A new high-tech museum allows visitors to "walk into" Herod's Temple.
By Janet Mendelsohn Moshe
The Davidson Exhibition and Virtual Reconstruction Center in Jerusalem's Archeological Park was recently opened to the public at the Old City's Southern Wall excavations. The Center is an extension of the Park, which is one of Israel's most important historical sites. Visitors to the Park may view important archeological discoveries spanning thousands of years; the Center highlights its main features by means of exhibitions, illustrations and multimedia presentations.
At the entrance to the exhibition, visitors may watch a film about the Park, which includes information about the archeologists who have been involved with the excavations. Of special interest is the area currently being excavated by Dr. Eilat Mazar, granddaughter of Professor Benjamin Mazar who dug there in the late 1960s. Dr. Mazar's finds date back to the days of King Solomon.
The exhibition continues past displays of remains from the Roman Period (63 BCE - 4th century CE). In an adjacent room, a film depicts a young Jewish man from Galilee traveling to Jerusalem to offer a sacrifice in Temple times. "We want our visitors to experience how a pilgrim to the Temple two thousand years ago may have felt," explains Sara Malka, director of the Visitor's Center. "In this film we see him purchase a young lamb, and then walk up to the splendid Temple built by King Herod."
The 10-minute high definition computer-generated film is more realistic-looking than most advanced computer graphics. The compilation of the film, as well as the virtual tour of the Temple Mount (also available at www.archpark.org.il) took two years to complete. Local archeologists worked with computer experts from the University of California in Los Angeles; the computer footage can be updated if archeologists uncover something else of interest.
Malka explains that if there had been enough finds from the First Temple Period (c.960 - 586 BCE), the film would have started at that point. However, since most of the discoveries in the area date from the Roman Period, the excavations and the Visitor's Center emphasize that era. "In the future, we hope to include other periods of interest," explains Malka. "As we already have remains from the Umayyad Period (661 - 750), that is the next one we are working on."
Projecting from the face of the wall near the southwest corner of the Temple Mount is Robinson's Arch, named for American theologist Edward Robinson, who first identified it in 1839. For more than a century, Robinson's Arch was thought to have been one in a series of similar arches supporting a bridge which linked the Upper City to the Temple Mount. This theory was disproved by the archaeological excavations of 1968-1977, directed by Benjamin Mazar. Evidence was found that the arch had in fact spanned over the paved street, and it is now believed that, together with a row of smaller vaults, it had supported an enormous flight of steps, which led from the street up to the Temple Mount. Remains of some of the original stone steps were found among the fallen stones on the paved street.
Archeologist Meir Ben-Dov recalls that he was once asked by American astronaut Neil Armstrong to name an area in Jerusalem where Jesus may have walked 2,000 years ago. Without hesitation, Ben-Dov pointed to the monumental stairway leading up the side of the mountain, and told Armstrong: "On his way in and out of the Temple, Jesus must have walked here." Armstrong replied with that he was just as thrilled to be on this stairway as he had been to take his first steps on the moon.