Biblical Hebrew Blog by ClassicalHebrew.com

The main source of water in ancient Jerusalem was the Gihon spring, located just outside the city walls. When the Assyrians waged an attack against Judah towards the end of the 8^th century BCE, led by king Sennacherib, king Hezekiah realized that in order to sustain throughout an Assyrian siege, the city must be better protected and the water must be accessible from inside the walls of the city. Hezekiah, considered to be one of the better kings of Judah both from a moral standing and as a leader of the people, substantially enlarged the area surrounded by a defensive wall to include more civilians, and built a tunnel that led the water from the Gihon spring into the city. Thus, when the Assyrians attacked in 701, Jerusalem withstood their attack and they eventually withdrew. The great importance of Hezekiah’s building projects is emphasized in the summary of his reign: “And the rest of the deeds of Hezekiah and all his might and the building of the pool and the tunnel bringing the water into the city are written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah” (2 Kings 20:20).

While the tunnel had been well known, the Siloam inscription was discovered by accident in 1880 by a young student from the nearby mission, who happened to look up while walking through the dark tunnel and noticed the inscription. The Siloam tunnel is a rare case in which we have an archaeological finding, including a written inscription, which enriches our knowledge of a biblical report of events. In order to build the tunnel, the workers split into two teams, digging from either end of the future tunnel while following a crack in the rock. When the two work-teams approached each other, they heard the sound of the axes of the other team and knew that the breaking through of the tunnel was almost complete. The inscription they placed at the place of the meeting of the two teams describes the day on which this meeting occurred.

The Siloam inscription is one of the only pieces of written evidence surviving from the First Temple period. Aside from the historical data it provides, it also supplies us with knowledge of the scribal practices of the time (separation of words using dots), the evolution of Ancient Hebrew handwriting, and facts about grammar and pronunciation which are very valuable to the linguistic research of biblical Hebrew.
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In approximately 930 B.C.E., the short-lived United Monarchy, which ruled over all the tribes of Israel, was divided into two kingdoms: Israel in the north, led by Jeroboam son of Nebat, and Judea in the South, led by Rehoboam the son of Solomon. The two kingdoms differed in cultural and religious aspects, the Judean faith’s main place of worship being in the Jerusalem temple, while Jeroboam established temples in Bethel and Dan in which he placed golden calves.

The Book of Kings presents us with the history of the two kingdoms, always separate and distinct. The northern kingdom is considered, in biblical terms, to be a sinful institution, while the southern kingdom is also generally not held in high moral regard, although some kings were considered worthy religious leaders. The two kingdoms were often involved in mutual conflicts such as the war raged by the Aramites against the Israelite king Baasha at the request of the Judean king Asa. However, there were also times of military treaties, as in the days of Jehoshaphat of Judea and Ahab of Israel, who fought together against the Aramites.

The Israelite kingdom was destroyed by Shalmaneser III king of Assyria, in 722 B.C.E. Following the fall of the kingdom, some refugees who escaped exile fled to Jerusalem, which was attacked by the Assyrians but withstood their attack some years later (701). The Judean kingdom was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 B.C.E.

Despite their differences and disputes, the two kingdoms were always considered sister kingdoms, sharing the same language (though there were two distinct dialects) and a variation of the same religion. The cultural connections between the two led to joint prophecy: Hosea, of the eighth century, who preached to both populations; Amos, who was from Judea but preached to the people of Samaria, and more.

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The Jerusalem Temple is a general name which conveys two different temples, operating from the 10th century BCE to the 1st century CE on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, with a seven-decade-long gap during the 6th century CE due to the Babylonian exile.

The Temple was the religious center of the Israelite and later Judean religion, and was the place of offerings and festivals, and included many ritual objects: the candlestick which provided light for the temple, the altar upon which the sacrifices were given, the altar of incense, and the Tabernacle, existing only during the First Temple Period, which contained the tablets of stone with the Ten Commandments and the manna. But first and foremost, the Temple was a place of prayer for all those wishing to pray to YHWH, whether Israelites or gentiles. The Temple became the religious center of the people only during the reign of Solomon, and was preceded by the desert Tabernacle and the temples of Shilo and Bethel.

The First Temple was built by Solomon, who completed David’s task of establishing the kingdom and its religious and governmental institutions. The Temple was to be the symbol of God’s presence amongst his people, as God says to Solomon: “This house which you are building, if you walk in my statutes . . . then I will keep my word with you . . . And I will dwell among the people of Israel, and I will not forsake my people, Israel” (1 Kings 6:12-13).
The First Temple was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE, and approximately 70 years later, the first exiles returned from Babylon and re-established the Temple. This Temple was a small and meager version of the first, but was an important symbol of the return of Israel to their land. In the 1st century CE, King Herod renovated the building and turned it into a beautiful and glorious architectural masterpiece, as the Rabbis said: “He who did not see the Temple of Herod has never seen a truly beautiful building” (Babylonian Talmud Baba Batra 4a).
The Second Temple was the center of Jewish religious and political life for over half a millennium, witnessing revolts, changes of external empires and internal governments, and many religious disputes. Among the reformers active in this Temple was Jesus, who overturned the tables of the money-changers who were working inside the temple court and drove out the animals being sold for sacrifice, in order to protest the state of the Temple and the fact that it had become a place of market rather than the house of God. The Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 CE.

Map of Jerusalem

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