Bible Atlas: A Manual of Biblical Geography and HistoryHurlbut, Jesse Lyman
Religion
Bible Atlas: A Manual of Biblical Geography and History
Hurlbut, Jesse Lyman
Bible -- Geography; Bible -- Geography -- Maps; Bible -- History of Biblical events
5. The Christian Quarter is in the northwestern part of the city,
between the Jaffa and Damascus Gates, in the picture. Its most important
locality is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where tradition has fixed
the scenes of the crucifixion and resurrection. The church is a group of
buildings, crowned with a dome, and erected at various periods. The Holy
Sepulchre itself is a marble shrine within the cathedral, 26 feet long,
by 18 broad, and 20 feet high. If the ancient wall can be certainly
shown not to have been _outside_ of this place, then the identity of the
holy places may be deemed measurably sure, since the cross and the
sepulchre were undoubtedly near the wall, but without it. Another place
of interest is the Muristan, a ruined castle, which was the headquarters
of the Knights Hospitallers during the Crusades.
V. =Fountains and Pools.= Most of these are without the walls, and only
one is shown in the picture. The identification of the ancient pools is
not easy, and explorers are not agreed with regard to their position and
modern name. 1. The _Birket Mamilla_, supposed by many to represent the
Upper Pool of Gihon (2 Kings 18:17; Isa. 7:3), lies 2,000 feet west of
the Jaffa Gate, and is now 240 feet long by 144 wide, but anciently much
larger. 2. The _Birket es Sultan_, supposed to be the Lower Pool of
Gihon, where Solomon was crowned (1 Kings 1:38), lies just outside the
southwestern corner of the wall, in the Valley of Hinnom. It is narrow,
but 500 feet long. 3. The _Birket es Silwan_, or Pool of Siloam (John
9:7), is in the Tyropoeon Valley, near its junction with the Kedron
Valley, just outside the limit of the picture, on the left. It is 52
feet long, and 18 wide. 4. The _Birket el Hamra_ ("red pond") lies south
of the Pool of Siloam, still further outside of the picture, and is
larger, but now nearly filled up, and without water. Some think that
this is the pool dug by Hezekiah. (2 Chron. 32:30.) 5. The spring
_En-rogel_, called by Christians the Fountain of the Virgin, and by
Moslems _'Ain Umm ed Deraj_ ("the spring the mother of steps," from the
28 steps leading down to it), is the only natural fountain near the
city. It lies in the narrowest part of the Kedron Valley, opposite the
stone Zoheleth. (1 Kings 1:9.) Its action is intermittent, rising and
falling suddenly, sometimes oftener than once a day. From this fact,
some have thought it to be the Pool of Bethesda. (John 5:2-9.) 6. But
most of the explorers regard the Pool of Bethesda as identical with
the _Birket Israel_, which may be found on the picture just within the
eastern (foreground) wall, between the gate of St. Stephen and the
northern wall of the Temple Enclosure, just behind the little domed
building by the wall, to the left of St. Stephen's Gate. This is 360
feet long, by 120 feet wide, and 80 feet deep, but half filled with
rubbish. 7. The _Birket Hamman_ ("Pool of the Bath"), generally known as
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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