Jesus' Crucifixion was at the Kidron/Hinom Valley Juncture

[Brianroy]

New Testament specifics to the location of the Cross    

  In the New Testament's Book of Revelation, the Great 2 Witnesses of the Tribulation Period1 are slain in Jerusalem, in a street spiritually called "Sodom and Egypt".

 According to Revelation:
These two witnesses who will yet come in the future,  will confirm -- by their deaths -- a very close general proximity of where Jesus suffered His crucifixion.

  Therefore, what I teach here as being the true location of Christ’s crucifixion,  will eventually be confirmed by the prophetical and literal deaths of these two great witnesses.  They will clearly be known to every nation on Earth, and their identification will be unmistakable.  When the deaths of these two Great Witnesses are televised, the precise location of their bodies, lying exposed to public view and in respects to the Temple, will be known -- to within a matter of feet.  The media will perhaps use GPS or something more advanced to mark and aerial photograph the very spot, and the nations will demand that they continuously look -- “live from Jerusalem” -- upon their bodies.  That Day of their demise will be greatly exalted as a Day of celebration, which must be immediately commemorated with gifts as if it were a “New Christmas” holiday (Revelation 11: 9-10).  

Let us look at it:

The Two Witnesses

"And I will bring forth to those 2 Witnesses of Me,2
and they will prophesy --  having been clothed in sackcloth -- 1,260 days.3
 This they are:  as 2 Olive Trees, and as 2 Lamp stands,4
standing before the GOD of the (whole) Earth.     

And if anyone acts to execute harm upon them,
fire proceeds out of their mouths,
and devours the enemies of them;
and if anyone acts to execute harm upon them,
thus, it is inevitably necessary that he is to be killed.

These have --and hold the right and might of --
Authority to shut the heaven,
 in order that it does not rain in the days of their prophecy;
and the right and might of Authority -
they do continually possess upon the waters,
to turn them into blood;
and to touch - strike - and smite the Earth with all plagues,
as often as they will it to  action,  wherever and on whosoever.
 
And fulfilling their desires, they reach the full end of their Witness.5  

The Beast, he ascending up out of the Abyss,
will make war in their midst,
and will overcome them, and will kill them.

And the bodies of them (will lay) upon the Great City's Plateia,
which is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, where our LORD --  
was indeed -- crucified."                
        (Revelation 11:3-8, w/ Greek word pictures - Translation mine)
   
In locating the Plateia (or “street of Egypt”) in Jerusalem, “where our LORD was crucified”, we revisit Matthew 13:22 with Jeremiah 46:7-8, and surmise that “Egypt” in Jerusalem deals with the Kidron Valley.  

We are required (by Scripture) to first locate this geography of Jerusalem that is called “Egypt”; and then to intersect that location with the geography called “Sodom”.

 The manner in which the location of “the street of Sodom”, in Jerusalem, is identified as the Hinom valley -- is quickly dispatched with the fact that the Hebrew Ge-Hinom (“Valley of Hinom”) is transliterated in the Greek as Ge-henna (“the Valley of Burning Fires”).

 Here, the booths of branches were annually burned -- following the Feast of Tabernacles.  Here, many tens of thousands of paschal lambs were cooked in open fire-pits for the Passover festivals.  Here also, in the Valley of Hinom, did the children of Israel abort their fetuses, and burn them as sacrificial offerings in hopes of prosperity from the demons (e.g. Jeremiah 7:31-32).  

From branches to lambs to children, the Israelis burned them all in the Valley of Hinom.  This valley of Hinom is directly SOUTH of the Temple, and the lower city of Jerusalem.  Hinom lays due south of the city of David,  and runs in an east-west direction.  

Therefore, we need only to  find the next intersection point:  the Hinom valley representing Revelation 11:8’s “Sodom”, which Scripture describes as a place associated with “fire, brimstone (sulfur)… and great smoke as from a furnace” (Genesis 19:24,28).





The Gospel of Paul also points to this location  

The book of Hebrews is identified by Irenaeus as being the good news of Paul, and composed by his pupil, Luke (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3.1.1. -- cf. BAS "Text forum", and "Redating Revelation" etc.,  by me:  Brianroy).  

The inference is that this composition follows Paul’s death in Rome with Peter, on June 29, 57 A.D. Therefore, Hebrews is a pre-70 A.D. composition, with a pre-70 A.D. concept of Jerusalem, written only 27 years following the LORD’s Passion.  In this book, Luke (in circa July of 57 A.D.) records the words of Paul, who taught:   

"Be not carried about with diverse and strange doctrines.  
For that the heart be established with grace (is) a good thing  --not with meats, which have not profited those who have been obsessed with them.
We have an altar, whereof they, which [still currently] serve the Tabernacle, have no right to eat.

For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the Sanctuary by the High Priest for sin, are burned without the Camp.

Wherefore, Jesus also,
that He might sanctify the people with His own blood,  
 suffered outside this gate.  [The gate of burning, the Hinom]

 Let us therefore go forth unto Him without the Camp, bearing His reproach."  
         (Hebrews 13:9-13)



 In the Temple rituals, the animals were sacrificed, and the bodies of the lambs were carried to one’s tent / tabernacle / or home in Jerusalem.  The ashes of the sacrificial blood that was burnt upon the logs of the altar-fire, were removed from the Temple Mount, by assigned Levitical priests.  These men were all 25-50 years old.  They used cart and ass or cart and donkey, and traveled west from the Temple Court, and then south into and through the lower city.

 These Levites normally left the walls of Jerusalem by way of the Dung Gate, to burn the bodies of various sacrificial animals (bullocks, turtle doves, etc.) in the Hinom Valley through the rest of the year.

 They would then take the ashes, and bury them in the wilds of Judea, in the Dead Sea area, stopping through various Dead Sea Communities for this purpose.  The vessels carrying the ashes of the blood of the Temple were separate and not to be mixed with the vessels carrying the ashes of the Hinom Valley.  

Simon the Cyrene was a Temple Levitical Priest, assigned to the vessels of the Hearth of Fire on the Passover, and was en route back to the Temple, when he was kicked about with the knees into submission by the Romans. Therefore, he is prohibited from having traveled any path that places him as West, East, or North of the Temple as others would suppose...that Simon might carry the Cross in any direction but two gates: the Dung (toward Hinom, the way he had just come) or out the Siloam Gate(Eastward into the Kidron Valley).  These are the ONLY two choices in regard to Simon's taking up the Cross in Jesus' behalf.  And considering that 3,000,000 packed Jerusalem...the Dung gate route, packed with Temple Levites who would refuse to move on religious grounds...only the Water Gate exit lay open to the Romans pressing on Jesus and Simon.

 The emphasis is that the crucifixion occurs outside the South-southeastern gate, through which the bodies of those sacrificial beasts were cast out and "burned".  The only primary location known for this activity at Jerusalem is the Valley of Ge-Hinom, which is transliterated as 'Gehenna'  (geena) in the Greek, and as  "hell" in the English.  


Outer Darkness: the Plateias in Jerusalem

According to eschatology, when G-D returns to Jerusalem to save the final Jewish/Israeli remnant on Day 2625,6 He finds His people thrust into the “outer darkness” of the city (doomed to destruction).  To these, He makes a way of escape by creating a Valley through Mount Olivet, and in effect, hiding them in the Cross.  From thence, because of His glorious light and presence, all the nations round about at Jerusalem then find themselves as being thrust into the outer darkness, and doomed to destruction.

In grappling with this concept of being “thrust out into the outer darkness”, we may this concept better by looking in an odd place.  When the Two Great Witnesses of the Tribulation are killed in the “street” of Sodom and Egypt, in Jerusalem on Day 1286 ½ in Revelation 11:8, John uses the word “Plateia”.  

"And their dead bodies (that of the Two Witnesses, shall lie)
  in the STREET  [Gr. - Plateias]  of the great city,    
  which is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt;
  where also our LORD was crucified.”  (Revelation 11:8 - re: KJV)


In this passage of Revelation 11:8, we read, the word for "street" in the Greek as being   PLATEIAS.  To translate it simply as "a street" only, in this passage, is misleading and lost upon the English language reader.
 The plateia is "the outer darkness":
a)   “the echoing chasm”(outside a city);
b)   “it is the fork of two highways;
c)   it is that open area of two valleys joining; and,
d)   it is also an open area’s corners or exalted points, be it a courtyard or park, that acts as a type of embankment or curve to be merged into.

  In Daniel 9, there are those who wish to equivocate this word with the expression of "four-square".  

However, the outer darkness and plateia are represented by “curves”.

 Darkness is a curvature of the principle of light.  The Hebrew word for “righteousness” involves the concept of a perfectly straight line, rod, or beam.  The concept of sin is to be curved, not fit as a straight line, to miss the mark due to a veering off.  

Plateia incorporates into its concept, not only a veering off, but a “dropping off”: such as an embankment that veers off downward, and becomes a ditch or chasm.  This is representative of sin, and its end- result.  Jesus tells us if those who are in bondage to sins, lead others suffering from the same bondage to the same types of sins, they shall both fall into destruction -- as though into a ditch.7

Here, in the angles, corners, and embankments of the Plateia: the NT describes those later called as hypocrites who pray openly to be seen of men (Matthew 6:5)8, even after they have robbed their own parents and spent their inheritances.  They behaved as if to attract the giving of alms into their hands under false pretenses.9  

 Here, in the angles, corners, and embankments of the Plateia: people eat and drink and some even teach (Luke 13:26); and here, the poor and the maimed and the halt and the blind blend into the crowds (Luke 14:21).  
So, by its own definition, the "Plateias" must either be within the city of Jerusalem at some court or open area, -- or it must be in the outer darkness of the city, where at least two “highways” or “valleys” meet.  Two, because we need a “way” called “Sodom”, and another called “Egypt”, both intersecting.

  Since Pompey filled the northern chasm up, and the Jews in Herod’s time built a new city called “Bezetha” upon this filled- in place;12  in regard to this and Simon the Cyrenian's Temple Service  (as cited above) we must rule that this northern area as completely, geographically, and prophetically, as disqualified.  Hence, bye bye tourist Garden Tomb.  

===================================================


1      The Tribulation period is descriptive of the end of the world, as we know it.  It is the end of the period of grace, and the beginning of Daniel 9:24-27’s 70th week of years.  Each week of years is defined as 7 actual years upon the earth.  When Jesus died upon the Cross, He stopped the Judgment clock, and we entered into a period of grace.  That last week of years is determined to bring all sins, from the age of Adam to ours: to a finality, to cut it off and to kill it -- therefore judgment and wrath from G-D.

 This wrath is upon all those who receive not the atonement of the Cross.  Mankind is called to ask G-D that He would pass over their unrighteous acts and rebellion toward Him.

 The 70th week of 7 years is collectively called “the Tribulation Period”, but it is actually divided into two halves (Daniel 9:27; 12:11,12).  The first half is also referred to as the “Tribulation”, while the second half is the “Great Tribulation” and the “Day of the LORD”.

 In the first 1290 days, there is still a call to believe and trust Jesus and his work of the Cross, that they might be taken up, and away from judgment in the coming Elijahn rapture.  At Day 1291, the Bible appears to describe a nuclear war that strikes America and Russia, started by a launch against an asteroid that strikes the Mediterranean, and over the course of the next 1335 days, the world’s population is decreased to possibly only the hundreds of millions.  Our current planet population is somewhere close to 7 billion.  

2      The Two witnesses are two famous biblical figures who were raptured or snatched up by GOD, as though through a time portal -- from their times to ours.  The primary Biblical candidates are Enoch  (Genesis 5:23-24), and Elijah (2 Kings 2:7-8,11).  However, Josephus tells us that his Temple copy of the Torah, which was captured in the siege of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, indicates that Moses was indeed also “raptured up into Heaven,” and did not perish.  -- The Temple Torah was taken to Rome, and placed in Vespasian’s “Palace of Peace” (Josephus, Wars of the Jews, 7.5.7).

 From here, in Rome, Josephus had full access to the Imprimis or “first” scroll of all Judaism Torah manuscript copies: that one scroll which was “in the first place” as the Source scroll (Josephus, Antiquities, 3.1.7., and 5.1.17.).  From this source, Josephus informs us that Moses was clearly raptured into Heaven, like Jesus, from the presence of Joshua, in the location they were then at (Josephus, Antiquities, 4.8.48.).

      This being the case, Enoch would then remain in Heaven as a type of the Heavenly Father.  Moses and Elijah would then portal through time, even as seen upon the Mount of Transfiguration Matthew 17:1-5); and act as witnesses as a human type of GOD the Son and GOD the Holy Spirit.  Moses the meek, possesses the characteristics of Jesus Christ the Messiah; and Elijah, displays the manners and character of GOD the Holy Spirit to the world for 1,260 days in the end-times.  

3      The appearance of the 2 witnesses will be on Day 26 ½ from the circa 3 pm  (Jerusalem time) signing of the 7 year Peace treaty which is signed by Israel, the “Palestinians”, representatives of the United Nations, Russia, Greece or Italy, the United States, and the European Union.  They will probably show up at about 3 to 5 am that morning, Jerusalem time, upon the Mount of Olives in one of two locations: either the general tract of land where Jesus was crucified, ancient Golgotha; or in or near ancient Gethsemane.  I do not believe it likely for them to show up first upon the bare exposed stone amongst the debris of the then “recently demolished Dome of the Rock”, but it is possible.

4      The number two symbolizes:  the Two Covenants, Old and New; the Two Churches, Gentile and Jew.  The Gentiles or nations of the New, do not and cannot replace the nation of Israel -- they simply join it, as a wild new Olive tree grafted into the great and large ancient one.  Nor can the Jew dismiss the nations, as they are invigorated and made alive to an ever greater and greater fruitfulness because of them.
               The symbolism of the two Olive trees: in the form of the two witnesses, they represent the Ark of the Covenant’s 2 Witnesses, being Cherubs or Seraphs.  That is, those privy to the most holy and inner sanctum of GOD; who are instructed, and who know His will.  The Cherubs of Solomon (I Kings 6:23-28) were each 10 cubits or about 17 ½ feet high (according to the more ancient 21 inch cubit, versus the less ancient 18 inch cubit).

5    Moses and Elijah will teleport to every nation upon the Earth (cf. Revelation 11:9-10), and instead of finding receptive audiences, they will be forced to command plagues and devastations upon the peoples they visit.  They will have reached a full end of their witness, and ensured the safe in-gathering of all Jews upon the face of the Earth to Israel.  Those of the tribes of Israel, who remain among the nations, are swiftly sought out and mercilessly slain.  Moses and Elijah will perform miracles that will feed the ingathered nation of Israel, both physically and in the spiritual sense as well.  

6    The Tribulation Period is divided into two sets of 3 ½ years.  The first 3 ½ years last 1290 days, and the second
3 ½ years last 1335 days beyond, totaling 2625 days from the signing of the Treaty w/ anti-Christ, to the return of the True Messiah.  (cf. Daniel 12:11,12)

7    Matthew 15:14.  In context: Matthew 15:1-14 informs us that the “Holy Ones”,  (the Pharisees), were robbing their parents, and driving them into severe poverty: so that they themselves might selfishly live softly.  They considered the mission of protecting the Temple an excuse for starving people so that they may be fat, and well clothed, and live in oversized apartments or houses with fine things.  Therefore, this particular sin of the Pharisees is “greed”, the love of money and wealth.  Such desires are NOT planted by the Heavenly Father in the heart of the believer (Matthew 15:13).  The vow of the Catholic priest to poverty after a fashion, is correct -- though his vow to refrain from marriage, is not.  The consequences of soft living through robbery of Temple Treasuries, affected the families of these “Protectors of the Temple Order”, by teaching children the virtue of thievery and self-justification.  

8  (Greek removed due to incompatibility with BAS Forum)
   
"And/ but    when     you pray         NOT      shall (you) be as    the       hypocrites

because    they (brotherly) love   in   the    Synagogues        and     in     the  Corners (by the High or Prominent Places)    

   of  the                                                                                                                    
 
Plateian    [the wide courts, streets, ways:  inclusive of those ways and        
                            valleys which  surround city walls]
  
  standing       up alongside to pray     so that      may     they appear      to             men.

“And when you pray, expressing your concerns and giving thanks,
  you should not be as the actors who pretend brotherly love in the
  Synagogues and in the places of prominence: the corners of the
  Plateian, standing (up and openly) alongside to pray, so that they
  may be seen of men.”  (Matthew 6:5, translation mine)  

9    Tertullian puts it this way: “Majesty is made a source of gain.  Religion goes about the taverns begging” (Tertullian, Apology, .13).  The city of Jerusalem was a city of pilgrimages and endless streams of people exercising charity upon the city and its Temple.  Where there is an abundance of money, there are often an abundance of beggars.

12     Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, 14.4.1; Wars of the Jews, 5.4.2.

[Brianroy]

Judas died at a Gonias Plateian

If you were to observe the location of Judas Iscariot’s last act, you would see that it is precisely in a “gonias plateian”, an embankment in the “outer darkness” of Jerusalem. 

The “gonias plateian” is an exalted place within the Valley, which could be prominently seen.  Judas’ hanging served as an anti-thesis to the crucifixion.  The Pharisees saw themselves as the “Sons of Light”, as protectors of the Holy Temple and the Faith.  Those without were considered as “the Sons of Darkness” and “the children of Belial”.

 The Dead Sea Scrolls describe the rift within the Pharisaic sect, not the Essene.  In this regard, the scholars have been wrong from day one.  The perspectives of the Dead Sea Scrolls are of those Pharisees who formerly served within the Temple, as being as highly placed as that of Temple Commanders, but who were unable to effect change -- so as to weed out corruption by the ruling establishment.  That ruling establishment appears to be inclusive of the “house of Caiaphas”, a Sadducee Galilean “house” (or family tree) that bought and ruled the Sanhedrin and high priesthood through the power of wealth. 

Therefore, we can now more clearly comprehend the actions and motivations of Judas Iscariot, as a loyal Galilean and devotee of a faction within the Sanhedrin.  This same Judas was the betrayer of Christ.  Judas had conspired with “the Sons of Light” against Jesus (Dead Sea Scrol1 QM 1:1ff; Luke 22:3-6), whose identities are described to us as that of being the Temple Commanders and scribes.  But, when Judas realized that he was not in an alliance with “the sons of Light” after all, what did he do?  He went out into the outer darkness, where Christ hung and quivered.

  In the outer darkness of the city -- the freezing body of Messiah was shaking violently upon the cross.  Judas gazed in great remorse upon the Cross, and by hanging himself; Judas declared by his action (within the first hour or two of Christ’s Passion) that the “sons of darkness” had taken over the Temple within, and cast the true “Son of Light” without.

 Christ hung and quivered in the “outer darkness” on a tract of land called “Golgotha”, on a clear and cold breezy day in March.  The night rains had (by this time) fully blown through, and Jesus was hung in the one place where most of the 3,000,000 who gathered in Jerusalem and could gaze upon Him.  Christ Himself, with His right eye not beaten shut, 1
 would also have been able to gaze upon the disciple of Him, across the Valley, hanging limp and lifeless upon the tree, strangled by a cord on a tree limb that extended over the south Hinom embankment.  Judas would have had to crawl out and then dropped from the end of the limb for maximum viewing effect.  He probably did not break his neck initially, but strangled himself in the manner that would have mimicked a Sanhedrinal judgment.  As a false witness who caused an innocent’s death, Judas should have been strangled by two men pulling on a cord about his neck in the presence of the Sanhedrin acting as a Beth Din, following a fair religious trial.  The first priests, because of their equal guilt, refused to condemn him or even consider the matter.


 Upon the earthquake at 3 pm, when Christ died upon the Cross, the body of Judas (which had now hung for at least 4-5 hours by this time), bounced on the rope until the limb snapped, and fell headlong onto a boulder or such below, where his corpse broke in half, and spilled out all his bowels (Acts 1:16-18).

Picture now an analog clock with its two hands.  Place the clock’s hands as revolving from the central point of the Kidron and Hinom juncture.  This is your compass.  Fix the 12 o’clock as north.  Set the hourly hand for 3 o’clock.  Set the minute hand for the number 7, so that your clock now reads 3:35.  You now have the approximate compass position of Christ and Judas, as of 12 noon on March 23, 30 A.D., just before the whole world became as the confusion of night. 2

  This aspect of the crucifixion has been lost upon the Christian:  that those who gazed upon Christ were offered this alternate spectacle of Iscariot across the Valley; and that Jesus too, would have gazed upon His own dead disciple.   

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1    Cyprian, Against the Heresy of one Noetus, .18; tells us Christ closed His (one) eye upon the Cross.  After a beating of 400-600 open hand strikes, mainly by right hands against the left side of Messiah’s face, we would expect that whole eye to be bloated and swelled shut -- even hidden.  Therefore, from Gabbatha to Golgotha, and until His death, Jesus was only able to see out of His right eye.  This vision would also have often been blurred by sweat, blood, and agitation to the optic nerve from all the head trauma He suffered.  However, there would have been moments of visual clarity.  It was in these moments, whether several minutes at a time or more, that Jesus would have looked over the Valley, and seen Judas’ alternate spectacle / public apology. 

2    Genesis 1:2 reads: “And the Earth was then in a state of existence that no longer exists,
being an empty and barren place of nothingness, desolate, and without any life whatsoever; and the face immediately above the deep was darkness.”
               (Translation mine)
       The Hebrew tells us that “In the Beginning…” the Earth had light upon its face, but not upon its depths.  The earth was glowing, but not like a ball of magma.  It was created as fully formed, as soft and hot.  The word for the deep in Genesis 1:2 is tohum, i.e. “tohu”.  While Job, 6:18 describes “tohu” as “a wasteland,” Job 26:7 uses “tohu” as the “dark vast and empty nothingness” upon which the Earth hangs. 

Tohu has a relationship with the Hebraic “hoshek”, which is “that darkness which is void of all light, promoting a predisposition to insanity and through chaos and the lack of orderliness.”  In the Greek New Testament, “hoshek”, in translation, is used to describe the literal blindness of men, as well as the spiritual.  Genesis 1:5 informs us, that “GOD proclaimed the Light (as) Day, and the Darkness He labeled as Night.”  The “Hoshek” (He-Shin-Kaf) He labeled as “the adversity (and the heartsick misery of falsehood)”, which a description of the sin nature.  That is, before even the creation of the sun and the moon, there was a Day and there was a Night, and “the plan of Salvation”. 

According to the Bible, Night and Day as they were  created at the first,  were in a state that no longer exists, nor (perhaps) can be comprehended at this present time. 

Psalm 104:2,5-6, suggests that the Earth  in Genesis 1:2 was covered in light like as with a cloak of the shekinah clouds of GOD’s presence (2 Chronicles 5:13-14).  Therefore, GOD covered “adversity (and the heartsick misery of falsehood)”, i.e. the sin nature that was to come, with the cloud of His glorious presence.  Here, showing us that in the ages to come, that which is of earth would sin, and He would have to become its covering.  This predicts the coming of the Cross  from the foundation of the world. 

       The very word for “evening”, ereb / erev, has some 16 differing definitions to its usage.  The rabbis themselves call this word “disorderly” and “chaotic”.  Three of the more interesting definitions of “ereb” are:
1)   as being a physical impurity;   
2)   as being swarms or dark clouds of flying insects;
3)   as being that worldly pleasure and contentment that is derived from the hustle and bustle of trading and bartering, of purchasing and selling, of intermingling in the marketplace.

 All of these are represented by or associated with the word “Egypt” in the Bible.  But the more interesting aspect is its Gematriac association with Arab, which most appropriately describes the modern sons of Esau: which means “to ambush”, or “to lie in wait” as the crouching lion of sin.  The word picture that is brought to mind, is that crouching lion of Cain’s anger and resentment that was ready to pounce Cain in Genesis 4:7. 

In Gematria, the letter Ayin  is interchangeable with the letter Alef : spelling it now as Alef-Rosh-Beth..  Rearranged, in the Gematriac analysis, EReB now becomes ABuR (Alef-Beth-Rosh) :  “he who infuriates himself by crossing over from simply having wrongful thoughts, to the doing and carrying out wrongful words and acts.”  Rearranged, this activity is BAaR (Beth-Alef-Rosh) : “destined to be kindled and consumed by fire,”  or as the “consummation of foods eaten by cattle” and cast out as dung piles.  Therefore, from even before Adam’s creation, the destiny of Adam and his descendants, from Beginning to End, was foreseen and foreknown by the Almighty: from Adam’s rebellion, to YHVeH’s personal sacrifice, to the Lake of Fire and Judgment.  And for man to choose “destruction over salvation”, “darkness over light”, is confusion and rebellion of the greatest disorder indeed.

All this is tied to a prophetic pointing of the Cross toward the Kidron and Hinom Valley. If Jesus is the Messiah, and He is...He is required by both prophecy and historical/literary testimony to be crucified at this heretofore unaddressed location...south and east of the current location of the Temple Mount. 

[Brianroy]

The Importance of the Cross should have been obvious

The Crucifixion of Jesus is the central theme of the New Testament, and of true Orthodox Christianity.  Through the ages since A.D. 30, faith in  'Jesus crucified' is an activity which, when properly placed, atones for all sins in the world, for all time.  This trust, in effect, is in turn set upon the Foundation of the historical Resurrection of Jesus from the dead and His Ascension back to Heaven before many witnesses.  This being the case, it should indeed be of great interest (to the believers of Christianity, and even its most ardent critics), for the location of the Crucifixion to be a known and affirmable site. 

In truth, the site has been on the lips of Christians since the early 2nd Century A.D., with the citing of the Apostles Creed.1 

The words from that Creed in the English "He descended to the dead" or "into hell", translates the Greek word "gehenna" for the words "dead" and "hell".  In Jerusalem, “gehenna” is the  transliteration of the Hebraic’s  "ge-Hinom" -- or, “the valley of Hinom.”  The Tradition of the Apostles certainly was accurately kept, but the meaning behind the like-sounding words of  "ge-Hinom" and "gehenna" was lost through bloody persecutions in the centuries that followed them.

 The early Church suffered throughout the centuries, in every place, but at differing times: via local rulers, governors, and even Roman Emperors.  In the successive centuries, the ignorance of the nations to the Jewishness of their "Christian" faith was also manifest, for their trust was supposed to be into a Judean born, and Galilean reared heir to the Throne of Israel: the Messiah called Yeshua of Nazareth.  Yet, as early as the Roman bishopric of Sixtus in the 120s A.D., we see a slipping away of this realization, until some restoration by St. Polycarp some 30 years later -- by whom, our observation of Communion was given.2 

The Communion is a direct symbolism of the Crucifixion of Messiah in the “Egypt” of Jerusalem (i.e., the Kidron Valley)a , and in “Gehenna” (the Hinom Valley): a location where the two valleys join, south and east of the Temple Mount.  The partaking of the Eucharist is the Roman Church’s compromise to Polycarp’s command to observe the Jewish Passover: partaking its third cup of wine, and second Matzoh or afikoman.  By keeping this teaching of Polycarp, which came from John, which came from Christ, the historical aspect of the tradition was kept through the ages for us to discern also.

The Greek of the New Testament tells us that when Jesus broke the Matzoh, He distinctly did it in such a way, as to break the ends of it off in a circle like fashion, as it the ends were leaves being plucked from a tree.  And it was this difference that separates His breaking of bread from all other semikah rabbis, before or since, who have ever celebrated either a Passover meal or a Communion borne from its Festival.

 The Roman Church under the bishopric of Anicetus did keep this Communion, if for no other reason, than simply to honor of the wishes and tradition of this 115-year-old visiting bishop of Smyrna, who was also a 30 plus year disciple of John, the most beloved Apostle of Christ.3  After all, how one views Christ, be one a Gentile or Jew, more often than not, is just considered as a matter of perspective.
   

The Cross represents our dead man of self to GOD

The Cross, in Christianity, is both central and the extreme end in understanding GOD with any finality.  In writing to the Corinthians, the Rebbe Paul declared,

 “The preaching of THE CROSS is -- to them that perish --   
    foolishness; but unto us -- which are saved --
               it is THE POWER OF  GOD.”       
                                          (I Corinthians 1:18 - KJV, punctuation mine)

Why is it the power of GOD?  Because it, the Cross, is the means by which we may have a relationship with our eternal source: YHVeH Messiah, -- whose very Name, YHVeH, comes from the sound of the breath of our nostrils:4 showing us that He is our Life. 

The difference between man and beast, is demonstrated by a comparison of Genesis 1:20, 24 (Hebrew singular, nefesh hayah) with Genesis 2:7 (Hebrew plural, nefesh hayyim).  In these verses, the Bible shows that while GOD imparted a single or first soul into beasts and man by the power of the spoken word, -- as YHVeH He breathed the breath of lives (hayyim), i.e., a plural of two souls and a second life, into the nostrils of man. 

Through this second life, and second soul, comes reason and eternality.  If we abrogate our responsibility to use this reason to seek out GOD, we are then liable to a Judgment for failing to do so (Hebrews 9:27). We find the pre-incarnate Christ, as YHVeH, to be the very “Being” who breathed this breath and eternal soul into our first ancestor (John 1:4,9; Lamentations 4:20).  Therefore, if this same YHVeH died for our behalf upon the Cross, and rose again from the dead 3 days later -- then our eternal existence, and second soul or second life (beyond this present and temporary –or fleshly -- one) is either given or taken away, based on our response to that message.

The early Church Fathers, such as Justin Martyr, demonstrated that the Cross is part of our human existence, present in masts of ships, in shovels, in the carrying of banners, in mechanical engineering, and so forth (Justin Martyr, First Apology, .55). 

The essential wood in those instruments, of masts and shovels and the like, are Lebanese cedar, having a red tone and oak-like strength.  

Therefore, even as Adam means “the reddish one”, so too, might it be that the mast or vertical beam of the Cross, be made of the red-toned cedars of Lebanon.

 And this is appropriate, too, as that very wood is also used in direct reference to Jerusalem and those who dwell there as if they were as prosperous and strong as the cedar trees of Lebanon (Psalm 92:12-13, Song of Solomon 4:15-16, Isaiah 10:32-34, 29:17ff.).  There again, we see a direct symbolism of the Cross with Jerusalem, which once had a house of Lebanese Cedar for the “ruler of Peace”(Isaiah 9:16) who like example was called “Solomon” (I Kings 7:1-12, 10:17, 10:21): the same Solomon, whose cedar house of Lebanon was once prominently displayed as the pride and joy of its king, in Jerusalem. 

 I believe the horizontal beam of the Cross to have been made of Acacia. 

Thus giving the Cross a trinity of material origins and an allegory for Scriptural interpretation of John 10:16, of two distinct and differing woods, cut down and united by iron pins.  

The Cross, says Justin Martyr, is metaphorically a man with hands extended; and just like the appendage of a nose to a face, so too, does the Cross have such an appendage apparent to it (by means of an iron bracket placed on the rear above the cross-beam).

 In Justin’s comparison, we see that even as breathing through the nose can lift and empower a man, and difficulty breathing through the nose can set him down, so too does “the rope and pulley lifted up and set down the Cross through that iron bracket.”5 

Man becomes a type of the dead tree,6 the bracket represents his nose (as it were):  Christ is crucified to man, (being the represented in the cross), as though both Christ and Adam were back to back.  Christ, the Living Second Adam is nailed to the First Adam, who is dead in trespasses and sins, and represented by the dead wood of the Cross:

  “…the Cross of our LORD Jesus Christ, by whom
the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world”
(Galatians 6:14, KJV)

 By virtue of being his direct physical and spiritual descendants, we are already in the First Adam, who is as dead as the Cross in trespasses and sins.  Our nature is already inclined and imbued with the fallacies of spiritual sin.  We are spiritually flawed from our very conception, and this is manifest even at birth by the act of crying, rather than yawning one’s first breath.  By the joining of the two Adams as One, Christ so makes it possible for him (the First Adam) -- and his descendants -- to transfer spirit and soul through the activity of trust into the Living Christ on the Cross.  They are then given a completeness, in which the flaws of spirit and soul are filled in by GOD’s own Spirit and presence.  Man, in the spiritual realm of his being, then becomes “baptized” or immersed into GOD, through Jesus Christ.  Thereby, we are crucified with Him, buried with Him, and Resurrected with Him by a Baptism of Trust into Him on the Cross (Romans 6:3-5; John 11:25-26).

 It is through the finished work of the Cross, and our faith and trust into He who finished that work, by which we are to come alive even as Christ is made alive again through the Resurrection (Romans 4:3,5,20-25; cf. I Corinthians 15:1-54). With death, we undergo a transformation and teleportation, receiving a body made without hands, eternal in the heavens (2 Corinthians 5:1-8,17); until we are added a recreated resurrected physical body, made from the atoms of “the self which makes up that you” which is now aiding you in the seeing, reading, or hearing of these words before you now.


The nose and the breath of GOD

The nose is the human appendage by which GOD breathed into Adam the breath of Life (Genesis 2:7), so that man became more than just a living creature, he became a living -- thinking and reasoning -- soul.

 It is through the Cross, that the appendage of the dead nose of the First Adam, represented by iron in the rear of the Cross, is made alive through a union with the Living GOD in Christ.  Adam and Christ -- through the Cross -- are back to back.  There is no sexual intercourse or union.  There is no second breath through the nose, either.  Adam faces backward, toward the origin of his sin, while Christ faces forward, toward eternity future.  This confirms also the innocence of Messiah upon the Cross.

 The old man, looking back (as if to the Garden of Eden, as if back upon the sin of his past), has no breath.  Yet, Messiah  -- while looking forward -- ceases breathing and dies.  All sin, past and future, is thereby atoned for in the Cross - by YHVeH Messiah.  The appendage of iron, (representing that soul which is dead), is upon the wood of the Cross (that tree which was once alive to GOD), is behind Christ, facing East.  Contrariwise, Messiah Himself (being truly alive to the Father), while hanging upon the Cross, faces west.  So that it is a trust-worthy saying that says,  “As far as the East is from the West, so far hath He removed our transgressions from us”(Psalm 103:12 - KJV). 
 
Messiah has taken out of the way all trespasses-- those by breath (that is all Spiritual Laws broken by man), and the handwriting of ordinances against us (that is all the Physical Laws broken by man), -- nailing them to the Cross (Colossians 2:13-14; cf. I Corinthians 6:9-10, 18).  He, Christ Jesus, has become our only mediator (I Timothy 2:5; Isaiah 43:25-26; I Corinthians 11:23-26).  It is only through YHVeH Messiah, Jesus Christ, that we may have a right relationship with GOD the Father.  This relationship is through the unmerited grace that GOD (by His great loving-kindness) gives us.  This coming perfect relationship and oneness with GOD, which is perfected through the Resurrection, is that of being His dear and beloved children.  We are to partake of just a tiny foretaste of that perfection in the now, by faith into Jesus.  This is accomplished by and through GOD the Holy Spirit, whom does so while giving glory and honor to the Son, Jesus Christ.7 

This, being the case, the Cross, as GOD’s perfect plan of Salvation and Redemption of Mankind, ought then to be so much the more important and central to us, and to our very existence.8

===================================================

1     One variant of the early Apostles Creed could have been cited in this way at the confirmation Baptism of a new believer, before many witnesses.  “I believe in GOD the father Almighty, maker of the heavens and the Earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only one-of-a-kind begotten Son, our YHVeH.  He was conceived by the power of the Spirit Holy, born of a virgin -- Miriam.  He was lifted up and crucified, died, and was entombed.  He descended into Gehenna.  On the third day, He resurrected from the dead.  He ascended up by the clouds into Heaven, and sits on the Right Hand of the Power.  From thence, He shall come again with clouds to judge the living and the dead.  I believe in the Spirit Holy, the Separation of the Saints of Communion, the Atonement of Sin, the Resurrection from the dead, and the ever-lasting life.  (World without end.)  Amen.” 

             The phrase, “the separation of the saints of communion”, is a reasonable assumption of the Syriac/Aramaic.  This later was clarified to be: “the Universal (Catholic) Church” - meaning that men and angels are both called out as being dedicated to YHVeH Messiah, unto Christ.  As to their separation, and love for one another - “the Communion of Saints”, they are as incorporate members, two sheepfolds that are part of the same flock, which is made possible through the Passion of Christ.  That is, by His crucifixion process, death, burial, and resurrection; even the angels are part of the Church, the body of Christ.

2    Roberts, Alexander and James Donaldson, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1885, May 1989 reprint; Vol. 1, pp. 568-569.  Fragments from the lost writings of Irenaeus, .III

3    Ibidem, p. 41,The Martyrdom of Polycarp, .9    Polycarp declared that he had been serving Christ for 86 years.  By implication, to the proconsul, Polycarp could only have meant that he had been serving as a bishop for that length of time.  Since a bishop assumes office at the same age as a rabbi, being no less than 30 years old, as a master, 86 more from age 30 makes age 116.  Bear in mind, Polycarp still could have been a  few years older still. For example: in circa 109 A.D., Simeon, the son of Cleopas, died as bishop in Jerusalem at the age of 120.  Polycarp died a martyr on or about February 23, 156 A.D.  This makes him appointed bishop in Smyrna by John six months to a year before the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, and 28 years before John’s own death on or about Passover of 98 A.D.  Polycarp, at the ripe old age of 115, made the arduous round trip sea voyage from Ephesus to Italy, in order to visit and instruct Anicetus in Rome.  By celebrating the tradition of the Eucharist, we celebrate the core of the Passover festival, the Cross of YHVeH Messiah: this is the tradition of the Apostles; who in turn, are true sons of their forefathers, Abraham and Isaac and Jacob.   

4    Lamentations 4:20; Genesis 2:7

5    cf. Ignatius, Letter to the Ephesians, .9  (shorter version).  Roberts, Alexander and James Donaldson, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1885, May 1989 reprint; Vol. 1, p. 53.

The Cross is lifted up and set by a mobile contraption that uses a rope and pulley system. 

 The Romans being experts in the art of war, always had a like number of artisans, carpenters, masons, etc., that accompanied them.  Their service would have been as a form of enlistment, contractual in nature for 5 years; or they would have simply been slaves.  Therefore, such a force of readily available artisans and engineers would have been present in Jerusalem, and daily put to work by the Romans.  The size of the detachment would have been in proportion to the Roman presence.  If the Romans had 600 soldiers plus officers, for example, these contract workers could have then numbered between 200-400.  These artisans would have been considered a non-entity, and it would have been bad form for their mention by any of the Gospel writers and most historians of the era.  Cf. Josephus, Wars of the Jews, 3.5.1-2.

6    That is, the dead tree -- being the Cross -- is an allegory for the “dead world”.  Due to its intimation as Lebanese cedar, and red tone, more specifically, the Cross becomes the First Adam.

7        John 14:16-17, 26; 15:26; 16:13.

8       “And the points connected with the Passion of the LORD,
     which were foretold, were realized in no other case:
 For neither did it happen at the death of any man among  the ancients
that the Sun set at mid-day, nor was the veil of  the Temple rent,
 nor did the Earth quake, nor were the rocks rent, nor did the dead rise up,
 nor was any one of  these men  [beside Christ] raised up on the third day,
 nor  received into heaven,
 nor at his assumption were the heavens opened,
     nor did the nations believe in the Name of any other;
 nor did any from among them, having been dead and rising again,
 lay open the New Covenant of Liberty. 

Therefore the prophets spoke not
     of any one else but of the LORD,
in whom all these aforesaid things occurred.” 

            (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 4.34.3)
   Roberts, The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 1, p.512.

[Brianroy]

Old Testament Confirmation in Teman and Toemnin

 In the Hebrew of Habakkuk, the significant word that deserves our focused attention is “Teman”, which denotes “south and to the east.”

 That is, to the same general location of the Kidron as what we have already looked to -- in relation to the Great Two Witnesses and the True Messiah of Israel, YHVeH Messiah Jesus Christ.

 In the King James Version of Habakkuk 3:3, we read,
“GOD came from Teman,
 and the Holy One from Mount Paran.  Selah.” 

 Teman is that which lays to the south of one’s Right Hand.  It is likened to a servant who follows at his master’s right hand, but three steps behind. 

In geography, Teman is in Edom, to the south and to the right hand of Jerusalem, as one faces north:  on the eastern bank of the Dead Sea (Jeremiah 49:7,20; Amos 1:12). 

Obadiah 9 calls Teman “Mount Esau”, “the hill of the firstborn son”.1  Mount Esau is the location of the hidden city of Petra (“Petra” means the “Rock”, a Messianic identifier).

 In Yiddish Food, according to the respectable work of John Cooper, we find that the Ashkenazi dish of Toemnin derives its name from Teman.2 

The Sabbath dish is “covered and hidden,” it is “concealed” for more than an entire day.  It undergoes a period of “sleep”, of “rest”.  It is “a dish of life” to some, a dish despised “as death itself” to others.  The location of the Cross and the tomb of Resurrection, is to us, Toemnin:  “it is hidden and concealed” by the ravages of wars --and the ravages of time -- upon the landscape of Jerusalem. 

Paran, which accompanies Teman in Habakkuk, deals with the “revealing” of that which is “Teman” or “Toemnin” -- a revealing of that which is covered, having been hidden and concealed.

 Like the book of Revelation’s title, “Paran” is the “pulling back of a covering” to show what lies within.  It is a revelation of that which was covered until now, that which was once hidden and concealed; but now, light having shone forth upon it, so that it is no longer in the state of darkness.  Even as YHVeH Messiah taught,
“For not -- is a thing  hidden (without a purpose),
 which if (were)not (hidden), it may be revealed;
                        nor came it (first) into being (as) covered,
that it might come into the Light (and be not as a thing still hidden).”     
                                                  (Mark 4:22 - translation mine)   


Again, note the contrast of these two words, of being  “hidden” and “revealed” in relation to Messiah’s ministry at the Cross.
 ‘To the South of one’s right hand’ --       Teman;          Crucified              (dark)
‘Covered’    --                                            Toemnin;       Dead & Buried    (dark)
‘ Revealed’ / ‘Revelation’   --                    Paran.            Resurrected          (light)


Even as the covered Sabbath casserole dish must rest over a very low flame for more than a day, stewing in its own juices to be the tastiest: so too, should this mystery “come to light”, after having stewed for two days -- being two millennia (Psalm 90:4, 2 Peter 3:, to be the most appreciated.  Toemnin is as an allegory of being as a Sabbath food for those -- in these last days -- who would partake of a Sabbath Rest in the work of YHVeH Messiah: whom we know as Jesus the Christ.  Amen.  For it was on the High Sabbath of the Passover that Christ was crucified; and like the Sabbath casserole, He was hidden and concealed, as though under a lid.  He was covered with a great stone in a tomb.

 The location was Teman -- “south and to the right” (of the Temple of Jerusalem).  Therefore, even as the early Church fathers might say,
"…Salvation is become a physical reality, and the Apostles are (shown to have been) filled with a form of completed knowledge or understanding, and the Passover of YHVeH advances…"
                  (The Epistle [of Mathetes] to Diognetus, .12 - translation mine)    


GOD comes forth from the South and to the right to conquer

The word “Paran” tells us that Messiah, who was dead and buried, and covered up, is alive to be revealed unto all.  GOD is not GOD of the dead, but of the living, energetic, and bright shining ones (cf. Matthew 22:31-32). 

Unlike their modern day descendants, the people of ancient Israel were cognizant of their Scriptures beyond the five scrolls of the Torah.  In the 1st Century A.D., there appears to have been one perspective in which GOD would come down in power from above, after the manner of “Paran”.3 

GOD would then, by means of a great and powerfully shining revelation, roll back the heavens and reality, as if He were rolling up a great Cosmic scroll.  In doing so, GOD would then rid Israel of their enemies before the establishment of His Kingdom.  But watch which direction He comes from.

     "And YHVeH shall be seen over them,
and His arrow shall go forth as the lightning,
      and YHVeH GOD shall blow the trumpet,
      and shall go with the whirlwinds of the South."     (Zechariah 9:14)     

     "YHVeH came from Sinai,   
               [Mt. Sinai - many miles south and east of Jerusalem]
       and rose up from Seir unto them;   
      He shined forth from mount Paran,      [a revealing light from the south & east]   
  and He came from the myriads of the holy ones at the Right Hand
      as His fiery hillsides (Heb. - asheda ) went out to meet them."
(Deuteronomy 33:2)

In the Scriptures, noteworthy scholars inform us that the Hebraic singular ashed  (ravine, valley slope) is used only in Numbers 21:15.  Its plural 'ashedot' or 'ashdot' is used specifically for the Jordanian River and its regions, including those near and around Mount Pisgah (Deuteronomy 3:17,4:49; Joshua 10:40, 12:.4

 Clearly, there is a connection for us to look south and east of the Temple.  Thus, from the Right Hand (East) and from or with the whirlwinds of the South, GOD comes down and forth, as the valleys and ravines lift up to meet His Coming.5 

GOD descends on Mt. Sinai in Arabia,6 travels north, then northwest or westward toward Jerusalem.  At such a time, GOD will reward the faithful who did not faint, and thrust out into the outer darkness the unfaithful (Zechariah 2:5).7  All the while, reaffirming that it is in this direction, from the Temple, in which we ought to be looking. 


Ezekiel’s vision of the coming Cross in this location

“And the glory of YHVeH went up in the midst of the city,
 and stood  (as though erected or propped up)
upon the mountain eastward of the city.”  (Ezekiel 11:23)

         In the Hebrew of the above verse, the Hebrew for “went up” is VeYaAhL,  “alah” in the Qal imperfect.  Comparison of “alah” in the phonetic should also be made where it reads the same enunciation with alef-lamed- he and Ayin-lamed-he.

 In the Tenach (Old Testament), alah is often translated as “that which is brought up”, and as “that which is offered up”.9 

The idea conveyed here, is not just that which merely “ascends” or “goes up from”; but “that which is being led away from.” 

 The Greek equivalent is “ago’, from which root word “angel” is derived.  It is a picking up, of carrying away, and of coming, going, or leading away.

 That “leading away” in “Alah” is the same experience that Jesus (called Yeshua in the Hebrew) experienced personally, in fulfillment of this prophecy, when He was led away from the midst of the city, from Gabbatha.

 At Gabbatha, within the walls of Jerusalem at “the Pavement”,10 Jesus was judged and whipped, and dispatched.  The Cross passed from here, through the Siloam Gate, and out to that mount “eastward of the city” (Ezekiel 11:23).  This verse is so important in prophecy, that in Ezekiel 43:1-7, we see how that Tawech (tav-vav-kaf) is reinforced so that it clearly defines how that the entire Temple Mount area, including that which would later become known as  “Gabbatha”.  Again, “Gabbatha” was that “midst of the city” from which “the Glory of YHVeH” was “led away from.”  Tawech is a derivative from a Hebrew root word that means, “to sever”.  And, indeed,  “after 62 weeks…Messiah the Prince…(was) cut off  [severed], but not for Himself”(Daniel 9:23).

 So, even in Ezekiel, we have a prophecy signifying the manner in which Messiah must die consistent with that of Jesus Christ:  as being led away (and rejected out of Jerusalem), then lifted up and killed (in a propped up manner such as a crucifixion).



The glory of GOD points us: EASTWARD.

When the glory of YHVeH “stood” upon the mountain, eastward of the city, the word used here for “stood” in the Hebrew is  VaYAMaD).  This word not only means “to stand”, but is also inclusive of  “that which is propped up”  or “erected”, such as the Cross.  

Even as the Cross was erected and stood up, being propped by means of a rope and pulley system, so too, does the prophecy point to a  “suspension” or SeLaH of GOD’s Glory to the East of the Temple, and in relationship to the Siloam Gate. 

In getting to this location, we find that the Kidron torrent river was flowing in John 18:2.  Twice, on the night prior to the Crucifixion, Christ and others crossed this flowing river. 

That means: that there were at least two wooden bridges that specifically crossed the Kidron from Mt. Moriah to Mt. Olivet in Jerusalem in A.D. 30 - 1) in the northeast area by the Temple spanning Olivet to Moriah; and 2) one to the south, spanning Olivet to the Lower city near the Gate of Siloam.  This latter point requires a road leading north on the westward side of Olivet from En Rogel to this bridge.  Christ, upon being cast out of Jerusalem, was denied access of the lower city bridge, and had to wade through its frigid running torrent.  This is informed us in prophecy found in 2 Kings 6:6.  In this, we are shown that both Simon (now bearing up the Cross) and Christ (whom Simon bore up the Cross for) had to cross this stream of the Kidron.11 

 Only one “river” in Jerusalem is ever mentioned concerning the Passover.  That torrent-flood runoff stream is Easterly from the Temple: the Kidron.  In 2 Kings 23:13, the Mount of Olives is viewed in the context of a northern and southern mount, or a double peaked mount, as it were.  Modern geographers will designate this Mount of Olives with 4 peaks.  The southern aspect of this mount is known as Lehar HaMaschiyith, the “hill of destruction” or the “destroying mountain”.  While some uses of Maschiyith mean “to pull down” (e.g. Genesis 13:10, and Ezekiel 26:4); it is also translated as “to wound” in Exodus 21:26.  Both of these carry Messianic implications: “the pulling down of strongholds” via the Cross, to which Paul alludes to in 2 Corinthians 10:4; and being “wounded for our transgressions” in Isaiah 53:5.  Even the bruising of the head, while having His heel bruised in turn, in Genesis 3:15, can be experienced through the Cross in prophecy and Gematria at this location. 

       The tomb of  “the rich man” is in this general location, for in relation to the Tomb, we see the prophecy of Isaiah, which states:

�It is an expression that the rest of Jerusalem’s streets are NOT founded in stones, like many of the Roman main arteries; and that the streets were dirt and rock of the mountain itself. 
The only exception to this will be that of the Temple itself; but even within the Courts of the Gentiles, the pave stones were covered in a layer of dirt, to ease the securing of animal excrements, in order that the Temple be not defiled.  This is demonstrated when Jesus, while at Solomon’s Porch, stoops down and writes (probably the Hebrew word for Falsehood: Sheqar  (Shin-Qosh-Rosh) in the dirt in John 8:6,8 -- (followed underneath by the names of the accusers, from oldest to youngest). 

11    The tree or “cross” of 2 Kings 6:6 being cast into a river, is taught in miracle of the floating axe-head, as Irenaeus relates:
“And the man of GOD said, ‘Where did it fall?’  And he showed him the place.  And he cut down a tree, and cast it in there, and the iron floated.
 
[That is, he cut down a tree and cast it into a river, --2 Kings 6:6 -- signifying that Christ had to carry His cross through the cold Kidron brook following a recent rain, and during runoff.  This was a sign that through death, as through the Jordan, Christ will bear the souls of all men who believe, aloft to Heaven with Him.  It is also a greater depth understanding to the bark  (Heb. “eitz”) that was cast into Marah, and made the bitter waters sweet.  This shows that the coming Cross of YHVeH is the only means by which one can attain the Living Waters of YHVeH, and hence, eternal life.  For the laws and statutes were “uplifted” (Heb.- “nisahu”) as upon the coming Cross, and “tested” in the uplifting.  (Exodus 15:23-24).  Cf. Riskin, Shlomo - Jerusalem Post International, “Weekly Portion”, February 6, 2004 p.31]

This was a sign that souls should be taken up and away, being borne aloft through the instrumentality of wood, upon which he suffered, who can lead those souls that follow up and away and aloft that follow His ascension.
          This event was also an indication of the fact, that when the holy soul  of Christ descended [into Ge-Hinom], many souls ascended and were seen in their bodies. [Matthew 27:52]. 

For just as the wood, which is the lighter body, was submerged in the water; but the iron, the heavier one, floated:  so when the WORD of GOD became one with flesh, by a physical and hypostatic union, the heavier and terrestrial having been rendered immortal by the Divine Nature, was taken up and borne into Heaven, after the Resurrection.”  (Irenaeus, Fragments .28) from: Roberts, “The Ante Nicene Fathers”.

[Brianroy]

Nehemiah’s Water Gate

As we have seen thus far, we are directed to associate an area South and East of the Temple for Christ’s crucifixion, death, burial, and resurrection from the dead.  In order to reach this location, Messiah must exit the Jerusalem through the Lower City.

 The question then becomes: “Is there even more Biblical confirmation as to which gate Messiah must be ejected through, so as to “more resolutely corroborate” a Lower City ejection from an area south of the Temple?”   The answer is, yes.


Nehemiah points to the Kidron Water Gate

The water gate that covers access to the Gihon Spring, is located in the lower city, immediately south of the Temple, along the Eastern or Kidron Valley.  In Solomon’s Temple design, the stairs of the lower city ran from this gate -- up into Zion, signifying the ascent and descent between Heaven and Earth; while pointing to a coming Emmanuel, in the flesh: “GOD with us”.

"But the Gate of the Fountain  [Gihon]
 repaired SHALLUN the SON of COL-HOZEH,
 the RULER of MIZPAH;
              and he built it, and covered it, set up the doors thereof,
              the locks thereof, and the bars thereof,
and the wall of the Pool of Siloa(c)h  by the King's Garden,
and unto the stairs that go down from the city of David."      
                                                   (Nehemiah 3:15)  KJV


   In Nehemiah 3:15, what is being said, is that, "He who is called Recompense" - i.e. the Savior  (SHALLUN), is the Son of  "the One who is able to see all"- i.e. GOD the Father (COL-HOZEH), who is in turn the Ruler of the "Height" / "Watchtower"/ or "Watch"- i.e. Heaven (MIZPAH).

 This is another Messianic Title of YHVeH Messiah: “He who is called Salvation” -- “the Son of the Heavenly Father” -- “Ruler of Heaven and Earth”.  In the Hebrew, Nehemiah 3:15 is directly related to the Torah's citation of Jacob becoming the builder and ruler of  “Mizpah” (Genesis 31:44-49).  

In those verses of Genesis chapter 31, we see that a mound of stones that are built up for a testimonial witness (or Galeed), and was called "MIZPAH": is literally become “the Watchtower of (Heaven)”.  

In the Akkadian, Mizpah would be referred to as “tulku”: “tul” being a heap or mound, and “ku” meaning that it is set apart as holy.  The Akkadian “tulku” is in turn used to translate astrological sign of Libra, the month of the weighing scales.1  

To the faithful, Mizpah upon the Earth, is a sacred place that also acts as a witness of scales from Heaven.  It is an earlier version, perhaps, of the Urim and Thummin (Light and Revelation - or “yes” and “no” stones) on the shoulders of the high priest. This is important to know, because the Pharisees placed so much emphasis on tipping the “Heavenly scales” by good works, and the brushing aside of sins by “indulgences” via animal sacrifice and the shedding of blood.  In this respect, they differed little from a “papal bull” version of Christianity.  We place our emphasis on the weight of our good works, versus the weight of our bad.  But GOD places His emphasis upon the straightness of the bar that is set upon the fulcrum, because in Hebrew, the same root word used for the straightness of the scale balance-bar, is also the same one used for “righteousness”.  

 In the application of this knowledge to Jerusalem, “the mound heap of stones” of Mizpah represents “the Temple”-- which is called to be the standard (or bar of straightness) by which all morality must be measured by.  Jerusalem, upon the Earth, is a type of a “Watchtower of Heaven”.2

  The “all-seeing One” -- and COL-HOZEH in Nehemiah 3:15 -- represents GOD the Father.  Thus, the “Ruler of the Mizpah”, the “Ruler of the Stone heap”; i.e., the true “Ruler of the Temple”, the one holding the scales, is the “son of the All-seeing One”: “YHVeH whom ye seek” (Malachi 3:1), who is de facto, “the son of GOD”.3

 At Bethabara, when the Hebrew nation crossed into the Promised Land, they also laid “a mound of stones in a heap” for a witness.  This is the First true Temple that followed the Exodus: it was an altar of stones, shaped without hands or iron instruments, built up unto GOD.  

When John the Baptist called upon Israel, he pointed to these very stones at Bethabara as a witness.  The populace of most all Israel came to this site, rather than to Jerusalem, numbering over 3,000,000 (cf. Josephus, Wars of the Jews, 2.14.4. and 6.9.3.).

 It is important that we cram this number into our psyche, or we will miss the impact.  The witness of the period is mind-bogglingly great, because it was over 3,000,000 Israelis, who witnessed both John and Christ, over the course of their respective ministries.  It was of these 3,000,000; in whose lifetimes, the New Testament was announced and published (both at home in Israel, and to the nations abroad). There were over 3,000,000 casual and intensive witnesses, who could have opposed and quashed Christianity at the first, but refused to do so.  Those 3,000,000 or so, were of a mind in which they felt alienated by the leaders of Judaism and those in power; and chose to be baptized in the Jordan for the remission of sins, rather than paying out money to the priest in Jerusalem, in order that they might be found right with GOD.  That is, through the rejection of the world system brought into the Church, John was beckoning the nation of Israel to take on the heart of the true faith of the Holy fathers.

 It was on this occasion, with John at Bethabara, that over 3,000,000 from the tribes of Israel prepared their hearts, that they might enter into the New Covenant of Jeremiah 31:31.  They became only a step away from being as children of the Kingdom, their hearts having been made ready for YHVeH their GOD (Luke 1:17,16).  

Soon after this event, many then saw the dull appearance of Messhiach Yeshua (Isaiah 53:2).  The crowds were disappointed, and quietly dispersed (perhaps feeling let down, though without bitterness).  Jesus came in a manner like unto a Prophet -- and whom, like Jonah, came out of Galilee.  In contrast to Jonah, who was swallowed up in the waters  -- this One, (following John’s announcement and baptism), “rose up straight out of -- and stood upon the waters” (Matthew 3:16, translation mine).  In Nehemiah 3:15, we find that the city of David is offered as an allegory for Heaven; and the Lower City as Earth.  

The Living Waters of Siloa(c) h is the Gospel of Judaism to mankind, while “Shallun” is an allegory for the Messiah who is called “the Recompenser / the Rewarder / the Redeemer”; but to us - He is called “Salvation” and “Jesus”.


 

The Siloach or Water Gate

  Siloach is spelled as Shin-Lamed-Chet, and having a Gematriac value of 338.  The significance of this, is that if a gate is named for Jesus; then for His greatest life event, He had better go out that gate for His crucifixion if He is Messiah.  Every indication of prophecy and history is:  that He does exactly that!

Now, in examining the epigraphy of the Hebraic alphabet prior to 410 B.C., but after Nehemiah's return, in the example of the Letter V from Arsham, we can find remarkable and almost indistinguishable similarities between the Het ? and the Mem ?.4 This similarity is  particularly relevant to the Book of Nehemiah, as we are quoting heavily on Nehemiah 3:15 in the above.  If the letter V from Arsham is composed within two generations of Nehemiah, and we see that the Het ? and the Mem ? are virtually indistinguishable, what does that tell us?  It tells us the answer of why, in respect to this “water source”, that we can see linguistically the raison d'être of how the Hebraic Scribal tradition kept the Het (pronouncing “Siloa-CH”), while the Oral Tradition among the people used Mem as the ending consonant (pronouncing  “Siloa-M”).

 The written tradition S(h)-L-CH (Shiloach) is retained in the Old Testament; and the Oral Tradition kept S(h)-L-M (Siloam / Shal?m) in the New.  

Why did this occur?  The Scribes and Elders translating after one manner, but the people held fast to another tradition.  This Paradigm between priest and people has thereby given way to a controversy over just one letter --regarding a known wellspring in the center of the Jewish World.  Why?  It appears that from the Scribal Tradition, there was a rigidity of discipline and service within the Faith, but that service was fulfilled in a manner of “law” and hardheartedness.  As Yeshua said, it was for the hard-heartedness of the Fathers that Moses granted them a bill of Divorcement; but in the Beginning, (and the times prior to Noah's Flood), it was not so  (Matthew 19:.  But was that stubbornness from the people or the priests themselves?  Whatever the reason, we see that S(h)iloach and S(h)iloam are both designations for the Gihon Spring Watergate that people access the city by way of a road that is meant to lead upward, by means of a stairway, that leads up to Heavenly Zion (Nehemiah 3:15).


Siloach and insights to Gematria

Siloach.  This is the Hebrew word, which appears for the Kidron Valley’s “Lower City” Water Gate and its towers, is also referred to as the “Towers of Siloam.”  It was a double walled gate, with four towers of equal proportions to one another.5  In 29 A.D., one of these towers fell and killed 18 men (Luke 13:4).  .  All of these towers were over 500 years old at the time of the one’s collapse.  The Hebrew language has no Gematriac letter for a value of 500.  Therefore, we then prophetically approach Siloach deducted by the number 18, being now at a value of 320, (338 - 18 = 320).  In this approach, we are thus informed by Messiah about Himself by Gematriac insight, that:

1)   That He is seen as the second Adam.6

2)   He lives His life as one unmarried.7

3)   His ministry does not allow Him the leisure of having a home.8

4)   He is a watcher of the people, but as a guardian, He is not deceived.  But He is also broken, that He might bear their burdens.9

5)   He enlarges His people by adding to its number.10

6)   He is a tabernacle and refuge unto those who trust into Him, and a thorn brier hedge to those who are offended in Him.11  

7)   He is offered up as a heaping, a shaking, or quivering heap that wavers back and forth as a sheaf of First-fruit grain unto GOD.12

   He is torn and rent by the scourging, insomuch that as He walks from Gabbatha to Calvary, His body is dripping to pieces: chunks of blood, flesh, and skin just drip off onto the ground.13

Therefore, we see that it is out this Gate-- the Gate that protected the Gihon Spring’s outlet, the Gate of Siloam, -- that Jesus must have exited Jerusalem, by way of prophetic fulfillment.  This gate, which protected Jerusalem’s primary water source, and located South-Southeast of the Temple proper, leads directly into the Kidron Valley, just slightly north of the Hinom Valley juncture.  

      
====================================================
1      Bullinger, E.W.  “The Witness of the Stars”, Grand Rapids: Kregel, 1893, 1997 reprint (Chapter 2, “Libra”).

2    For which reason that even one stone set upon another was not allowed by the Romans in A.D. 70.  (cf. Mark 13:1-2).  GOD wanted to make sure that the Jews knew they were violating Deuteronomy 28, and would have no place to even call a mound heap as their Temple until the time of dispersion was fulfilled (Luke 21:24).

3    Micah 5:2 describes His origins as from of old, even to the everlasting ages of the everlasting ages.  John 1:1-18 informs us that this one is Jesus Christ.  He was at the “Beginning”, at the "arche", the “Bere****h”, or “beginning of all time”, as expressed in Genesis 1:1.  This concept is seen in Greek concepts, in which Ceres (the daughter of Prometheus) became Isis, the queen of Egypt (through marriage to Osiris).  Thereafter, she was called by the Attic Greeks “IO”, after the concept of  “we have arrived as a civilization, beginning here.”  Egyptian wealth, naval and military, education and medicine, food and liquor, was all infused into Attic society Arch? is, in turn, equated in the Greek with protos: the first in pre-eminence, time, position, and authority before all others.

  So when John uses protos in Revelation 1:5, when he quotes Messiah Yeshua as “the First”, he does not just explain Messiah as being just a “first one” born from the dead, but reaches for a deeper meaning.  Christ is “before the birth” prototokos of all Creation, as Paul cites in Colossians 1:15.  He bears forth the Creation of the universe by His power, the power of the spoken word (Hebrews 11:3, Isaiah 14:24).

 The Father thinks it, the Son speaks it into existence (John 8:28,38; 12:49; 14:24; Psalm 119:160, 33:6,9).  Cf. the “Oneness of GOD” in John 10:30, Deuteronomy 6:4, Zechariah 14:9.  Isaiah 48:16-17 lists a LORD YHVeH, YHVeH Spirit, and YHVeH the Redeemer; the Old Testament origin to Matthew 28:19’s justified use of  “Father, Son, and Holy Ghost”.
In John 1:3 , of YHVeH Messiah, we are informed twice that “all things through Him egeneto”  -- all things came into being at a point in time when the “Beginning” was in a new state, and still unfolding into existence (i.e., ginomai being twice in the aorist).  

“Egeneto” is followed immediately by an emphasis on ginomai’s perfect tense: “gegonen”.  This tells us the continuing existence of the new state that has come into existence, as being upheld by the word of His power (as it were).  (Cf. Zodhiates, Spiros “The Complete Word Study New Testament”, and the “The Complete Word Study Dictionary”, Nashville: AMG, © 1991, © 1992.)

4      e.g.  Trevor, John C. “The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Personal Account”, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, © 1965,1977; pp. 140-141.

5      e.g. Biblical Archaeology Review, Vol. 25, No. 6, Nov/Dec 1999, “Rewriting Jerusalem History” by Hershel Shanks, pp. 20-29.

6   (Nun-Ayin-Rosh)   No’ar.  Valued at 320.  The word means a boy or youth.  Irenaeus reveals that when Adam and Eve were created, they were de facto as youths (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3.22.4.).  This tradition he received from Polycarp, who received it from John, who received it from Messiah.  This age of equivocal maturity of Adam and Eve also answers: as to why a boy is given his Bar Mitzvah at 13, and a girl her Bat Mitzvah at age 12.
In the 1904 discovered Armenian manuscript of Irenaeus' "Apostolic Preaching", we find that it took a vigin man of Jesus to redeem a virgin Adam who fell in Eden.
  
7    (samekh-Rosh-Samekh) Caric.  Valued at 320.  It means one who is unmarried, and does not engage in sexual intercourse: living life after the same asexual nature as a eunuch is supposed to.
8   (Nun-Ayin-Rosh)  Na’ar.  This is the alternate pronunciation of No’ar.  It means “one who is tossed about”, “a wanderer”.  Jesus said, “Foxes have holes (to retreat into), birds of the air have nests (to lodge and rest in), yet the Son of  Adam has no place to lay His head (and call “Home”).”  cf. Matthew 8:20, Luke 9:58.


9   (Ayin-Yod-Rosh-Mem)   Iyram.  Valued at 320.  There are several definitions of Iyr: a place that is guarded by watchers; a watcher or guard; a recently broken in and prepared animal (so that he might bear a load).  “Am”, or the “Mem” (by itself), is simply translated as either a people or nation.  The additional definition of the letter “Mem” is “waters”, which can also be used in metaphor and allegory for “people”.  Therefore, a “watcher or guardian of the people, who can discern their innermost thoughts”, is the intent of the word.

10    (Rosh-Chet-Beth-Ayin-Mem)   Rechabam/Rehoboam.  Valued at 320.  “He who enlarges a people”/ “a people who have enlarged”.  

11   (Shin-Kaf)  Sok / Sak.  Valued at 320.  A “Sok” is an interlaced booth or shelter, and is recognized as a Tabernacle (such as exhibited during the Feast of Tabernacles/Booths).  Inside the Tabernacle is refuge, such as with the example of Job 1:9-10, in which that which is within the hedge is a large place.  

In Psalm 118:15 we read that it is the voice of Jesus (or “Salvation”) who is within the Tabernacles of the Righteous (ones).  There the people call Him “the Right Hand of YHVeH” (Psalm 118:15-16), who grants them eternal life (v.17).  This Tabernacle is a very “large place” to which the saints are delivered to (Psalm 18:6-19 describes the Elijahn Rapture; John 14:2 reaffirms its largeness).

“Sak” is a briar hedge, of goads and pricks.  It is a barb-mesh so super-sized, so that getting through is considered impossible.  When Jesus convicted Paul a few miles outside Damascus in Kaukab (Archaeology, Nov/Dec 1996,  “The World of Paul” by Neil Asher Silberman, pp.32, 33), He told Paul -- who was then called “Saul” -- that He was like a Satan / apostate coming against Job, on the outside of the Tabernacle, kicking against the briars, trying to get in (Acts 9:4-5).  Job also lived in Syria, whose lands included an area in or around Saul’s destination of Damascus.
 
12   (Ayin-Mem-Rosh-Yod)   Omriy.  Valued at 320.  It means “a heap that is chastised from blows”.  Rearranged, it becomes: (Ayin-Mem-Yod-Rosh)  Amiyr.  Amiyr is that “bunch, handful, or sheaf (of grain)” waved as the First-fruits wave offering at the altar cauldron of the Temple.  Christ was indeed chastised by blows, until He became as a heap.  Then, He was sent away as the sacrifice of Israel (John 11:49-53), as the “First-fruits unto GOD” (I Corinthians 15:23. cf. Revelation 14:4).

13  (Pe-Rosh-Mem)   Param.  Valued at 320.  Param means, “to tear, and rend” (as to pieces).  
                                    
Rosh-Samekh-Samekh)  Racac.  Valued at 320.  Racac means “to moisten with drops or drippings, until (it) drips to pieces”.  The flesh of Messiah was so beaten, that to simply touch some of His flesh, was to see it fall away like flood-soaked drywall.  Therefore, as He was led from Gabbatha, and all the way to Calvary, He lost drippings and chunks of flesh and blood -- all along the Way.  The saying, “I’ll have my pound of flesh from him” was a literal happening on the Watergate Road, perhaps several times over, perhaps more.

[Brianroy]

In Gematria, the Orthodox Judaism practice of word association within the Hebrew language using word and numerical association, the phonetics of a word are also important, because the “spoken word is living”.  And since GOD is a Living GOD, the sounds of words spelled the same have a mystical association as well as the numerical.  These are synonyms of a type, or doors to a parallel dimension, opening the Scriptures to the wise in a deep and living way that is closed to the unlearned.  In effect, these teachings from the Scriptures are “Kingdom teachings”, to which the Pharisees and others hid from their congregation, and used against those who had not learned “letters”.

 For example, the letter Shin ? is a letter of “piety”, and generally pronounced with a “sh” sound.  It can also be pronounced as a simple “s”, which gives it synonymous capabilities with Samekh ?, which also is pronounced as a simple “s” sound.  This association can be seen in the Hebrew to Greek translation of Siloach/Shiloach to Siloam/Shiloam.  At the crucifixion march, when Jesus was cast out of the City of David, and out of Jerusalem, He was expedited out this gate (Shin-Lamed-Chet): SiLoaCH.

 In Gematria, Siloach is related in letter association and word association with (Samekh-Lamed-He),  Selah,  (the He ? and the Chet ? also being, at times, interchangeable in Gematria based on phonetics and other considerations).  Traditionally, this alternate spelling of Selah means “forgiveness”, and it was for this reason that on the Cross -- Jesus died: that all men might believe into Him, and receive the reconciliation and forgiveness of GOD.  After the phonetic equivalent, “selah” means “to hang and suspend”.  That is, it is also a designation of the Cross; and the manner of a crucifixion whereby “reconciliation and forgiveness”
from GOD is attained.

At Mizpah, Jacob saw the stairs of the angels / messengers of GOD, leading from Earth to Heaven (Genesis 28:12).  In Jerusalem, these stairs led from Siloach / Siloam up to the Temple (Nehemiah 3:15), opening more by revelation and symbolism to man.  Therefore, forgiveness of sins is made available to us by the means of the Cross, and through the Source of Christ.14  Both forgiveness, and the Messiah who brought that forgiveness, was sent from Heaven to Earth.  The atonement of the work of the Cross is “Heaven sent”, as from the Heavenly Zion -- as though down the staircase or ladder used by the angels (and priests) (cf. Neh. 3:15) -- and from the Throne of GOD the Father, personally. 

The gate of "Siloam" was perhaps first known as the gate of "Shalom" (), the gate of "Peace".  It is quite probable that the waters (which are translated as "still" in the KJV) in Psalm 23, and translated as “the waters of rest”, refer directly to the waters of this particular spring of Gihon.  The Gihon Spring itself becomes a symbol of Messiah and His Living Tabernacle, to which David finds comfort in.


In the days of the Jebusites of Jerusalem, when the leader of an enemy was conquered, he may well have been taken captive to Jerusalem.  There was an area once called “the heights of Zion”, where certain of the enemy were sometimes exhibited.  Then, while still bound hand and foot, the enemy was pushed or dropped from a height of over 500 feet (at that time)  into a shadowy chasm below. 

It may or may not be obvious to you, that David does indeed take this same view of Zion and the Kidron.  For in Psalm 23, in calling the Kidron Valley as the Valley of the Shadow of Death, he speaks of returning home as a son to his father: Jesse.  For he says, “Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me” (Psalm 23:4).  The LORD takes the place of his beloved and late father, Jesse, for David says: “When my father and mother leave me behind, then YHVeH will take me up” (Psalm 27:10, - translation mine).15 

For that reason, it is through the Kidron Valley, which David passes through in Psalm 23, while returning home to the heights of Zion in Jerusalem; and entering through the Water Gate (Nehemiah 3:15).16  In similarity, when a Jewish or Christian believer dies, this Psalm is quoted, because subconsciously, we all know that the inference of this Psalm is an earthly reflection of the Heavenly example: a returning to Zion and to the LORD in His Temple / a going home to Heaven and to the LORD at His Throne.  We therefore, possess inwardly, a confirmation of this interpretation also.



What is the prophetic significance of the word SiLoaCH?

Let's look at it.  The word SiLoaCH (Samekh-Lamed-Chet) is also the same spelling as ShaLaCH:   "to send away" or "to cast out". 

This event happened when YHVeH Messiah was scourged and cast out of Jerusalem in A.D. 30.  Again, the spelling also can read as (Samekh-Lamed-Chet) / "ShiLuaCH": a dismissal or divorce (decree). 

In the case of YHVeH Messiah, the cry of the Sanhedrin’s bully faction was:  "We have no King but Caesar"  (John 19:15 -KJV).  It was a third utterance of Divorce by the Jewish People toward their King, and toward GOD.  Even as the betrothal marriage ceremony was performed at Sinai/Horeb; so on Mount Moriah, the Jewish nation through its first priests - scribes - and “holy ones” -- chose to Divorce themselves rather than to submit to marriage with its coming Messiah and King, the Right Hand of Power.17

Again, by such a declaration as "We have no King but Caesar" (John 19:15), the First Priests, who represented the nation of Israel, divorced not only their rightful King and Messiah, but they divorced themselves from GOD.  Using just John, we see that the three utterances required in the presence of the rabbinate is fulfilled as:

"I divorce You":  John 18:29-32
 "I divorce You":  John  19:6-7
 "I divorce You":  John  19:15 18

This desire of a divorce from YHVeH Messiah was a result of blindness.  It was a blindness and disorder of sin, which was addressed by Messiah in the parable of the wicked servants who took over the vineyard of their master (Matthew 21:33-40).  These simply few wicked but in-charge servants were full of darkness within and without (Matthew 6:23).

 But, from the common folk, came Faith: though from among the poor.  The Pool of S(h)iloam,  is probably also meant to be known, by its phonetics,  as the Pool of Shalom -- the Pool of Peace.

 This is the same “Pool” that the man who was born blind was sent to by Jesus.  As though an “apostle” (or “one who is sent”), this humble blind man was instructed to wash the clay from his eyes that Jesus had placed there - in order that he might see for the first time in his life (John, chapter 9).  In the Bible, humility often will bear good fruit; but pride, just as often, leads to bad fruit: darkness within, and the darkness without.  The darkness of sin will thrust one outside the Tabernacle of GOD’s grace, into the “outer darkness”.  Here, one is like the Devil with Job (Job 1:8-10), at the outside hedge of super-sized goads and briars, looking in.  In the outer darkness, unable to do anything but to weep, wail, and gnash their teeth.

Thought on the Blind man’s Quest for Siloam / Shalom

   “For I determined not to know anything among you,
   save Jesus Christ
 [the anointing of Salvation],19
               and Him crucified.”
            (I Corinthians 2:2)


====================================================


14     “Christ is the source, and the Cross is the means” of victory, and salvation.  This is a favorite saying of Jimmy Swaggart on “A Study in the Word” Television program.  For new program info or recent program archive access:  www.jsm.org

15    Cf. also Luke 2:40-49.

16    Not only do the stairs go down from the city of David, by means of this singular access from Zion, they go up to the city of David -- from the Gate of Siloam -- also.

17    Jesus was betrayed by “the elders, the first (or “chief”) priests, and scribes” in Peter’s account of  Mark 8:31 in Rome, as well as Matthew’s account in Matthew 16:21 in Jerusalem.  At the actual raucous before Pilate, in Mark 10:33 and Matthew 20:18, the chief priests, and scribes are listed by Christ as His detractors.  It would be these who delivered Him over to the Gentiles to be mocked, beaten, spit upon, whipped, and put to death (Luke 18:31-33, 22:2). 

Judas Iscariot communed with the “first priests and Temple Commanders [Gk. strategos]” in conspiring against Jesus.  The scribes and Pharisees worked hand in hand in such a manner, as to be virtually inseparable (Matthew 15:1, 23:13ff.).  It appears then, that the definition of a Pharisee or “holy one” was that of a society of  “Protectors of the Temple”; almost like a Special Admittance Masonic Lodge, if you will.  This required an oath of loyalty to the Order in the name of religious fervor to the Faith.  It also acted in an exclusionary manner to those not born into the Levitical tribe, and Kohenim (the priestly order).

 As Saul (who became Paul) found out, he could be enabled as its “High Executioner” in the same way the Catholic Church enabled its executioners to ferret out the Jews in the Middle Ages, but Saul could never truly be the “insider” he truly wanted to be -- as a priest unto GOD.  Therefore, when we see the conspiracy of first priests against Jesus, (with the exception of the Sadduceean High Priest Caiaphas), we are seeing those who are known as “Pharisees” -- “Holy Ones” -- “The Protectors of the Temple Order” coming together against Messiah.  In the mind of Christ’s betrayer, Judas Iscariot the zealot, he was playing both ends of righteous zeal against the middle, and found himself lost to both.

18    When Israel asks, “Why hath the LORD done thus unto this Land, and unto this House?”  concerning the A.D. 70 destruction of Jerusalem and the Diaspora, the answer comes back from the era of Solomon, “Because they forsook the LORD GOD of their fathers, which brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold on other gods, and worshipped them, and served them: therefore hath He brought all this evil upon them.”  (2 Chronicles 7:21, 22).  Because the first priests divorced themselves from YHVeH Messiah to serve other gods such as Caesar and Mamon (wealth), so too, did GOD grant them their request for their generation.

19    The Gospel of John, in its entirety, is summarized by this verse.  In English, we say “Salvation”; in Hebrew, we say “Yeshua”; while in Greek, we utilize “Jesus” as the English adaptation.  By determining to know “Salvation”, the blind man who was man to see is determined to know “Jesus”. 

[Brianroy]

 Acacia as a literal and  Theological application

The Acacia connection, pointing East to the Kidron Valley:

"And in that Day, it will be that the mountains
   will rain down YHVeH's Spirit,
   as though flowing down forth an intoxicating New Wine;
   and the hills will gush forth and flow with fatness;
   and all the deep channels of Judah shall flow with Living Waters;
   and an overflowing river shall pour forth as a artesian well-spring
   from out of the House of YHVeH,
              and a refreshing and watering it shall give as it fills  (even)
           the Valley of the Pierced Tree."      
(Joel 3:18, fully amplified from Hebrew, my translation)
   
       It was while reading this prophecy that led me on the inquisitive search for what the Bible truly teaches about the location of the Cross.

At the same time that the Living Waters gush forth from the Throne of YHVeH Messiah in the Temple, the mountains will be thick with the Shekinah Mist of YHVeH Spirit.

 The hills of Jerusalem will be “a very air of intoxication, and a refreshing - restorative one at that.”  I was particularly struck by the phrase, "Valley of ****tim", which in the English, is translated as:  "the Valley of the Pierced Wood" or "the Valley of the Pierced Tree.”  

The pierced wood or tree is a direct - inference to the Cross upon which Messiah was crucified.1
 
When the Ark of the Covenant was made, it was constructed of ****tah or Acacia wood.  

The Hebrew word “Aron”, for “ark”, is used both of the Ark of the Covenant (which carried the 10 Commandments tablets and manna - e.g., Joshua 4:7), and of Joseph’s coffin (Genesis 50:26).  To some, the wood itself is a dead thing bearing about dead things; while to others, it is merely symbolic and a direct spiritual connection to eternal life.  The one mindful of “dead things,” has his mind on the direct concept of materialism.  The other -- correctly ascertains the spiritual connection and representation: (his mind in the heavenlies, while his hands and feet pragmatically operates in the sphere of the earthly).  

I believe that the vertical beam of the Cross, to which Messiah’s feet were nailed with stakes, was made of the cedars of Lebanon.

The Crossbeam, to which the bends of Messiah’s wrists were pierced, I believe to have been made out of Acacia. However, this is only an unproven theory on my part.

 If the Cross were made of one sole wood, as “****tim” implies, it probably then refers only to Acacia.  Yet, even as there were two tablets of the Law of Moses in the 10 Commandments, so too, is this Acacia wood representative of the two hands of YHVeH Messiah: the one who spoke those Commandments to Moses.  Could this alos be applicable to two kinds of woods...acacia be simply one of them?  I believe it very likely, or "yes".      

         When the Escape-goat of Yom Kippur was tied in the wilderness to receive the sins of Israel, it was tied to the ****tim, also known to us as the Acacia; its head wrapped about with a crown of scarlet wool, and having been jabbed and spit upon  (cf. Epistle of Barnabus 7.6 ff.).  The shrub thought to have shared the characteristics of the matron, Rachel.  

At the first, this seems a harsh assessment.  Acacia can grow as either a shrub or a tree.  It yields a non-tart edible food that is much like the pea pods.  Some Acacia bark can even be chewed like gum.  In the desert, nomads in need of water, have been known to cut up the roots of the Acacia about 4 to 5 feet from the stump, and chop up 2 to 3 foot sections.2  The water is then poured out into a water skin or it is sucked out of the root.  On some occasions, a clop of dirt is inserted into one end of the root.  It is then used as a temporary canteen (for that day), and carried over short distances.  

Therefore, when Rachel is thought of, she is remembered for as the matron of shepherds, who gave Jacob/Israel the strength to roll away the stone, and grant the sheep a stream of overflowing life-giving waters (Genesis 20:6-9, cf. vv.20, 17).3  This is an allegory of Messiah: Jacob representing Christ at the resurrection, and the children of Israel and those believers from the nations, are symbolized by the sheep.

 In Exodus 25:10, and again in chapters 36 and 37, we find that GOD turns the ****tim/Acacia wood into His dwelling place.  Just like this example, Christians point to the power of YHVeH at the Cross, -- as though it were also GOD's dwelling place, captured in Time -- but reaching into every nanosecond of all time, to the forevers of eternity.  The bends of Jesus wrists attached to this kind of wood, as the Psalmist says (in the Hebrew).  

The Acacia teaches us that, like the waters of the root, our life is hid in Christ (Colossians 3:3).  When YHVeH Messiah died upon the Cross, the body of our sins -- from our conception to our deaths -- warped through time, to the Cross.  Those who believe into Him, their sins entered into Christ Jesus, into His innermost being, and our second death was destroyed, in the all-consuming fire of who He really is (Hebrew 12:29, 1:3), being the same essence and inner substance as the Father.  Our sins were not buried in the tomb with Christ, they were consumed -- once and for all -- in Him, at the Cross.  At the moment He cried out, “My GOD, My GOD, why hast thou forsaken Me?”  (Matthew 27:46)4 -- sin was paid for and consumed, “once (and for all time)” (Hebrews 10:10).

 To those of Heaven, beholding, the visage would have probably appeared to the angels (of the next dimension) as miraculous as was the Creation (Job 38:4-7).  The Cross would have looked as though it were on fire throughout, with black billowing smoke; a vacuuming effect of shadows and multitudes of human spirits throughout the ages, from Adam to the end of human procreation would have been witnessed as being absorbed into Christ’s chest, into His innermost being, with every sin - vice - and uncleanness burned up within.  All this would have been as though it was an alternate reality or dimension, and yet it was not.  All sin, for all time -- was consumed within Christ, as if He were the altar of the hearth of fire.  



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1      The likeness of entering this Valley (at Jerusalem by Messiah) is seen in the historical anamnesis in the Book of Judges.  In Judges 7:22, when the Midianites were defeated by Gideon and the 300, the survivors fled to the “House of Acacia” or “Beth ****tah”, in the East.  This location is in the Jordan Valley, near where John the Baptist first baptized by the Yarmuk and Jordan River juncture, before moving southward to Beth Bara.  The Ephraimites were called upon by Gideon to enter Beth Bara, and did so.  The house of Acacia represents the “ark” and the “cross”.  The Ephraimites represent all the race of Israel beside that of Judah, who will be cast into Israel in the last days by a world wide anti-Semitism that is sparked by the nuclear flattening of Damascus, Syria (Isaiah 17:1).  They come to faith through sack cloth and ashes, like John the Baptist, at Beth Bara, and are reborn into a New Israel in the Great Tribulation: in those last 3 ½ years before Christ’s return.  
 
2       Air Force Manual 64-3,  “Survival - Training Edition, U.S. Air Force” 15 August 1969; p. A1-37

3       In its first mention in Exodus 25:5, ****tim / Acacia wood appears between ram (and other) skins, and oil.  When our First Father Adam sinned in the Garden of Eden, He and our First Mother were clothed by GOD in the coats of skins as a covering for sin (Genesis 3:21).  The oil that follows the ****tim wood, is oil for lighting (Exodus 25:6).  John 1:4 tells us that in Christ was life, and this life was the LIGHT of men.  And as we read the order of things in the Torah here in Exodus 25:3-8, we see the order of all things.  In verse 3, we see that first GOD created His Sanctuary, which we call Heaven, by the representation of gold, silver, and brass.  Then we see in verse 4 that GOD created the angels, the cherubim, and man - through the colors blue, purple, and scarlet, and that man was the last of these, yet destined as the centerpiece, being like unto both angels and cherubim in one form.  We then see in verse 5 that the atonements, which precede the ****tim Wood, which wood, represent the Cross.  The Cross then leads to the restoration of man in verse 6, for the light  of eternal life and the anointing of man occurs.  The incense, which represents prayer, shows an intimate restoration of communication between man and GOD.  In verse 7, we see how that GOD destines man to be as a priesthood unto Him; and in verse, that this plan is for all eternity, even as GOD is eternal, and is the GOD of the living (for all live unto Him that are His).  

4    There is a testimonial found in this quote of Psalm 22:1, that is revealed in the decipherment of Atbash.  At bash is the inverting code of the Hebraic alphabet.  The first letter and last letter switch places, the second and the second to last letter switch places, and so on.  Along with Gematria, this practice also dates back to at least the Babylonian exile.  Unlike Gematria, it is less understood, and more tedious.  Psalm 22:1 is an Atbash code of  5 sets of trinity, as a testimony of the ordeal of the Cross and Israel’s crucified Messiah.  
  
Translated:   “The people cut and oppress,
                                 the people cut and oppress;
      Righteousness is branded and scarred,
      Piety and Truth has been sweated out.
      (Let it now) contract, and come to a close.”

[Brianroy]

The Great Tree of Shechem, a representation of the prophesied Cross

“And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Shechem
  of the plain of Moreh…And YHVeH appeared unto Abram, and said,
      ‘Unto your seed will I give this Land.’
  And there, he built an altar unto YHVeH, who appeared unto him.”
                                                    (Genesis 12:6-7)

As stated earlier in this chapter, I believe the vertical beam of the Cross to have been made of Lebanese Cedar wood.  The prophecy of the Cross is also found in Israel’s relationship to the Great Tree of Shechem, from the time of Abram in 1981 B.C., until the death of Absalom in circa 1040 B.C.

 (I may have to and am well able to defend my dates at a later time, using Greek and other literary sources to justify them.  But this also calls for a an extensive reply for redating of the Old Testament era between 900 -2000 B.C., proving a co-expulsion of Jews and Hyksos in 1551 B.C.).

In Genesis 12:6-7, YHVeH appears to Abram at Shechem (“the shoulder”), in the plain of Moreh (“the Teacher”), while in the presence of this great oak or terebinth tree.  It is quite probable that this tree was now about 367 years old, dating back to the receding of the floods of Noah.  Either Josephus places an equally old tree at Hebron, or he mis-locates his recollection of this tree.  In either case, Josephus cites that a tree, said to have existed since the Flood (that is, the Creation of the world as they knew it) still existed in his day (Josephus, Wars of the Jews, 4.9.7)   


The Great tree itself was representative of the very Name of GOD, of EL.  EL comes from the Hebraic root word of “ool”, which word picture is best described as “the base of a great tree, which fibers are wrapped and rolled and twisted together in such power, that even the sharpest axe fails against it.”  Ezekiel 31:8-9 lists three types of trees that were in Eden: the cedar, the fir or “pine” tree, and the chestnut.  The Great Tree was not a chestnut, whose bark annually peels off.  The Great Tree was not a “pine tree”, which sheds its needles and leaks sap, to defile an encampment with “litter”.  The Great Tree was a cedar, whose wood was used in the Temple and by the Kohenim at the altar hearth of fire.

 Called erez (Alef-RoshZayin) in the Hebrew, this wood in Israel and Lebanon often has a red tone, and is pleasantly odorous.  It is ideal for beams and paneling, such as Solomon’s great house (I Kings 7:2 ff.), because it is frequently free from knots and defects, and is a natural repellent to bugs and pests.5

In Genesis 33:18-20, Abram grandson Jacob returns to this tree, and purchases his inheritance for 100 pieces of money.  Here, at the Great Tree, Jacob erects an earthen altar and calls this place:  “El Elohe Israel”, translated as, “El, the GOD of Israel.”  To what was this tribute made?  To the ancient tree, which symbolized EL, the GOD of Israel, and His coming Cross.  And when Jacob fled his Father-in-law Laban, and hid the idols of his household, to where did he run and bury them?  He ran to this tree, symbolizing the coming cross.

 It was here that Jacob hid his sins, received forgiveness of sins from GOD, and then went forth in victory as a terror to all the enemies of GOD (Genesis 35:5).  Therefore all the sons of Jacob, he who is called Israel, are called out to follow after the example of their father, and be born again -- believing into Christ, YHVeH Messiah, and His atoning work at the Cross.
They are to do this in remembrance of this tree...but today's Biblical  Theologians act as if (or perhaps simply are)  oblivious to this testimony in the Torah.

 In 1471 B.C., just before the death of Joshua, we read how that the descendents of Abram did gather under the Great Tree, erecting the Tent of Meeting, and placing the Great Tree within the very Sanctuary of YHVeH (Joshua 24:19-28).  The Tree represents Messiah on the Cross.  And making a Covenant with YHVeH, the children of Israel brought forth a Great Stone, rounded without instrument, and raised it up, erecting it in the shadow of the Great Tree, which was now some 877 years old.  In the presence of the Cross, they took a stone, symbolizing death; and raised it up, symbolizing the resurrection (and symbolizing the stone of Christ's tomb that would later be rolled away). 

Stone in Hebrew is spelled Alef-Beth-Nun.  Separate Alef, which letter represents the Name of GOD, and you will read Alef-BeN, or “GOD’s Son”.  Again, the Cross, as represented by the Great Tree, was central to a restored and right relationship between Israel and GOD.
 
In Judges 9:37, we find this Great Tree again; but now, having the power of divination granted unto it, and being called “the Tree of Prophecy.”  The word “Moreh”, on which plain this tree was located, being spelled backwards as “Haram”, means “sacred”.  Haram is defined as the surrendering and giving of devoted service to GOD, or the giving up of something profane to its ruin or destruction.  The mount on which this Great Tree rested was called “Ephraim” (doubly fruitful).  But rearranged, we see that like Jesus, this Great Tree was one of offence, for Shechem can be rearranged to spell “Makesh” in Hebrew, which means a place of stumbling or falling. 

This is how we last know of the Great Tree, sometime around 1040 B.C., Absalom, the son of David, passed under this tree on his war mule, while in fighting his father’s armies in his rebellion.  This 1308-year-old tree, blown upon by the Spirit of YHVeH, reached down and grabbed Absalom up by his hair, and crucified him by his head, suspending Absalom helpless in its branches by the hair between heaven and earth.  David’s general, Joab, then took 3 arrows and pierced the Son of David through the heart (2 Samuel 18:9-15).  In the process, thus likening Absalom to Christ: who for the sins of Adam, was pierced through the heart with the arrows of 3 sins (the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life) in our place, upon the Cross.



Thought upon GOD’s love to us through the Cross:

“And let it not be, that I should glory, save in the Cross of our LORD Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”                                                             
                          (Galatians 6:14)


When the nation of Israel sinned against GOD, they sinned also at and through ****tim / Acacia (Numbers 25:1) because of their unbelief.  But when then believed, ****tim became to them the route through which they attained access into the Promised Land (Joshua 2:1, 3:1).  The pierced tree and the acacia “bush” are synonymous.  These are for us to know that we are to find Salvation and eternal life through the Cross.

 Even as the Church is to now find its root in Israel, so Israel is to find its root is also to be as the Acacia, that is -- it is to be rooted in YHVeH Messiah, hid in Christ, even as the waters are hid in the Acacia’s root.  We find this confirmation, not by looking up, but by looking down.

In Micah 6:5, we read that Balaam's first prophecy against the children of Israel occurs at ****tim (“the pierced tree” or “acacia”), to which he said,

 "Come, curse me, Jacob.  Come, defy (me) Israel. 
How shall I curse (whom) GOD hath not cursed? 
or how shall I defy (whom) the LORD hath not defied?
From the tops of the rocks, I see Him, and from the hills, I behold Him.6
Lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations.
Who can count the dust of Jacob, and the number of the fourth of  Israel.
Let me die the death of the Righteous, and let my last end be like his.”     
 (Numbers 23:7-10  -   KJV)

In the emboldened above, I wish to show that the LORD is the focus of a dual prophetic application here. 

The immediate application is indeed, seeing in that present time, the nation of Israel, the descendants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  But remember, YHVeH is speaking in a prophetical parable through Balaam (Numbers 23:5,7); and we are supposed to be missing the point, because it is a parable spoken too plainly in the plain sense. 

The  emboldened speaks of the LORD, who shall be beheld from the tops of the rocks, looking downward; and from the hills, looking downward.  He is not set high in terms of elevation, exalted from the top-most rock.  Rather, he is only slightly elevated, looked up to a little, but largely Messiah is crucified in a low place.  He is to be beheld in a form of humility (as it were), by those upon the hills looking down upon Him.  The Hills represent Jerusalem, and He has descended into the Valley of Jerusalem's Hills.  In other words, into Joel's prophecy, the Valley of the Pierced Tree, the Valley in which YHVeH Messiah was crucified.  His last end is in victory, resurrected incorruptible, eternal in joy and greatness unspeakable and unimaginable, in glory ruling all nations for all time.

As the Paschal Lamb of GOD, He fulfills the prophecy of Micah, which says,
“As a Shepherd, feed and nourish your people with the rod and scepter
of your tribe, as the firstborn flock of your possession and
successive heritage, who dwell and tabernacle as alone and as
isolated as a planted vineyard in an open field in the thick of a forest.
As a Shepherd, feed and nourish them in Bashan [the place of spears]
and Gilead [the heaping mounds] as in the ancient times.”   
  (Micah 7:14, translation mine).

As the people look upon Christ, they find a spiritual food from His flesh and blood, which is to the salvation of their souls.  This is the Christian Communion partaken of the third cup of wine and broken second Matzoh in the Passover meal.  While their bodies remain stationary, to them that believe into Him - their souls are saved and hidden away, as in a secret vineyard in the thick of a forest.  The forest is representative of the wood of the Cross.  It is the means and the method by which we are as if “teleported” instantaneously, and beyond interference, away to a place of rest in Him.  The symbolism giving rise to the Christian doctrine of the coming Raptures (or snatching away of believers, as Zephaniah2:3 and other passages imply).

  We become as the firstborn lambs of the flock that are dedicated to the LORD, set aside as His possession.  We become as firstborn children, set aside for the LORD’s heritage, as children in the loving and caring family of YHVeH. 



Living Waters and YHVeH’s Love: through the Cross

In the Valley of ****tim, the Valley of the Kidron, there flows a spring of   "living waters" (an artesian well) of importance to Joel's prophecy.  The well is called Siloam in the Greek, but Siloach in the Hebrew.  It is this well-spring that GOD Himself will replace with living waters that pour from out of His heart, through the left side of His belly, from His throne, to fill this Valley in the Kingdom Times of our LORD -- times yet to come  (Ezekiel 47:1ff; John 7:37-38; Revelation 22:1-2).

And strangely enough, when we look at the whipped body of Christ through the rabbinic teachings of Gematria, we see “GOD’s Love”.  For 26 lashes to the back is the same numerical values as YHVeH  (or ‘JeHoVaH’ or ‘LORD’), being 10 + 5 + 6 +5; while 13 lashes to the breast is the same numerical value as AHaVaH  (or ‘LOVE’), being 1 + 5 + 2 + 5.  Therefore becoming symbolically, the 39 lashes upon Christ’s body was “The Love of YHVeH,” or “YHVeH’s Love;” (this being a free translation).  So now we see that in Scripture, even the whippings have deep meaning and great significance for us: being the physical demonstration of GOD’s Love (for us). 
 For as it is written,
   “For GOD so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever that believes into Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”  (John 3:16 - KJV)

Each hand and arm of Jesus represents branches to Him, our true Vine: one arm to carry the nations (or we Gentiles); and one arm to carry the Jews.  Or we may counteract the Mormon position, and say that with one arm He upholds the Angels, and with one arm He carries mankind.  The one group He prevents more from having fallen away; while the other, He wholly redeems.  We are therefore called to be assembled -- joined together by Christ our head, -- even as there is one GOD, who is above all, in us all, and through us all”.  (Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5.17.3; Ignatius, Epistle to the Trallians, .11)  And all this happens through the Cross!


5    Cedars are already known in Israel and Lebanon to exceed 40 feet at their base circumference, and 100-120 feet in height (cf. Harris, Theological Word book, p. 70; Tenney, Merrill C., Zondervan Pictorial Bible Dictionary, Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1963, 1964 edition, p.662); in order to stand out, the Great Tree of Shechem would have had to dwarf such trees altogether.  It would have been a gargantuan type of tree never before seen, whose sheer size promoted awe and worship: perhaps to the effect of branches stretching out 195 feet from side to side; 225 feet in height; and a girth of 70 feet.  But this is only personal speculation.  I might yet be underestimating its sheer original size.

6   In his exposition of Genesis 15:5, Rashi explains how that GOD took Abram outside, and gave him the vision of being able to “look down” from above.  In effect, even before the ram in the thicket (Genesis 22:13), Abram was able to see Messiah’s Day and be glad (cf. John 8:56 with Genesis 15:4,6).  Cf. Doron, Pinchas -  “Rashi’s Commentary”, Northvale, N.J.: Aronson, (c) 2000,  p.31.   

[Brianroy]

From the Siloam Gate to Azal

“And you shall flee into the Valley of My mountains, for the Valley of My mountains shall reach unto Azal.”  (Zechariah 14:5a)

In the Day that Jesus returns to set His foot on the Mount of Olives as YHVeH Messiah revealed, He will set His foot upon the Mount, and cleave it in two: from east to west.  This very activity reveals the location of the Cross and the Garden Tomb near which He was crucified.  The northern half shall move north, and the southern half shall move south (Zechariah 14:4). 

The locality of YHVeH Messiah’s contact with Olivet will be in a section in which a secret fault runs directly from the gate of Siloam in an easterly direction to Azal.

 Azal, in the Aramaic, is translated as “went”.  The prophecy of Zechariah 14:5 tells us that the fault begins to split in the Kidron, and opens to wherever the remnant of Israel, who were pinned down and under fire in the Kidron, are said to have “went” at the time of Christ’s return on Day 2625, which is Azal.  In all likelihood, the fault will run in such a way, so as to go between the second and third peaks.  In Tosefta’s Baba Batra 1:11, and the Jerusalem Talmud’s Nazir 57(d), we are told that the Tomb of David has a rock fissure access from the Kidron Valley on this Eastern Mount.

 In Nehemiah 3:16, David’s Tomb is described as being (de facto) on the Mount of Olives, at the Hill of Offence, directly near to and opposite the Pool of Siloam.

 In the Roman History of Dio Cassius, .69, we are educated that the tomb of David survived beyond the 70 A.D. siege by Titus, but did not stand upright as far as the Second Revolt of 132 A.D.  If archaeologists wish to find David’s first (now ruined) sepulcher, all they need do is locate the Pool of Siloam, move due East or Southeast across the Valley, locate the rock fissure, and trace it into Olivet.1 

The sepulcher of David will lie immediately north of the fissure, while Christ’s resurrection tomb will lie south of the fissure, and some distance from it (probably 144 cubits or 216 feet from the position of where the Romans erected Christ on the Cross). 

How ironic, that those who gazed on Messiah’s crucifixion, could also in the same field of view see David’s tomb, and miss the messianic implication of Jesus Christ as being both David’s Lord (Heb. -“Adonai”) and “son”.

 In the last days, if David’s tomb is not revealed before YHVeH Messiah cleaves open the fissure with His foot at the end of the Great Tribulation, then those Jews who flee through this Valley to Azal will see the remnants of David’s Sepulcher as they take flight to safety through a new valley of Olivet.  Therefore, when we picture Christ Crucified, looking East from the Lower City and upon Him, up stream to our left on the mount of Olives-- we see David’s Sepulcher, and downstream upon the mount south-most base  -- we see the Well called En Rogel.

We are erudite that archaeologists have unearthed some 900 burial caves in and around Jerusalem that date to the Second Temple Period.2  Of these, only four elaborate tombs meet a like description of the Resurrection tomb.  Of these four, guess what…only the Kidron Valley tomb is ignored in any and all of the tomb discussions among the scholarly publications and lectures.  We truly need to follow up on the 1932 excavations in the Kidron by E.L. Sukenik with modern digs in this vicinity.

Now, in the Bible, the northern part of Olivet, in the Hebrew, takes on the connotation of “the rolling ascension”, which is descriptive of Christ’s resurrection and deliverance of souls at the tomb; while the southern part of Olivet takes on the undertone of “the rejection of the prophets”.  The similarities of these two halves of Olivet are as the choices between life and death, between truth and falsehood, between the blessings and the curse.  They become a type of co-covenant with Mt. Sinai/Horeb (Deuteronomy 29:1, 30:15,19-20).  These two portions of Olivet will be the future covenant that will also be like a renewal of that with Mounts Gerezim and Ebal, which reads:

      “And it shall come into being, when YHVeH your GOD
        has caused you to come into the Land where you are going to displace and occupy,
        that you shall put forth and fasten the blessing upon Mount Gerezim,
        and the curse upon Mount Ebal.”  (Deuteronomy 11:29, translation mine)
   
The location of those two mounts of “Gerezim and Ebal”, as found in Deuteronomy 11:30, are against Gilgal (the place of rolling, or repentance - the place of liberty) and the plains of Moreh (the archer who instructs with the razor’s edge): the same inferences as the names of the two northern peaks of Mt. Olivet.  Repetitively, these names of instruction teach us about passing between the choices of life and death.  They also teach us about Messiah, and of His Cross and Resurrection; as well as the Judgment and separation of the redeemed and the evil in the Last Days.  Case in point: good king Josiah. 



King Josiah points to Messiah

Josiah (who ruled Judah from ca. 639-608 B.C.) chose Life.  In turn, his actions pointed to the location of the coming Messiah.  The Bible tells us that there was never before a King who turned to the LORD with all his heart, soul, and might -- according to the Law of Moses -- nor was there one arising after him (2 Kings 23:25).  However, despite all his best efforts, Josiah by himself could not stave off the coming Judgment upon Jerusalem.  He could however, set an example that was followed by four young men of Judah in the coming years: by Daniel and his three friends (Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah / aka., Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego - Daniel 1:6-7 ff.).

King Josiah chose to destroy all the idols of Jerusalem, and rid those dedicated to their promotion.  In doing this, he did the LORD’s work.  Then, as today, those hostile to GOD’s unadulterated Word attached themselves to the House of the LORD, and set up shop in order to neutralize its threat from within.  But Josiah would have none of it.  He took the idols brought into the House of YHVeH, took them East into the Kidron Valley, and burned them in the “fields of the Kidron” (2 Kings 23:4). 

He broke down all the altars and idols of Jerusalem, and beat them to dust.  If the Kidron brook was dry -- he took the ashes to Bethel (“the House of GOD”).  When the Kidron was running because of recent rains, he scattered the ashes into the Kidron torrent, so that it could be washed away by Living Waters.3 

By destroying the three idols upon the Mount of Olivet’s mount of Corruption, we have a prophetic confirmation of both the Trinity of GOD, and that this location is to be that under which Christ must be crucified.4 

For Josiah, as a type of Christ and forerunner of Messiah, he was also the keeper of the greatest Passover Israel had ever seen from the days of the Judges to those times after him (2 Kings 23:21-23).  Even so, the righteous actions of one man, was still not enough to stave off the Judgment of an entire nation.  But it is through Josiah, that we are again directed south and east, to the Kidron, -- and to the area, we now know as Golgotha, by the fissure that leads to Azal, -- through which the eternal Covenant of Christ is erected for us. 

The Covenant of Christ is everlasting, past - present - future (Hebrews 13:20, .  Still, at Azal, we are directed to still yet another New Covenant, an end of days New Covenant that is still yet to come, set for the Kingdom Age and the Millennial Reign of Messiah.5   

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1      The pool of Siloam is a known site, and its excavation can be read in Biblical Archaeology Review, Volume 31, No 5, Sep/Oct 2005, pp. 16-23: “Where Jesus cured the blind man.” by Hershel Shanks.

2      Biblical Archaeology Review, Volume 25, No. 5, Sep/Oct 1999, pp.23, 25: “Did a Rolling Stone Close Jesus’ Tomb?” by Amos Kloner.

3      Those ashes then would be merged into the salt and water of the Dead Sea; even as “holy water” is salted, and sprinkled on the people entering the Temple Courts, mixed with the ashes of the red heifer.  The Epistle of Barnabas, .8, tells us that 3 boys are to sprinkle all the people entering the Temple, using a stick wrapped with purple wool and hyssop, dip it with the ashes of the red heifer, and sprinkle the people.  The only effective way is by the mixture of “holy water” and “ashes”.  The ashes would comprise a ratio of about 1:600 parts of water (to make it kosher), and thereby be effectively sprinkled upon the masses.  The nicknames of these three boys are “Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”  Therefore, by beating and grinding up the idols of gold and silver to dust, and casting into the Kidron -- Josiah was sprinkling the land of Judah with the ashes of faith, and pointing to a coming One who would sprinkle and cleanse all nations from this location of the Kidron in centuries to come. 

4      2 Kings 23:13 describes these three idols as Ashtoreth (Phoenician deity of sexual appetite), Chemosh (“the subduer”), and Milcom.  By placing these 3 idols on Mt. Olivet at the peak of Corruption, we guarantee a prophetic necessity for Christ to be crucified here to atone for the 3 sins of Adam in the Garden of Eden (I John 2:16, Genesis 3:6).  The number 3 is also significant in relation to verification of the Trinity of the GOD-head as marking this spot for the Cross.

    Ash-toreth in Gematriac understanding, is descriptive of the destination of this way of life, leading to a “moth-gate” or the “gate of the dead”.  This is the lust of the flesh.  In the next idol, we see the second sin of the pride of life: for Chem-esh in Gematriac understanding, is the activity of pride, of the desire “to stand out in existence”, as noteworthy, as someone to be noticed.  Mil-kem is to see with the eyes, and “to be full by pining after”; rounding out the three sins of Adam with “the lust of the eyes”.

5   There is another new Covenant coming, which is simply for the duration of the Millennial Reign of Christ.  It will be a Covenant of the Valley of Azal, that in the Kingdom, will be one of which the New Testament calls “palaios” ?.  It is to be “old” and useful for a specified period, -- such as the Law of Moses was.  It is a covenant of Living Waters where one is free to choose life, and death is made dormant.  It is a coming Covenant that is set-aside for the future: for those who have gone through -- and those children descended from those who have gone through -- the Tribulation and Great Tribulation Periods.  It is not a Covenant that is “archaios”,  “old from the very beginning”, such as from the time of the First Man in the Garden with GOD; even though we can, we see the similarities (e.g. Genesis 2:15-17).

 When the Millennial Reign ends, it may be that with the coming of the New Heavens and the New Earth that even this Azal Covenant Valley will be “put off” in the same way that the Old Testament Covenant is put off with the New.  2 Corinthians 3:14 expresses that the Old Covenant is not smashed and discarded, but rather it finds a fulfillment in the New.  However, as with the “old man” or “ho palaios anthropos” of Romans 6:6, we are called to find then, that our old nature is to no longer to be of use, and to put it off.   
 
 A raincoat is no longer of use “as being worn” when one is on a trek through the Sahara on a cloudless and scorching- hot day.  The body of corruptible flesh will be alien to us when we put on the new for a while, the next dimension and the next body being both of substance and ethereal.  We are called to put the old off, because it was meant only for a set time, and even to discard any desires of it -- once we have put on the new, but not before.  We find an Old Testament allegory in Josiah incinerating all Jerusalem’s idols.  In effect, we will one day do even as Josiah did with the ashes.  He dumped them into the running Kidron River-Torrent, as he looked forward to the coming of the Cross -- and he obtained a new day of freedom and liberty from GOD, which he had never heretofore known.  We likewise, are to baptize our old nature of death into the Passion of Messiah, immersing it completely into Him by means of faith; that by means also, of His Resurrection; we might be raised up eternally, in newness of life (Romans 6:1-10). 

[Brianroy]

East of Jerusalem with Simon the Cyrenian

Just who led captivity captive?[/[/u]center]

The bully faction of the First Priests were so confident in their zeal, that they triumphantly led Jesus directly out the Water Gate, and out of the City, stripped of His clothing, to be led as one near naked to His death on Golgotha.  As the “Nasi”, as the “princes” of the city, they lead Jesus on -- as if they were returning Caesars, -- leading their captive foe for all of Rome (in this case, for all of Jerusalem) to see. I am of a mind, that because Nicodemus was one of the 7 elders of the Sanhedrin, and a secret believer in Jesus, that no more than 6  led the procession (being the remaining of the 7 elders). 

 In all likelihood, the precious garment of purple was carried in a satchel by one of the guards; because if it were ruined through and through with blood, it would be all but worthless to gamble over (Matthew 25:36-37).  The Tradition left us by Josephus is that Jesus was to be garbed in sackcloth when presented for Judgment.  But the focus here is not what Jesus wore or did not wear before being stripped naked at the Cross.  It is the open show -- the parade to which the First Priests made of Jesus, -- that Jesus did reverse (by the power of His Resurrection) and make of these First Priests and others to which Paul also alludes to in Colossians 2:15,

      “And having stripped the clothes off the first rulers and
        the authorities,
                              He displayed (these ones instead) in all
                          public speaking (and in the public eye),
                        leading them       in it triumphantly
                                      (as if they themselves now  follow behind).”
      (Colossians 2:15 -- my translation w/ word pictures) 
 

         

 Even so, it is the power of what GOD did at the Cross, which was the true triumph; because the Resurrection was the affirmation of that very power and victory of GOD, in Christ Jesus, over sin -- through the Cross.
 
Again, Matthew and Mark accurately portray what the Roman soldiers did to Jesus, and having been the ones who led Jesus away (Matthew 27:31; Mark 15:20).

  Luke’s documentary from eyewitnesses to the event, as well as John of Zebedee, infer that the chief priests also participated in the living funeral march -- as Christ was led away to Calvary  (Luke 23:26; John 19:16).

Therefore, the parade of Jesus being  led by the first priests of the Sanhedrin is not a Pauline theological hypothesis or concept, it is an established and historically testified eyewitness fact. 

 The documentary evidence gathered from Mark through Peter would have also included the testimony of Simon the Cyrene through Simon’s wife and their son Rufus, who were founding members of the Churches of Rome (Romans 16:13). 

The Churches of Rome and Ephesus found their origin in Corinth of Achaia, where Luke had written his Gospel years earlier in A.D. 50.
We know that Eusebius cites Dionysius, bishop of Corinth (ca. 190-200 A.D.), as writing that Peter jointly founded the Corinthian and Roman Churches with Paul (Eusebius, History of the Church, 2.25). 

 Therefore, both Mark (i.e. Peter) and Luke, who both spent time with Rufus and his mom, in both Corinth and Rome, and  found their source witness in mother and son first at Corinth (where Luke wrote his Gospel first, in A,D, 50).

  Because of Luke’s meticulous nature for accuracy, we may conclude the extreme likelihood that both of these witnessed Simon being kicked about with the knees, until he submitted to carrying the Cross.  Afterwards, following the family Patriarch to Golgotha, where he was set free from his forced service in carrying the Cross of Jesus all the way from the Dung and Water Gate street intersect.  From there, he followed behind Jesus, who followed behind and up alongside with the Romans, who followed behind the  First Priests.

This confirms Paul’s statement in Colossians 2:15, for Christ not only won every debate, but He -- through the Cross, and visibly confirmed by His victorious resurrection -- did turn the defeat into a victory, placing shame and dishonor upon the would be victors of the Sanhedrin katan (lesser group of 23 within the Sanhedrin-of-70 / Sanhedrin-gadol)  Conspiracy.        



The Passage of Simon the Cyrenian

As was just mentioned, that even as the certain of the First Priests made an open show of Christ, and led him to His death; there was another victim in all of this, who was forced into this event: Simon of Cyrene (Cyrene: located in modern eastern Libya). 

Cyrene, in the early First Century A.D., was an overflow colony from Egypt, settled largely by Jews from out of Alexandria.   Because of the Crucifixion experience, and what followed thereafter, (i.e., the Resurrection), Simon settled and was buried in Jerusalem.1

          In A.D. 50, the physician Luke compiled His Gospel account while in Corinth of Achaia, Greece. 

In Corinth, Luke interviewed the visiting apostles of Christ, as well as the mother of Jesus.  Luke also interviewed many more who also were eyewitness of Christ, perhaps before becoming disciples of Him at Pentecost in 30 A.D., and thereafter.  From these, he recorded the first of the 4 gospels, and wrote down the eyewitness accounts only 20 years after the events themselves. 

In relation to this, he would write the Book of Acts some 7 years later.  Acts was almost immediately followed (within two months) by Paul’s teachings as recollected by Luke (following the June 29, 57 A.D. deaths of Peter and Paul in Rome).  That third work became known to us as the Book of Hebrews (cf.  "Redating the Revelation and the New Testament while destroing the "Q' Myth"  thread, under "texts" forum). 

So, in 50 A.D., in the midst of the Apostles Peter and Paul, and in the midst of other Apostles who have come to Corinth (cf., I Corinthians 9:5), and of Rufus and his mom, Luke writes:

"And as they led (Christ) away, they [the Roman guards] laid hold upon one Simon, a Cyrenian, coming out of the country, and they laid the cross on him, that he might bear (it), following behind Jesus."      (Luke 23:26)  KJV

The combined accounts of Matthew 27:32, Mark 15:20c-21, and Luke 23:26, in the Literal Greek to English Translation would read as thus: 

"And brings out and leads Him so that He may be crucified;
and after having searched, found a man returning from the wild fields,
a certain Simon, --who by name and reputation is the father of Alexander
and Rufus --  this one they beat about with the knees violently, in order
that he would take up, raise the Cross, and bear it;
which he did take up, bear, and endure  behind the back of Jesus.”       
                                                             (Translation mine)   

                         
       The emphasis in this verse is where Simon was coming from: the "country". 

The word for "country" in the Greek, is the anarthous noun, "agrou"; or literally, "a field".

 When this usage is examined in relation to Jerusalem, it is directly used of that region which lies south of Jerusalem. 

In other words, an entrance through a southern lower city gate (onto a north - south route) directly converging with the east-west water gate road (to Siloam/ the Water gate) that lay in/against the Kidron Valley.
=====================================================

1     Biblical Archaeology Review, Vol. 29, No. 4, Jul/Aug 2003, pp. 46-51.  “Family Tomb of Simon the Cyrene…’Treasures in the Storeroom’ by Tom Powers.”

 In 1941, Eleazar Sukenik (and his assistant Nahman Avigad) discovered the hewn rock cave of Simon the Cyrene in the Kidron Valley.  Among the bone ossuaries: Simon, his son Alexander, and three others of the family.  A Herodian era lamp lay present in the tomb, as well. 

[kattey]

The historian Will Durant in his series of _The Story of Civilization_ says the Jews banned abortion at an early time, primarily because they numbered so few.  Their goal was to build up their population, and I can't believe the Jews were doing so at the time of Jesus' crucifixion.  Durant said it was the Canaanites who aborted and sacrificed their children in the Valley of Hinom, which supposedly is the Hebrew word for hell.

After reading some of the interpretations of Revelations, including the latest which says the number 666 referred to Nero, I have my doubts about any of the interpretations.  John was banned to an Island off the coast of Turkey, where he wrote raging threats against the Romans.

[Brianroy]

Kattey,

    The stigma of Hinom as a valley of abortion went back to the prior expulsion under Nebuchadnezzar in 586 B.C. 

Passages such as:
"the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire unto Molech" Jeremiah 32:35 

 for example, are used to say "that because of idolatry, Israel and Judah were taken captive and dispersed among the nations."   

In regard to 70 A.D., the rabbinic works say it was in regard to "causeless hatred" or "in-fighting" among the factions of the Jews during the Roman war.

If you got the impression that I was saying in the time of Christ that abortions were being committed in Hinom, I apologize.  My position is prior to 586 B.C.  unborn babies and children not yet recognized in age by Torah  were offered up to Baal and Molech.  At the time of Christ, Paschal lambs were cooked and then burned, and Booths were burned in the Hinom in the Spring and Fall festivals.

As for John, there are those who say he was banished to "copper mines" when they mix myth into tradition as if fact.  But we know that Caesar's copper mines were on Cyprus, and NOT Patmos (josephus, Antiquities, 16.4.5) in which Antipater had passed on as an inheritance in his line, half ownership in the copper mines of Cyprus that had been gifted him by Caesar. 

Please check my posting as to the redating of Revelation and the NT while destroying "Q"  thread.  In it, I quote a proper context on the 666 issue, showing how liberal scholars, taking Irenaeus out of context, have created a myth that John wrote his Apocalypse in the 90s, when de facto, it was over 40 years earlier.   As late as Epiphanius, it was known that John was aphiemi - sent away or banished, not imprisoned with desmos (bonds or chains) but simply afflicted (thlipsei) emotionally and psychologically. 

Irenaeus supports this very specifically, telling us that after Paul left, John remained PERMANENTLY among the Ephesian Christians so that there was no discernable period of absence for anyone to accuse that Church of not having John present.  Hence, for 44 years...since Paul APPROVED Revelation (according to more second Century tradition), and Acts bears such an account as being plausible in inference,  666 certainly is not nor could be Nero, if John is available to be asked the meaning and at 98 A.D., no one still knows such-a-one's identity.  Not even John, who, as I demonstrate, was age 52 when he wrote the Apocalypse following the Ephesian riot after which he suffered and had his life permanently altered as a consequence for what Paul did in that city.   

Don't forget, the Apostles assisted other Churches in founding and teaching -- as 1 Corinthians 9:5 demonstrates the Corinthians having personal knowledge of, and having met.  Further, the very Synagogue Paul came from was mixed Cyrenes, Ephesians, and Cilicians at Jerusalem...hence a likelihood that one of the Jewish leaders who stirred up the pagans at Ephesus, recognized John and had him seized when the garrisons came investigating.  Hence, John being boiled in oil, delivered by a miracle and "aphiemi" out to go anywhere but here.

Hope this helps.  Peace.

[serapha]

Simon the Cyrene was a Temple Levitical Priest, assigned to the vessels of the Hearth of Fire on the Passover, and was en route back to the Temple, when he was kicked about with the knees into submission by the Romans.

Hi there...

 



Source please.


~serapha~

[Brianroy]

My conclusions are sourced in the Greek of the NT Gospel accounts...
the traditions involved in the Pesach, and what one would be doing in coming in from the wild fields of Judea to have a note of importance among 3,000,000 others there...
the extreme likelihood  that one of his sons was a lawyer...
the prominence of the man being above reproach was not simply because he was rich, he is presumed in the NT after the manner of a holy priest or Levite above reproach by friend and foe alike in how he is addressed...
the fact that this same Cyrenian may have belonged to   the same or same kind of Pharisaic  synagogue that Paul (as "Saul")  attended at Jerusaelm (of all the 500 synagogues that were then present in Jerusalem) for which reason Luke mentions the mixture in Acts to Theophilus (who was keenly aware of the testimony in the Gospel of Luke)...
the fact that Simon was buried and allowed to be buried on holy ground in the Kidron (anathema to a non-Jewand perhaps to a non-priestly family of the period) in spite of his being a Christian...
even if rich, only a priest would have such a right.



You may also wish to read these two articles on Simon's burial in the Kidron Valley at a very precarious  time in Jewish history, when a non-priest Christian would almost certainly have been prevented by the Sanhedrin and Sicarii opposition.


Biblical Archaeology Society

AOL Search


I cannot say it is absolute...but I believe that I am making a correct and most likely analysis of the data.

I hope this helps.

Peace.

[Brianroy]

Turanclancath posted an excellent link recently, at which site this article was found:


Jerusalem's Tombs

Tombs in Jerusalem's Valleys

By Jacqueline Schaalje


If the Temple Mount is Heaven, then the valleys around it represent the opposite. The valleys surrounding Jerusalem's Old City have long been associated with Hell and the Last Judgment. According to sources in the Bible and elsewhere, and archaeological finds, the Kidron and Hinnom Valleys were a busy burying ground. Hundreds of graves, mostly from the Second Temple Period and belonging to wealthy Jews, lie scattered here. A number of these have been excavated. Work on this is still continuing.
Kidron Valley

The Kidron Valley, actually a wadi as it consists of a dry river bed, cuts along the Old City on the east and north side. On the east lies the Mount of Olives, which has one of the oldest Jewish cemeteries. On the north, Mount Scopus gently slopes upwards.

The Kidron valley was thought to be the place of the last Judgment due to the combination of quotes by two prophets. The visionary Joel wrote that the final reckoning of God would be in the valley of Jehoshaphat. It was also simply the name of one of the kings of Judah, who was buried in the valley and gave it its name. Zechariah thought that the day of reckoning would take place on the Mount of Olives. People who let themselves be interred there hoped to be the first in line to be received by God's redeeming justice.

In the depth three magnificent structures can be seen. They can be reached by foot from the Mount of Olives.

The first and most famous one is the Tomb of Avshalom. As is usual with almost all of these tombs, it has received a name that is very far removed from the real purpose and history of the monument. The first 'discovery' that it had something to do with Avshalom was by the medieval writer Benjamin of Tudela, who freely interpreted the text in 2 Samuel 18:18: 'Avshalom in his lifetime set up for himself a pillar that is in the King's Valley."


...This elegant shrine has nothing to do with Avshalom, the rebellious son of David. It dates from the first century. In David's time Jerusalem only consisted of a small settlement on the ridge south of the Temple Mount, which is known as the City of David. It was also here that the kings of the First Temple Period were buried, so it would be unlikely to find a grave of David's line in the Kidron valley.

So who was buried in the 20 meters high Avshalom's Tomb then? It probably belonged to the adjacent burial cave of Jehosphahat. The memorial or 'nefesh' is cut in the rock up to the roof and has Ionic columns on its four sides. The grave itself is decorated with vine leaves and bunches of grapes and has eight separate burial chambers. According to the custom of the times, the dead would be lain in one of these chambers. Often the bones were later collected and put in a stone chest with lids, or ossuary. These were also found in great abundance in the valleys. The most impressive ones are on display in the archaeological section of the Israel Museum.

The second tomb is the Tomb of Zechariah, again an incorrect name. It probably served as the nefesh of the tomb below it. This is indicated by the Hebrew inscription on the architrave above the two Doric columns on the lower monument on the south side, which says that it belonged to the priestly family of the Bene Hezir. The second structure on the north side is the actual tomb. The Hezirs worked in the Temple. The name also appears in the Bible: "the seventeenth of Hezir (1 Chronicles 24:15)." They continued serving also in the Second Temple, because they are again mentioned among the functionaries (Nehemiah 10:20).

The Doric columns of the Bene Hezir tomb are carved from the rock. The upper tomb of Zechariah is a square structure with Ionic columns and covered with a roof in the form of a pyramid.

There are other tombs in the Kidron valley, but they are less known, partly because they are in the village of Silwan on a separate hill. This was sometimes called the Mount of Offense; once the heathen Temple for Solomon's wives stood on its summit. The Arab village itself is not a popular tourist spot. It is built on a cemetery of the Iron Age. Some of the graves here are very old, and go back to the ninth century BCE. They were dug by Phoenicians. Their graves, in the middle of the rock, were never used. They are just empty holes.

At a later time Jewish Temple officials designed graves for themselves in Silwan. One of these is known as the Tomb of Pharaoh's Daughter, after a thought that it was a temple which Solomon had built for his Egyptian wife (1 Kings 3:1). It is located in the north of the village, and looks like a house without windows. The structure is similar to the Tomb of Zechariah and consists of a rock-hewn cube with a pyramidal roof on it. Again this memorial is very old and dates from the 8th Century BCE. A hermit who inhabited the tomb in medieval times renovated the building and damaged the Hebrew inscription, of which only two letters remain in the upper left corner.

One other tomb in Silwan is very interesting for its inscriptions, which has been brought to the British Museum. One text says that it is the sepulcher of "Yahu who is over the house. There is no silver and no gold here but his bones and the bones of his slave-wife with him. Cursed be the man who will open this." The tomb is identified as belonging to Shebna, one of the diplomats sent by Judean king Hezekia to make peace with the Assyrians in 701 BCE (2 Kings 18:18, Isaiah 36:3, 22:15-25).

Scattered in the village and surroundings are a dozen other tombs. They all belonged to rich Jewish families. Some families were not of Judea, but came from the Diaspora.

...Hinnom valley

Other tombs were detected in the Hinnom valley. This sunny valley stretches round the southern and western sides of the Old City. It seems unlikely now, but it was traditionally associated with Hell. It was the location of the 'Tophet' (Burner), where children were sacrificed alive to the god Moloch (2 Kings 23:10). It was also the haunting spot of the demon Azazel (Leviticus 16:10). This creature lives on in the Hebrew saying: "go to Azazel", the equivalent of 'go to hell.'

The connection to Azazel comes from a passage in the writings of the Jewish writer Enoch who describes the damned valley. It was burning with a fire, in which the kings and powerful people were cast. They were put into heavy chains of iron. Enoch then asks for whom the chains are meant. He receives the answer: "These are being prepared for the hosts of Azazel so that they may take them and cast them into the abyss of complete condemnation (1 Enoch: 54:1-5)."

Hinnom is translated into Greek as Gehenna. In the Mishnah this dark place is known as the pit of destruction (Avoth 5:19). The idea that it was hell also comes from the contrast with the Temple Mount: it is the highest point in Jerusalem, while the Hinnom valley is the lowest.

There are two well-preserved Jewish tombs from the time of Herod inside the monastery of St. Onuphrius on the southern slope. The first one has been turned into a chapel. Both have perfectly preserved classical facades decorated with varied geometric designs. The monuments have several burial niches with benches on which the dead were laid out.

A little bit more to the south, near Ramban in Alfasi street, is the tomb of Jason. There is no connection with the Greek hero, but in this case the family of the high priests of the Temple is meant. The second book of Maccabees (5:5-10) tells that Jason's family was banned in 172 BCE by Menelaus, a rival priest. The next king Alexander Jannaeus restored them, and made repairs to the family tomb in order to prepare it for the burial of his grandson, who was also called Jason. This man was a naval commander, which is probably why there is a charcoal drawing of two warships in the courtyard. Also an inscription witnesses that Jason sailed to the coast of Egypt. Inside there are eight niches for graves, behind a small opening on the left. To make room for additional burials the bones were later removed to the charnel space in front. The pyramidal roof over the courtyard is a reconstruction. The building has only one column.

Just south of the King David Hotel is the family tomb of King Herod. It is closed by a large stone. Herod himself was not buried here, but at the site of Herodion. The four chambers of beautifully cut stone were found empty, because they were robbed. That Herod had a family tomb in West-Jerusalem is recorded by Josephus (War).

from the September 2001 Edition of the Jewish Magazine