Western Wall

31°46′36″N 35°14′3″E

The Western Wall by night.

The Western Wall (Hebrew: הכותל המערבי, translit.: HaKotel HaMa'aravi), or simply The Kotel, is a retaining wall in Jerusalem that dates from the time of the Jewish Second Temple (516 BCE - 70 CE). It is sometimes referred to as the Wailing Wall (Template:Lang-ar), referring to Jews mourning the destruction of the Temple. The Western Wall is part of the bigger religious site in the Old City of Jerusalem called Har ha-Bayit (the Temple Mount) to Jews and Christians, or Al-Haram al-Qudsi al-Sharif (the Noble Sanctuary) to Muslims. The Western Wall is revered for its proximity to the sacred Holy of Holies on the Temple Mount, which is the Most Holy Place in Judaism. This means that for Jews the Western Wall is the holiest location that is currently generally accessible to the Jewish people for prayer. There is a small area below ground level, called "The Cave", in the Western Wall Tunnel, that is closest to the site of the Holy of Holies. However, as this area is not amenable to the large groups that frequent the wall, most people limit their visits to the outdoor plaza.

At any hour, Jewish men and women can be found praying at the wall, which is actually a large outdoor synagogue. As is traditional in Jewish synagogues, there are a number of holy arks containing Torah scrolls, tables for reading of the law and a mechitza, or divider, separating the men's and women's sections of the wall. Bar mitzvah celebrations are frequently held here, and people of various ages travel from all over the world to have their ceremonies at the Kotel. It is also a tradition to deposit slips of paper with wishes or prayers on them in the crevices and crannies of the wall. Looking closely, one can see hundreds of tiny, folded papers stuffed inside every space that will hold them.

The Temple in Jerusalem was the most sacred building in Judaism. Herod the Great built vast retaining walls around Mount Moriah, expanding the small, quasi-natural plateau on which the First and Second Temples stood into the wide open spaces of the Temple Mount seen today.

History

According to the Bible, the First Temple or Solomon's Temple was built in the 10th century BCE atop a pre-existing megalithic platform. It was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. The Second Temple was built in 516 BCE, the sixth year of the reign of Darius the Great (Ezra 6:15) and destroyed by the Roman Empire in the year 70 CE as a result of the First Jewish-Roman War.

According to Judaism's religious texts, when the legions of Titus destroyed the Temple, only a part of an outer court-yard "western wall" remained standing. Jewish texts teach that Titus left it as a bitter reminder to the Jews that Rome had vanquished Judea. The Jews, however, attributed it to a promise made by God that some part of the holy Temple would be left standing as a sign of God's unbroken bond with the Jewish people in spite of the catastrophes which had befallen them.

Eyewitness accounts of Roman actions

According to Josephus,

as soon as the army had no more people to slay or to plunder, because there remained none to be the objects of their fury (for they would not have spared any, had there remained any other work to be done), [Titus] Caesar gave orders that they should now demolish the entire city and Temple, but should leave as many of the towers standing as were of the greatest eminence; that is, Phasaelus, and Hippicus, and Mariamne; and so much of the wall as enclosed the city on the west side. This wall was spared, in order to afford a camp for such as were to lie in garrison [in the Upper City], as were the towers of feet [the three forts] also spared, in order to demonstrate to posterity what kind of city it was, and how well fortified, which the Roman valor had subdued; but for all the rest of the wall [surrounding Jerusalem], it was so thoroughly laid even with the ground by those that dug it up to the foundation, that there was left nothing to make those that came thither believe it [Jerusalem] had ever been inhabited. This was the end which Jerusalem came to by the madness of those that were for innovations; a city otherwise of great magnificence, and of mighty fame among all mankind.

And truly, the very view itself was a melancholy thing; for those places which were adorned with trees and pleasant gardens, were now become desolate country every way, and its trees were all cut down. Nor could any foreigner that had formerly seen Judaea and the most beautiful suburbs of the city, and now saw it as a desert, but lament and mourn sadly at so great a change. For the war had laid all signs of beauty quite waste. Nor had anyone who had known the place before, had come on a sudden to it now, would he have known it again. But though he [a foreigner] were at the city itself, yet would he have inquired for it.

...the Romans set fire to the extreme parts of the city [the suburbs] and burnt them down, and entirely demolished [Jerusalem's] walls.

When [Titus] entirely demolished the rest of the city, and overthrew its walls, he left [three] towers as a monument of his good fortune, which had proved [the destructive power of] his auxiliaries, and enabled him to take what could not otherwise have been taken by him.

Venerated by the Jews

Jews praying by the Western Wall

Slips of paper with prayers on them in the cracks of the Wall.

The Western Wall in 1870

The Western Wall is holy to the Jewish people because, of the remaining walls of Temple Mount, it is located closest to the Holy of Holies, the holiest site in Judaism. The Wall has become the holiest site accessible to Jews, since according to Jewish law entry to the Dome of the Rock, site of the Foundation Stone where the Holy of Holies was located during Temple times, together with the rest of the Temple Mount, is now forbidden under the pain of Karet (Divinely hastened death).

Jews have prayed at the Western Wall for hundreds of years, believing that the Divine Presence (Shekhinah) rests upon it and that the gate of heaven is situated directly above it. The tradition of placing a prayer written on a small piece of paper into a crack in the Wall goes back hundreds of years.

Included in the thrice daily Jewish prayers are fervent pleas that God return the Jewish exiles to the Land of Israel, rebuild the Temple (i.e., build the Third Temple), and bring the messianic era with the arrival of the Jewish Messiah.

Restricted holy areas

See also: Temple Mount

According to many rabbis, Jews are forbidden to enter certain areas of the Temple Mount according to Jewish law. These areas are defined differently by different rabbinic authorities. Nonetheless, almost all agree that the entrance into the area occupied by the Dome of The Rock is forbidden. That same area was once occupied by the Temple, which was a biblically designated holy place.

The rock beneath the Dome of The Rock is considered by some rabbinic midrashic texts to be the foundation from which God created the universe. According to some rabbinic works, this rock was where the Biblical patriarch Isaac was bound by Abraham during his near-sacrifice in the binding of Isaac. This area was held to be where the patriarch Jacob slept and dreamt of a ladder going up to heaven with angels going up and down. This spot is identified with the Holy Of Holies.

During the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah, only certain people, such as the priests, were permitted into the Temple's grounds. The Temple complex consisted of distinct areas, each with its own level of holiness. The most holy area, the Holy Of Holies (Kodesh Hakodashim), the central part of the Temple, was entered only once a year on Yom Kippur and only by the High Priest, the Kohen Gadol. He was tethered by a rope, because it was believed that others entering the Holy of Holies would be put to death by God for not being pure enough to enter. The rope made it possible to remove the body of the Kohen Gadol from the holiest part of the temple if he was not ritually clean enough to enter and was put to death.

Other courts were accessible only to members of the priestly family, the Kohanim. Other areas farther out were accessible to the Levi'im. Still farther out were courts accessible to male Jews, then all Jews, and the outermost courts, accessible to non-Jews.

During subsequent occupations

During the time that foreign armies occupied the lands of Judea and the Land of Israel, the Western Wall always remained a site venerated by Jews; many trekked from across the world to spend their last years near the walls of Jerusalem, spending much of their time in tearful prayer in front of the Western Wall; non-Jewish observers watching the Jews cry there (mourning the destruction of the Temple) gave the site its popular nickname, the Wailing Wall.

The Wall as viewed by Muslims

The site is also holy to Muslims, who believe Solomon to be a Holy Prophet of God. Muslims also believe that Mohammed made a spiritual journey to "the farthest mosque," which they hold to be Jerusalem, in 632 CE on a winged creature from God named al-Buraq, a journey which is referred to as Isra and Mi'raj. While there, it is believed he tethered the horse to a wall, which some Muslims believe to be the Western Wall. Hence the Arabic name for the wall is the al-Buraq Wall. To commemorate the same belief, in 687 CE Muslims built the Dome of the Rock and the nearby Al-Aqsa Mosque ("the farthest mosque") on the Temple Mount, encompassed by the wall.

The theory that the Western Wall was used for this tethering is, however, disputed. The eponymous Al-Aqsa Mosque is adjacent to the south wall, and Islamic scholars in the 11th and 17th centuries thought the tethering occurred there. The scholar Shmuel Berkowitz explains that Muslim attribution of holiness to the Western Wall began only in the last 100 years. The official guides published by Waqf in 1914, 1965 and 1990, do not attribute holiness to the wall and the entry "al-Buraq" in the Encyclopedia of Islam does not make the connection either. According to Moshe Sharon, a professor in Islamic history at the Hebrew University, the Muslim connection is a complete fabrication: "Jerusalem is unimportant to Islam until someone else wants it"

Historically, el-Mabka, meaning "place of wailing," was the Arabic term for the wall. The designation "Wailing Wall" which found its way into many European languages stems from this name.

Ottoman control

By 1517 Islamic Ottoman Empire under Selim I took the land of what was once ancient Israel and Judea from the Egyptian Mamelukes (1250-1517). The Ottomans had a benevolent attitude towards the Jews, having welcomed thousands of Jewish refugees who had recently been expelled from Spain by Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella of Castile in 1492. Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent was so taken with Jerusalem and its plight that he ordered a magnificent, surrounding, fortress-wall built around the entire city, which was not that large at that time. This wall still stands and can be seen today.

Under the British

1917. Jewish Legion soldiers at the Western Wall after taking part in British conquest of Jerusalem

Following Britain's victories during the Sinai and Palestine Campaigns under Field Marshal Edmund Allenby, the British took control of the land in 1917. Jews were allowed to stand at the wall and pray.

The 1929 Hebron massacre broke out partly because the Arabs claimed variously that the Jews were trying to build a synagogue near the wall or take over the site. In 1930 the British Government appointed a commission "to determine the rights and claims of Moslems and Jews in connection with the Western or Wailing Wall". The League of Nations approved the commission on condition that the members were not British.. The commission concluded that the wall, and the adjacent pavement and Mograbi Quarter, were solely owned by the Muslim Waqf. However, Jews had the right to "free access to the Western Wall for the purpose of devotions at all times" subject to some stipulations that limited which objects could be brought to the Wall and forbade the blowing of the Shofar. Muslims were forbidden to disrupt Jewish devotions by driving animals or other means.

Jordanian rule

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the area near the wall was taken over by the Jordanian Arab Legion. Jews were denied access to the wall during the period of Jordanian occupation, in violation of the 1949 Armistice Agreement.

Israel since 1967

Prior to 1967, the Western Wall existed little more than as a sliver, measuring approximately 100 feet. While a narrow space was allowed in front for prayers, it was otherwise surrounded by houses, even as it encroached upon the Holy Mount.

Following the victory of the Israel Defense Forces during the 1967 Six-Day War, the Western Wall, together with all of Jerusalem and the West Bank came under Israeli control. The Israelis demolished the medieval Moroccan Quarter in front of the Western Wall facing away from the Temple Mount, and built a large plaza in its place, unveiled in an extension all the way to its southern corner. It was also realized that the retaining walls extended downward nearly as much as they had been exposed above what was considered ground level. The lower courses were larger, better-shaped, and much older. Tens of thousands of Jews flock to the wall on the Jewish holidays, and it remains a favorite tourist attraction year round.

Many foreign heads of state who visit Israel come to the Wall out of their respect for its significance to the Land of Israel and world Jewry. The Western Wall continues to have a powerful hold on the devotion of Jews all over the world. Over the decades, millions have come as tourists and pilgrims to be able to touch the Wall with their hands and feel the sanctity that is said to emanate from it.

Since 1967, it has been customary among many Jews throughout the world to hold their Bar Mitzvah services at the Western Wall.

It has also become known for its Tefillin booth, where Chabad activists regularly promote the Tefillin Campaign. This is one of the Lubavitcher Rebbe's Mitzvah Campaigns, which calls for all Jewish males to don Tefillin on days other than Shabbat and Yom Tov, in accordance with Jewish law.

Since 1989 Women Of The Wall have been conducting a court battle to secure the right of women to pray at The Wall wearing a tallit praying out loud and reading from the Torah.

After the Six Day War, Rabbi Shlomo Goren famously sounded the shofar at the site.

The Western Wall Plaza is the site of the swearing-in ceremonies of newly full-fledged soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces following basic training.

• The Western Wall in April 2006
  The Western Wall in April 2006
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  The Western Wall and Israeli Flag
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  Bar mitzvah celebration at the Wall (located on the right)
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  Men of different backgrounds praying at the Kotel in January of 2005
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  A swearing-in ceremony for the Israel Defense Forces in late January, 2006
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  The Western Wall Plaza from above
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  Early 1900s.

Recent damage to plaza

On February 16, 2004, a portion of a stone retaining wall that forms one side of the Western Wall Plaza and supports the ramp that leads from the Western Wall plaza to the Gate of the Moors and onto the Temple Mount collapsed. In February 2007 repair work on the ramp led to violent demonstrations.

See also

• Western Wall Tunnel
• Western Stone

External links

• Resources > Jerusalem Project of the Dinur Center for Research in Jewish History, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• Researching the Jerusalem Temple Mount
• [4]
• History of the Western Wall
• An Ultra-Orthodox Jew will pray on your behalf for 40 consecutive days (Jewish Tradition)
• Placing notes between the stones of the Western Wall
• Center for Jerusalem Studies
• "Western Wall" or "Wailing Wall"?
• Inscription on a Course of the Western Wall
• Egyptian writer says Muhammad's night trip was to Medina, not Jerusalem
• The Temple Mount and Fort Antonia
• The Shofar and the Wall (1930)
• Women of the Wall

Live cameras, movies, and photographs

• Virtual Tour of Jerusalem @ jerusalem360.com - Interactive Panoramas from Israel
• Live 24 hr camera (click on webcam and live cameras)
• Live view of the Wall, refreshed every 20 minutes
• 360 degree dynamic panorama of The Wall (QuickTime movie format)
• Part of the wall in 3D (in gallery set 3)
• Jerusalem Photo Portal- Western Wall
• Liberation of the Temple Mount and Western Wall by Israel Defense Forces - Historic Live Broadcast on Voice of Israel Radio, June 7th, 1967
• Western Wall Photos