In a prophecy of the Messiah as the foundation, or threshold, of a new temple, it was declared by the Lord: “Behold, I lay [or, I have laid] in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner-stone of sure foundation.”[463] Again, it was the promise of God to the Israelites that they should be restorers of worship on former foundations. “They that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in.”[464] New Testament phraseology makes frequent reference to this same idea. “According to the grace which was given unto me, as a wise master-builder, I laid a foundation,” says Paul. “But let each man take heed how he buildeth thereon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Christ Jesus.”[465] The Christian saints of the “household of God,” as “living stones,”[466] are “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief corner stone; in whom each several building, fitly framed together, groweth into a holy temple in the Lord.”[467] Muhammadanism, which shows many survivals of primitive ideas and primitive customs, emphasizes the importance of the first foundation as the only foundation, in the traditions and legends of the holy places of its most sacred city. Every _masjid_, or “place of prostration,” in that vicinity is on a site counted holy long centuries before the days of the Prophet of Islam. The Kaʿbah, or Holy House, in the mosk at Meccah is said to have been built by Adam himself, on the model of a similar structure in heaven. It would seem as if no earthly foundation, or threshold, could have been earlier than that; indeed, the Qurân declares: “The first house appointed unto men to worship in was that which was in Beccah [or Meccah];”[468] yet there is a tradition that Adam erected a place of prayer even before he built the Kaʿbah. In the Deluge the Holy House was destroyed; but Abraham was directed to rebuild it, and on digging beneath the surface of its site he discovered the original foundation, and the Kaʿbah was newly built up on that. According to Muhammadan traditions, it was while Hagar was near the site of the Holy House, with her famishing son Ishmael, that a spring of water gushed forth with its life-giving stream from beneath that holy site. And that spring is the well Zemzem, or Zamzam, whose waters are deemed sacred and life-giving to-day.