Day Six - The City of David

Our group less two not in the picture.

The Menorah.

The Knesset.

Lunch at IWO’S.The model of First Century Jerusalem.

The miniature 1:50 scale replica of the First Century city of Jerusalem.

Day Six - The City of David, Oct. 31 Today will be hard to describe to you. After the tour has ended Ed and I (Jim) might be writing some more articles about the many things that we learned on this trip. But for now this was our day. We spent most of our day, not in the Old City, but in the City of David which is on the southern end of the Temple Mount. This was the place that King David came to and made his palace. It was here that King Solomon was anointed king, at the Gihon Spring. Eli Shukron took us to an area not open to the public. Here he showed us his discovery of the temple that he believes is the place where Melchizedek lived as King of Salem (Jerusalem). He was priest of God and brought out bread and wine and blessed Abram. (Gen. 14:18,19). He explained the various things that he discovered here. We were deep under the ground going down lots of steps to see these sites. Quite the experience. He then showed us what he believes is the real location of the Pool of Siloam and then the road up to the Temple from there. This is the pool where the blind man received his sight after being touched by Jesus. Jesus put mud on his eyes and told him to go, wash in the Pool of Siloam. (John 9) He discovered the Pool of Siloam in 2004. In 2007 he excavated an ancient Jerusalem water channel that drained Jerusalem. In 2012 he uncovered the ancient Jerusalem pilgrim road. We were ready for lunch and had hamburgers and fries at a restaurant called, IWO’S. We then headed back toward our hotel and took a group picture at the Menorah near the Knesset. Just down the street we went to both the Bible Lands Museum and the Israel Museum Jerusalem. The Bible Lands Museum showed the history of the ancient Near East, the lands of the Bible. Then we crossed the street and went to the Israel Museum to see the Holy Land Model, a 1:50 miniature replica of Jerusalem during the time of Christ. Many historical documents were used to recreate Jerusalem in the first century. We also saw the Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran. A big day with lots of information and walking. Back to the hotel for dinner. 

(Unable to put up pictures from the City of David. I’ll put them up on another post.)