When was temple mount built

Emperor Hadrian's collective punishments for the Jews included a ban on visiting Jerusalem, let alone Temple Mount; folding the province of "Iudaea" into a new political entity, Syria Palaestina; and rebuilding Jerusalem - as pagan city, named Aelia Capitolina. Jerusalem's rebranding included installing cultic statues abhorred by Judaism on the Temple Mount, and possibly building a pagan temple there for the Capitoline Triad of supreme deities - Jupiter, Juno and Minerva.

Some authorities however say this temple was located elsewhere in the city. Temple Mount was not rebuilt, though. The main Christian shrine in the city became the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built at Constantine's order on Golgotha, the site of a pagan temple — and of Jesus' crucifixion. Pilgrims at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

Photo by: AP. The following year, Julian — who was devoutly pagan and wished to reinstate worship of the Roman pantheon — dropped by Jerusalem on his way to invade Persia. As part of his ultimately fruitless efforts to undo the Christianization of the empire, he decreed that the Jews could rebuild their temple. The Jews apparently took to the task with much enthusiasm, only to have their hopes crushed less than a year later when Julian was killed in battle. With his death, his protection disappeared.

Over the centuries, the pagan shrines on the Temple Mount crumbled. That would change. In the desert of Arabia, a new religion was taking form, led by a merchant named Mohammed. Many Islamic doctrines were based on Judaism and Christianity and in fact, the original direction of prayer the Qibla was towards the Temple Mount.

Then, 13 years after Mohammed decreed that the Qibla would be the Temple Mount in CE, he changed his mind, and decreed that henceforth it would Mecca. Nor are the city or the site mentioned explicitly in the Quran. Several caliphs later, in , Caliph Abd al-Malik had a shrine built over a rock in the middle of the Temple Mount.

In Jewish tradition, that rock, called the Foundation Stone, is the meeting point of heaven and Earth, the site where Creation began. It is also believed to be the rock on which Abraham bound Isaac; the spot where Jacob rested for the night and dreamed of wrestling with the angel while escaping Esau; it is believed to be the center stone of the Temple, and the place where Muhammad led the prayer during his night journey.

Al-Malik's shrine, the Dome of the Rock, that shelters the rock, was built on the site of the Second Temple and its dome - once gray, now golden - dominates the Temple Mount to this very day. It was apparently Abd al-Malik himself who began the work of replacing the nearby wooden structure built by Umar with the magnificent silver-domed stone mosque Al Aqsa.

However, traditional Jewish law has been understood to bar entry to the site. The exact location of the Holy of Holies is not known. The Western Wall, the last standing retaining wall of the Temple Mount, is the closest to the mount that Jews are traditionally permitted to pray. However, Jews do visit the Temple Mount regularly. Since Israeli forces regained control of the Old City of Jerusalem during the Six-Day War of , Israel has extended its sovereignty over the site, though most of the world regards Israeli authority in all of eastern Jerusalem to be illegitimate.

Day-to-day authority over the site rests with the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf. A waqf is a charitable trust recognized by Islamic law. The Temple Mount may be accessed by anyone, but entry to the Dome of the Rock is restricted to Muslims. Though there are multiple gates to access the site, non-Muslims must enter through the Mughrabi Gate, located near the Western Wall plaza.

Israeli security controls the entry points. Instead of a small emergency exit, the Waqf excavated two arches, creating a massive vaulted entranceway. In doing so, bulldozers dug a pit more than feet long and nearly 40 feet deep. Trucks carted away hundreds of tons of soil and debris. Israeli archaeologists and scholars raised an outcry. Some said the Waqf was deliberately trying to obliterate evidence of Jewish history.

Others laid the act to negligence on a monstrous scale. But he told the Jerusalem Post that archaeological colleagues had examined the excavated material and had found nothing of significance.

And he bristled at the suggestion the Waqf sought to destroy Jewish history. Zachi Zweig was a third-year archaeology student at Bar- Ilan University, near Tel Aviv, when he heard news reports about dump trucks transporting Temple Mount soil to the Kidron Valley. With the help of a fellow student he rounded up 15 volunteers to visit the dump site, where they began surveying and collecting samples.

A week later, Zweig presented his findings—including pottery fragments and ceramic tiles—to archaeologists attending a conference at the university. By that point though, Zweig says, his cause had attracted the attention of the media and of his favorite lecturer at Bar-Ilan—the archaeologist Gaby Barkay. Zweig urged Barkay to do something about the artifacts. In , Barkay got permission to search the soil dumped in the Kidron Valley.

He and Zweig hired trucks to cart it from there to Emek Tzurim National Park at the foot of Mount Scopus, collected donations to support the project and recruited people to undertake the sifting. The Temple Mount Sifting Project, as it is sometimes called, marks the first time archaeologists have systematically studied material removed from beneath the sacred compound.

Barkay, ten full-time staffers and a corps of part-time volunteers have uncovered a wealth of artifacts, ranging from three scarabs either Egyptian or inspired by Egyptian design , from the second millennium B.

A bronze coin dating to the Great Revolt against the Romans A. Barkay says some discoveries provide tangible evidence of biblical accounts. Fragments of terra-cotta figurines, from between the eighth and sixth centuries B. Other finds challenge long-held beliefs. For example, it is widely accepted that early Christians used the Mount as a garbage dump on the ruins of the Jewish temples. Barkay and his colleagues have published their main findings in two academic journals in Hebrew, and they plan to eventually publish a book-length account in English.

To be sure, the Mount is a flash point in the Middle East conflict. While Israelis saw this as the reunification of their ancient capital, Palestinians still deem East Jerusalem to be occupied Arab land a position also held by the United Nations.

The Temple Mount is precariously balanced between these opposing views. Although Israel claims political sovereignty over the compound, custodianship remains with the Waqf. A few days after the meeting, Netanyahu called King Abdullah and assured him that the Jordanian special status at the Temple Mount would not change. Palestinian individuals participated in various acts of violence and incitement at the Temple Mount and al-Aqsa Mosque during October and November Protestors with bags over their hands and feet and masks on their faces to obstruct their appearance flung rocks, molotov cocktails, cinderblocks, and other items at Israeli security forces on multiple occasions.

On November 13, , more than 60 foreign Ambassadors and Diplomats stationed in Israel were briefed by the Israeli Police Commissioner and Deputy Foreign Minister about the status of the recent situation at the Temple Mount. During the briefing they were shown photos and videos of Palestinian individuals building barriers and other obstructions with trash cans and other materials to prevent security personnel from accessing certain areas of the grounds, and hurling fireworks and molotov cocktails from within the al-Aqsa Mosque where there is abundant historical and irreplacable material.

The only harm that came to the al-Aqsa Mosque came from the Palestinians themselves. They have their eyes on it. The women chanted at Jewish visitors, hurled anti-Semitic slurs, and chased Jewish individuals, leading some of them to be banned from the holy complex. A large group of masked Palestinian protestors attacked Israeli security forces at the Temple Mount with rocks, molotov cocktails, homemade explosives, firecrackers, and peices of wood during the weekend of July 25, After initially clashing with Israeli security forces, the protestors retreated inside of the al-Aqsa Mosque and began throwing items at police officers from within the Mosque.

In response, the police officers ventured inside of the Mosque and closed the doors and windows, which diffused the situation. Hundreds of Jewish individuals visited the Western Wall during the holiday. The group of U. Allegedly Jordanian Waqf gaurds, who carry the responsibility of providing security at the Temple Mount, began harassing the guide who was leading the Congressmen and trying to take his maps away.

Police were called to break up the commotion as a group of individuals began shouting at the Congressmen, and for the rest of their visit the group was followed by several Arab men who continued to intimidate and antagonize them.

Palestinian leaders spread false rumors in late that Israeli authorities were considering altering the status-quo at the Temple Mount and allowing Jews to pray in the mosques, which stoked the flames of violence.

Palestinian Muslim protestors and Israeli police clashed on the Temple Mount during the weekend of September 12, Palestinian youths and young adults holed up inside the al-Aqsa Mosque and flung molotov cocktails and large rocks at the security forces attempting to keep the peace among chaos.

Twenty-six Palestinians were injured during the confrontation along with five Israeli policemen. The violence damaged the windows and the carpets inside the mosque. In response to this violence, Israeli officials ramped up security and deployed additional soldiers and police officers in the area surrounding the Temple Mount. The following weekend Palestinian protestors once again clashed with Israeli security officers at the Temple Mount, but the situation was much more controlled.

Following a series of terror attacks targetting Israelis during September and October , Israeli authorities implemented age restrictions on the Temple Mount for the second time in less than one year, and closed Palestinian access to the Old City. On October 4, , Israeli security officials announced that they were banning non-resident Palestinians from the Old City of Jerusalem, as well as banning Muslims under the age of 50 from the al-Aqsa mosque compound.

The security forces had most recently restricted access to the mosque only to patrons over 50 years of age in November Although these restrictions were lifted two days later, the violence escalated. During the subsequent week seven Israelis were killed and twenty were injured by Palestinian terrorists, mostly in stabbing attacks.

The Israeli military deployed reserve troops throughout Jerusalem during the second weekend of October to assist security forces in countering this wave of violent attacks. Six companies worth of troops were deployed in Jerusalem on October 13, and security gaurds were on high alert country-wide. The violence continued into the next week. The resolution, which passed with 25 abstentions, also condemned Israel for archaeological excavations in the Old City of Jerusalem and particularly near the Temple Mount.

Secretary of State John Kerry announced on October 24, , that Israeli and Jordanian authorities had agreed to various steps aimed at reducing tensions at the holy site. After meeting with Israeli leaders as well as Jordanian King Abdullah and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, Kerry stated that all parties involved agreed to consider having round-the-clock video monitoring installed at the site.

All sides reaffirmed the Jordanian commitment to keep the current status-quo at the Temple Mount. Israel and Jordan officially signed an agreement for the installation of security cameras at the Temple Mount on March 6, The feed would be monitored by both Israeli and Jordanian authorities, and there would be no cameras placed inside the al-Aqsa mosque.

Installation of the security cameras was expected to be completed by Passover The resolution refers to the entire Temple Mount area only as the al-Aqsa Mosque, only referring to the Temple Mount in parenthesis. Israeli security officials made the decision to lengthen the time in the mornings dedicated to Jewish and non-Muslim visitations to the al-Aqsa compound by one hour. This decision, announced on December 5, , allows Jews and non-Muslims to visit the al-Aqsa compound from a.

A third police officer was lightly wounded. The shooters were subsequently killed by Israeli security forces. Israeli authorities shut down the holy site for two days for searches and subsequently learned an accomplice had hid the weapons used in the attack in the al-Aqsa mosque. This was only the third time the Temple Mount had been closed since the War. It was reopened on July 15, , with newly installed metal detectors, which Israelis officials said were necessary to ensure the safety of visitors to the site.

Cameras were added a few days later. The security measures are similar to those used at other holy sites around the world; nevertheless, Palestinians and some other Muslims outside Israel claimed they altered the status quo of the holy site. Fatah subsequently incited violent protests and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announced he was cancelling all cooperative activities with Israel until the detectors were removed.

Meanwhile, the Waqf called for worshippers to avoid the Temple Mount if the security measures remained in place. On July 24, , Israel decided to remove the cameras and metal detectors to defuse the situation while considering the introduction of other security measures.

The Dome of the Rock Arabic, Qubbat al-Sakhra is one of the most recognizable architectural glories of the world. It is the oldest Muslim religious building outside Arabia. The design of the building is basically Byzantine - double octagonal ambulatories encircling the Holy Rock.