A Day at Museums

For one of our last free days, I took Rachel to two museums so that we could do a visual review of the places we have been and the things that we have learned this year.  We also wanted to visit the Knesset, the Israeli parliament building, but because it was the fast of Tisha b'Av, it was closed.

Street Scenes in West Jerusalem

On our way to the museums, Rachel snapped a few photos to give us a visual memory of what this part of the city is like.

A female Israeli soldier with full pack and big gun, just walking the streets

A Haredi (ultra Orthodox) man and his son

On solemn fast days like Tisha b'Av, observant Jews are not supposed to wear leather shoes.  It may be hard to see in this picture, but this Haredi man was wearing black crocs!.

A modern Jerusalem landmark: the Chords Bridge for the light rail system

 

Israel Museum

Bronze bull in Canaanite style, a sign of early Israelite syncretism

A horned incense altar from a high place

The Holy of Holies from Arad

Silver amulets with the priestly benediction inscribed on them

The famous Caiaphas ossuary

 

The Pilate inscription, giving us the correct title (praefectus) of the Roman governor who crucified JEsus

Diagram of the crucifixion method of "Yehohanan"

Yehohanan;s ankle bone, pieced by a crucifixion spike

Stone of trumpeting inscription

Part of the warning inscription on the soreg or boundary between Gentiles and Jews in the Second Temple

Rachel in a reconstruction of a Byzantine chancel, consisting of real artifacts taken from different churches in the Holy Land

Artist's rendition of the two-part Holy Sepulchre complex at its height

Detail of the exposed Rock of Golgotha in the original Holy Sepulchre coplex

Reconstruction of a fourth century synagogue typical for that period

A beautiful Qur'an from Kashmir

Abortive Visit to the Knesset

The Bible Lands Museum

This museum had a surprisingly full collection, organized around the history an text of the Hebrew Bible.

Teraphim or small idols

My Rachel with the teraphim, recalling how the biblical Rachel stole her father's idols

Great model of Jerusalem at the time of Hezekiah

Close-up of the complex of Solomon's Temple and his palaces

Shrine of the Book and Jerusalem Model

Next we headed back to the Israel Museum to visit the facility holding many of the Dead Sea Scrolls.  After that we took pictures of the famous model of Jerusalem at its height in A.D. 66, the year the Jewish Revolt against Rome broke out.

The white building was designed to look like the top of one of the jars in which the scrolls were found.  The water represents the Qumran community's emphasis on ritual purity

This black monolith represents the Sons of Darkness, in perpetual struggle with the Sons of Light

The Second Temple as it may habe looked after the completion of the Herodian expansion and remodeling

The temple proper within the courts of the women and priests

 

The Royal Portico where the Al Aqsa Mosque stands now

Herod's Palace, where the Roman governors later had their headquarters.  Today stretching south of the Citadel of David into the Armenian Quarter, this is the most likely place for Jesus' trial before Pilate

The Rock of Golgotha as it appears in the model

Back to "Our" Neighborhood

Once we returned to East Jerusalem, Rachel and I drove up to A-Tur on the Mount of Olives to run some errands

They do not call this "Crash Corner" for nothing!  A busy four-way intersection without a light or a stop sign!