Produktdetaljer
Biographical note
Alan Balfour is Professor and Dean of the College of Architecture at Georgia Tech. Formerly he has served as dean of Schools of Architecture in Texas and New York and was chairman of the Architectural Association in London. His writings include Creating a Scottish Parliament and books on three world cities Shanghai, New York, and Berlin. He has received numerous awards, including the Topaz Medal, the highest recognition given in North America to an educator in architecture.- The most extensive study of the interrelated history of two monuments, Solomon’s Temple and The Dome of the Rock, drawing on an exhaustive review of all the visual and textual evidence
- Relayed as a gripping narrative, allowing readers to re-enter and experience the emotions and the visceral reality of the major events in its history
- Integrates illustration with the text to offer a highly detailed and accurate portrait of the major structures and figures involved in the history of the temple
- Opens up a fascinating line of questioning into the conventional interpretation of events, particularly Christ’s actions in the Temple
- Reproduces rarely seen detailed drawings of the subterranean passages beneath Temple Mount as part of the British survey in the 19th century
List of Figures ix
List of Plates xii
Prologue 1
1 Solomon’s Temple 6
The Ark of the Covenant 8
King David 19
The Temple of Solomon 21
Nebuchadnezzar II 28
2 Herod 37
The Maccabeans 41
Pompey 43
Herod 45
Herod Demolishes the Second Temple 48
The Third Temple 51
The Royal Portico 57
3 ‘‘Not . . . one stone upon another’’ 65
Moneychangers 68
Paul 72
The Temple Destroyed 74
4 The Holy Sepulcher 88
Hadrian and Aelia Capitolina 88
Constantine 93
The Plague 103
The Fall of Rome 105
Hagia Sophia 107
Madaba 110
The Persian War 111
5 Dome of the Rock 117
Muhammad and the Fall of Jerusalem 122
Umar in Jerusalem 123
The Dome of the Rock 129
The Rock 137
6 Templum Domini 146
The Jews Return 149
The First Crusade 154
Crusader Jerusalem 158
Templum Domini 160
The Templars in the Palace of Solomon 163
Saladin 167
7 Recreating the Temple 175
In the Imagination of Priests 178
The Temple in the Popular Imagination 199
Return to Mount Moriah 205
8 Jerusalem 217
Views 217
Maps 225
British Ordnance Survey of Jerusalem 234
The Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) 240
Jerusalem and World War I 247
9 Al-Haram Al-Sharif 254
The Path to Conflict 254
Jerusalem Under Transjordan 257
An Naksah, The Six Day War 259
Liberation of Temple Mount 260
Archeology and the Western Wall 263
The Burning of Al-Aqsa Mosque 264
Jewish Prayer on Temple Mount 266
The Rabbi’s Tunnel 269
Continual Provocation 271
Rabbi’s Tunnel Revisited 275
Camp David Summit 276
The Second Intifada 277
Epilogue 282
Acknowledgments, Sources, and Methods 290
Index 295
“In this carefully researched and beautifully illustrated work, Alan Balfour places the Temple Mount within its cultural context, making a vital contribution to our understanding of the Middle East today.”
Jonathan Schneer, Author of The Balfour Declaration: The Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict.
“With the skill of a master detective, scholar and architect, Alan Balfour peels away the layers of time to reveal the astonishing history of one of the world’s most significant places.”
Robert Campbell, The Boston Globe.
This work charts the interrelated histories of Solomon’s Temple and Islam’s Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem over the course of three thousand years.
Alan Balfour, a leading architectural historian, combines scrupulous research, primary documentation, and ample illustration, with an authoritative and elegant narration to chronicle the history of a place that serves as a cultural nexus of Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike. He vividly re-creates the will of the players – Solomon, Herod, Christ, Paul, Muhammad – and the epic events that have been played out on this sacred ground, which continues to compel the imagination of all the religions of the book.
The book details the constructions and reconstructions from its founding into the present and the continuing struggle after the Israel–Arab wars; anticipating the future controversies about the possession and use of the site. Alongside the pilgrims, plunderers, and power brokers, Solomon’s Temple depicts the many travelers and artists who have passed through, narrated, and imagined the Temple across the millennia.