 
 in detail, which will I hope be interesting to the reader. I 
 shall commence with the Eastern Churches, among whom 
 the Greeks will claim the first notice. 
 
 I. ORIENTALS. 
 
 1. The Greeks. 
 
 THE Holy Orthodox Church of the East still reckons four 
 patriarchs, who exercise spiritual jurisdiction over the scat- 
 tered ruins of those ancient churches in which the light of 
 the Gospel shone with unclouded brightness, while the west- 
 ern world was shrouded in heathen darkness. Of these 
 patriarchates, the last erected was that of Jerusalem. During 
 the first ages of Christianity, the prelates of that city had
 
 440 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 enjoyed no peculiar privileges, or prerogatives 1 . Caesarea 
 of Palestine was then the capital of the province, and the 
 seat of the government, and its bishop exercised metropolitan 
 jurisdiction in the diocese of Jerusalem, dignity expressly 
 reserved to him by the first Nicene Council 2 . But the reco- 
 very of the sacred localities, and the erection of the Church 
 of the Resurrection, which could not fail to attract the reli- 
 gious devotions of the Christians of that period, served by 
 degrees to raise the importance of the see ; and in the fourth 
 general council the assembled Fathers consented to erect 
 "the mother of all churches" into a fifth patriarchate. 
 
 In order to effect this, the metropolitan sees of Caesarea 
 and Scythopolis were detached from the jurisdiction of An- 
 tioch on the north, while Rabbath Moab and Petra of Arabia, 
 were ceded by the patriarchate of Alexandria on the south. 
 Besides this, several suffragans were attached to the patri- 
 archal chair as peculiars, from the several dioceses of the 
 various metropolitans, and others newly erected ; by which 
 means the chief pastor of the church of Jerusalem was in- 
 vested with so much dignity as was considered suitable to 
 the high title which had been conferred upon him, and reck- 
 oned in his subjection four metropolitan sees subdivided into 
 68 bishoprics, besides 25 suffragan bishops, independent of 
 any authority, save only that of the patriarch 3 . 
 
 1 " Hierosolymitana ecclesia usque 
 ad tempora Justinian! sanctae recorda- 
 tionis Augusti, episcopum habuitnulla 
 vel modica dignitatis prscrogativa gau- 
 dentem." Will. Tyr. Lib. \\m. p. 
 1046. What argument Dr Keith can 
 find in this against episcopal govern- 
 ment, I am at a loss to imagine, (Land 
 of Israel, p. 189) : surely a carriage and 
 horses, a gold mitre and lawn sleeves, 
 
 are not necessary to the order ; the es- 
 sence is contained in the words " epis- 
 copum habuil." Presbyterians will do 
 well not to look to Jerusalem for pre- 
 cedents for their novelties. 
 
 8 See above, Part i. chap. iii. 
 
 3 William of Tyre, 1. c. gives the 
 catalogue. See also Reland's Pales- 
 tine, Lib. i. capp. xxxiv. and xxxv. 
 pp. 207, &c.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 441 
 
 If we consider the various vicissitudes of this ancient 
 church, the depopulation of the country, and the long domi- 
 nation of the infidels, it will be rather matter of surprise 
 that so much of the wreck has escaped complete annihilation, 
 than that the frame-work of the vessel has not been trans- 
 mitted entire. The present patriarchate 4 , extending north and 
 south from the mountains of Lebanon to the Red Sea, and 
 from the Mediterranean on the west to the great desert on 
 the east, embraces all the country described by the ancient 
 names of Phoenicia, Palestine, Galilee, Samaria, Juda3a, Idu- 
 ma3a, and Arabia Petraoa. It is divided into fourteen sees, 
 but the vacancies are not regularly filled up, as the present 
 circumstances of several of the dioceses can unhappily too 
 well dispense with the residence of a bishop. Even in the 
 case of those appointments which do take place, it is in most 
 cases little better than a titular dignity, the holders of which 
 reside in the great monastery of Constantine, at Jerusalem, 
 only visiting their sees occasionally, as the exigences of their 
 flocks require. The bishops of Ptolemais (Acre) and Beth- 
 lehem are the only two permanently resident ; the former 
 of whom at present exercises spiritual functions in the neigh- 
 bouring diocese of Nazareth, which has been vacant since 
 the translation of the latter to the see which he now holds. 
 
 The patriarch himself has been non-resident for many 
 years 5 . It is judged that he can better serve the interests 
 of the church at the seat of the supreme government, and 
 on this account he remains at Constantinople. He is there 
 
 4 For an account of the patriarchate, 
 see Appendix. 
 
 5 The patriarch Theophanes, A. D. 
 1608 1641, first purchased a house 
 with a church and gardens, which had 
 formerly belonged to the princes Can- 
 tacuzene, situated in the part of Con- 
 
 stantinople called the Phanar. It was 
 burnt down in 1649, restored by the 
 merchants of Constantinople, enlarged 
 and adorned by later patriarchs. It is 
 still their usual residence, and they 
 seldom visit Palestine. Mouraviefl", 
 cap. xl. ad fin.
 
 442 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PABT II. 
 
 assisted by an ecclesiastic of his own appointment, who even- 
 tually succeeds to the patriarchal dignity l : but should he die 
 without having nominated his successor, the election is made 
 by "the brethren of the Holy Sepulchre." This religious 
 college, whose chief seat is at Constantinople, consists of 
 bishops, priests, or simply of monks, who are attached to 
 the person of the patriarch, and act as his messengers in 
 the affairs of the church. Their whole number is about 
 150. All have a voice in the election of the patriarch, and 
 their decision is independent of any other authority, the 
 oecumenical patriarch himself having no voice in it 2 . 
 
 The patriarch, as indeed all the bishops, are invariably 
 Greeks, mostly from the islands ; and it is centuries since the 
 natives were considered eligible to the higher offices of the 
 church. But the apparent inconvenience of this arrange- 
 ment is much obviated by the fact, that the pastors of the 
 congregations are invariably natives. The charge of injus- 
 tice which might be urged against their exclusion from the 
 episcopal rank is not so easily answered, but the following 
 may serve as an explanation. It is a rule of all the oriental 
 churches to elect their bishops from the regular clergy ; and 
 it is reasonable to suppose that a practice so universally 
 adopted was the result of experience of its advantages. 
 The disorderly conduct of the native monks led to their 
 exclusion from the principal monasteries about three cen- 
 turies ago, and the natural result of this was their exclusion 
 from the episcopal office, for which it is further alleged they 
 had frequently proved themselves incompetent 3 . 
 
 1 This practice was introduced by 
 Germanus, the founder of the present 
 Greek dynasty of bishops, to ensure 
 the exclusion of native Syrians. Mou- 
 ravieff, cap. xxxix. 
 
 8 I learnt this in a conversation 
 with the archimandrite Joel, at Jeru- 
 salem, August 19, 1042. 
 
 8 Germanus, a native of the Morea, 
 but so great a proficient in the Arabic
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 443 
 
 This general sketch of the constitution of the patriarchate 
 may be illustrated by its present condition. " The Most 
 Blessed" Athanasius, who now occupies the patriarchal throne, 
 the hundred and thirty-first in succession from St James, is 
 upwards of ninety years old, and being incapacitated for the 
 more active duties of his office by his advanced age, lives in 
 literary retirement in one of the Prince's Islands in the Sea 
 of Marmora, having delegated the cares of his office to his 
 appointed successor. This is the very excellent and learned 
 Hierotheus, archbishop of Mount Tabor, and for several years 
 the legate of the patriarch at the court of Russia, in which 
 appointment his amiable qualities and superior endowments 
 won for him the affection and respect of all who knew him. 
 I may be allowed to add, that the favourable report which I 
 had heard of him in the East was abundantly confirmed by an 
 interview with which I was honoured at Constantinople. He 
 is a great friend to education, and has appointed to the 
 school in the patriarchate at Jerusalem 4 a truly excellent 
 Didaskalos, Christodulos Kokkinakes, with whom I believe he 
 has since associated another learned preceptor, besides filling 
 up the office of preacher, which had become vacant by the 
 death of its late occupant, with an able and eloquent priest. 
 
 The management of the internal affairs of the patriarchate 
 is entrusted to two or three of the most discreet of the resi- 
 dent ecclesiastics, under the title of Guardians (eirirpoTroi). 
 This office is no^ filled by Misael, the venerable bishop of 
 
 language as to pass for a Syrian, was 
 elected to the patriarchal chair in 1554, 
 by the synod of native bishops. He 
 presided until 157'J, and contrived, 
 during his incumbency, so to fill up 
 the vacant sees as to secure a majority 
 of Greeks in the synod, whom he easily 
 
 persuaded to pass enactments for the 
 perpetual exclusion of the natives. 
 Mouravieff, cap. xxxix. 
 
 4 It should be observed that this 
 school is of a high order, and that the 
 monks, even the priest-monks, com, 
 pose the Didaskalos' class.
 
 444 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PAKT II. 
 
 Petra, and Cyrill, the shrewd and intelligent bishop of Lyd, 
 who are assisted by a synod composed of the remaining 
 bishops 1 , together with certain archimandrites, and the secre- 
 tary of the see. A treasurer, vestiarius, librarian, and other 
 minor officers, are appointed for the regulation of the great 
 monastery in its various departments ; and the annual influx 
 of pilgrims preparatory to the great feast gives full employ- 
 ment to all. The visitors are received on their first arrival 
 in the great convent, where they are entertained one night. 
 On the following morning they come before the synod to 
 present such offerings as their circumstances allow, for the 
 support of the church and monastery, and to enter their own 
 names, and the names of such friends as they will, in a book, 
 for special intercession in the prayers of the church. They 
 are then assigned, according to their nation or condition, to 
 one of the many monasteries of the Orthodox in Jerusalem a , 
 where they reside during their stay, attending the daily 
 services in their own convent-chapel, and visiting at their 
 will the various sacred localities in and around the city. By 
 this systematic arrangement the confusion and inconvenience 
 which would otherwise attend the annual arrival of the pil- 
 grims is effectually provided against, and order maintained at 
 least among the members of the same church. 
 
 The spiritual charge of the native Christians of the Or- 
 thodox communion in Jerusalem is entrusted to six secular 
 priests, who minister in the churches of the Ointment-bearers 
 and of St Mary, immediately without the entrance to the 
 Church of the Holy Sepulchre. These priests are all natives, 
 
 1 These were, in 1843, four, viz. 
 Gaza, Neapolis, Sebastia, and Philadel- 
 phia. There were about 7 archiman- 
 drites, 4 irpioToi dyye'Xot, 15 priest- 
 monks, 6 deacon-monks, and in all 
 
 about 100 brethren of the Greek rite. 
 
 2 The Orthodox possess 1 2 monas- 
 teries and 5 nunneries within the walls, 
 but some of them are very small.
 
 CH. IV. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 445 
 
 and married men ; the Orthodox church of the East allowing 
 none but such to hear confession ; a precaution against those 
 serious evils to which the forced celibacy of the Latin clergy- 
 has given occasion, to the great scandal of Christendom. 
 The services are conducted both here and throughout the 
 East in the vernacular language, and sermons are preached 
 every Lord's day and on Festivals by the best qualified of 
 the clergy 3 . But it is deeply to be deplored that no adequate 
 provision is made for the instruction of the parochial ministers, 
 nor is their standing such as would secure them the respect 
 of their flocks, except for the dignity of their sacred office. 
 
 The number of Christians of the Orthodox communion 
 permanently resident in the city is only 600, according to 
 an authority which cannot be suspected of under-stating the 
 amount, or I should have concluded that it was much larger 4 . 
 The whole patriarchate reckons about 17,280 souls of the 
 Greek rite, many of whom are residing in villages almost 
 exclusively Mahommedan, miles from a church or priest, 
 yet holding fast the profession of their faith, so far as they 
 have been taught it ; touching at least the hem of their 
 Saviour's garment, with simple faith in His saving virtue, 
 and so receiving from His fulness healing and grace. 
 
 3 When I was at Jerusalem it was 
 the practice of the preacher to go every 
 week to a learned archimandrite, priest 
 Joel, to be instructed in a sermon for 
 the following Sunday. 
 
 4 My authority is the statement 
 mentioned above, furnished by the pa- 
 triarchate itself. See Appendix. The 
 computation is: 
 
 Orthodox Greek Christians 600 
 Roman Catholics 200 
 
 Other Christians, about 120 
 
 Jews, about 5000 
 
 Mahommedans 5000 
 
 Total 10,920 
 
 I should have been disposed to take 
 about 2000 from the Jews and add it 
 to the Christians, which would very 
 nearly agree with Dr Robinson's ac- 
 count, which seemed to me pretty cor- 
 rect. B. R. Vol. 11. p. 85.
 
 446 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 2. The Georgians 1 . 
 
 THE Georgians, though at present very inadequately re- 
 presented in Jerusalem, will claim the second place, not only 
 on account of their orthodoxy and consequent inter- communion 
 with the Greek Church, but on account of their early esta- 
 blishment in the neighbourhood of the sacred localities, and 
 the great importance which they formerly possessed. 
 
 Their connexion with this see, which dates from a very 
 early period, was commenced under circumstances which 
 promised a long continuance of friendly relations, and was 
 afterwards cemented by an additional tie. According to the 
 ancient annals of the Georgian church, the Cross was first 
 planted in Iberia by the apostle St Andrew and Simon the 
 Canaanite. St Clement of Rome, being banished to Pontus 
 by the emperor Trajan, watered in his exile the seed which 
 had thus been sown, and fire-worship and idolatry, attended 
 with human sacrifices and cannibalism, vanished before the 
 blessed influence of the Gospel of Christ. At the close of 
 the third century, however, the ancient superstition was 
 beginning again to advance its claims, when Georgia was 
 visited by St Nina, or Nonna, whose labours resulted in the 
 conversion of all Iberia, from the shores of the Black Sea 
 almost to the mountains of Albania, and from the Caucasus to 
 the confines of Persia. This apostle had for her maternal 
 uncle the then bishop of Jerusalem, with whose blessing she 
 had set forth to that work of which she was permitted to see 
 the happy consummation about the time when the Holy City 
 was becoming a more prominent object of attraction to all 
 
 1 I am here indebted to the Rev. Mr 
 Blackmore for the use of his MS. trans, 
 lation of a most interesting history of 
 
 the Georgian Church, compiled from 
 native annals, by a native, M. Jossi- 
 lian.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 447 
 
 Christians through the pious magnificence of St Helena and 
 her son. The first Christian king of Iberia, whose name was 
 Miriam, emulated the devotion of the octogenarian empress, 
 and at a like advanced age undertook a pilgrimage to Jeru- 
 salem. On his journey he had an interview with Constantine, 
 from whom he obtained a grant of land for the purpose of 
 erecting a church on one of the sacred localities about the 
 Holy City. The pious interest thus manifested by Miriam 
 was afterwards imitated by many of his successors. Fifteen 
 centuries of intestine division, during which this warlike people 
 have been exposed to the repeated attacks of Magian and 
 Mahommedan invaders ; torrents of blood shed in the defence 
 of the Christian faith ; the repeated devastation of their 
 country and the spoiling of their goods, in the fruitless at- 
 tempt to shake their religious constancy ; their intestine 
 troubles occasioned by heretics, and latterly by the emissaries 
 of the papal see : not ah 1 these combined have been able to 
 divert their thoughts from the holy places, or to quench the 
 zeal which the example of Miriam had kindled. In every 
 century of their annals we read of pilgrimages undertaken, 
 of monasteries and churches founded or enlarged, and of 
 costly offerings to the Holy Sepulchre from the religious 
 princes of Georgia ; until their community became the most 
 important and wealthiest in the city. 
 
 This interest may be further accounted for by the fact, 
 that the princely family of Bagration, the last of four dy- 
 nasties which have governed the country from the days of 
 Alexander the Great, deduced its origin from the royal 
 house of David. The date of their migration from Jeru- 
 salem is fixed by Constantine Porphyrogenitus 2 to the fifth 
 
 2 De Administ. Imp. n. xlv. p. 99. He gives the names of those who 
 migrated, as David and Spandiates.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 century, and towards the close of the seventh they succeeded 
 to the throne of Georgia 1 . The memorial of their illustrious 
 descent was handed down from generation to generation in 
 the coat of arms which they still bear, exhibiting, among 
 other devices 2 , the sling and harp of David; and this idea, 
 however it originated, could not fail to produce a more than 
 ordinary interest in Jerusalem, which displayed itself in their 
 munificent support of those religious establishments which 
 their predecessors had founded in that city 3 . The number 
 of these amounted at one period to eleven, some of which 
 must have been founded very early, since we find among 
 other works of the Emperor Justinian, in the middle of the 
 fifth century, that he repaired the monastery of the Iberians 
 in Jerusalem, and another of the Lazi, a tribe of the same 
 family, in the desert of Jerusalem 4 ; and all these convents 
 were endowed with houses and lands, and furnished with 
 serfs for their support. 
 
 But that long and bloody struggle, maintained for cen- 
 turies, in the noblest cause, against the enemies of the Chris- 
 tian faith, which so weakened them at home that it forced 
 them at last to throw themselves for protection into the arms 
 of Russia 5 , could not but tell on their establishments at Jeru- 
 
 1 This was brought about through 
 the adoption of Gouram-Bagratides by 
 Stephen, the last king of the dynasty 
 of the Sassonides. This first king of 
 the new dynasty was confirmed on the 
 throne by Justinian 11. 605 71 1, with 
 the title of Curopalata, a distinction 
 afterwards conferred on his grandson 
 Adranasi by the Emperor Leo the Isau- 
 rian, 718741. Cont. Porph. 1. c. 
 
 8 A pair of scales, emblematical of 
 the justice of Solomon, also appears on 
 the shield which is supported by lions, 
 
 the supporters of his throne. Their 
 motto is : " The Lord hath sworn in 
 truth unto David, He will not turn 
 from it : Of the fruit of thy body will 
 I set upon thy throne." 
 
 3 See Constantine Porph. 1. c. 
 
 4 Procopius de JEdif. Just. v. ix. 
 This author gives the Iberians a 
 deservedly high character in another 
 work. De Bell. Pers. i. xii. 
 
 * This they did by the advice of 
 their last king George XIII. The 
 negotiations were brought to a close at
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 449 
 
 salem, which passed, one after another, into the hands of 
 the Armenians or of their brethren of the Greek rite. Yet 
 even so late as the beginning of the last century, Vachtang 
 VI. sent a present of 2000 toomans as an offering to the 
 Holy Sepulchre; nor does the decline of their importance date 
 so far back as the circumstances of their country might have 
 led us to expect. So late as the commencement of the six- 
 teenth century they enjoyed immunities which were conceded 
 to no other Christians at Jerusalem 6 . Their pilgrims were 
 free from those vexatious imposts which others had to pay, 
 and their men and women entered the city in full armour, 
 with their banners displayed, in martial array, nor did the 
 infidels dare to molest them. They ranked fourth in the 
 Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and owned the Chapel of the 
 Discovery of the Holy Cross. 
 
 The only convent now remaining to them is that which 
 was first erected, by their king Tatian, in the fifth century, 
 apparently on the land granted by Constantine to Miriam, 
 situated in a valley on the left of the Jaffa road, about 
 twenty minutes' walk from the city walls. It derives its 
 name from the Holy Cross, the wood of which is supposed to 
 have grown near this spot 7 . Its massive walls and low 
 portal, guarded by an iron door, bear witness to the un- 
 settled state of the country ; and the building has been fre- 
 quently exposed to the attacks of the lawless Arabs, who, a 
 few years ago, effected an entrance by night, and murdered 
 
 the beginning of the present century. 
 The manifesto of the Emperor Alex- 
 ander bears date Sept. 12, 1801. 
 
 6 Baumgarten, who visited Jeru- 
 salem in 1507, thus describes them : 
 "...semper aperto marte signisque erec- 
 tis sine tributo ullo aut molestia, liberi 
 intrant. Eorum fseminae nobiliores, 
 more Amazonum, arma tractant." 
 
 29 
 
 Travels, Lib. n. cap. ix. 
 
 7 The statement furnished by the 
 patriarchate to M. MouraviefF gives 
 another reason for this name : viz. that 
 it was here that Heraclius elevated the 
 Cross after he had recovered it from 
 the Persians. But this account is not 
 adopted in the UpoarKwijTaptov.
 
 450 
 
 THE HOLT CITY. 
 
 [PART ir. 
 
 the superior in his bed. At various periods from the time of 
 its foundation it has been greatly enlarged, and at the close 
 of the seventeenth century it contained 220 cells ; at present 
 it numbers no more than three or four monks, under the 
 superintendence of a Georgian archimandrite, whose friendship 
 I had the good fortune to enjoy during my residence at Jeru- 
 salem. Its principal church, which is very large, though now 
 in a state of miserable decay, still bears traces of its former 
 magnificence, in the fragments of tesselated pavement com- 
 posed of variegated marbles, and its walls richly ornamented 
 with mosaic. The memory of its pious benefactors is scarcely 
 preserved in the decayed pictures of certain kings of Georgia 
 and patriarchs of Jerusalem. The present excellent supe- 
 rior 1 mourns over the ruins, and is most anxious to restore it 
 to its former glory ; but the building fund is so very insig- 
 nificant as barely to suffice for the necessary repairs of the 
 convent. It amounts only to 12,000 piastres not much 
 more than 100 a-year, derived from estates attached to it 
 in Georgia ; while he computes that 500,000 piastres would 
 be necessary to put the church itself into decent repair. 
 Much more would be required to restore it thoroughly. It 
 were surely an object worthy of the great autocrat, who now 
 represents the Georgian kings, to extend to this convent that 
 princely liberality which has adorned so many churches in 
 this country ; and there can be little doubt that a proper 
 representation of the facts of the case would engage his 
 hearty interest in it, and induce him to undertake its restora- 
 tion with his accustomed munificence. 
 
 1 He was appointed only four or 
 five years ago, by the reigning ortho- 
 dox patriarch of Jerusalem, in whom 
 the appointment is vested. He found 
 the church in a wretched state, and has 
 
 expended all his private means in fur- 
 nishing it with service-books and other 
 things necessary for the decent per- 
 formance of public worship.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 451 
 
 3. The Armenians*. 
 
 This important community own a common descent with 
 the Georgians 3 , but do not, unhappily, belong to the same 
 household of faith. Their separation from the Catholic Church 
 dates from the Council of Chalcedon, whose decrees they 
 persist in rejecting to this day 4 . They form by far the most 
 important branch of the Monophysite heresy, and their re- 
 storation to the orthodox communion is a consummation so 
 devoutly to be desired, that the slightest approaches to it, or 
 the very inclination for it, cannot but be hailed with extreme 
 satisfaction. It is gratifying therefore to know that their 
 chief patriarch has been received with distinguished honour 
 in the Russian capital, and that negotiations for a reconcilia- 
 tion have been set on foot; and although for the present the 
 result has not been favourable, yet it may be hoped that a 
 better understanding has been mutually established, which 
 may in due time bring about the desired union. The tried 
 orthodoxy of the Eastern Church is a sufficient guarantee 
 that subscription to the decisions of the Fourth General 
 Council will be required as an indispensable condition of in- 
 tercommunion, and the language now held by the orthodox 
 and Armenian writers encourage the hope that this necessary 
 
 2 Through Mr Blackmore's kind- 
 ness I here avail myself of his MS. 
 translation of the History of the Gre- 
 goro-Armenian church, extracted from 
 the journal of the Russian minister of 
 the interior, 1843. And to him I am 
 likewise indebted for his translation of 
 the interesting works referred to below. 
 
 3 Gaick and Carthlos, from whom 
 the Armenians and Georgians respec- 
 tively derive their native names, were 
 brothers, great grandchildren of Ja- 
 pheth, apparently through Javan and 
 
 Tarshish. See Genesis x. 2, 4. They 
 were contemporaries of Ninus or Nim- 
 rod. 
 
 4 This council was formally re- 
 jected by the Armenian church, in a 
 synod A. D. 491. This must of course 
 be undone. Intercommunion with the 
 orthodox church of the East has been 
 twice restored for a time ; first under 
 Heraclius, A. D. 629, when it continued 
 for eighty-four years, and again under 
 Manuel Comnenus( A. n. 11431180.) 
 
 292
 
 452 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 condition may present no insurmountable obstacle. It is re- 
 presented on both sides 1 that intestine commotions alone pre- 
 vented them from sending deputies to take part in the pro- 
 ceedings of the Council of Chalcedon, and that the subsequent 
 condemnation of its decisions was the consequence of misre- 
 presentation, and proceeded on the idea of their opposition to 
 the doctrine established at Ephesus. It is further attempted 
 to put an orthodox interpretation on the doubtful language 
 of their more learned doctors; the frequent expositions of 
 the faith are remarkably free from any mixture of the Eu- 
 tychian leaven 2 , distinctly recognizing the perfection of the 
 two natures in the one person of our Lord ; and they re- 
 pudiate with horror the imputation of Monophysite heresy, 
 which they anathematize and abhor. 
 
 All this is very hopeful, and there can be little question 
 that the adjustment of this unhappy difference between these 
 two important communities would be productive of the most 
 blessed results, not only in the removal of the scandal which 
 their divisions have so long occasioned, but in that it would 
 enable them more successfully to resist the encroachments of 
 the Church of Rome ; and not so only, but might lead to the 
 further extension of the Gospel in the world : for no nation 
 on earth could be better qualified than the Armenians to act 
 as missionaries to the infidels of the East, if they could be 
 brought to devote themselves to the propagation of the faith 
 with the same ardent zeal which they have shewn in the 
 pursuit of earthly riches. 
 
 1 Mr Blackmore has translated a , if Gibbon can be trusted, up to the last 
 
 very valuable Exposition of the Con- 
 fession of Faith of the Armenian 
 Church, written in Russ by the arch- 
 bishop of the Russian Armenians, 17W9. 
 2 This is the more important, as, 
 
 century they alone remained " the pure 
 disciples of Eutyches, an unfortunate 
 parent, who has been renounced by the 
 greater part of his spiritual progeny." 
 Decline and Fall, cap. xlvii.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 453 
 
 From the fifth century downwards, " the troubles of 
 Armenia have served to scatter her children abroad over the 
 face of the earth ; and the unsettled wandering life, consequent 
 on the absence of a national bond, has served to turn their 
 native spirit of calculation, enterprize, and activity, almost 
 exclusively towards commerce, of which they became the 
 principal channels between Europe and Asia. In this view 
 they have established themselves in those places where these 
 two continents come in contact with each other. Under the 
 protection of the Mongals, they were scattered throughout the 
 whole of the extensive limits of their settlements in Eastern 
 Europe, in the Khanats of Astracan and Kazan, in the Cri- 
 mea, in the Kussian Ykraine, and more especially in Volhynia 
 and Galicia. They followed the footsteps of the Osmanli 
 Turks to Constantinople, and inundated all the Eastern coasts 
 of the Mediterranean. The establishment of a government 
 in the centre of Asia, under the sophis of Persia, attracted 
 them to the interior of Iran, from whence they penetrated 
 into India, to Madras, and Calcutta. In Europe itself, they 
 have advanced on one side from the borders of the Austrian 
 kingdom to Venice and Vienna, and on the other, from the 
 frontiers of the great empire of Russia to Moscow and 
 St Petersburg. Thus is this nation dispersed over an im- 
 mense extent of the globe, from the Indian Ocean to the 
 Baltic, from the steppes of Tartary to the valley of the 
 Nile, to the crests of the Carpathian Mountains and the 
 Alps, while the land of their fathers is divided between 
 Russia, Turkey, and Persia." 
 
 Yet, like the Jews, whom they resemble in so many 
 points, they have retained, in all countries, their distinctive 
 features and habits, while their general probity has secured 
 for them universal respect. Their Church, founded by St 
 Gregory the Great, has been their sole bond of union, and
 
 454 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART u. 
 
 the patriarch of Etchmiazine 1 , the successor of that apostle 
 of their nation, their one visible head: for the dignitaries, 
 who are honoured with that title at Constantinople and Je- 
 rusalem, wear it rather as a political than as a religious dis- 
 tinction ; nor does their office in any way interfere with the 
 jurisdiction of the catholicos of Etchmiazine, to whom they 
 stand almost in the capacity of vicars in partibus. The 
 title of Patriarch was assumed by the bishop at Jerusalem 
 in 1310, and at Constantinople in 1461. The latter of these 
 two dignitaries has authority over all the dioceses within the 
 limits of the Ottomon empire 2 , with the reservation of gene- 
 ral subordination to the catholicos, and with the exception of 
 the patriarch of Jerusalem, who is independent of all but the 
 supreme authority, within the limits of his own jurisdiction, 
 which extends over Palestine and the Island of Cyprus. 
 
 This office was filled, during my residence at Jerusalem, 
 by a dignitary named Pogos, of polished manners and affable 
 address, and moreover of considerable literary attainments; 
 he resigned however in the year 1843, and was succeeded 
 by Zecharias, who stands so high in the estimation of the 
 whole Church, that on the late free election of a Supreme 
 Patriarch, his name obtained the greatest number of suffrages 
 next to Narcissus, who was actually chosen. A synod of 
 bishops adds dignity to the patriarchal court, but they do 
 not, I believe, claim, and certainly do not exercise, any juris- 
 diction within the dioceses of Palestine, from which they 
 derive their title; however this may be, the more ancient 
 practice of consecrating these dignitaries to some of the ex- 
 tinct sees in Armenia was decidedly less open to objection 
 
 1 This spot is situated at the dis- 
 tance of three leagues from Erivan, 
 and is now comprehended within the 
 Russian empire. 
 
 - The Armenians of India are un- 
 der the jurisdiction of the Archbishop 
 of Ispahan.
 
 CH. IV.J THE HOLY CITY. 455 
 
 than that which now prevails, which looks like a schismatical 
 attempt to interfere with the authority of the bishops of the 
 orthodox communion. 
 
 The Armenians possess the large convent of St James 
 the son of Zebedee, on Mount Zion, within the walls, and 
 a much smaller one which occupies the traditionary site of 
 the house of Caiaphas, a little without the Zion Gate. Both 
 of these, with other sacred localities, formerly belonged to 
 the Georgians 3 ; but on the decline of their fortunes, they 
 were fain to dispose of them to this more wealthy frater- 
 nity, on the condition, however, that they shall be restored 
 to their original owners, should the latter ever find them- 
 selves in a condition to pay the amount of tribute exacted 
 by the Turks for the occupation of these buildings 4 . 
 
 The patriarchal monastery of St James is said to occupy 
 the site of that apostle's martyrdom; but, as it is evident 
 that this part of Mount Zion must have been within the 
 ancient city, it is difficult to reconcile the tradition, which 
 is not very ancient, with the established historical fact, that 
 the executions of the ancients took place without the gates. 
 The convent is of such extent that it can furnish accommo- 
 dation for the two or three thousand pilgrims who annually 
 resort to the celebration of Easter ; and the church is larger 
 
 3 George I. Curopalata, in the llth 
 century, first built a monastery at the 
 reputed place of St James's martyrdom. 
 Mouravieff, Hist, of Jerusalem, Vol. I. 
 p. 375. 
 
 4 Letters to this effect, it seems, are 
 still preserved in the Patriarchal Court 
 at Jerusalem : so says M. Jossilian, 
 
 sum of 80 ducats in acknowledgement 
 of the Georgians' rights; which was, 
 of course, soon withheld. Once in the 
 17th century the orthodox, under their 
 Patriarch Psesius (A. D. 16451660), 
 succeeded in obtaining possession of it 
 for a few years ; and have not yet re- 
 linquished their pretensions, grounded 
 
 History of the Georgian Church, note | on their relations with the Georgians, 
 
 26 on cap. vii. The transfer took 
 place as early as the 15th century ; and 
 the Armenians were to pay an annual 
 
 whose name Iberes, affords a pretext 
 for a like claim to the Latins, which 
 they are not ashamed to urge !
 
 456 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 and more handsome than any of the other churches in the 
 city, excepting only that of the Greek orthodox attached to 
 the Holy Sepulchre. But the decorations of the Armenian 
 Church of St James are nowhere equalled in richness, and their 
 sacred vestments are peculiarly splendid : the great wealth 
 of the community, and the universal interest felt concerning 
 Jerusalem 1 , allowing them to provide for the public service 
 of God more sumptuously than any other communion. Among 
 their other treasures, they boast to have the chair of St 
 James, the first bishop of Jerusalem ; and it is not impro- 
 bable that their archives would enable them to make out 
 a tolerable pedigree for this venerable relic, running up to 
 the time of Eusebius, in whose days it was certainly sup- 
 posed to be still in existence at Jerusalem 2 . 
 
 4. The Syrians, or Jacobites. 
 
 The Syrians and Copts are connected with the Arme- 
 nians by terms of intercommunion, owing to their general 
 agreement in the Monophysite heresy, although shades of dif- 
 ference have been discovered between the different churches 3 . 
 They assist at each other's services, and the weaker com- 
 munities look for support to their more powerful and influ- 
 ential co-religionists, in return for which they are expected 
 to submit to such spoliation and degradation as their poverty 
 admits, and the pride or caprice of the Armenians chooses 
 to impose. They derive their name Jacobites from James 
 
 1 Ricaut mentions that three col- 
 lections are made in all Armenian 
 churches during the hours of divine 
 service on Sundays ; the first for Jeru- 
 salem, the second for Etchmiazine, 
 and the third for the church where 
 they are. (Present State of the Arme- 
 
 nian Church, 1678, p. 393.) Whether 
 this practice is continued, I know not. 
 
 3 Eusebii H.E. VH. 19. 
 
 a There is an admirable treatise on 
 the Monophysite heresy in Assemann's 
 Biblioth. Orient. Vol. 11.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 457 
 
 Baradaeus, an heretical monk, a disciple of Severus of An- 
 tioch, who, in the former half of the sixth century, restored 
 the persecuted and sinking cause of the Monophysites in 
 Syria 4 , and through whom the present Jacobite patriarch 
 of Antioch traces his succession to that Severus whose un- 
 fortunate ingenuity discovered a solution of the mystery of 
 the Incarnation, opposed alike to Catholic verity, and to 
 the conflicting but equally perverse definitions of Nestorius 
 and Eutyches. 
 
 This dignitary resides in the monastery of Zapharan, near 
 Mardin, in the province of Diarbekir, from whence he exer- 
 cises spiritual jurisdiction over a poor and scattered flock, 
 which he with difficulty keeps together, owing to the per- 
 severing exertions of the active missionaries of the Propa- 
 ganda, backed as they are by the busy cooperation of the 
 civil representatives of France 5 . The vicar of this Syrian 
 prelate at Jerusalem, during my sojourn, was a truly amiable 
 person, Abd-el-Nur by name, bishop of Orfa, in Mesopo- 
 tamia, of whose death I have lately heard with regret. The 
 community is very small, one priest and one deacon formed 
 the staff of the bishop ; the number and condition of the 
 pilgrims would not afford them a very numerous establish- 
 ment ; and several houses which they formerly possessed in 
 the city, the revenues derived from which maintained them 
 in comfort, have been taken out of then* hands by their 
 Armenian protectors. 
 
 They occupy the ancient monastery, known as the house 
 of Mark, the only one remaining to them of several which 
 
 * Eutychii Annales, VoL n. pp. 
 145, 146. 
 
 5 They were lately deprived of six 
 churches and convents, between Da- 
 mascus and Aleppo, by the united ex- 
 
 ertions of the political and religious 
 agents. The British ambassador at 
 Constantinople procured a finnan for 
 their restoration, the object of which 
 was however defeated.
 
 458 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 they formerly owned, the remainder having been confiscated 
 by the Turks, by the law of might. To these, however, 
 they trust hereafter to make good their claim, by the ancient 
 deeds which they still preserve, in expectation of a day, 
 not far distant as they hope, when the domination of a 
 Christian power shall repair the injuries of centuries of op- 
 pression, and restore to them the inheritance of their ances- 
 tors, of which they have been unjustly deprived. 
 
 5. The Copts. 
 
 The important see of Alexandria, which had furnished 
 the Church with her ablest and best champions of orthodoxy, 
 against Arian and Nestorian heresy, became a scourge and a 
 curse to the faith during the presidency of Dioscorus, the 
 successor of St Cyril. Nor did the sentence of deprivation 
 pronounced against him by the Council of Chalcedon, arrest 
 the progress of the error which he had propagated. The 
 bands of monks of the Egyptian deserts had become hope- 
 lessly corrupted with heresy, and the disease was not to be 
 eradicated by the sword of the orthodox emperors 1 . The 
 torrents of blood shed in the attempts to establish the faith 
 of Chalcedon in the churches of Egypt most signally failed ; 
 a succession of heretical patriarchs was perpetuated in the 
 monasteries of Thebais, and the whole country, with the 
 exception of an insignificant fraction, followed the persecuted 
 cause, which found that protection from the Mahommedan in- 
 vaders which it had looked for in vain to the Christian empe- 
 rors of the East. At the present day, while the jurisdiction 
 of the orthodox patriarch, elected by the synod of Constan- 
 tinople, supported by not so much as one suffragan, scarcely 
 extends beyond the limits of his own monastery at Alex- 
 
 See Gibbon, Decline and Fall, cap. xlvii.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 459 
 
 andria, the Jacobite prelate, with a synod of bishops, presides 
 in his convent at Cairo over an indigent but obedient people, 
 scattered in the villages bordering on the Nile, and exercises 
 metropolitan powers in the church of Abyssinia, the appoint- 
 ment of whose Abuna, or chief ecclesiastical officer, is vested 
 in his hands. 
 
 The friendly intercourse lately opened between this pre- 
 late and some dignitaries of our own church promises the 
 happiest results, if only it be conducted throughout in the 
 same judicious and cautious manner hi which it was com- 
 menced 2 , and by which a feeling of the most unbounded con- 
 fidence in the Anglican Church has been excited in the mind 
 of the Coptic patriarch. In all our dealings with the op- 
 pressed Christians of the East the utmost caution is required, 
 not only lest we identify ourselves with their heretical per- 
 versions of doctrine, or practical corruptions of ritual, but 
 lest we mistake their desire of protection and temporary 
 assistance for a disposition to receive from us spiritual advan- 
 tages, since the cruel exactions to which they are subject may 
 appear to them to justify such dissimulation, and will perhaps 
 excuse it to those among ourselves who consider the debas- 
 ing and demoralizing influence of centuries of servitude under 
 the yoke of Mahommedan oppressors. 
 
 The advantage taken of the friendless condition of the 
 Copts may be seen by the following recital, which will fur- 
 ther serve to illustrate the manner in which justice is ad- 
 ministered in Jerusalem, and not there only, but in almost 
 all the courts of law within the Turkish dominions. The 
 events occurred in the year 1842. The small Coptic esta- 
 
 2 I allude to the exertions of my 
 friend the Rev. Dr Tattam, to whose 
 friendship with the Coptic patriarch 
 the church is indebted for the recovery 
 
 of some valuable works of the ancient 
 fathers hid for centuries in the monas- 
 teries of the Egyptian deserts.
 
 460 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 blishment at Jerusalem was mainly dependent for its support 
 on the rent of six small houses, which yielded but a very 
 scanty return. But even of these they were not allowed to 
 retain undisputed possession. One of the many natives who 
 call themselves Franks, and think that the designation entitles 
 them to European protection in any iniquities which they 
 think fit to practice this worthless fellow laid claim to three 
 of these houses, without the slightest shadow of right. The 
 poor Copts requested the cadi to allow them time to send to 
 Cairo for the deeds and papers, which are in safe keeping 
 at the patriarchate. The request was complied with ; but 
 before the appointed time had expired, or the documents 
 could arrive, the false claimant went with a bribe in his 
 hand to the pasha, and prevailed on him to serve a notice to 
 the cadi requiring him to act immediately. The Copts 
 seeing no other course open to them in their extremity, 
 resolved, with the advice and assistance of the more wealthy 
 Armenians, to purchase justice by a bribe to the cadi ; and 
 for this purpose borrowed a sum of 105, almost the value 
 of the houses. The following will further prove the value of 
 water in Jerusalem. About the same time they had a dispute 
 with a Turk concerning a cistern of water ' which was com- 
 mon property, having an opening both from their convent 
 and his house, but which he claimed for himself exclusively. 
 Judgment was given in their favour, but only in considera- 
 tion of a bribe of 45 ! It is not surprising that disputes 
 so decided should be afterwards revived, especially when the 
 
 1 There is a very large cistern be- 
 longing to their Convent of the Sultan, 
 which will repay a visit of the anti- 
 quary. Owing to the water and the 
 darkness I could not properly explore 
 it. They call it the Church of St 
 Helena, and point out in a distant part 
 
 two columns of white marble, where 
 they say an altar stands. It appears to 
 be a very lofty cave in the native rock, 
 and the descent to it is by a handsome 
 staircase in one of the angles. The 
 visitor should go provided with many 
 tapers.
 
 CIT 
 
 . IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 461 
 
 arrival of a new cadi may be supposed to cancel all the acts 
 of his predecessor ; for this judicial appointment is held for 
 three years, during which period the functionary is to turn 
 it to what advantage he can, by the administration or per- 
 version of justice. Accordingly, the troubles of the Copts 
 were renewed the year after their adjustment ; but I am 
 sorry not to be able to report the result. 
 
 By what singular good fortune this community was able 
 to establish itself in the large monastery contiguous to the 
 Church of the Holy Sepulchre, is not very clear. The domi- 
 nation of the Mamaluke sultans appears to have been more 
 favourable to them than to other Christians ; and they have 
 an interesting but very vague tradition relative to the con- 
 vent, which I had from the superior. A Coptic secretary to 
 one of these sultans was offered any reward he chose to ask 
 for his long and faithful services ; he refused to accept any 
 remuneration for himself, but humbly prayed that his master 
 would repair this ruined convent at Jerusalem, and grant it 
 to his brethren. The sultan consented, and the memory of 
 this event is still preserved not only in the name of the 
 Convent, Deir-es-Sultan (the Convent of the Sultan), but in a 
 heavy iron chain fastened in the wall by the door as a per- 
 petual memorial of the sultan's bounty, and a witness to all 
 that the convent was under his special protection ; and the 
 significant token has hitherto preserved to them the pos- 
 session of this important building. 
 
 The date of this transaction may be pretty accurately 
 determined by the following notes of time. The ancient 
 Georgian annals relate that one of their kings had received, 
 as a reward of his military services, from one of the Greek 
 emperors, the half of Golgotha, which he covered with monas- 
 teries 2 . This is sufficiently vague ; but it further appears, 
 
 3 Jossilian's Georgian History, cap. viii. n. 66.
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART ir. 
 
 Bagration IV. repaired these buildings in the eleventh century 1 , 
 and that so late as A. D. 1507 the Georgians were established 
 on Mount Calvary, having recovered it from the Armenians 
 through the powerful influence of another Georgian king with 
 the sultan of Egypt 2 . Now since the city passed from the 
 Mamaluke sultans of Egypt to the Ottoman rule under Se- 
 lim I. in the year A. D. 1517 3 , the story of the Coptic superior 
 must belong to the ten years preceding the fall of the dynasty 
 of the Mamalukes. 
 
 The monastery of the Sultan is presided over by a mar- 
 ried priest a singular anomaly, and tenanted by a few poor 
 Copts, and still more abject Abyssinians. The Copts also 
 possess a smaller monastery dedicated to St George, in an- 
 other part of the town, and at no great distance from that 
 they had commenced a very large new convent, under the 
 protection of Ibrahim Pasha, but on his expulsion from the 
 country this extensive building was abandoned. 
 
 Having thus reviewed the Oriental Churches, as they are 
 represented around the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, I pro- 
 ceed to the Occidentals, among whom the Latins will challenge 
 the first notice, both on account of their importance and the 
 priority of their establishment. 
 
 II. OCCIDENTALS. 
 
 1. Latins. 
 
 THE foundation of Monastic establishments of the Latins 
 in Palestine is coaeval with the introduction of the monastic 
 rule into the country, and was much promoted by the zeal of 
 
 1 This Bagration was son and suc- 
 cessor of George I. who, in the same 
 century, founded the monastery of St 
 James. See ahove, p. 45,5, n. 3. 
 
 8 Baumgarten's Travels, Lib. u. 
 cap. ix. pp. S<0, 91. 
 3 See above, p. 240.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 463 
 
 St Jerome and the liberality of his pious friends and disciples, 
 whose virtues he has immortalized. We have seen that prior 
 to the period of the Crusades they occupied the monastery 
 of the merchants of Amalfi, otherwise called " Sancta Maria 
 de Latina," which was afterwards enlarged into the hospital 
 of the Knights of St John 4 . On the recovery of the city by 
 Saladin, the strangers were expelled, and on their return, 
 established themselves around the Csenaculum on Mount Zion, 
 where a Franciscan convent was erected by Sancia, queen of 
 Robert of Sicily, in which the western pilgrims of the four- 
 teenth and two following centuries were entertained during 
 their visit to the city 5 . From this convent they were expeUed 
 by the infidels in 1560 ; and a pilgrim who visited the Holy 
 City, and was received by them in their new convent, only 
 twenty years later, gives a curious account of the circum- 
 stances which led to their removal 6 . A Constantinople Jew, 
 who had great influence with the grand vizir on account of 
 his riches, requested the Latin pilgrims to allow him to per- 
 form his devotions at the tombs of David and Solomon, whose 
 place of burial was said by ancient tradition to exist under 
 the arches of their church. But his most earnest entreaties 
 were ineffectual. The Jew, in anger, vowed revenge, and, on 
 his return to Constantinople, rebuked the vizir for his indif- 
 ference to two great prophets celebrated in the Koran, whose 
 holy relics were in the hands of the infidels. His represen- 
 tations, aided by bribes, had the desired effect, and the holy 
 places were rendered as inaccessible to the Christians as they 
 had before been to the Jews. 
 
 4 See above, p. 230, and Addison's 
 Knights Templars, p. 61. 
 
 5 See the authorities in Robinson's 
 Biblical Researches, i. p. 358, and 
 note 3. 
 
 This was Prince Radzivil, who 
 visited Jerusalem circ. A. D. 1583. He 
 is quoted by M. Mouravieff, History 
 of Jerusalem, cap. xxxviii.
 
 464 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 The Latin monks next migrated to the convent of St Sal- 
 vador, which they still occupy, originally the property of the 
 Georgians, and probably identical with their celebrated Iberian 
 monastery, erected by king Vachtang in the fifth century 
 (446 499), and afterwards repaired by Justinian 1 . The 
 church is dedicated to St John the Divine, and is frequented 
 by such of the native inhabitants as conform to the Latin 
 ritual. Their number is stated by the Greeks at 200, or a 
 third of their own ; and although I should imagine the numbers 
 of both to be understated, yet the proportion appears pretty 
 correct. They are entirely under the spiritual care of the 
 Latin fathers, chiefly Spaniards, in number from twelve to 
 fifteen, presided over by a guardian, who exercises episcopal 
 jurisdiction, without the order of bishop, as a mitred abbot, 
 during his triennial appointment. 
 
 Notwithstanding the dispute between St Jerome and the 
 bishop John, and the exemption from episcopal jurisdiction 
 claimed for the alien monks by Epiphanius, the good under- 
 standing between the Greeks and Latins in the Holy City 
 does not seem to have been permanently interrupted previous 
 to the Crusades ; but it was impossible that harmony could 
 survive the schismatical invasion of the patriarchate and all its 
 subject sees by the Latins, immediately after their occupation 
 of the city. And when to this grievance were added the irri- 
 tating claim of papal supremacy, and the no less exciting 
 questions relating to the procession of the Third Person of 
 the Blessed Trinity, the doctrine of Purgatory, and the use 
 of unleavened bread in the Holy Eucharist, it was every way 
 to be expected that a controversy conducted, as such contro- 
 versies too often are, with more zeal than charity, should 
 finally terminate in mutual denunciations and open hostilities, 
 
 1 See above, p. 448, and Procop. De JEdif. Just. v. 9. Vol. n. p. 467.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 465 
 
 such as have, for the last three centuries, kept Jerusalem in a 
 perpetual ferment. 
 
 But the evil was much fomented by the active endea- 
 vours of Pope Urban the Vlllth to make up for the defections 
 from the Roman see in the West by extensive proselytism in 
 the East. Not one of the ancient churches but was visited 
 by missionaries of the Propaganda, or the enterprizing mem- 
 bers of the Society of Jesus ; who, not satisfied with the con- 
 version of heretics to the Catholic faith, sought with equal 
 ardour the reconciliation of the schismatics so they called 
 the members of the Orthodox Churches of the East to what 
 they intended by " The Apostolic See 2 ." When we consider, 
 on the one hand, the deplorably low state in which the 
 Oriental Churches were sunk through the prevailing igno- 
 rance and corruption of morals, and on the other, the zeal, 
 ability, and persevering patience of the best-instructed and 
 most devoted missionaries that the world had seen since 
 primitive times, it is no matter of surprise that their self- 
 denying labours were crowned with abundant success. And 
 when to all this it is added, that their strenuous exertions 
 were backed by the hearty co-operation of the French go- 
 vernment, whose influence was directed by the kings them- 
 selves in the Supreme Porte and by their consuls in the East, 
 it is astonishing that the ruins thus assailed did not crumble 
 to dust. But to trace the progress of these operations in the 
 East, interesting as it would be, would take me away from 
 the subject in hand; thus much has been said in order to 
 explain that, from the seventeenth century to the present time, 
 
 * A most interesting series of letters 
 of these missionaries was published at 
 Paris, 1780, under the title of " Let- 
 ires Edijianteset Curieuses^ lately re- 
 printed. In the first volume will be 
 found a letter of the superior of the 
 
 30 
 
 Jesuits in Syria to the general of the 
 society, containing an account of the 
 first establishment and operations of 
 these missionaries in the East, under 
 Pope Urban VIII. A.D. 162,5.
 
 * 
 
 466 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 the ancient orthodox church of Jerusalem has been exposed, 
 in common with the other patriarchates, to these incessant en- 
 croachments ; and although on the whole it has suffered much 
 less than the northern parts of Syria, where whole dioceses 
 have been won over to the Roman obedience, yet has it been 
 robbed of many of its children, and those who still continue 
 in its communion have been encouraged in a spirit of insub- 
 ordination which defies the correction of ecclesiastical disci- 
 pline. One instance of this may be given. There is a 
 Christian village named Beit-Jala, lying off the road to the 
 right, between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, containing about 
 200 families, with a church, and four priests, from ancient 
 times subject to the orthodox patriarch, in whose diocese it is 
 situated. A few years ago the whole village passed over to 
 the Latins, and as this wonderful agreement was certainly not 
 the result of conviction, as the sequel will prove, some counte- 
 nance is afforded to the suspicion of the Greeks that bribery 
 was practised. On this theory they say, that when the money 
 was spent the faithless village returned to its allegiance to 
 the patriarch. It will further illustrate the animus with 
 which the controversy is carried on, to state, that all who 
 had been baptized during the continuance of the schism, were 
 rebaptized by the orthodox ; who, on being expostulated with 
 on the impropriety of such a course, acknowledged it at once, 
 but said it was necessary in order to inspire the ignorant 
 natives with detestation of their rivals ! One other fact rela- 
 tive to this village should by no means be passed over in 
 silence. Soon after the arrival of the Anglican bishop at 
 Jerusalem, they offered themselves, through their sheikh, as 
 Protestant converts ; but as no negotiation was entered upon, 
 the sum required for this transaction or transition must 
 remain unknown.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 467 
 
 2. American Congregationalists. 
 
 The fact last stated may well introduce this Society, 
 which claims precedence among Protestant missions, by the 
 rule of priority in their establishment at Jerusalem : for al- 
 though it be true that a missionary who subsequently joined 
 the Anglican Church, connected with a society which was 
 also afterwards brought into closer relations with the same 
 Church, has resided at Jerusalem from the period of their 
 establishment, yet it will be presently seen that the operations 
 of both were so completely identified, in their own view, and 
 in the eyes of the natives, that the Anglican Church cannot 
 properly be said to have been represented in the Holy City 
 until the arrival of Bishop Alexander, in 1842. 
 
 Previous to this the Americans had been established in 
 Jerusalem for ten or twelve years, and with their proceedings 
 I am at present concerned. It is well to have from them- 
 selves a distinct and authoritative statement, to the effect that 
 " the object of the American missions to Syria, and other 
 parts of the Levant, is not to draw off members of the Oriental 
 Churches to Protestantism 1 ." Well would it have been had 
 this not only been avowed, but consistently acted upon from 
 the commencement ! then might that which is their declared 
 object have been much nearer its accomplishment than now it 
 is, if not through their agency, perhaps through the agency 
 of others not less qualified for the task " of awakening them 
 to the knowledge and belief of the gospel-truth, in the purity 
 and simplicity of its original scriptural form." Whether their 
 practice has been conformable to their profession, will pre- 
 sently appear. It is not impossible that a simple narrative of 
 facts would suggest the idea that the ill success of their first 
 
 1 Biblical Researches, Vol. i. p. 332. 
 
 302
 
 468 THE HOLY CITY. [PART II. 
 
 attempts have caused them to alter their tactics, and adopt 
 a new method of proceeding. 
 
 On the first arrival of the Americans at Jerusalem, they 
 were received and entertained for some months in the monas- 
 tery of the Archangel, belonging to the Orthodox, then under 
 the superintendence of the very worthy archimandrite Joel, 
 whose name I feel pleasure in repeating. They were wel- 
 comed, with courtesy and kindness at least, by the members 
 of the Greek Church, and permission was even granted to 
 bury their dead in the ground of the Orthodox. Whence 
 came it then that in a few years the hearts of these Eastern 
 Christians were estranged from them, that jealousies and sus- 
 picions were awakened, and the faithful almost forbidden to 
 hold intercourse with them? Whence came it that in no 
 long time regard was exchanged for something like aversion, 
 so that on one occasion, when permission was asked to inter 
 in their ground, it was granted only under a written promise 
 that the request should never be repeated ? 
 
 Coldness and indifference might be explained on the sup- 
 position that expectations of temporal advantage had been 
 entertained by the covetous monks which were not realized, 
 and, with a reservation in favour of the venerable superior 
 and some others, I could not undertake to deny the charge ; 
 but the explanation is insufficient to account for the feelings 
 which at present exist, the true grounds of which I will 
 endeavour to investigate. 
 
 What if the grey-bearded bishops of these venerable 
 churches came in time to discover that the missionaries, 
 who had come from the far west to teach them scriptural 
 religion, denounced, as corrupt and dangerous, doctrines 
 which their church had derived from Scripture ; that these 
 apostles so is still their name in Greek were separate 
 from the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship, as they, in com-
 
 CH. rv.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 469 
 
 mon with all Oriental Christians, understand it? was it 
 strange that they should hesitate to accept as teachers of 
 scriptural truth those whom they must necessarily consider 
 unskilled in the first elements of the Christian faith? If, 
 further, they found that these same missionaries were actively 
 engaged in disseminating among their flocks books and tracts 
 containing novelties which their churches do not recognize, 
 that children were brought together to schools, and adults 
 to preachings, without the knowledge or sanction of their 
 spiritual guides, was it not to be expected that a feeling of 
 suspicion and distrust should be soon engendered? 
 
 They asked their Occidental instructors for creeds and 
 liturgies they were answered by the well-known Protestant 
 motto. But the Orientals, admitting its truth, would have 
 sense enough to observe, that the necessity of an interpreter 
 of " the Bible" was yet acknowledged by the missionaries 
 themselves, and would perhaps be curious to examine these 
 more pure expositions of scripture truth, which were to be 
 substituted for the ancient creeds and canons of the Orthodox 
 Church. And what would they find? One of the most 
 popular books distributed by the missionaries in the East 
 bears on its cover the title, " Luther and his Times 1 ." This 
 is no place to discuss the character of that great man ; I 
 wish only to state the fact, that he, in common with Calvin, 
 was branded as a heretic by the church of Jerusalem in 
 the 17th century 2 . I do not wish to justify the act; but 
 supposing Luther had been the most perfect pattern of Chris- 
 tian graces that the world ever saw, was it consistent with 
 the precepts of the Gospel to commence " the regeneration 
 
 1 I adduce this as one of many like 
 mischievous books, issued from the 
 Malta Press, now happily abandoned, 
 
 or in better hands than formerly. 
 
 * In the synod of Bethlehem, under 
 the patriarch Dositheus, A. D. 1672.
 
 470 
 
 THE HOLY CtTY. 
 
 [PAKT II. 
 
 of the East" by such a method as this ? Was this to feed 
 children with milk, reserving strong meat for those of riper 
 age ? or was it not rather to pour new wine into old bottles, 
 to sew new cloth on to an old garment ? Was it not, in fact, 
 to cast to the winds the profession of no intention to pro- 
 selytize, supposing such a profession had then been made, 
 and to unfurl a banner of revolt to the disaffected! 
 
 And the disaffected were received. At least, they were 
 withdrawn from their obedience to their ecclesiastical supe- 
 riors, though not judged sufficiently advanced to be admitted 
 to the privileges of church-membership in the Independent 
 congregation ; and anything more melancholy than the state 
 of these unhappy men cannot be conceived. I knew one 
 well, the most favourable specimen by far of all with whom 
 I had any dealings ; and his case may serve to convey an 
 idea of the result of these endeavours. This disciple had 
 been led, I hope and believe, to the honest conviction that 
 certain practices in the Church of Rome he was a Greek 
 catholic 1 were erroneous or unscriptural : he was further 
 persuaded that it was his duty to depart from its commu- 
 nion, and he did so : his wife continuing stedfast in her old 
 profession. The man became a Protestant. He gave up 
 the practices of fasting, crossing, confession, communion, fre- 
 quenting church ; and for these he substituted attendance on 
 one Arabic service conducted by the missionaries on the 
 Sunday. But he was not comfortable : he began to have 
 misgivings : he felt a thirst which the missionaries could not 
 satisfy : he began to detect defects in their system which 
 he had not before observed. He enquired for their bishops, 
 
 1 i.e. Convert from the Greek to 
 Latin Church in his own person or in 
 his parents. All the native Protestants 
 
 at Jerusalem were, I believe, of the 
 Latin Church.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 471 
 
 and was not satisfied with the reply, " We are bishops." 
 He questioned his teachers, and argued with them on other 
 points, and his doubts were only confirmed. An English 
 Prayer-book fell into his hands, and he found that a church, 
 whose doctrines had been represented to him as identical 
 with those of the Congregationalists, differed on many essen- 
 tial points : that it had bishops, priests, and deacons, creeds, 
 and a liturgy ; festivals and fasting-days ; articles and canons : 
 that it acknowledged the efficacy of the sacraments and the 
 reality of sacramental grace : it was free from those errors 
 which had drawn him from his old communion, and from 
 those defects which he had observed in the new. He was 
 delighted with the discovery ; but his joy was of short dura- 
 tion. He was told it was a dangerous book, containing many 
 errors, and it was taken away. But his perplexities were 
 increased, and he was very miserable. To retrace his steps 
 was impossible, even had he desired it. Yet with all his 
 anxiety, he was in a happier condition than others who had 
 taken the same decided step, and had fallen into a state of 
 listless indifference and unconcern which it was most grievous 
 to witness. 
 
 But this is not the worst. Let it be remembered that 
 the Oriental Churches do not force celibacy on their clergy, 
 or any others, but they simply allow monastic vows. Every 
 monk is a free agent. The rule of the Armenian, as of 
 the Greek Church, is to elect their bishops from the regular 
 clergy. They are bishops because they were monks, not 
 monks because bishops 2 . Could it be right to tempt from 
 the Armenian convent at Jerusalem those who had bound 
 
 8 I insist on this in order to dis- 
 connect the case of the secular clergy 
 who felt justified in marrying at the 
 era of the Reformation, whose example 
 
 has, I believe, been lately imitated in 
 Germany. I do not wish to pronounce 
 an opinion on their case.
 
 472 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART ir. 
 
 themselves by voluntary vows of celibacy, and had in con- 
 sequence been admitted to the highest dignities in their 
 church? Could it be right to encourage them to marry? 
 Could any glory result to God, any good to the unhappy 
 men themselves, by the violation of such obligations ? or was 
 it to be expected that, after having broken such vows, they 
 should be holden by the cords of sand with which it was 
 attempted to bind them? The missionaries know whether 
 they are satisfactory Protestants 1 . 
 
 But I have done with this most distressing subject ; and 
 if I have spoken plainly of the system pursued by the Ame- 
 rican Congregational missionaries, it is because I am convinced 
 that, with the very best intentions, they are doing incalcu- 
 lable injury to those whom they are seeking to benefit. 
 But this conviction is in no way inconsistent with the greatest 
 personal regard for the truly estimable gentlemen of that 
 body with whom I had the good fortune to become ac- 
 quainted ; the example of whose private and domestic virtues, 
 amid the corruption and laxity of oriental morality, has con- 
 ferred an inestimable blessing on the natives, which will 
 counterbalance, if anything can, the evil which the schisma- 
 tical tendency of their not very successful proceedings is 
 calculated to produce. It was impossible to have any inter- 
 course with them without feeling an earnest desire, that, 
 if the English Church and nation cannot be represented to 
 
 1 There were three of these unhappy 
 men; I believe not more. The mission- 
 aries have taken charge of their fami- 
 lies, as they were bound to do. The fol- 
 lowing will shew the influence of these 
 examples. A monk from Mount Leba- 
 non had come by stealth to Jerusalem. 
 He was brought to me by the native Pro- 
 testant, of whom I have spoken above ; 
 
 he told me "he wished to become a 
 Protestant." "Why?" "I want to 
 marry." "No other reason?" "None." 
 Was it wrong to tell such an one to 
 remain where he was, until he knew 
 some better reason for changing; to 
 refer him to Judges xi. 35 ; Eccles. v. 
 4, &c. ; and to bid him pray God to 
 enable him to perform his vow.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 473 
 
 the foreign Christians by countrymen of our own, we could 
 prevail with those of our own blood, who own a common 
 language, to join with us in a common cause, to be conducted 
 on sounder principles. Even with their present views they 
 would represent the English Church quite as faithfully, and 
 much more creditably, than some others, from the conse- 
 quences of whose inadequate ideas of its constitution and cha- 
 racter it has long suffered, and is still suffering, more than 
 can be told, in the estimation of the more intelligent Christians 
 of the East : not that it is to be wished that the Americans 
 should join us on any misapprehension of our real character ; 
 but may it not be hoped that the universal consent of all 
 the ancient churches, with which they are there brought in 
 contact, to certain points of doctrine and discipline, while 
 they are most bitterly opposed on various other points, will 
 at length convince them that what they once considered 
 as peculiarities or blemishes in the Reformed Church of Eng- 
 land, but which she is found to hold in common with all 
 churches, are not Romish corruptions, but Catholic traditions, 
 not of man's invention, but of Divine sanction ? 
 
 3. The English Mission. 
 
 It was an unfortunate circumstance for our Church that 
 it was first introduced to the Christians of Jerusalem, in later 
 times, by a Lutheran minister, and a Dane. Whatever other 
 qualifications such a missionary might possess, it was not to 
 be expected, as of course it was not proposed, that he should 
 faithfully represent the distinctive character of the Anglican 
 doctrine and polity. It was moreover very natural that the 
 few isolated Protestants at Jerusalem should agree to merge 
 their differences, which were not considerable, and that the 
 Lutheran and Congregational ministers and missionaries should 
 meet together on an equal footing ; nor could it be expected
 
 474 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 that admission of the former to priest's orders in the English 
 Church, on grounds of convenience rather than of conviction, 
 would interrupt the harmony or interfere with the mutual 
 understanding of equality which had been before established. 
 
 The exhibition of an Anglican priest dividing the service 
 with the Congregational ministers, or even sitting on their 
 divan to receive the emblems of the Holy Communion at their 
 hands, was no doubt truly gratifying to those who witnessed 
 it 1 , and would be taken as an edifying proof of the Catholicism 
 of both bodies ; but it was hardly a fair representation of the 
 English Church, and to the Christians of the East would ap- 
 pear much more latitudinarian than catholic. It was to be 
 expected, under these circumstances, that the English Church, 
 in its only representative, would be identified with all the 
 irregularities of which the Americans were guilty, and would 
 be held alike responsible for any schismatical interference with 
 the orthodox or sectarian bodies ; and such was the case 2 . 
 
 The munificent proposal of the King of Prussia to establish 
 an Anglican bishop in the Holy City, seemed to open a brighter 
 prospect, and to promise an adequate representation of the 
 English Church to the Christians of the East. That proposal, 
 communicated to the heads of our Church and of the Govern- 
 ment, in the autumn of 1841, by the Chevalier Bunsen, a 
 worthy ambassador in a religious cause, resulted in the con- 
 secration, at Lambeth, of Bishop Alexander, as representative 
 of the Anglican Church in Chaldea, Mesopotamia, Syria, 
 Palestine, Egypt, and Abyssinia. Tho great object of his 
 
 1 See Dr Robinson's Biblical Re- 
 searches, Vol. i. p. 335. " In the 
 ' large upper room' of Mr Whiting's 
 house, where 'prayer was wont to be 
 made,' eleven sojourners in the Holy 
 City, all Protestant ministers of the 
 gospel, and ten of them from the new 
 
 world, sat down. ..to celebrate," &c. 
 
 2 Indeed, this seems to have been 
 granted on all hands ; so much so that 
 the English considered themselves 
 bound by the promise given to the 
 Greeks by the Americans, not to ask 
 permission to use their burial-ground.
 
 CH. IV. 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 475 
 
 Prussian Majesty, as set forth in his instructions, and in the 
 authoritative statements of his government, was to effect an 
 union between the Church of England and the evangelical 
 confessions of Germany over the Tomb of their common Lord 
 at Jerusalem. Whether either country was prepared for an 
 union on such a basis as could alone secure its stability and 
 permanency with mutual advantage, has since appeared ; but 
 in the view of the miserably distracted state of Christendom, 
 an attempt to forestall the wished-for consummation is a venial 
 error. The desire to promote unity is itself laudable ; but an 
 effort made in the right direction, and in the spirit of self- 
 sacrifice, as this was made, is beyond all praise, and deserved 
 a more liberal return from those in whose favour that great 
 sovereign renounced both national and ecclesiastical predilec- 
 tions. Not only has his pecuniary grant for this object been 
 met in a spirit of meanness which may well cause us a blush 3 , 
 but the purity and simplicity of his motives have been ques- 
 tioned, and political designs been imputed without the slightest 
 warrant, while the supposed failure of the undertaking has 
 been further ascribed to him. But if mistakes have been 
 committed, it is at least extremely ungenerous in us to charge 
 them on his Prussian Majesty, whose only error could be that 
 he reposed too implicit confidence in the English Church ; and 
 if the measure, instead of promoting unity, should unhappily 
 create a fresh schism as was the case with his excellent 
 father's attempt to unite the two Protestant families of his 
 kingdom however such a result might demonstrate the sandy 
 
 3 I allude not so much to the fact 
 of the endowment fund not being yet 
 made up, which might be explained 
 on other grounds, as to some discredit- 
 able items in the list, which have filled 
 Prussians with amazement and covered 
 
 Englishmen with shame; but especi- 
 ally I refer to some enquiries which 
 have been made and repeated relative 
 to the fund collected in Prussia, by His 
 Majesty's orders, in 1842.
 
 476 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PAKT II. 
 
 foundation of the structure which he designed to rear, yet 
 would not the failure prove the absence of upright intention 
 on the part of the architect. 
 
 If any one has cause to feel aggrieved, His Majesty has 
 a right to complain that the object with which he established 
 the bishopric has .been virtually superseded by one which it 
 does not appear that he ever comtemplated 1 . But he has too 
 much Christian feeling not to take a lively interest in the 
 cause which he has thus inadvertently served. And although 
 Jerusalem is not perhaps the city which he would have chosen 
 for the head seat of a mission to the Jews 2 , had that been his 
 design, yet it is probable that if any sensible impression could 
 be made upon them there, the happy event would exercise 
 great influence over their brethren in other parts of the world. 
 Whether the likelihood of this is so great, or the advantage 
 would be so clear as to justify the concentration of all the 
 missionary operations on the comparatively few Jews of Pa- 
 lestine, while the many thousands in Asiatic and European 
 Turkey are neglected, I am perhaps not competent to judge ; 
 but some such hypothesis seems necessary to explain the fact, 
 that Constantinople, with considerably more than ten times as 
 
 1 Considering the turn which things 
 have since taken, it is curious to re- 
 mark the entire absence of all mention 
 of the Jews in the German state papers, 
 and in documents of a still earlier date, 
 and of even higher authority. 
 
 2 Owing both to the paucity of their 
 numbers, of which more below, and to 
 their peculiar character, of which Dr 
 Robinson says, that " they are of all 
 others the most bigoted, and the least 
 accessible to the labours of Christian 
 missionaries." Bib. Res. n. 8?. I 
 am not sure, however, that what he 
 
 calls "bigotry," meaning, as he ex- 
 plains it, " strong attachment to their 
 ancient faith," is any bar to their re- 
 ception of the gospel. I very much 
 question whether the Jews of the 
 Burton Street synagogue, London, and 
 the reformed Jews of Liverpool, are 
 one step nearer to Christianity than the 
 "bigots." They are perhaps nearer 
 to rationalism and infidelity. The 
 apostles made more converts from the 
 Pharisees than from the Sadducees. 
 (Acts vi. 7; xv. 5; xxi. 20.)
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 477 
 
 many Jews as there are in all Palestine 3 ; Salonica where the 
 principal and most influential part of the population are Jews, 
 not to mention many other Turkish cities of scarce inferior 
 importance are left without a single missionary, while other 
 places of much less consequence are supplied. 
 
 There is however, if not a large, yet a sufficient field of 
 exertion, hitherto unoccupied, among the lost sheep of the 
 house of Israel, in the city of their fathers ; which, however 
 unpromising, will no doubt yield fruit, if cultivated with 
 earnest, serious diligence, in a spirit of holiness and self- 
 denial ; not in dependence on an arm of flesh, but in simple 
 reliance on an Almighty Power. And it may be that mis- 
 sionary labours, so conducted, might exercise a beneficial in- 
 fluence on the other Christian bodies, sufficient to compensate 
 for the lack of direct intercourse, which neither party seems 
 forward to invite, and which could not, at least for many 
 years, be expected to lead to any decided results. But even 
 without this, much might no doubt be done to disabuse the 
 minds of the Christians of Jerusalem of those unfavourable 
 impressions which have been produced against us by popish 
 and protestant misrepresentation, and so prejudices might be 
 gradually weakened, and the way paved for mutual advances 
 when the time shall come. This, it is plain, can only be 
 effected by the utmost circumspection and forbearance ; for 
 Jerusalem is not so large, and its inhabitants not so fully 
 occupied, as to allow the proceedings of a society, which can- 
 
 3 The number of Jews at Jeru- 
 salem has been set at 3000, (see above, 
 p. 445, note 4.) In 1842 the number of 
 Jews at Hebron was stated by them- 
 selves as 100 families, or about 380 
 souls in all ; 42 families, about 150 
 souls, of Spanish, the remainder Rus- 
 
 sians, Poles, Germans, &c. In the same 
 year there were 150 Jewish families at 
 Tiberias, according to the chief rabbi 
 there. The number at Safed, since the 
 frightful earthquake in 1837, can scarce- 
 ly exceed that at Tiberias. At Con. 
 stantinople alone there are 80,000.
 
 478 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 not but be regarded with suspicion and distrust, to escape 
 unobserved ; so that an inconsiderate expression might create 
 a breach which it would take years to heal ; an injudicious 
 act produce an impression which nothing could remove. 
 Further ; if the superstitions of the Jews are to be not merely- 
 tolerated, but countenanced 1 , may not some consideration 
 be likewise shown to the weaknesses of other Christians, so 
 far as can be without compromising truth ? If the symbol 
 of our salvation is to be kept out of sight, for fear of offend- 
 ing the prejudices of the former though the Cross, however 
 presented to them, must always be a stumbling-block, and 
 it is obviously dangerous for Christians even to seem to be 
 ashamed of it yet if this be done, should not the same 
 principle be carried out in our dealings with our brethren of 
 other communions ? Their infirmities deserve at least as 
 much tenderness, and the apostolic rule applies equally to 
 all 2 . For example ; if we have not ourselves any deep vene- 
 ration for the decisions of the Fourth General Council, though 
 its language is adopted by our Church in her authorized 
 formularies, and its decrees prescribed by the state as one of 
 the rules whereby to judge heresy 3 , yet regard for the 
 Orthodox Church of the East should induce us to be very 
 
 1 Must we not regard in this light 
 the substitution of 'OnN for niiT; 
 after the manner of the synagogue, in 
 the Hebrew service ? 
 
 * 1 Cor. x. 32. Might not e.g. such 
 concessions as the following be made ? 
 The Greeks make a point of baptizing 
 by trine immersion, and consider it of 
 such consequence, that the want of it 
 affects the efficacy of the sacrament, 
 except in cases of necessity. It is im- 
 possible to deny that immersion is the 
 rule of our church ; ought not then (lie 
 
 practice to be restored in the East, 
 where no danger could result from it, 
 and an objection of other Christians be 
 removed ? There especially should 
 "all things be done according to the 
 order" prescribed by the Church, 1 
 Cor. xvi. 40, as commented on in the 
 Preface to the Prayer Book, " Of 
 Ceremonies," &c. 
 
 3 See Article 2 of the 39 Articles, 
 and act 1 Elizabeths, cap. i. sect. 3fi. 
 Gibson's Codex, Vol. n. p. .54.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 479 
 
 guarded in our intercourse with those who reject and anathe- 
 matize it ; not that these last bodies need be unnecessarily 
 scandalized 4 , or treated otherwise than with courtesy and 
 kindness, in the hope that the exhibition of such sympathy 
 and consideration as is not inconsistent with the strict main- 
 tenance of catholic truth, may dispose them to listen to our 
 invitations to return to the unity and purity of the faith. So 
 again, even though we place no faith in their local traditions, 
 and regard the sacred places with indifference ourselves, it 
 were surely well to bear with their weakness in this respect, 
 and avoid the appearance of a contemptuous or irreverent 
 violation of scenes associated in then* minds with the most 
 awful events of the Sacred History 5 . 
 
 The fact is, that circumspection on these and kindred 
 points is absolutely indispensable, if we wish to exercise any 
 influence for good in any part of the East, in the way of 
 imparting to the Christians of those countries, or deriving 
 from them, any spiritual gift. For this again must be re- 
 marked, if we think we have everything to teach and 
 nothing to learn, we are wanting in the first qualification 
 for the task which we have set ourselves the spirit of 
 humility. And we shall soon find that we are grievously 
 mistaken in supposing that the Orientals are prepared to 
 acknowledge the pre-eminent excellency of our institutions. 
 They are quite as jealous of our remedies, as we of their 
 
 4 I cannot but regard it as an un- 
 fortunate circumstance, that the land 
 selected for the English church was 
 the property of the Jacobites, unjustly 
 confiscated by the Turks, and especi- 
 ally that their venerable church of St 
 James the son of Alphaeus should have 
 been used as a depository for lime and 
 other building materials. 
 
 5 Yet one would have hoped that 
 the mere association connected with 
 the name of " Aceldama," the " Field 
 of Blood," even if the tradition were 
 manifestly false, would have deterred 
 any but infidels from selecting its im- 
 mediate neighbourhood for the festivi- 
 ties of a. fete chumpetre !
 
 480 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 contagion ; as indisposed to submit to us, as we are forward 
 to proclaim our own superiority ; as apt to charge us with 
 innovations in doctrine 1 , as we to object to them corruptions 
 of practice. Neither are the chief pastors of those churches 
 sunk in such a depth of ignorance as we are wont to ima- 
 gine ; and he should be a skilful controversialist, well exer- 
 cised in Scripture and no tyro in patristical theology, who 
 has to defend the Anglican formularies against the objections 
 of a bishop of the Orthodox Church of the East. The long 
 years passed in the convents, from which the higher clergy 
 are always taken, are not wasted in idleness at least, the 
 drones are not raised to the higher dignities in the church ; 
 and it is marvellous how much not merely of book-learning, 
 but of the knowledge of mankind, is acquired by many in 
 this seclusion, so that they come forth to take an active part 
 in the affairs of the church and of the world, much better 
 furnished with sound practical knowledge than many who 
 have passed their lives on its busy stage. 
 
 One great difficulty with which we have to contend is 
 the ignorance of the true character of our Church which pre- 
 vails throughout the East, resulting, as is natural, from the 
 long suspension of friendly intercourse. Indeed, it ought not 
 to be expected that the Orientals should be better instructed 
 in the doctrine and discipline of the Anglican Church than 
 English Christians in the past history and present position of 
 the Eastern Churches ; and the measure of our ignorance on 
 these subjects may be taken as a fair criterion of their 
 
 1 I had thrice the honour of seeing 
 his holiness the patriarch of Antioch. 
 In every interview he put me on the 
 defensive, by objecting to the addition 
 in the Nicene Creed ; and quoted me- 
 moriter long passages from St Johan- 
 
 nes Damascenus, against the procession 
 of the Holy Ghost from the Son. He 
 convinced me that either his holiness 
 or myself entirely misinterpreted the 
 Article in question.
 
 CH. IV.] 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 481 
 
 knowledge of us ; with this additional excuse for them, that 
 of late years an inadequate representation of professed friends, 
 and calumnious misrepresentation of avowed enemies, have 
 served still further to mislead them, and to strengthen them 
 in the belief that we are destitute of what they have been 
 taught to consider the necessary notes of an orthodox church: 
 to wit, an apostolic ministry 2 ; a prescribed liturgy and 
 ritual ; and a dogmatic theology, conformable to the decrees 
 of the (Ecumenical Councils, and the consent of Catholic 
 Fathers. Nor ought we to expect that they will understand 
 and appreciate the distinctive character of our Church, to 
 which they have been so long strangers, until they have had 
 a fair trial. It is not by our profession, but by our conduct, 
 that they will judge. It is therefore a source of deep regret, 
 that the general laxity and unfaithfulness to her godly di- 
 rections that prevailed at home, during the last century, has 
 ruled the practice of our congregations abroad, and pro- 
 duced an unfavourable impression, which will not easily be 
 removed 3 . 
 
 What has been hitherto said refers to the position of our 
 Church in the East generally; but there are peculiarities in 
 our establishment at Jerusalem which serve to increase the 
 difficulties, and to render caution doubly necessary. In other 
 parts of the Levant the presence of an English chaplain has 
 been the consequence of a previous establishment of British 
 
 a It is a humiliating fact, that while 
 the Greek Church admits the orders of 
 the Latins and Armenians, they do not 
 recognize those of the Anglican Church ; 
 supposing them without the apostolic 
 succession. 
 
 3 Jerusalem is, I believe, the only 
 place within the limits of the Orthodox 
 Church of the East, where the daily 
 
 31 
 
 service is used in the English Church. 
 Nowhere is any regard paid to the 
 church holy-days or fasting-days, ex- 
 cept on the great festivals; while in 
 some places the irregularities and in- 
 decencies would shock the most lax 
 and irreverent English churchman. 
 They cannot be specified.
 
 482 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART n. 
 
 residents, mostly for mercantile purposes. The object was 
 understood ; there was no room for suspicion. At Jerusalem 
 the case was widely different. A church capable of accom- 
 modating four or five hundred persons was commenced, while 
 as yet there were but eight or ten individuals for whom it 
 would be available, and even they were there simply with a 
 view to its construction 1 : and a bishop was sent out, not to 
 superintend a flock for there was not one that could justify 
 the measure, but to gather one where he could. These were 
 the facts presented to the eyes of the Greek and Armenian 
 bishops. Now when it is remembered how novel an idea 
 missionary exertions, especially among the Jews, must be to 
 them; how hopeless the prospect of success, of which they 
 might imagine that the missionary who had been established 
 there for twelve or fifteen years was a competent judge 2 , it 
 was not unnatural that they should suspect an ulterior though 
 unavowed object in these proceedings ; and if they were 
 jealous for their flocks, as it was their duty to be, they 
 could not but regard with distrust and hostility those who 
 they feared had come to scatter them. True, it undoubtedly 
 is, that nothing but friendly intentions were professed ; that 
 all desire of proselytism was distinctly disavowed, yet should 
 
 1 Previous to the bishop's arrival, in 
 January 1842, the mission consisted of 
 the clergyman, the architect and his 
 clerk, the foreman of the works, the 
 carpenter, an apothecary, and one 
 other. The foreman had a wife and 
 two children. Only two of all these 
 were English. The consul and his 
 lady were absent. 
 
 Some natives, Protestant volunteers, 
 of the Latin rite, pointed to the church 
 in proof that we contemplated prose- 
 lytism. It was very natural, and I 
 
 cannot but hope that the suspension of 
 the building, which could surprise none 
 who were acquainted with all the 
 circumstances, may have been over- 
 ruled for good in more ways than one. 
 a See Biblical Researches, Vol. 11. 
 87. " The efforts of the English mis- 
 sion have as yet been attended with 
 very slight success ; and it remains to 
 to be seen, whether the proposed erec- 
 tion of a Jewish Christian church in 
 Jerusalem will add to the influence and 
 prosperity of the mission."
 
 CH. IV.J 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 483 
 
 it in justice be considered that the same language had been 
 held by other Western Christians, until they had obtained 
 sufficient influence in the country to secure the success of 
 their aggressive operations. The Latins in the seventeenth 
 century 3 , and the Americans in the nineteenth, had promised 
 quite as fair 4 ; and the last case at least was too recent to 
 have escaped their memory. Besides all which, the political 
 superiority of England had been too lately felt in the East, 
 and especially in Palestine itself, to allow a people whose 
 suspicions have been sharpened by long oppression and servi- 
 tude, to disconnect the movement from ambitious projects of 
 worldly policy, to which they might remember that religion 
 had been sometimes made subservient. 
 
 These considerations will excuse the reasonable appre- 
 hensions of the Armenian patriarch 5 , who, contrary to his 
 usual courtesy, took occasion, on the first ceremonial visit to 
 the English prelate, to express a hope that if any disaffected 
 member of his church should sue for admission to our com- 
 munion, the applicant might not be received without previous 
 reference to him. They might even palliate an offence which 
 it was right to feel more keenly. The same dignitary had 
 
 8 The Latins went very far : con- 
 formed to the Greek practices, attended 
 their services, made handsome presents 
 of sacred vestments and vessels to their 
 churches, aided their clergy, educated 
 children in their faith, until they found 
 a favourable opportunity of throwing 
 off the mask, and declaring themselves 
 openly. 
 
 4 The early afternoon service in 
 Arabic, on Sundays, established by the 
 American missionaries at Jerusalem, 
 and "regularly attended by some 
 twenty or thirty Arab Christians, of 
 the Greek rite," (Bib. Res. i. 332,) was 
 
 a novel method of convincing the clergy 
 and laity that they did not wish " to 
 draw off members of the Oriental 
 Churches to Protestantism." Ibid. 
 
 5 I do not mean that the Greeks 
 were not equally jealous, but they had 
 the art or good taste to conceal it. Or 
 perhaps they did not so much fear the 
 defection of their people, who in the 
 case mentioned in the last note, and in 
 a case mentioned in speaking of the 
 Latins, seem not to be easy until they 
 have returned to their own church after 
 a temporary separation from it. 
 
 312
 
 484 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 one day entertained an English clergyman with a tirade 
 against the ambition of the Roman pontiff; a favourite sub- 
 ject with his holiness, and had expatiated on the evils which 
 the " schismatical proceedings of popish emissaries had pro- 
 duced in the East." Had he felt any doubt on the subject 
 before, a very slight knowledge of facts would have sufficed 
 to convince any one but a Roman Catholic of the justice of 
 these observations, and the Englishman warmly assented. He 
 was somewhat startled by a rejoinder for which he was not 
 at all prepared : " Now this is exactly what the Archbishop 
 of Canterbury is doing." A most positive and almost an in- 
 dignant disavowal of such intentions, with an appeal to his 
 Grace's express declaration, was of course the ready reply; 
 but it is only by a long and consistent course of action, with 
 patient forbearance and forgiveness of prejudices however 
 unwarranted, that the minds, whether of Greeks or of Arme- 
 nians, will be disabused of the suspicion of sinister intentions 
 which our enemies have produced, and appearances seemed, 
 in some measure, to justify ; while on the contrary, any as- 
 sumption of superiority to which the English are so prone, 
 any uncanonical invasion of the patriarchal jurisdiction 1 , or 
 lastly, not merely the invitation, but the reception of prose- 
 lytes, must defeat its own object, and widen still more the 
 breach which separates us from the Eastern Churches. It is, 
 unhappily, too true, that the doctrinal errors of some, and the 
 corrupt practices of all, which they are not at all prepared 
 either to acknowledge or repudiate, forbids the hope of any 
 speedy approach to reconciliation ; but no good will accrue, 
 either to the communities or to individuals, by creating fresh 
 
 1 This may be thought to have been 
 sufficiently guarded against ; but 1 
 deeply regret to say that claims have 
 been urged, on grounds not acknow- 
 
 ledged by any church, which must do 
 infinite mischief if they should once be 
 known.
 
 CH. IV.] THE HOLY CITY. 485 
 
 divisions among them. All experience has shewn, that re- 
 formation, to be productive of extensive and permanent ad- 
 vantage, must commence with the head, and be conducted in 
 an orderly manner, with all the consideration and deliberation 
 which so solemn a work demands. We may be permitted to 
 hope that the demonstration of a better way, in a spirit of 
 simplicity, meekness, and love, by a Church which, whatever 
 be her deficiencies, we believe to have been, on the whole, re- 
 modelled after the pattern of the primitive and purest ages of 
 Christianity and so equally free from those later innovations 
 and additions which grieve us in them, and from those modern 
 corruptions and defects which scandalize them in others may, 
 in process of time, dispose them to review their sacred books 
 by the light of God's word, and ultimately lead to the re- 
 moval of those blemishes in their holy services for which they 
 can find no warrant in catholic antiquity, and which, however 
 excused in individuals, cannot but be displeasing in his sight 
 who has said, " My glory will I not give to another 8 ." But 
 however these practical abuses which we deplore must pre- 
 sent an insurmountable barrier to an union ; yet so long as 
 those who have been baptized and educated hi the obedience 
 of those churches can live as Christians within their pale, 
 without committing themselves to what is positively sinful, so 
 long must they continue where God's providence has placed 
 them, seeking the good of their church in such ways as they 
 can ; so long would it be a sin to tempt them to a schisma- 
 tical separation from those who are " over them in the Lord." 
 The mere preservation of these venerable branches of his 
 
 2 From what 1 have seen of the 
 Eastern Churches, I should say that the 
 greatest practical grievance is the in- 
 vocation of saints, especially of the 
 Blessed Virgin. Concerning the vene- 
 
 ration of pictures, see Dr Pusey's able 
 note, and the authorities there quoted, 
 appended to the Translation of Ter- 
 tullian, in the Library of the Fathers, 
 (Vol. i. p. 109, note B.)
 
 486 
 
 THE HOLY CITY. 
 
 [PART 11. 
 
 Church throughout the East, furnishes both a proof that God 
 has not left himself without a witness among the disciples of 
 the false prophet, and a strong presumption that he has still 
 a work of mercy in store for them, when he shall " look down 
 from heaven, and behold and visit this vine," so long wasted 
 and devoured, that, being watered with the dew of his bless- 
 ing, it may "take deep root and fill the land,... that the hills 
 may be covered with the shadow of it, and the boughs there- 
 of be like the goodly cedars,... and that she may send out 
 her boughs unto the sea, and her branches unto the river." 
 May God hasten the time !
 
 APPENDIX, No. I. (See page 21.) 
 SOUTHERN BOUNDARY OF THE LAND OF PROMISE. 
 
 I AM thankful to be able to throw light on a subject so much in- 
 volved in obscurity as this has been ; and the reader will, I am persuaded, 
 feel deeply grateful to my friend, the Rev. J. Rowlands, for his most 
 valuable communication, and will congratulate him that his most per- 
 severing efforts were crowned with such complete success. 
 
 I shall introduce the long extract from his very interesting letter by 
 a few notes of a journey which we took together, which is alluded to 
 more than once, and which will serve, I hope, to render his geographical 
 remarks more intelligible. Our object was the southern boundary of 
 the Holy Land. In the autumn of 1842 we left Jerusalem for this ex- 
 cursion, and having secured the services of Sheikh Salim of the Teahars, 
 we quitted Hebron about mid-day, on Monday, the 3rd of October, and 
 passing Ziph, Kirmel (Carmel), Main (Maon), we encamped, at a quarter 
 past five, at a place called 'Ayn 'Gowain, in Wady Gophain. Leaving 
 this place on the following morning at seven, we descended at half- 
 past nine into the plain of Malehk, and saw Tell Arad some miles to the 
 S.S.E. Here we halted at a Bedouin encampment for three hours, 
 then passed " Bir el-Malehk," a very old and well-built well, at three 
 o'clock. Our way lay over a wide plain, bounded on the south by a 
 range of hills, the country inhabited by the Kenites and Amalekites. 
 Shortly before five we came to some water at a place called Arar ( Aroer), 
 and at a quarter past six encamped. Quitting this on the following 
 morning at a quarter past six, we came, in two hours and a half, to the 
 hills at the south of this large plain, crossing the first ridge of which 
 we entered into an elevated plain called Wady Rakhmah, extending 
 east and west ; having followed this for some distance, we halted at a 
 well of the same name for three hours, and then proceeded southward. 
 At three o'clock we turned to the left of our path, and having ascended a 
 ridge, a scene of awful grandeur burst suddenly upon us with such start- 
 ling effect as to strike us dumb for some moments. We found ourselves 
 standing on a gigantic natural rampart of lofty mountains, which we 
 could trace distinctly for many miles east and west of the spot on which 
 we stood, whose precipitous promontories of naked rock, forming as it 
 were bastions of cyclopean architecture, jutted forth hi irregular masses 
 from the mountain-bander into a frightfully terrific wilderness, stretched 
 far before us towards the south, whose horrors language must fail to 
 describe. It was a confused chaos of chalk, and had the appearance of 
 an immense furnace glowing with white heat, illuminated as it now was 
 by the fierce rays of the sun. There did not appear to be the least
 
 488 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 particle of vegetation in all the dreary waste : all was drought and bar- 
 renness and desolation. Immediately below was a wide and well-defined 
 valley, called Wady Murreh, which some few hours to the east of this 
 place divides into two, at a singularly formed hill called Moddera ; the 
 southernmost retaining its name, and running east into the Araba, the 
 other, called Wady Fikreh, N.E. to the Dead Sea. We felt no 
 doubt that we were standing on the mountain-barrier of the Promised 
 Land, and this impression was confirmed by our Sheikh pointing out, 
 some hours to the west, in a valley, the site of Kaddese, the Cadesh of 
 Scripture, mentioned in the border. We much regretted that we could 
 not now investigate further this interesting subject, but my friend was 
 afterwards able to accomplish this journey, and has kindly permitted me 
 to give the result of his researches, as communicated in a letter addressed 
 to me at Jerusalem, dated from Malta. 
 
 Before proceeding to this it may be well to state, that on our return, 
 we found Beersheba to be eight hours from the spot which I have de- 
 scribed, nearly due north. Our course from Hebron had been about 
 south by west. 
 
 " From Gaza our course was to Khalasa : on our way we discovered 
 ancient Gerar. We had heard of it at Gaza, under the name of Joorf 
 el-Gerar (the Rush or Rapid of Gerar), which we found to lie three 
 hours S.S.E. of Gaza, within Wady Gaza, a deep and broad channel, 
 coming down from the S.E., and receiving a little higher up than this 
 spot Wady es-Sheriah, from the E.N.E. Near Joorf el-Gerar are 
 traces of an ancient city, called Khirbet el-Gerar (the ruins of Gerar). 
 Our road beyond to Khalasa lay along a plain, slightly undulated. This 
 plain must be ' the land of Gerar.' Here we ' sojourned ' for two days (one 
 of which was a Sunday), with Abraham ' in Gerar.' Khalasa (ancient 
 Chesil, I think,) must have been a very large city the remains are very 
 extensive heaps of stones and portions of houses, &c. Our road from 
 Khalasa was nearly in a direct line all the way to Suez, passing near the 
 south-east extremity of Mount Halal. Two hours and a half from 
 Khalasa is an ancient site, called Sepata; only a few traces of a city, 
 pottery, &c. This, I thought, must be Hormah, or ancient Zephath 
 (Judg. i. 17), the Arabic form of which name would be precisely Sepat 
 or Sepata. Hormah was a name given it by the Jews ; and the Arabs 
 would probably, according to their usual practice, retain the ancient 
 name. Chesil and Hormah are mentioned together in Josh. xv. 30. 
 Hormah could not therefore be veiy far from Chesil, and the situation 
 of Sepata corresponds well with the great elevated plain of Serr (or Seir, 
 where the children of Israel were chased before the Amalekites) ; it lies 
 to the west of the mountains of Rakhmeh, which, as you remember, 
 are to the west of Ain Rakhmeh, where we saw the wild Arabs. 
 To the east of Ain Rakhmeh is the grand plain called es-Serr, which
 
 APPENDIX. 489 
 
 must be the Seir alluded to in Deut. L 44. The Amorites chased them 
 down the western side of the mountains of Rakhmeh unto Hormah, or 
 Sepata, which lies near the border of the plain. From thence they re- 
 turned southward to Kadesh. Deut. i. 45. Hormah is nowhere mentioned 
 to be a border city. A few hours to the east of Sepata (said to be three 
 hours) an ancient site was mentioned to me, called Asloodg or Kasloodg, 
 with some ancient walls, most probably ancient Ziklag. About a quarter 
 of an hour beyond Sepata we came to the remains of what must have 
 been a very well-built city, called now Rohebeh, (the e in the middle 
 having a broad sound). This, I have not the slightest doubt whatever, 
 is ancient Rehoboth, where Abraham, and afterwards Isaac, digged a well, 
 (Gen. xxvi. 18, 22). This lies, as Rehoboth did, in the land of Gerar. 
 Outside the walls of the city is an ancient well of living and good water, 
 called Bir Rohebeh. This, most probably, is the site, if not the well 
 itself digged by Isaac. The city is not quite so extensive as Khalasa, 
 but the ruins are much more considerable. Some portion of almost every 
 house remains perfect beautiful masonry. Mr Johns admired it greatly. 
 It is of the Saracenic style. The Bedouins said it was once inhabited by 
 Christians. About ten hours beyond Rohebeh, on our road (i. e. ten 
 hours camel's pace), is a place called Moilahi (or Moilahhi), a grand rest- 
 ing-place of the caravans, there being water here, as the name implies. 
 It lies in one of two or three passages or openings in the very southern- 
 most hills or southern border of the Land of Promise, which form the 
 grand outlet from Palestine into the desert, or the grand entrance from 
 the desert into Palestine, by which the great caravan roads from Akaba, 
 Mount Sinai, and Suez, pass to Hebron and to Gaza. It may be ten or 
 fifteen miles to the E.N.E. from the nearest extremity of Mount Halal. 
 Shall I not please you when I tell you, that we found here Bir Lahai-roi. 
 We slept one night close to the water, and my happiness would have 
 been double what it was, if you had been with us. I remembered how 
 much you had talked about Beer Lahai-roi during our journey to the 
 south, and what desire you had to find it. Now I can tell you that I have 
 found it, to my entire satisfaction. I have no doubt about it whatever. 
 
 Now for my proofs. (1) Moilahhi lies on the great road from Beer- 
 sheba to Shur, or Jebel es-Sur, which is its present name, a grand chain 
 of mountains running north and south, a little east of the longitude of 
 Suez, lying, as Shur did, before Egypt (Gen. xvi. 7). (2) It is probable, 
 from Gen. xvi. 14, that Bir Lahai-roi was not far from Kadesh : Moilahhi 
 is about twelve miles from Kadesh. But the grand settling point is its 
 present name. The well has disappeared, and the " Bir " (well) very 
 naturally has been changed into " Moi " (water) : and, what is very re- 
 markable, the Arabs of the country call it Moilahhi Hadjar (Hagar). 
 The Arabs from the neighbourhood of Gaza called it Moilahhi Kade'sah, 
 but the former insisted upon its true name being Moilahhi Hadjar; and 
 this, as they explained to me, not from the rocky mountains near, but
 
 490 APPENDIX. 
 
 from the name of a person called Hagar : and to confirm this statement of 
 theirs, they conducted us to the house of Hagar (Beit Hagar), where they 
 said such a person lived. It is about half or three-quarters of a mile from 
 Moilahhi, in a ravine among the hills. It is certainly a curious place 
 its description is simply this : a square chamber of no great dimensions, 
 excavated in the perpendicular face of a rock, at some height above the 
 base : the entrance into this is by a passage bored through the rock from 
 beneath, with a winding staircase of good steps cut in the rock, leading 
 up into the middle of the floor of the chamber. Behind this chamber are 
 three other small chambers connected with it, which may possibly have 
 served as dormitories not at all like tombs, nor shewing any evidence 
 whatever of their having been a sepulchre. Its name is Beit Hadjar, or 
 the house of Hagar. Whether Ishmael may have constructed this as a 
 refuge for his mother after her final expulsion from Abraham's house, or 
 whether Ishmael himself passed any of his time here, it is very difficult 
 of course now to say, though the Bedouins maintain the former. This is 
 certainly true, that " the wilderness of Paran," where Ishmael is said to 
 have dwelt (Gen. xxi. 21,) lies immediately to the south of this; a grand 
 plain, bounded on the west by Halal and Yelek, on the east by the 
 mountains or wilderness of Kadesh and Jebel el-Khirm, on the north by 
 the southern hills of Judea, or rather of the promised (not of the pos- 
 sessed) land. This is El-Paran, or plain of Paran, alluded to in Gen. xiv. 
 6. This also is the country (excellent for pasture in some parts in the 
 rainy season) where Abraham dwelt, between Kadesh and Shur not at 
 all the same country as Gerar, inferred (without any reason) from Gen. 
 xxi. 1. Shur or Sur lies at its south-west extremity, and Kadesh at its 
 utmost north-east extremity. This plain is the Paran through which the 
 Hebrews came from Sinai on their way to Kadesh. Numb. xii. 1G, and 
 xiii. 26. The wilderness of Paran might possibly mean the hills bounding 
 the plain to the east of it, and to the south of the wilderness of Kadesh, 
 or, as I am rather inclined to believe, the wilderness of Kadesh was also 
 called the wilderness of Paran from the adjacent plain, as it was called 
 that of Kadesh from the fountain of Kadesh. Now, my dear friend, for 
 Kadesh, my much-talked-of and long-sought-for Kadesh you may con- 
 ceive with what pleasure I tell you that I have at length found out this 
 important and interesting locality to my entire satisfaction. Our excite- 
 ment (I can speak at least for mine while we stood before the rock smit- 
 ten by Moses, and gazed upon the lovely stream which still issues forth 
 from under the base of this rock,) would be quite indescribable. I cannot 
 say that we stood still our excitement was so great that we could not 
 stand still we paced backwards and forwards examining the rock and 
 the source of the stream, looking at the pretty little cascades which it 
 forms as it descends into the channel of a rain-torrent beneath, sometimes 
 chipping off some pieces of the rock, and at other times picking up some 
 specimens, and some flowers along a green slope beneath it. The rock is
 
 APPENDIX. 491 
 
 a large single mass or a small hill of solid rock, a spur of the mountain to 
 the north of it rising immediately above it it is the only visible naked 
 rock in the whole district. The stream when it reaches the channel 
 turns westward, and, after running about 3 or 400 yards, loses itself in the 
 sand. I have not seen such a lovely sight anywhere else in the whole 
 desert such a copious and lovely stream. I took two vials full of it 
 away with me. Shall I send you one ? I think I must do it, if you will 
 not go and see Kadesh yourself. But I must give you some particulars 
 about the locality of Kades, or Kudes, as it is called. I shall there- 
 fore first of all describe its position, and then adduce my proofs for its 
 identity with ancient Kadesh-Barnea. The waters of Kades, called Ain 
 Kades, lies to the east of the highest part of Jebel Halal, towards its 
 northern extremity, about twelve miles (or four and a half hours by 
 camel) to the E. S. E. of Moilahhi. I think it must be something like 
 due south from Khalasa. But to the proofs, which is the most important 
 point. 1. Its name Kades, or Kudes (pronounced in English Kaddase 
 or Kuddase), is exactly the Arabic form of the Hebrew name Kadesh ; the 
 K, as you will find both in the Hebrew and the Arabic, not being the 
 common Kaf, but Kof, and giving the a a sound somewhat resembling a 
 short u. 2. The locality corresponds with or falls in the line of the 
 southern boundary of the Promised Land, (Josh. xv. 1, 8,) from the south- 
 ern extremity of the Dead Sea, by Safaa or Maaleh Akrabbim, the Wady 
 el Murra, and the Wady el Arish, or the river of Egypt. 3. It corre- 
 sponds also with the order in which the places of the border are men- 
 tioned. Adar and Azmon, two places in the border, which we have disco- 
 vered hi the names of Adeirat and Aseimeh, sometimes called Kadeirat and 
 Kaseimeh, now and perhaps always merely fountains or springs, lie to 
 the west of Kades, and Wady el Arish, or river of Egypt, succeeds in the 
 same line. 4. It lies east of Jebal el Halal, or Mount Halak, mentioned 
 somewhere by Jeremiah as the uttermost extremity of the Promised Land 
 to the south. 5. It lies at the foot of the mountain of the Amorites, 
 (Deut. i. 19). 6. It is situated near the grand pass or entrance into the 
 Promised Land by the Beer Lahai-roi, which is the only easy entrance 
 from the desert to the east of Halal, and most probably the entrance to 
 which the Hebrews were conducted from Sinai towards the Land of Pro- 
 mise. 7. A good road leads to this place all the way from Sinai, and the 
 distance is about five days of dromedary-riding, or about ten or eleven 
 days of common camel-riding, as the Bedouins stated (Deut. i. 2). 8. A 
 grand road, still finer, / was told, by broad Wadies, goes from Kades to 
 Mount Hor (Numb. xx. 22). 9. The nature of the locality itself answers 
 in every respect to the description given of it in Scripture, or rather in- 
 ferred from it the mountains to the east of Kades, and some very grand 
 ones to the south, called Jebel Kades, "the wilderness of Kadesh ;" the 
 rock, the water, and the ^grand space for encampment which lies to the 
 south-west of it, a large rectangular plain about 9 by 5, or 10 by 6 miles,
 
 492 APPENDIX. 
 
 and this opening to the west into the still more extensive plain of Paran. 
 But enough of Kadesh. I must hasten on to Suez, without making many 
 notes or comments on our jouruey. We were three days getting through 
 the plain of Paran the road was very fine one could drive a carriage 
 all the way from Khalasa or Beersheba to Suez, except in passing over 
 the ridge of the range of Sur, into the regions of Africa, towards Suez 
 there the path is only too narrow." 
 
 APPENDIX, No. II. (See page 104.) 
 DESCRIPTION OF JERUSALEM BY JOSEPHUS. 
 
 Tpicrl Se (oxypa>fii>r) Tfi^ecriv rf TroXu, Kadd p,^ TOIS dftdrois (pdpayt-iv 
 fKVK\ovTO' rat/TT? yap eis rjv 7rept'/3oXoy avn) pev virep 8i>o \6<pa>v dvri- 
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 (TTfiTa Tij piov\jj OMvairrov, f7T\ TTjv tcmtpiov TOV Ifpov <7Todv dirtjpTi^fTO. 
 KUTO. OaTtpov 8f Trpbs 8vo~i,v, dirb TOV avTov p.tv dpxop.fvov ^topi'ou, 8id 8f 
 TOV Brjd(Ta> Ka\ovp.evov KaTOTtivov eVrt Tqv ''Eo-o'ijvaiv Trvkrjv, Kal cTmra irpbs 
 VOTOV vrrtp TTJV 2tXb>a/t tm<TTp(<poi> irrjyijv, tvdtv Tf 7raXn (KK\IVOV irpbs dvaTO. 
 Xyv (irl TTJV SoXo/xeoi/oy Ko\vp.ftr)6pav, Kal 8if)Kov p-fXP 1 - XP OV Tlv bf, on KaXov- 
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 KVK\ovfj.evov 8f TO irpocrdpKTiov K\ip.a fj.6vov avfl
 
 APPENDIX. 493 
 
 TptVo) fie TJV dpx?i 'inwiKos irvpyos, o6ev p-e^pt T v /3p t ' ou /cXt'/iOToy Kara- 
 Tflvov errl TOV "1r^<pivoy Trvpyov, oreiTa KadfjKov dvTiKpv T>V 'E\evrjs fj.vr]p.eia)v' 
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 XIK&V fJL7]nvv6p.evov fKap.TTTfTO p.ev ycoi/iat'o) TTvpyw Kara TO TOV TVacpetoy 
 irpoa-ayopevopevov p.vf)fj,a' TW fie ap^atw Trepi/3dX&> crvvcmrov (is T^V KeSpcSi'a 
 Ka\ovfj,fvr)v (pdpayya K.a.Tf\r)yev. TOVTO TIJ TrpocrKTicrdficrrj TroXei TTfpi(6r)Kfv 
 'Aypimras, fjirep TJV ircura *fv\i.vr\. itki]6ti. yap wrep^eo/iew;, KOTO piKpbv 
 fdp7re TOIV Trepi/SdXwi', *cat ToO iepov TO. irpocrdpKTia irpbs T<5 Ad<p6> crv/i.- 
 Tro\ioiTfs, fir' OVK oXiyov Trporjhdov, KOI reraprov TTfpioiKijdfjvai \6<pov, os 
 KaXeirat Beeda, Kftpfvos p,ev dvTiKpv rfjs 'AvTOvias, dnoTffj.v6fjiVOS Se opvy- 
 pa.Ti fiadel' 8ifTa(ppeiidr) yap eVi'rj/Ses' (os pr) T< \6(pa> crvvaTTTOvrfs ol 
 6ffj.f\ioi TTJS 'AvTotviast finrpocriToi re fiev, KOI TJTTOV v^rr)\oi. 810 S^ /cat 
 ir\fi(TTOv VTJ/OS TOIS Trvpyois TrpocreSi'Soti TO (Sd^oy Trjs ra(ppov' eTTt^wpiwy 
 Se fKXr)6r) Begeda TOV veoKTKTTOv pepos, o p-fdepp-r/vevofjievov 'EXXaSt y\a>cra-r) 
 Kaivr) XeyotT* av TroXis. 
 
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 dfiwp e'^e^etTo, /cat TroXXot Trepi TO. vdpaTa irvpyot TreXetaSaii/ qpeptav. aXXa 
 yap 00^ tpfjiTivevcrai 8vvaTov dt-itos TO /3ao~tXeta, K. T. X.
 
 494* APPENDIX. 
 
 'H 8e 'Avrcovia, Kara ycoviav p.ev 8vo CTTOCOV eKeiTO TOV npcoTov Iepov, 
 TTJS re TTpos eo-Trepav, Kal rfjs irpos apKTOv. 8e86p.r)TO 8' inrep TreTpas irtv- 
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 \ecos, ev co /xaXtcrra TO (pvcret fieyaXovovv eVeSei'^aro. rrpcoTov p.ev CK pi&s 
 17 TTfTpa 7rXat Ke/caXv7rro Xe/ats \idcov, e"s re KaXXos, KOI as airdXi<T6a.voi 
 TTO.S 6 irpoo-fBaivfiv /cat Komapt Treipafjievos. fTTfira irpo TTJS TOV irvpyov 
 8onrj(reus, rptcSj/ TTTJ^WV ret^os ijv, evdorepa) de TOVTOV, TO TTCLV oiaa"rr]p.a 
 TTJS 'Avravias, fTrl Tfo-crapaKovra TnJ^ety jJyet'peTo. ro Se evdov jBa<n\fia>v 
 t^ -)(u>pav KOI Siddecriv. /nf/ieptoro yp fls iraarav OIKO>V Ifttav Tf Kal 
 Xpfjcriv, TrepicrTod re Kal jSaXai/eta KOI orparoTre'Sa)!' avXas TrXaTetay, a>s TW 
 /tev TraiTa e^eir ra ^pftwfi?;, TroXei? eiVai SoKeiv, Trj TroXuTeXei'a 8e 
 TTVpyoei8rjs 8e ovcra TO TTO.V tr^^a, Kara ycoviav Tecrtrapa'tv eTepois 
 Trvpyois' <ov ol [lev aXXot Trevr^/coira TO v^os, 6 8e eVl T ( ^ neo~r)fji^piv^ KO.I 
 KOT' dva.To\r)v ycavia neipevos f^8op.jjKovra irrj^av ^v, cos Kadopav oXoj/ OTT' 
 avTOt) TO iepov. Kada 8e crvv^nTO TOLS TOV Iepov CTTOOIS, els dp.(f)OTepas ei^e 
 KdTajSucreis' 81 u>v KdTtovres ol (ppovpol, KadfjcrTO yap del eV avTrjs Taypa 
 Pa>p,ala>v, Kal bCio~Tdp,fvoi Trepl Tas o~Tods p,eTa TCOV OTT\(OV, ev TOIS eopTals, 
 TOV 8fjfiov cos \>.r\ TI vfcoTfpio~0eir) irapefpiiXaTTOv. (ppovpiov yap eireKeiTO TTJ 
 TrdXei p.ev TO iepov, TCO lepco Be 77 AVTlUfla. KaTa. 8e Tavrrjv ol TCOV Tpicov 
 <pv\aKfs yo~av, Kal TTJS avco TroXews I8iov (ppovpiov rjv, Ta 'HpcoSov /3ao-/Xeia. 
 f) Bee6d 8e \6(pos 8i^prjTo p.ev, cos efprjv, dirb -njs \vrcovias' irdvrcov 8e 
 ir\lfrjXoTaTos cov p.epei TTJS Kaivrjs iro\fcos TrpocrcpKio-TO, Kal fj.6vos TcS lepco 
 KUT apKTOv eTreo~KOTei. Trepl [j.ev 8r) TTJS TroXecos, Kal TU>V Tfi^cov av6is elirelv 
 aKpi(3t(TTepov eKacrTa TrpoTedeipevus, firl TOV Trapovros dTro^pcovTcos eipTjua. 
 Joseph. Jewish War, Book V. Chap. iv. Sect. 1, 2, &c., and Chap. v. 
 Sect. 8. 
 
 DESCRIPTION OF JERUSALEM BY TACITUS. 
 
 QTitus] igitur castris, uti diximus, ante mcenia Hierosolymorum 
 positis, instructas legiones ostentavit. 
 
 Judaei sub ipsos muros struxere aciem, rebus secundis longius ausuri ; 
 et, si pellerentur, parato perfugio. Missus in eos eques cum expeditis 
 cohortibus, ambigue ceiiavit. Mox cessere hostes, et sequentibus diebus 
 crebra pro portis proclia serebant; donee assiduis damnis, intra mrenia 
 pellerentur. Romani ad oppugnandum versi : neque enim dignum vi- 
 debatur, famem hostiura operiri: poscebantque pericula, pars virtute, 
 multi ferocia, et cupidine prsBmiorum. Ipsi Tito Roma, et opes, vo- 
 luptatcsque ante oculos ; ac, ni statim Hierosolyma conciderent, morari 
 videbantur. Sed urbem, arduam situ, opera molesque firmaverant, quis 
 vel 1 1 1. 1 1 1:1 satis munirentur. Nam duos colles, immensum cditos, claude- 
 bant muri per artem obliqui, aut introrsus sinuati, ut latera oppugnan- 
 tium ad ictus patescerent. Extrema rupis, abrupta : et turres, ubi 
 mons juvisset, in sexaginta pedes ; mter devexa, in centenos vicenosque
 
 APPENDIX. 495 
 
 attollebantur ; mira specie, ac procul intuentibus pares. Alia intus moe- 
 nia, regise circumjecta : conspicuoque fastigio turris Antonia, in honorem 
 M. Antonii ab Herode appellata. 
 
 Templum in modum arcis, propriique muri, labore et opere ante 
 alios : ipsse porticus, quis templum ambiebatur, egregium propugna- 
 culum. Fons perennis aquae, cavati sub terra montes ; et piscinae cis- 
 ternseque servandis imbribus. Praeviderant conditores, ex diversitate 
 morum, crebra bella : inde cuncta, quamvis ad versus longum obsidium ; 
 et a Pompeio expugnatis metus atque usus pleraque monstravere. Atque, 
 per avaritiara Claudianonim temporum, empto jure muniendi, struxere 
 muros in pace, tamquam ad bellum ; magna colluvie, et ceterarum ur- 
 bium clade aucti : nam pervicacissimus quisque illuc perfugerat, eoque 
 seditiosius agebant. Tres duces, totidem exercitus. Extrema et latis- 
 sima moenium Simon; mediam urbem Joannes, quem et Bargioram 
 vocabant ; templum Eleazarus firmaverat. Multitudine et armis Joan- 
 nes, ac Simon ; Eleazarus loco pollebat. Sed proelia, dolus, incendia inter 
 ipsos, et magna vis frumenti ambusta. Mox Joannes, missis per spe- 
 ciem sacrificandi, qui Eleazarum manumque ejus obtruncarent, templo 
 potitur : ita in duas factiones civitas discessit, donee, propinquantibus 
 Romanis, bellum externum concordiam pareret. Tacit. Hist. V. 10, 11, 
 &c. 
 
 APPENDIX, No. III. (See page 147.) 
 EXTRACT FROM JUSTIN MARTYR CONCERNING JUDAIZERS. 
 
 Km 6 Tpv(pa>v Trd\iv, eav 8e TIS, fi8a>s OTI ravra OVTO>S fx fl > A ier< * 
 roC Kal TOVTOV fivai TOV Xpurrbv enio-Tao-dai 8rj\ovoTi, KOI TrrnurTev- 
 Ktvai KOI TTfidea-dai avrco, fiovXerai Kal ravra $>v\acr(Ttiv, (r<adq<r(Tai ; 
 
 Kayw, o5y pev epol 8oKel, < Tpvfpatv, \eyca on. (ru>d^ar(Tai 6 TOIOVTOS, 
 (av P.TI TOVS aXXovs uvdpwTrovs, Xe-yw 817 TOVS dnb ruiv f6va>v 8ia TOV 
 XpioTov a?r6 TTJS TrXdvrjs TrfpiTp.ijdfVTas, fK iravros irelQfiv dyavifrTai, 
 TO.VTO. avTW (pv\dcr(rfiv, \eya>v ov crudya'fo'dai, avrovs, tav pi) ravra 
 (pvXdt-QMTiv' oTroIov tv dpxfl TO>V \6ya>v KOI crv firpams, aTrofpaivo- 
 p.fvos ov cr<i>6ri<rfO-6ai p,e, edv pr) ravra (j)v\d^a>. 
 
 KaKtlvos, did ri ovv faras, cos p.fv ep.ol 8oKfl <T<a6y(reTai 6 TOIOVTOS, 
 fl fj.^ TI flo~lv ol XeyoiTfs on ov (rcodrjo-ovTcu ol TOIOVTOI ; 
 
 TLlarlv, dTTKpivdp.r)v, co TpvfpGtv, Kal pT)8e KOivcuvtiv 6/xtXtaf t] eo-rias 
 Tols TOIOVTOIS To\p.>vTfs' ols eyco ov avvaivos ei/it' aXX' eav avTol 8ta 
 TO dcrdeves TTJS yvcafjujs Kal TO. oo~a Bvvavrai vvv fK Tatv Meocrecos, a 8id 
 TO o-K\r)poKdp8iov TOV Xaou voovp.fv Starera^^at, [KTO. TOV eVt TOVTOV
 
 496 APPENDIX. 
 
 TOV Xpio-rbv f\rri(ftv, KOI Tas alaviovs KCU (pvo-ft 8iKaioirpatas Kal cvo-e- 
 /Seta? (pv\do~o~iv /SovXtoi/rat, KOI aip&vrai o~vjjv rots Xpicrriavols, <as 
 TrpofiTTOV, fj.f/ TretdovTfs avTOvs p-yTc TrepiTepveo-dai O/JLOLCOS avTois, p]Tf 
 <ra/3/3arie', pyre aXXa Sera roiavrd e<rri TTjpeiv, Kal i rrpoo~\ap.^dveo-6ai, 
 Kai Kotvfoveiv drrdvTuv, cos opoo-irXdyxvois KOI dde\(pols, 8elv dfro(paivecr6cu. 
 fav 8e ol dirb TOV yevovs TOV vfjtfTfpov TrurTfveiv Xeyovres eTri TOVTOV TOV 
 'KpitrTov, w Tpv(pa>v, eXeyov, en jravros Kara TOV Swi Maxreos diaTa^devra 
 vop.ov dvayKafacri Qv TOVS f fdv>v TTio-TfvovTas errl TOVTOV TOV Xpio~Tov, 
 T) p,Tj Koivcoveiv avTois TTJS ToiavTTjs o-vvavaycoyfjs alpcavrai, 6p,oia>s KOI 
 TOVTOVS OVK aTToSe^o/nat. TOVS 8e Treidop-evovs avTois firl TOV evvopov 
 TToXiTfiav, (ifTo. TOV <f>v\d<T(Tfiv Trjv fls TOV XpiQ-Tov TOV Qeov 6p.o\oyiav, 
 KOI o-atOrivecrBai 1o-(os vTroXa/ijSava). TOVS 8e 6p,o\oyqo-avras KOI fmyvovras 
 TOVTOV flvat TOV Xpurrbv, Kal gTiviovv arn'a p.fTa[3dvTas fTrl TOV (vvopov 
 TroXtret'av, dpv7)o-ap.fvovs OTI OVTOS eo~Tiv o Xptcrros Kal Trplv Te\evTrjs fir) 
 fjifTayvovras, ovo* oXcos o~a>0i]o-fo~dai a7ro^>aiVo/iat' Kal TOVS OTTO TOV o~7rep- 
 paTos TOV 'Afipaafj. >vras Kara TOV vopov, Kal eVt TOVTOV TOV Xpioroi/ 
 /iij iria-TfvovTas irplv TeXevrijs TOV filov ov o-a)d^o-fo-6ai 6p.oia>s aTrofpai- 
 vofiai. Justin Martyr, Dialogus, Sect. 47, pp. 142, 3. Paris Ed. 
 1742. 
 
 APPENDIX, No. IV. (See page 331.) 
 
 ACCOUNT OF THE BUILDING OF THE "CHURCH OF THE 
 PURIFICATION" BY JUSTINIAN, FROM PROCOPIUS. 
 
 'Ev 8e 'lfpoo-o\vp.oi,s Ifpov TTJ GeoroKO) dvedrjKfV wTTf/) aXXo etVca- 
 <r6fjvai ov8ev olov re ecrnv' veav fKK\rj(riav KaXovo~i TO lepbv ol eTrt- 
 yaipioi' OTTfp 817 OTTOIOV TTOTC eo~Tiv, tya> fi^Xaxra), TOCTOVTOV VTTfinfav, 
 <as r) TToXtr \o(pta8rjs p.ev e<mv fK TOV eTrtTrXeioToi/. ov yf<a8eis 8e of 
 \6(poi flo-iv' aXX' ev Tf rpa^ei Kal djroKprjp,v<p frravto-x^Kao-i, ray dp.(f)68ovs 
 ev K\ifiaKos Tponco OTTO roi! opd'iov ts TO irpaves KaTOTeivovTes. TO p.ev 
 ovv aXXa TTJS TroXtws oiKoSo^/nara a-rravra f(f> tvbs x ) P'- ov <rvp.f3aivfi 
 dvai fj firl \6<pov TTfrrotr}fj,va, rj Iv roi %()ap.aXca Kara ro dvairfTTTanevov 
 rfjs yijs' TOVTO 8e U.OVQV TO itpbv ov Tavrrj TTTJ fX ft - eVecrreXXe yap avro 
 'lovo~Tiviavbs /SautXevs (V r<5 Trpov\ovri yfvfo~6ai TO>V X6(p(ov, 8ij\(oo~as 
 oirolov ra r aXXa fie^o-et Kat r6 (vpos avrw Kal p,f)Kos flvai' OVK aTre- 
 XPW* Te * cara T ^" /3o"*^ e/ ^f MTOU> Trpbs TOV epyov TTJV xf> f ' Lav 
 \6tpos' aXXa TOV Ifpov TO rerapr^/uopioi/ aTrfXeXetTrro jrpos re avepov 
 VOTOV Kat dvio~\ovrd TTOV TOV rf\iov, Iva. 817 6pyidfiv Toils ifpevo~i 6ffj.ts. 
 8ib 8r) firtvoovv Ta8f, ols TO f'pyov TOVTO reKro' diroppi^ap,evot TO 
 f)ffj.(Xin fls yfis TTJS vTTTids ra ea'^ara, oiKo86p.r)iJ,a TTfnoirjvTat o~vv(7ra- 
 TO? <TK07rX&>. (ir(i8r) TI ava> KOTO. TTJV aKpa>vvxiav fyevovTO,
 
 APPENDIX. 497 
 
 86\ovs (K8ep.fvoi, <Tvvairrov<Tt, Tr)v oiKo8op.iav 
 
 oXXo> TOV Tfp.tvovs f8d(pti. ravrrj re 6 vea>s irfj p,fv eVi TreVpas i 
 tfipvTat, irr) fie rj(opr)Tai, rrjs TOV jSaa-tXe'ws 8vvdp.fcos p.fyt6os aXXo eiri- 
 Tfxvr)o-ap,emis T<B Xdcpw. Tavrrjs fie 817 rfjs oiKo8op.ias ol \idoi ov Totot 
 fie' fieri p.fyfdos, onoiovs io~p.fv. irpbs yap TOV x a> P lov Tr;v (pvcriv of 
 firi8rjp,iovpyol TOV tpyov Tov8e 8iafj.a^6fj,(voi, vtyos 8e dvTiTeTa.yp.fVov 
 Tffl crKOTTfXto 8icnrovovp.fvoi, TO>V vvfidicrp.ev(>)v aJXfyojp^xoTes cmavrwu 
 eVi ra irapd8oa KOI S\a>s dyvcoTa fni.Tr]8fVfj.dTa>v e^capovv' TreVpas ovv 
 VTTpp.fyedfis fK TO)V opS>v VTTOTfp.v6fj.fvoi, arrep ovpavop.r]Kri tv TOIS irpb 
 TTJS 7ToXea>ff x<apiois dvf^fi, f-vo-avrfs Tf avTas fTTio-Tap.fva>s, evravBa rjyov 
 TpoTrca rotaiSe. dpdas p,fv TOIS TtfTpais fTfKTalvovro fifytdft io~as. fva 
 8f \i6ov fVfTiQfvro dfjuit-r) fudo-rr]. /Sdfj T6 dpio-riv8r)v Trpbs /3a<rtXecoy 
 ffi\fynevoi KdTa Tfo~o-fpaKovTa <rvv TTJ dfid^rj TOV \L6ov e<pfi\Kov. aXX' 
 fTTtl TO.S ts Trfv TTO\IV (pfpovQ-as 68ovs TavTas fie (fifpeiv TO.S dfj.das ap.rf- 
 %ava ^v, KTfp.vovTfs firnrXficrTov ra opfj, ftrtTTjra Tais fTTiytvopevais 
 ayxa^ats eiroiovv. OVTO> Tf TrfpipriKT) dTreipydcravro TOV vf<av, rjirfp /SovXo- 
 (jL(v<p Tw jSacriXei r\v. tvpos Tf aurw Kara \6yov TTfTfoirjfjifvoi, Teyos eWt- 
 Bflvai TW fep<5 <as rjKio~Ta et^ov, 8pvp.ovs Tf ovv KOI 8do~r) Trdvra irfpi- 
 'ioinfs, KOI fi TTOV TI %a>piov rfKovfTO ovpavop.r)Kfo~i KdTafpvTov 8tv8pois, 
 v\7)v Tivd tvpov dp.(pi\a(j)fi, Kt8povs (fiepovo-av ts vtyos f^iKvovfievas drrf- 
 pavTov Q<TOV. ais 8)) TTJV 6po(pr)v TW i/eai t6fvro, v\^os auTai KOTO p.fTpov 
 TrfTToirjfjLfvoi, ts oo-ov Tf fvpvvfTai Kal fs TO P.TIKOS e'^ayerat. Tavra p.fv 
 ovv 8vvdp.fi Tf dv0pa>7Tfiq Kal Tf^vrj ^atriXew? 'lovo~Tiviavbs e^etpyacraro. 
 eWSw/ce fie /cut ) TTJS evo-fftfias f\Trls dp.fif3op.fvr] avTOV TTJ Tip.fj' Kal 
 ^vvf7n\ap.^dvovcra TO o~7Tov8ao-p.a TOVTO. TW p,fv yap tepw jravra^oa'f KIO- 
 va>v efiet, ro re eifios ov*c aTroSfovrcav TOV dp,(pl TO Tfp.fvos KaX\ovs, Kal 
 TOIOVTOV TO p.eyf6os, oloi Si) owes aKre^eiv e's TO a%dos TUIV fyKfip.fv<av 
 o-(pio-iv tp.f\\ov. rf fie X^P a e '" "HI P-fO'oyfia Kfip^vr) Trjs 6a\dcro~r]s TroXXai 
 anodfv, opfo~i T iraTa-^oQfv aTroTrf(ppayp.fVT) dTroTop.ois Tio-lv, r/Trtp p.oi 
 etpijrat, anopov TOIS TfKTaivop.tvois TO f8a<pos firoifi Kiovas fTtptadtv 
 flo-Kop.ito~dai. aXXa /SaatXe'cos 8vo~(popovp.fvov TTJ TOV tpyov dp.T)xaviq, 
 \idov <pvo~iv 6 Geos e'TTiT^fietws e's TOUTO f^ovcrav fv Tots ay^tcrTa opto~iv 
 f8fifv, rj ovo~dv Tf Kal KpvirTop.fV7)v TCL TrpoTepa, fj vvv yfvop.finjv. fir' 
 dp.(p6rfpa fie TTIOTOS 6 Xoyos rrjv aiTiav eis TOJ* Qf6v dva(ptpovo-av. ypfis 
 p.fv yap dv6pu>rrfiq 8vvdp.fi irdvra o-Ta6p.top.fvoi, TroXXa e's TO dbvvaTov 
 diroKtKpio-dai olop.(da' TW fie 0e<p T>V irdvTatv ov8tv OVT arropov, ovr' 
 dp.qx.avov ytvoiTO. Kiovtav TOIWV fv6tv8f p-e'ya TI xpfjp.a vnfpp.fyf0o)v 
 Tf Kal dirop.ip.ovp.eva>v TW xpap.aTi irvpos Tiva (p\6ya, Travrax60fV VTTO- 
 <rrfpiovo-i TOV vtcav' ol p.fv fvfpdtv of fie vnepfffv, of fie dp.<pi Tas aroas 
 at 7reptj3aXXovo-i TO Ifpbv o\ov, 7rXJ)i/ T^S Trpos ecu TfTpap.p.fvrjs TrXevpas" 
 dtVTTfp 8vo fordo-i irpb Trjs TOV vfa> dvpas virfpfpvf'is ayav, (cat T>V fv 
 yfj TTJ irdo~rj Ki6va>v to-a)s ov8fvbs fievrepor oToa Tts e'/cfie'^eTat fvrtvdfv 
 eYepa eVt TOU vdpdrjKos <avop.ao~p.fvri oip.ai, T(5 p.r) fvpvvfo~dai. avXr) p.fTa 
 KIOO-IV 6/ioi'ots tv TfTpajr\fvpa> dvf\opifvrj' 6vpat /LteVavXot fepo- 
 
 32
 
 498 APPENDIX. 
 
 Trepeis OVTO>S, wore fjn]vvov(n, rots ?< lovcriv OTTOI'O) TTOTC 6fdp.ari tv 
 fj.f\\ov(Ti. TrpoTTvXcua 8e TO ev6fv8f davp-dcria ota, Ka'i TIS eVl KIOVOIV 
 8velv eiraipop.(i>T) d\|/(ff es a(parov ttyos' irpo'iojrrt, 8e Trpocru) iJ/niKUKXa 
 duo, aXX^Xoi? avrnrpocrcnTra eKarep&dtv TTJS ri TO Itpov 6Sov ecrratri. 
 evS>ves Se r^s erepas f(p' fKarepa Suo, 'loua-rij/tavoC /Sao-tXeas epyov 
 aTepos [lev i-fvois v8rjp.ov(Ti KO.Ta\vn']piov' 6 8e erepos avairava"n]piov 
 vocrovcri TTTW^oty. TOVTOV 8e rov TTJS QeoroKov vea>v 'lova-Tiviavbs /3atrtXevy 
 KOI TTpooroSa eVi'/iaae xP r )P'^ TO)V ptya^<w- T M^" vv *v 'lfpoo-o\vp.ois 
 'lov(rriviav<a ^acrtXei TreTrpay/xera TOWTT; TTJ; etr^ev Procopius do 
 ficiis Justiniani, Lib. v. Cap. vi. Vol. n. p. 465. 
 
 APPENDIX, No. V. (See page 441.) 
 
 ABSTRACT of a " Description of the Boundaries of the Apostolic See of 
 the Patriarch of Jerusalem, and of the Dioceses subject to Him ; 
 composed by the command of the Most Blessed Patriarch, Atha- 
 nasius, by his Secretary the Monk Anthymus, in Jerusalem, 1838;" 
 contained in the Appendix to the second part of A. M. Moura- 
 vieffs Travels to Jerusalem in 1830. 4th edition. St Petersburg!), 
 1840. Translated from the Russ for the present work, by the 
 Reverend R. W. Blackmore, Chaplain at Cronstadt to the Ho- 
 nourable Russia Company. 1844. 
 
 GENERAL BOUNDARIES. 
 
 The Patriarchal See of Jerusalem, and the Dioceses subject unto 
 it, are included in the following ancient Provinces. 
 
 I. Phoenicia or Libanesia. It commences from Mount Lebanon, 
 and extends to the river Eleutherus, Bezor (Nahr Zerka, near Caesarea). 
 
 II. Palestine. The plain which commences at Caesarea, and ter- 
 minates at Larissa of Egypt, el-Arish ; it also includes the mountains 
 of Judaea. 
 
 III. Judffia. This' mountainous district commences at the Valley 
 of Aylun and extends to Bir es-Seba, for one day's journey on the road 
 which leads to the desert of Suez, above Gaza. 
 
 IV. I < I u 1 1 i;r;u It extends from the southern shore of the Dead Sea 
 to the Wilderness of Paran, towards the south-west. 
 
 V. Samaria. A hilly district from the valley of Besor to the village 
 of Jenin and Scythopolis (Bcisan). 
 
 VI. Galilee, extends from Scythopolis to the source of the Jordan, 
 that is, to Csosarea Philippi (Banias), and the mountains of Antilebanon
 
 APPENDIX. 499 
 
 in length; and from Mount Carmel to the boundaries of Syria and 
 Arabia in breadth. 
 
 VII. Arabia; Petrsea. The mountains beyond Jordan to the north 
 of the Red Sea, which extend to Antilebanon. Mount Sinai is in- 
 cluded in it. 
 
 I. The Diocese of the Patriarch. 
 
 The Diocese of the Patriarch of Jerusalem lies in the middle of 
 these ancient provinces, as a central point. It begins at Ramleh, and 
 making a circle to the north, terminates with the River Jordan. A 
 hundred villages are included in it, but Christians live in only eight 
 of them. 
 
 Orthodox Native 
 Inhabitants. Priests. Native Churches. 
 
 Jerusalem 600 6 The Ointment-bearers, and 
 
 St Mary Magdalene. 
 
 Ramleh 300 2 St George. 
 
 Beit-Jala, 200 families = 1000 4 St Nicholas. 
 
 Ram-Allah, 200 families = 1000 3 St Mary the Virgin. 
 
 Bireh 5 (attend at Ram-Allah). 
 
 Large Church in ruins. 
 'Ain-'Arik, 30 families = 150 (no priest, but a church served from 
 
 Ram-Allah). 
 
 El-Taiyibeh 200 1 St George. 
 
 Rummon 5 (ruined Church). 
 
 Jifna, more than 400 families = 2000 2 St George. 
 
 Bir-Ebzal 50 1 One Church. 
 
 Sanie (es-Samieh), 10 families = 50 
 
 II. Ctesarea of Palestine. The First See. 
 
 The boundaries of this Diocese extend in length from the Plains 
 of Haifa on the sea-shore to Antipatris (Arsuf ), and in breadth from 
 the Mediterranean to the mountains of Samaria. Mount Carmel is 
 included in them. 
 
 Haifa 30 Orthodox Families = 150 souls. 
 
 III. Scythopolis. The Second See. 
 
 This Diocese extends in length from Mount Carmel to the Jor- 
 dan, and in breadth from the Sea of Tiberias and the brook Kishon 
 on the south, to the mountains of Samaria. The villages containing 
 Christians are as follows : 
 
 Orthodox 
 Families. Inhabitants. 
 
 Jenin 20 = 100 No resident Priest, but a Church. 
 
 Burkin 100 =500 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 Kefr-Kud 20 = 100 No Priest, and no Church. 
 
 Zapata 30 = 150 No Priest, but a Church. 
 
 Jezreel (Zerin)... 10 = 50 No Priest, (ruined Church). 
 
 Nain 2 =10 No Church. 
 
 322
 
 500 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 IV. Petra of Arabia. The Third See. 
 
 This Diocese begins at the northern part of the Dead Sea, and 
 extends to the eastern parts of the desert of Arabia, from whence 
 it turns south to the mountains of Moab, reaches the Red Sea, and 
 includes Mount Sinai ; then returns to the southern shore of the 
 Dead Sea, where its limits terminate with the Diocese of Bethlehem. 
 The village of Kerack alone contains any Christians. 
 
 About forty years ago the Arabs took the place and murdered 
 all the inhabitants except the Orthodox, who having there enjoyed 
 an unusual degree of liberty, had increased in numbers, and had a 
 Church under the invocation of St George, and two Priests. In 1834 
 it was taken by Ibrahim Pasha, who transferred the Christians to 
 the neighbourhood of Jerusalem. Two years since they were allowed 
 to return to Kerack, but war and emigration had reduced their 
 numbers to 200 families, who have neither Church nor Priest. We 
 have endeavoured to supply these deficiencies. 
 
 V. Ptolemais. The Fourth See. 
 
 This Diocese is situated in Phoenicia, and beginning from the 
 maritime village of Zephra, extends to the east to the summit of 
 Mount Rammon, on the southern side of which is situated the vil- 
 lage of Ramma : thence it turns to the south-west, and terminates 
 at the mouth of the river Kishon, near Haipha. The bishop Pro- 
 copius, who resides in a monastery in the town, exercises jurisdiction 
 over the Christians in the following villages. He also is in the habit 
 of visiting other Dioceses as Exarch, confirming the orthodox in their 
 faith, and inspecting their Churches. 
 
 Families. 
 Ptolemais or Acre... 100 
 
 Ebraweh 100 
 
 Jente 25 
 
 El-Mekr 12 
 
 Kefr Yasif 300 
 
 Abu Senan 60 
 
 El-Bussah 
 
 Sex Malta 
 
 Dar Secha 
 
 The following villages lie on 
 
 El Bukeiah 
 
 Makhus 5 = 
 
 ErRameh 
 
 Sukhnin 
 
 'Aleibun 
 
 Souls. 
 
 500 A Priest, and Church of St George. 
 
 500 A Priest. 
 
 125 A Priest. 
 
 60 Attend Divine Service in other villages. 
 
 1600 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 300 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 20 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 20 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 20 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 the hill side, and are called " Jebel Safed :" 
 
 130 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 25 No Priest, a Church cut in the solid rock. 
 
 400 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 30 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 300 A Priest, and a Church.
 
 APPENDIX. 501 
 
 VI. Bethlehem. The Fifth See. 
 
 The boundaries of the Diocese of Bethlehem are as follows : be- 
 ginning from the valley which lies near the city of Bethlehem to 
 the north, they extend to the east as far as the Dead Sea; from 
 thence they go to the south, including the whole of Idumaea and 
 Judaea Proper, Jebel-Khulil, and turning to the west, extend to the 
 north, embracing all the mountains of Judaea to the Brook Etham. 
 They terminate to the east at the village of Beledj, called in ancient 
 times Bezek ; and from thence pass through the valley and the brook 
 of Bethlehem to the city itself. The bishop Dositheus resides in the 
 convent at Bethlehem. The orthodox Christians are, 
 
 Orthodox. 
 
 Bethlehem 280 Three Priests, and a Church. 
 
 Pimenas 600 A Priest. Church in ruins . 
 
 VII. Nazareth. The Sixth See. 
 
 The boundaries begin at that city, and extend to the south to 
 the large brook which flows between Nazareth and Ptolemais; thence 
 they pass to the southern base of Mount Tabor, and return to the 
 west direct to Nazareth, forming a kind of triangle. 
 
 Orthodox. 
 
 Nazareth 1000 Two Priests, and a Church. 
 
 A'bilin 400 Two Priests, and a Church. 
 
 Yafa 400 One Priest, and a Church. 
 
 Ma'lul, 60 families =300 A Church. 
 
 Er-Reineh 500 One Priest, and a Church. 
 
 Kefr Kenna 100 One Priest, and a Church. 
 
 N.B. This is a peculiar of the Patriarch. 
 
 VIII. Lydda. The Seventh See. 
 
 Commencing from Lydda, the boundaries extend straight to the 
 east of the village till they reach the village 'Abud, from whence 
 they turn direct to the north, keeping the mountains of Samaria on 
 the rignt, and go as far as Mount Irkan ; after this, turning to the 
 west through a valley, they approach the borders of Ephraim, and 
 from thence again reach Lydda. 
 
 Orthodox. 
 
 Lydda 100 Two Priests, and a Church. 
 
 'Abud 150 Two Priests, and a Church. 
 
 IX. Gaza. The Eighth See. 
 
 The boundaries of the Diocese of Gaza commence from the river 
 Rubin, and extend south to the river Azmon, otherwise called Rino-
 
 502 APPENDIX. 
 
 corura, and the River of Egypt, (Wady el 'Arish). This river sepa- 
 rates the Patriarchate of Jerusalem from that of Alexandria ; extending 
 themselves hence to the east as far as the mountains of Judaea and 
 Idumsea, and afterwards to the north, the boundaries terminate near 
 the sources of the River Rubin, from whence they commenced. Chris- 
 tians are found only in Gaza. 
 
 Gaza 30 families = 150 souls. A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 X. Sinai. The Ninth See. 
 
 Mount Sinai depends on the Patriarchal See of Jerusalem. The 
 Archbishop of Sinai is consecrated in Jerusalem, as are all the Arch- 
 bishops dependent on the Patriarch; their Deacons and Priests also 
 come to Jerusalem for ordination. 
 
 (The boundaries and villages of this See are not described.) 
 
 XI. Joppa. The Tenth See. 
 
 This Diocese is bounded on the west by the Mediterranean, on the 
 east by Ramlah and Lydda, on the north by Antipatris (Arsuf?) 
 and the brook which falls close by it into the sea, on the south by the 
 River Rubin. There are no villages inhabited by Christians. 
 Jaffa contains 300 Orthodox, a Priest, and Church of St George. 
 
 XII. Neapolis (Nablouse). The Eleventh See. 
 
 The boundaries of this Diocese commence at the large valley behind 
 Zipha to the south, and reach the village of Abut, where the brook 
 flows into the Jordan. On the east it has the plain of Jericho, on 
 the west the large plain of Palestine ; it borders on the Dioceses of 
 Lydda and Csesarea, and to the north on that of Sebastieh, being sepa- 
 rated from it to the south by a great and dry valley, distant one 
 hour's journey from Sebastieh. 
 
 Orthodox. 
 
 Nablouse 300 Two Priests, and Church, St Demetrius. 
 
 Rufidia 200 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 Faraon 40 No Priest, and no Church. 
 
 XIII. Sebastia. The Twelfth See. 
 
 Bounded on the east by the plains of Jordan, on the west by the 
 extremity of the tribe of Ephraim, where Samaria also terminates ; on 
 the south by the large valley between Sabastia and Nablouse ; on the 
 north by the fortress of Sanur, and the village of Kubatiyeh. 
 
 Orthodox. 
 
 Nous-Ezbin (Nuss Ijbeil)... 200 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 Beit Imrin ftO A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 Jinisinia . . . fiO No Priest or Church.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 503 
 
 XIV. Tabor. The Thirteenth See. 
 
 This Diocese commences at the western foot of the Holy Mountain 
 of that name, and extends eastward to the sea of Tiberias. On the 
 right is the great river Kishon, on the left, to the north, the hills of 
 Safed. 
 
 Orthodox. 
 
 Mezetel 40 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 Sedgere (esh-Shajrah) 60 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 'Aulam, or Ulama 250 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 XV. Philadelphia. The Fourteenth See. 
 
 The Bishop of Philadelphia is subject to the Metropolitan of Petra. 
 This Diocese is bounded by the hills beyond Jordan, separated towards 
 the north by the River Jabbock (Wady Zurka), and to the south by 
 the River Arnon (Wady el-M6jeb). 
 
 Orthodox. 
 Es-Salt 400 A Priest, and a Church. 
 
 There are many villages in this Diocese, but few are inhabited by 
 Christians, of whom there are not more than from five to ten families 
 in a place. 
 
 We should here remark, that all the Priests who are ordained to 
 the above-named villages, receive from the Patriarch a band for the 
 head, and all the utensils, from the first to the last, required for the 
 Divine Service. 
 
 N.B. I have put in Italics such names as I have not been able 
 to discover in Maps, or in Mr Smith's Tables in the Appendix to 
 Vol. in. of the Biblical Researches, by which I have corrected the or- 
 thography, which had suffered materially in its passage from Arabic to 
 Greek, Russ, and English.
 
 DESCRIPTION OF ANCIENT LOCK AND KEY. 
 
 The iron padlock, of which a sketch is annexed, was found in 1839 
 in the fosse of the ancient tower, commonly called the Tower of David, 
 at Jerusalem. It was forwarded to His Imperial Majesty by the 
 Russian Consul at Jaffa, as being a very curious and perhaps unique 
 specimen of ancient mechanism. 
 
 The lock itself is of forged iron, of a square form, weighing about 
 38 Russian pounds, and in size 9| by 9| English inches. The me- 
 chanism is enclosed in a cylinder between three and four inches in 
 diameter. The key, five pounds in weight, five inches in diameter, 
 and thirteen in length, is introduced through an opening in one of the 
 iron ends of the cylinder, and at a certain distance from the entrance 
 the wards or projections of the key press six springs, simply and in- 
 geniously constructed, and by keeping them compressed permit the 
 removal of that end of the padlock to which the bolt adheres, leaving 
 the interior visible. To lock it, the key has simply to be withdrawn ; 
 compression being removed, the springs instantly return to their 
 grooves, and no way of opening can be used except that of breaking 
 the lock or applying its own key. 
 
 The exterior of the lock is covered with a grooved pattern, into 
 which, hi all probability, ornaments were soldered. On its disinterment, 
 the channels were filled with an earthy substance so much hardened by 
 time, that it could with difficulty be extracted. 
 
 On the lower extremity of the lock, and at the end of the bolt are 
 cavities in which it is evident that escutcheons have been fastened, as 
 the end of the key still bears the traces of incrustation in copper and 
 silver. 
 
 Its form, weight, and the manner by which it must be attached, 
 prove that it can only have been made use of to fasten a large door 
 or gate, such as that of a city or tower. 
 
 Does not the double cross on the key indicate that at the time of 
 its manufacture the Christians were yet masters of Jerusalem? The 
 arms of the city were a double cross d'or on a field argent. Its perfect 
 preservation may be accounted for by the extraordinary thickness of 
 the metal, the mechanism being so completely concealed in the depth 
 of the cylinder that the rust could with difficulty reach it, especially 
 if we bear in mind the dryness of the soil in southern latitudes.
 
 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 JERUSALEM founded 1913 
 
 Visited by Abraham 1872 
 
 Conquest of Canaan by Joshua... 1415 
 
 Jerusalem taken by David 1048 
 
 Solomon 1015 
 
 Dedication of the Temple 1004 
 
 Rehoboam 975 
 
 Invasion of Shishak 971 
 
 Abijah 958 
 
 Asa 955 
 
 Jehoshaphat 914 
 
 Jehoram 889 
 
 Jerusalem sacked by Philistines. 887 
 
 Ahaziah 885 
 
 Athaliah 884 
 
 Joash, or Jehoash 878 
 
 Amaziah 837 
 
 Uzziah fortifies Jerusalem 809 
 
 Jotham 758 
 
 Ahaz 742 
 
 Hezekiah 726 
 
 Alanasseh 698 
 
 Ammon 643 
 
 Josiah 641 
 
 . repairs the Temple 623 
 
 Jehoaz 610 
 
 Jehoiachin 610 
 
 Zedekiah 590 
 
 Jerusalem besieged by Nebu- 
 chadnezzar 590 
 
 Temple burned 588 
 
 Restoration under Cyrus 535 
 
 Temple rebuilt 515 
 
 Hainan's plot frustrated 510 
 
 Ezra arrives in Jerusalem 457 
 
 Nehemiah rebuilds the walls 446 
 
 Alexander visits Jerusalem 330 
 
 Ptolemy Soter 323 
 
 Philadelphia 284 
 
 Evergetes 246 
 
 Philopater 221 
 
 Judaea seized by Antiochus 213 
 
 Ptolemy Epiphanes 204 
 
 Philometor 180 
 
 Revolt of the Maccabees 168 
 
 Walls of Jerusalem rebuilt 164 
 
 Death of Judas Maccabeus 161 
 
 Simon 143 
 
 frees the Jews from the 
 
 Macedonian yoke 142 
 
 Hyrcanus 136 
 
 Antiochus surrounds the city, and 
 
 finally destroys the walls 134 
 
 Aristobulus succeeds 106 
 
 Alexander Jannaeus 105 
 
 Alexandra 78 
 
 Hyrcanus II 69 
 
 Pompey marches upon Jerusalem, 
 and declares the State tribu- 
 tary to Rome 63 
 
 Antipater rebuilds the walls of 
 
 Jerusalem 44 
 
 Julius Caesar murdered 44 
 
 Hyrcanus II. deposed 40 
 
 Herod the Great 37 
 
 A.D. 
 
 Archelaus 3 
 
 Judaea becomes a Roman pro- 
 vince 12 
 
 Agrippa receives the kingdom 
 
 from Claudius 44 
 
 It again becomes a Roman pro- 
 vince 47 
 
 Nero 54 
 
 Jerusalem besieged by Cestius ... 66 
 Titus encamps before it, and com- 
 
 pletes its destruction 70 
 
 Adrian 117 
 
 visits Jerusalem. JElia 
 
 Capitolina rebuilt 130 
 
 Insurrection of the Jews under 
 
 Bar-Cochab 132 
 
 Tenth persecution of the Christ- 
 ians 303 
 
 Constantino 311 
 
 Recovery of the Holy Sepulchre. 326 
 
 Julian 361 
 
 Theodpsius 383 
 
 Justinian 527 
 
 Jerusalem taken by the Persians. 614 
 The true Cross restored to Jeru- 
 salem by the Emperor Hera- 
 
 clius 629 
 
 Jerusalem taken by the Saracens. 637 
 Commencement of the reign of 
 
 the house of Abbas /52 
 
 First of the Fatimites 909 
 
 Peter the Hermit first visits Jeru- 
 salem 1094 
 
 Arrival of the Crusaders 1099 
 
 Godfrey made King 1009 
 
 Jerusalem taken by Saladin 1187 
 
 Final expulsion of the Christians 
 from Palestine by the Mam- 
 
 louks 12!1 
 
 Selim 1 1517
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Abraham, visits Jerusalem, 1. 
 
 Abijah, 26. 
 
 Absalom, pillar of, 374. 
 
 Acra, identical with Jebus, 6, 105; its 
 situation mistaken by Dr Robinson, 
 260 ; evidences from Josephus, 264, 
 273, 282, 310, 313. 
 
 Adrian finds a Christian church and 
 seven synagogues at Jerusalem, 132; 
 he proposes to rebuild the city to be 
 colonized with Romans, and called 
 jElia Capitolina leaves Aquila to 
 superintend the work, ib. ; tradition 
 of his desecration of the Holy Sepul- 
 chre, 291. 
 
 Agrippa, receives Herod's kingdom 
 from the Emperor, 103 ; prevents 
 the erection of Caligula's statue in 
 the Temple, ib. ; proposes to build a 
 wall, but is prevented by the em- 
 peror, 106. 
 
 Ahaz, 33 ; restores idolatry, invasion 
 of the Philistines, 34. 
 
 Ahazialt, 30. 
 
 Alexander ilic Great, defeats the Per- 
 sians, and marches upon Jerusalem, 
 62 ; his reception, ib. 
 
 Alexander Jannccus, at war with his 
 countrymen, 83; conquers Idumea, 
 and appoints a prefect, 84. 
 
 Alexandtr, bishop of Cappadocia, as- 
 sists Bishop Narcissus, 153 ; admits 
 Origen to the priesthood, ili.\ esta- 
 blishes a library at Jerusalem, 155; 
 is succeeded by Mazabanes, ib. 
 
 Alexandra, queen of the Jews, 83. 
 
 Archclaus, succeeds to one half of He- 
 rod's dominions, 102 ; is banished 
 to Gaul, and Judaea becomes a Ro- 
 man province, ib. 
 
 Aristobulus, son of Hyrcanus, 82. 
 
 son of Alexander Jannaeus, 
 
 attempts to seize the government, 
 84 ; flees to Petra Judaea invaded 
 by Arabians under Antipater is 
 besieged in the Temple purchases 
 the aid of the Romans, who raise the 
 siege, ib. ; again attempts to recover 
 the kingdom, 87 ; dies by poison, 
 88. 
 
 Amaziah, 31. 
 
 Amman, 39. 
 
 Amrou, besieges Jerusalem, 195, 
 
 Anaslatius, bishop of Jerusalem, 189. 
 
 Antigonus, appears in Judaea with Par- 
 thian troops, 91 ; attacks Herod and 
 his brother in the palace in Jeru- 
 salem, ib. ; plunders Jerusalem, 92 ; 
 besieges Massada, 93 ; is attacked by 
 Herod in Jerusalem surrenders is 
 put to death at Antioch, 95. 
 
 Antiochus the Great, 65; permits the 
 re-edification of the Temple and City, 
 and grants many privileges, ib. ; cedes 
 Judaea to Egypt, as dowry for his 
 daughter, 66. 
 
 Antiochus Epiphanes, burns and de- 
 stroys the palaces and city- walls 
 erects a fortress upon the mountain 
 of the Temple, 69 ; orders every 
 profanation, and abolishes the ob- 
 servance of the law, 70 ; is opposed 
 by the Maccabees, 73 ; dies in Per- 
 sia, 7-"'. 
 
 Antiochus Eupator, marches upon Ju- 
 daea, 75 ; demolishes the fortification 
 of the Temple returns to Antioch, 
 76. 
 
 Antipater, prefect of Idumea, 84 ; the 
 friend of Hyrcanus, ib. ; appoints
 
 INDEX. 
 
 507 
 
 Herod to the government of Galilee, 
 88. 
 
 Antipater, son of Herod, calumniates 
 his half-brothers, 98; plots against 
 his father's life, 100 ; is condemned 
 and executed, 101. 
 
 Antonia, tower of, its erection, 78 ; oc- 
 cupied by John, 112; destroyed by 
 Titus, 114, 281, 323; Josephus' ac- 
 count of it, 350 ; equivalent to Acra 
 of the ' Antiquities ' and Macca- 
 bees, 351 ; the accounts of Josephus 
 and the Maccabees respecting it re- 
 conciled, 353 ; unintelligible notice 
 of Josephus considered, 355. 
 
 A guila is baptized, 132; joins the 
 Jews translates the Scriptures, 133. 
 
 Ark, removed by David, 7 ; falls into 
 the hands of the Philistines, 9 ; de- 
 posited in the Temple, 16; fate un- 
 known, 46. 
 
 Asa, reformation defeats the Ethio- 
 pians erects walled cities, 26. 
 
 Athaliah usurps the throne, 30. 
 
 St Athanasius, his banishment to Treves, 
 readmission to the church at Jerusa- 
 lem, 171. 
 
 Bar-cochdb, revolt led by him, 140. 
 Basilica, when erected, 160 ; further 
 
 notices of it, 299. 
 Beit Jebrin, the ancient Eleutheropo- 
 
 lis, 257. 
 
 Bernice, intercedes for the Jews, 108. 
 Bether, situation of, 136; tradition of 
 
 the siege, 138. 
 
 Bethlehem, monastery there, 189. 
 Bridge, described by Dr Robinson, 
 
 336; evidences from Josephus against 
 
 his theory, 344 ; identical with the 
 
 causeway of Solomon, 345. 
 
 Caesar permits the Jews to rebuild the 
 
 walls, 88. 
 
 Caiaphai, his town-house, 421. 
 Calvary, 289, 253. 
 
 Cestius, encamps on Scopus, 109 ; raises 
 the siege without cause, 109; this a 
 divine interposition, 126. 
 
 Charlemagne, his friendship with Ha- 
 run the Just sends costly presents 
 to the Holy Sepulchre receives in 
 return the keys of the church and 
 other valuable gifts from Harun, 
 208 ; he obtains relief for Jerusa- 
 lem, and sends money for the resto- 
 ration of churches, 209. 
 
 Christians, their flight to Pella, 128; 
 governed by a succession of bishops 
 to the time of Adrian, 122 ; Church 
 at JElia Capitolina they observe the 
 Mosaic law, 140 ; dissensions in con- 
 sequence of the election of a gentile 
 bishop, 141 ; separation of the Na- 
 zarenes, 147 ; persecution under Dio- 
 cletian, 157; dreadful massacre under 
 Chosroes, with destruction of their 
 churches, 193; fifteen years without 
 a bishop, ib. ; persecutions under 
 Hakem, 210 ; Christian men ex- 
 pelled from the city by the Emir, 
 217; defeated at the battle of Tibe- 
 rias, 232 ; dissensions among them 
 at the present time, 436 ; Greek 
 Christians, 339 ; the Georgians, 446 ; 
 Armenians, 451 ; Syrians and Jaco- 
 bites, 456; Copts, 458; Latins, 462. 
 
 Crassus, visits Jerusalem strips the 
 Temple, 88. 
 
 Cross taken to Persia, 193 ; restored to 
 Jerusalem by Heraclius, 194 ; notice 
 of its alleged discovery, 303. 
 
 Crusades, origin of, 214 ; arrival of the 
 army, 216; city taken, 223; cruel- 
 ties of the victors, 224 ; another in- 
 vasion, 236. 
 
 Cyril, St, succeeds Maximus, 1?1 ; is 
 involved in a dispute with Acacius, 
 and is deposed, 173 ; restored by 
 Julian, ib. ; present at the second 
 council at Constantinople, 1 77 ; his 
 story of a luminous cross his death, 
 179; his testimony respecting Gol-
 
 508 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 gotha, 302 ; and of the true cross, 
 304. 
 Cyrus permits the Jews to return, 50. 
 
 Daniel and his companions, 43. 
 
 David takes Jerusalem, 6 ; unites the 
 fortress of Zion to the city of Jebus, 
 7 ; brings the ark from Shiloh, 7 ; 
 his tombs, 415; said to have been 
 deprived of its treasure by Hyrca- 
 nus, 416; traditions respecting the 
 tombs, 417- 
 
 Ettas, bishop of Jerusalem, promotes 
 monasticism erects churches the 
 Church of the Purification, now Mosk 
 of Aksa, 190. 
 
 Epiphanius, his testimony respecting 
 the Nazarenes, 147 ? differences with 
 John, 179. 
 
 Eudocia withdrawn from orthodoxy by 
 Theodosius, 188 ; is restored, and 
 builds churches, monasteries, and 
 almshouses, 189. 
 
 Eusebius records the names and order 
 of the first Christian bishops, 151 ; 
 his account of the recovery of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, 162 ; supposed to 
 have favoured Arianism, 171. 
 
 Ezra, 50 ; reformation under him, 55 ; 
 Sacred Scriptures collected by him, 
 58. 
 
 Fountains, that of Siloam, 378 ; pecu- 
 liarity of the water, 379 ; another 
 near the area of the Great Mosk, 
 explored by Mr Woolcott, 381 ; 
 identical in taste with the water of 
 Siloam, 384 ; another supplied with 
 the same water in the possession of 
 the Franciscans, ib. ; supposed source 
 of the water, 386; alluded to by 
 Tacitus, 387 ; the true situation in- 
 dicated by Scripture, 391 ; that of 
 the Virgin, 399 ; statements recapi- 
 tulated, 400; that of Nehemiah, 
 407 ; that of Etam, 413. 
 
 Gates, Gennath, 261, 285, 288, 313: 
 Jaffa, 268, 430; four of the Temple, 
 274; Shallecheth, 276; Parbar, or 
 gate of the Suburb, 278 ; Damascus, 
 285, 364, 391; Porta Judicii, 287; 
 Golden, 328, 341 ; St Stephen, 364; 
 Sheep-gate, 402. 
 
 Gibeon, its site, 5. 
 
 Gregory, St, of Nyssa, his testimony 
 respecting the moral state of Jeru- 
 salem, 183. 
 
 Godfrey de Bouillon, his position at 
 the siege of Jerusalem, 217; pro- 
 claimed king of Jerusalem, 226; 
 defeats the Saracens at Ascalon, 227 ; 
 his tomb, 301. 
 
 Helena, S^, visits Jerusalem her inter- 
 est in the recovery of the Holy Se- 
 pulchre, 168, 303. 
 
 Heraclius restores the true cross to Je- 
 rusalem, 194 ; orders a massacre of 
 the Jews, 195. 
 
 Herod, enters on the government of Ga- 
 lilee, 88 ; marries the grand-daughter 
 of Hyrcanus, purchases the favour of 
 Marc Antony, is confirmed with his 
 brother Phasaelus as tetrarchs, 90 ; 
 is shut up with his brother in Jeru- 
 salem, the dispute decided by trea- 
 chery, 91 ; escapes to Massada, and 
 thence proceeds to Petra, 92 ; goes 
 to Rome, is there pronounced king 
 of Judaea, 92 ; releases his family, 
 and proceeds to Jerusalem abandons 
 the siege, 93 ; marches to Samosata 
 to see Marc Antony, 94 ; takes Je- 
 rusalem, 95 ; his cruelty, ib. ; repairs 
 to Rhodes to meet Octavius, who 
 confirms him in his kingdom, 96 ; 
 Herod builds splendid cities his pa- 
 ternal care in the time of famine, 96 ; 
 conspiracy against his life frustrated, 
 97 ; he rebuilds the Temple its 
 magnificence shewn in the fragments 
 found in the walls of the modern 
 Haram, 97 ; occupies nine years and
 
 INDEX. 
 
 509 
 
 a half in building, 98; execution 
 of two of his sons, 99 ; conspiracy 
 against his life discovered, and his 
 son Antipater convicted, 100 ; his 
 illness the destruction of the brazen 
 eagle over the principal entrance of 
 the Temple his death, 101. 
 
 Hezekiah,3o; fall of Israel, captivity 
 of the ten tribes, 36 ; pool of, 269 ; 
 its situation determined by Scripture, 
 398. 
 
 Hippie Tower, its situation, 105, 261, 
 288. 
 
 Hymen&us, 155 ; attends the assembly 
 at Antioch called to condemn the 
 heresy of Paul of Samosata, 1 56. 
 
 Hyrcanus, 80 ; besieged in Jerusalem 
 by the king of Syria, 81 ; his death, 
 82. 
 
 Hyrcanus II. his friendship with An- 
 tipater disputes with his brother 
 Aristobulus, 84 ; war in consequence, 
 the Temple besieged, 85 ; he is con- 
 firmed in his priestly office by Pom- 
 pey, 8? ; Antipater and his sons cited 
 before him, 89 ; Antigonus besieges 
 Jerusalem, 91 ; he is betrayed and 
 captured by him, and rendered inca- 
 pable of holding the priestly office, 
 92. 
 
 James, St, the Just, the first bishop of 
 Jerusalem, 122 ; his life and mar- 
 tyrdom, 124; his successor, Simeon, 
 son of Cleopas, 125 ; his tomb, 373 ; 
 monastery of, 455. 
 
 Jehoatiaz, dethroned and carried into 
 Egypt, 42. 
 
 Jehoash, 31 ; death of Zechariah, ib. ; 
 invasion of the Syrians, and violent 
 death of the king, ib. 
 
 Jehoiachin, led into captivity, 43. 
 
 Jehoiakim, placed on the throne by 
 Pharaoh-Necho, 43. 
 
 Jehoram, his wicked reign, 29. 
 
 Jehoshaphat, completes the reformation 
 from idolatry, 27 ; defeats the Am- 
 
 monites and Moabites, 28 ; joins 
 himself to Ahab, 29 ; his tomb ma- 
 nuscript found there, 376. 
 
 St Jerome, his opinion upon pilgrim- 
 ages, 184. 
 
 Jerusalem, city of Melchizedek, 1 ; 
 visited by Abraham, 2 ; taken by 
 David, 6 ; buildings erected in it by 
 Solomon, 22 ; sacked by Shishak, 
 25 ; by the Philistines, 30 ; fortified 
 by Uzziah, 32 ; taken by Pharaoh- 
 Necho, 42; by the Chaldeans, 43; 
 destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, 45 ; 
 the walls rebuilt by Nehemiah, 57 ; 
 taken by Alexander the Great, 63 ; 
 seized by Ptolemy Soter, 64 ; who 
 fortified it, ib. ; benefits granted by 
 Antiochus, 65 ; palaces and walls 
 destroyed by Antiochus Epiphanes 
 a fortress erected in the city, 69 ; 
 recovered by the Maccabees, 71 ; the 
 walls rebuilt by Judas, 74 ; defences 
 strengthened by Simon, 80 ; a double 
 trench dug and a hundred lofty towers 
 raised by the king of Syria, 81 ; the 
 walls destroyed, 82 ; besieged by the 
 Romans, 86 ; the walls repaired by 
 the permission of Caesar, 88 ; city 
 besieged by Herod, 93; improved 
 and adorned by him, and Temple 
 rebuilt, 97 ; geographical description 
 of it in the time of our Lord, 104 ; 
 the walls, 105; intended fortifica- 
 tion by Agrippa, 106; assaulted by 
 Cestius, the siege raised, 109 ; at- 
 tacked by Titus, 110; final destruc- 
 tion of the city, 117; three towers 
 and part of the wall preserved, 119 ; 
 intentions of Adrian respecting it, 
 132 ; seized by the Jews under Bar- 
 cochab, 134 ; the Jews forbidden to 
 enter Jerusalem, 139; its desecration 
 by the Romans, 140 ; Christian 
 Church there, ib. ; Church of the 
 Holy Sepulchre, and others, 160 
 169 ; attempted re-edification of the 
 Temple abandoned, 1?6 ; becomes
 
 510 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 the resort of pilgrims, 182 ; churches, 
 &c. built by Eudocia, 189; others 
 by Elias, 190 ; taken by Chosroes, 
 king of Persia, 193 ; the sacred 
 buildings restored, 194; dreadful 
 massacre of Jews in the city, 195 ; 
 besieged by Amrou, 199 ; Omar en- 
 ters the city, 201 ; founds the Mosk 
 of Omar, 205 ; benefits conferred by 
 Charlemagne, 209 ; taken by Malek- 
 Shah, 212 ; arrival of the Crusaders, 
 216; the city taken by them, 223; 
 taken by Saladin, 233 ; repairs the 
 wall, 236 ; city dismantled by Yosa, 
 238 ; given up to the Franks, ib. ; 
 visited by Selim the First, 240 ; the 
 present wall built by Soleiman, 240 ; 
 present state of the city and future 
 prospects, 247 ; present aspect, 430. 
 
 Joseph averts the dangers of the state, 
 66; divisions of the people on his 
 death, 67. 
 
 Josiah repairs the Temple, finds the 
 law, restores the services, 41 ; Jere- 
 miah prophecies Josiah killed, 42. 
 
 Jotham, his good reign the age of the 
 prophets Joel, Amos, Hosea, and 
 Isaiah, 33. 
 
 Julian restores St Cyril, 173 ; attempts 
 to falsify the divine predictions, 1?4 ; 
 his death, 1?6. 
 
 Juvenal, bishop, present at the third 
 (Ecumenical Council, 187; persecuted 
 by the monk Theodosius, 188; is 
 restored to his bishopric, 189. 
 
 Macariut receives unlimited power 
 from Constantine to adorn the Church 
 of the Holy Sepulchre, 166, 255, 
 312. 
 
 Maccabees, 71 ; refuse to obey the royal 
 edict Judas Maccabeus defeats the 
 Syrian king, ?3 ; is victorious over 
 the Edomites and others, 74 ; is ap- 
 pointed high-priest, 76 ; is killed in 
 battle, 77- 
 
 Mariamne, 91 ; marriage with Herod, 
 
 94 ; her cruel death, 95. 
 Modcstus collects funds to restore the 
 
 sacred buildings, 193. 
 Modin, its probable situation, 71 ; 
 
 burial-place of Judas Maccabeus. 
 Mosk-el-Aksa on the site of the church 
 
 of Justinian, as described by Proco- 
 
 copius, 332. 
 
 Narcissus, Bishop, mentioned by Eu- 
 sebius, 'presided at the Council of 
 Palestine, 151 ; miracles attributed 
 to him, 152 ; remarkable circum- 
 stances related of him, 153 ; Alex- 
 ander of Cappadocia associated with 
 him, ib. 
 
 Nazarcncs, their separation from the 
 Church, 147; the estimation in which 
 they were held according to Justin 
 Martyr and Epiphanius, 147, 149. 
 
 Olivet, situated in the district of Beth- 
 any, 366 ; Church of the Ascension 
 upon it, 367 ; the accounts given by 
 the Evangelists reconciled, 368. 
 
 Onias takes refuge in Egypt builds a 
 temple at Heliopolis, 76. 
 
 Ophir, its situation, 17. 
 
 Pclla, its position, 127- 
 
 Phascelus, brother of Herod, appointed 
 to the government of Jerusalem, 88 ; 
 declared tetrarch by Marc Antony, 
 90 ; is killed, 92. 
 
 Pompey invades Judaea, 85 ; besieges 
 Jerusalem, 86 ; he enters the Holy 
 of Holies his forbearance, 87- 
 
 Pools, of Siloam, 379 ; Serpent's, of 
 Josephus,392; Siloam, called 'Lower 
 Pool ' Hezekiah's, called ' King's 
 Pool,' 400 ; two others mentioned 
 by Chroniclers of the Crusades, and 
 by Quaresmius, 401 ; Bcthesda and 
 Sheep's Pool, ib.; called Struthius by 
 Josephus, a proof that it is Pool of 
 Bethesda, 404 ; Pool of Mamilla,
 
 INDEX. 
 
 511 
 
 405; Lower Pool of Gihon, 410; 
 
 proved to be an ancient pool, 411 ; 
 
 the three pools of Solomon, 413. 
 Ptolemy Soter seizes Jerusalem carries 
 
 the inhabitants into Egypt fortifies 
 
 the Temple, 64. 
 Philadelphia redeems the Jews 
 
 in Egypt sends costly offerings to 
 
 the Temple, 64. 
 
 Epiphanes, Judaea recovered to 
 
 Egypt by his generals, 65. 
 
 Reftoboam, 24 ; division of the king- 
 dom, ib. 
 
 Sdba, St, his firmness, 190. 
 
 Saladin invades Judaea, 232 ; battle of 
 Tiberias, ib.; takes Jerusalem, 233. 
 
 Sanballat builds the Temple on Mount 
 Gerizim, 60. 
 
 Sepulchre, the Holy, its recovery under 
 Constantine, 161 ; the state in which 
 it was found, 164; destroyed by 
 Chosroes, 193 ; repairedby the bounty 
 of Modestus and the patriarch of 
 Antioch, 194 ; enriched by Charle- 
 magne, 208; destroyed by Hakem, 
 210; re-edified under the directions 
 of the patriarch Nicephorus, 211; 
 disputes of its present possessors, 241 ; 
 destruction of the building by fire, 
 1808 restored the following year 
 chiefly by the Greek Christians, 242 ; 
 defence of the traditions respecting 
 it, 253 ; Dr Clarke's notices of it, 
 259 ; remarkable coincidence of Jo- 
 sephus with Christian tradition, 288 ; 
 arguments in favor of its present 
 site, 289 ; its appearance at the pre- 
 sent time, 293 ; the testimony of 
 Eusebius, 294; ceremonies during 
 the holy week, 433. 
 
 Simon the Just, frees the Jews from 
 the Macedonian yoke, 78 ; his reign 
 described in the first book of Mac- 
 cabees, 79 ; is murdered, 80 ; his 
 cisterns beneath the Temple-area, 386. 
 
 Simon, leader of a faction in Jerusa- 
 lem, 110 ; is taken after the destruc- 
 tion of the city, and put to death by 
 Titus, 119. 
 
 Solomon, erects the Temple, 16 ; extent 
 of his dominions, 19 ; his other build- 
 ings, 22 ; his causeway seen at the 
 present day, 2?4 ; identical with the 
 bridge mentioned by Josephus, 343. 
 
 Temple, built by Solomon, 16; re- 
 paired by Hezekiah, 35 ; repaired by 
 Josiah, 42; destroyed by Nebuchad- 
 nezzar, 45 ; rebuilt under the decree 
 of Cyrus, 53; fortified by Ptolemy 
 Soter, 64; re-edified under Antio- 
 chus, 65; desecrated by Antiochus 
 Epiphanes, 69 ; fortifications demo- 
 lished by Eupator, 76; repaired by 
 Simon, 80 ; besieged by Antipa- 
 ter, 84 ; injured by Pompey, 87 ; 
 stripped by Crassus, 88 ; rebuilt by 
 Herod, 97 ; the cloisters in part de- 
 stroyed by Titus, 114; its utter de- 
 struction, 117; Julian encourages 
 the Jews to attempt the re-edifica- 
 tion, 175 ; the Mosk of Omar erected 
 on its site, 205; the four gates of 
 the Temple, 274; present state of 
 the Temple Mount, 315 ; exterior 
 walls, 319; contrast between the an- 
 cient and modern area, 324 ; Dr Ro- 
 binson's explanation not confirmed by 
 history, 327 ; the Golden Gate, 328 ; 
 size of the present enclosure ex- 
 . plained, 329; situation of the King's 
 Gate, 342 ; situation of the Holy 
 house according to the Rabbies, 349 ; 
 fulfilment of prophecies concerning 
 it, 358 ; further consideration of Dr 
 Robinson's measurements, 360 ; site 
 neglected by Christians prior to the 
 Saracenic conquest, explained, 36 1 ; 
 a confirmation of the theory respect- 
 ing the foundation of Church and 
 Hospitals built by Justinian, 362 ; 
 immense reservoirs supposed to exist
 
 512 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 beneath it, 385 ; the account given 
 by Aristeas, 386 ; supplied by an 
 aqueduct constructed by Pontius 
 Pilate, 414. 
 
 Titus marches to Jerusalem, 110 ; 
 pitches his camp within the third 
 wall, 1 12 ; he remits the siege, hoping 
 for a surrender, 113; draws a wall 
 around the city, 114 ; enters the 
 sacred precincts, and is saluted Im- 
 perator, 115 ; his parley with the 
 Jews, 116; he destroys the city, 
 118; sparing three towers occupied 
 by a Roman guard, 120. 
 
 Tombs of the Kings, 422 ; probably 
 the " royal caves" of Josephus, 424. 
 
 Tyropceon, a valley so named by Jose- 
 phus, 104 ; its situation mistaken 
 by Dr Robinson, 267 ; called in 
 Scripture Millo, 273, 322. 
 
 Vespasian, sent by Nero to quell the 
 sedition in Judaea, 110. 
 
 Xystus, 117,321,344. 
 
 Zacfiarias accompanies the Holy Cross 
 to Persia his treatment there, 193. 
 
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