The Pool of Salom

On Sunday, we took Darrell and Diana to the Jerusalem Baptist Church to meet some friends the Dukes had known from their last stay in Israel five years ago. After church, we went out to eat before walking down and around the City of David. This part of Jerusalem is different than the Old City and is, in fact, just below the Jaffa Gate and the Old City wall. It is the actual area on which the ancient city of David would have been built. While not as preserved as the Old City, the City of David boasts two great Biblical sites: Hezekiah's Tunnel and the Pool of Salom.

It was too damp and cold to go wading through Hezekiah's Tunnel so we went to the Pool instead. The excavation area lacks any of the charm found in historical Old City sites. Surrounded by the houses and streets that crowd down the valley, you would mistake it for a construction site if it were not so clearly marked as a historical site. Even with the signs, you look around a second time to make sure and think, "Ok, this must be the right place."

The steps that lead into the pool are slowly being uncovered. Much of the stone has been buried since the city was destroyed and is still being uncovered. The number of steps and the size of the area shows just how large the pool would have been. Now as they uncover the area, they are uncovering a staircase that leads right up to the temple mount. These would have been the stairs the priests walked down to collect water from the fresh water spring that still flows near that pool and bring it back up to the temple. It was kind of eerie walking into the excavation tunnel that wasn't roped off, warning signs everywhere, safety insured like what would have been required in the states. I was surprised how far down they had to dig to uncover the stones of the stairway. The stones that make up the wall bear the Herodian margin and date the age of the staircase. They plan to continue the excavation as far up the hill as they can, uncovering the pathway to the Temple.