"_MARK YE WELL HER BULWARKS._"
NEHEMIAH iii.
The Book of Nehemiah is our principal authority for the ancient
topography of Jerusalem. But, as we have been already reminded, the
sieges from which the city has suffered, and the repeated destruction
of its walls and buildings, have obliterated many of the old landmarks
beyond recovery. In some places the ground is now found to be raised
sixty feet above the original surface; and in one spot it was even
necessary to dig down a hundred and twenty feet to reach the level of
the old pavement. It is therefore not at all wonderful that the
attempt to identify the sites here named should have occasioned not a
little perplexity. Still the explorations of underground Jerusalem
have brought some important facts to light, and others can be fairly
divined from a consideration of the historical record in the light of
the more general features of the country, which no wars or works of
man can alter.
The first, because the most obvious, thing to be noted in considering
the site of Jerusalem is its mountainous character. Jerusalem is a
mountain city, as high as a Dartmoor tor, some two thousand feet above
the Mediterranean, with a drop of nearly four thousand feet on the
farther side, beyond the Mount of Olives, towards the deep pit where
the Dead Sea steams in tropical heat. Looked at from the wilderness,
through a gap in the hills round Bethlehem, she soars above us, with
her white domes and towers clean-cut against the burning sky, like a
city of clouds. In spite of the blazing southern sunshine, the air
bites keenly on that fine altitude. It would be only reasonable to
suppose that the vigour of the highlanders who dwelt in Jerusalem was
braced by the very atmosphere of their home. And yet we have had to
trace every impulse of zeal and energy after the restoration to the
relaxing plains of the Euphrates and the Tigris! In all history the
moral element counts for more than the material. Race is more than
_habitat_; and religion is more than race.
Closely associated with this mountainous character of Jerusalem is a
second feature. It is clear that the site for the city was chosen
because of its singularly valuable ready-made defences. Jerusalem is a
natural fortress. Protected on three sides by deep ravines, it would
seem that she could be easily made impregnable. How awful, then, is
the irony of her destiny! This city, so rarely favoured by nature for
security against attack, has been more often assaulted and captured,
and has suffered more of the horrors of war, than any other spot on
earth.
The next fact to be noticed is the small size of Jerusalem. The
dimensions of the city have varied in different ages. Under the Herods
the buildings extended far beyond the ancient limits, and villas were
dotted about on the outlying hills. But in Nehemiah's day the city was
confined within a surprisingly contracted area. The discovery of the
"Siloam inscription," leading to the identification of the gorge known
to the Romans as the _Tyropoeon_ with the ancient "Valley of
Hinnom" or "Tophet," cuts off the whole of the modern Zion from the
site of the ancient city, and points to the conclusion that the old
Zion must have been nearer Moriah, and all Jerusalem crowded in the
little space to the east of the chasm which was once thought to have
run up through the middle of the city. No doubt the streets were
narrow; the houses may have been high. Still the population was but
slender, for after the walls had been built Nehemiah found the space
he had enclosed too large for the inhabitants.[173] But our interest
in Jerusalem is in no way determined by her size, or by the number of
her citizens. A little town in a remote province, she was politically
insignificant enough when viewed from the standpoint of Babylon, and
in comparison with the many rich and populous cities of the vast
Persian dominions. It is the more remarkable, then, that successive
Persian sovereigns should have bestowed rare favours on her. From the
day when Solomon built his temple, the unique glory of this city had
begun to appear. Josiah's reformation in concentrating the national
worship at Jerusalem advanced her peculiar privileges, which the
rebuilding of the temple before the restoration of the city further
promoted. Jerusalem is the religious metropolis of the world. To be
first in religious honour it was not necessary that she should be
spacious or populous. Size and numbers count for very little in
religion. Its valuation is qualitative, not quantitative. Even the
extent of its influence, even the size and mass of this, depends
mainly on its character. Moreover, in Jerusalem, as a rule, the really
effective religious life was confined to a small group of the
"pious"; sometimes it was gathered up in a single individual--a
Jeremiah, an Ezra, a Nehemiah. This is a fact replete with
encouragement for faith. It is an instance of the way in which God
chooses the weak things--weak as to this world--to confound the
strong. If a small city could once take the unique position held by
Jerusalem, then why should not a small Church now? And if a little
knot of earnest men within the city could be the nucleus of her
character and the source of her influence, why should not quite a
small group of earnest people give a character to their Church, and,
through the Church, work wonders in the world, as the grain of mustard
seed could move a mountain? The secret of the miracle is, like the
secret of nature, that God is in the city and the Church, as God is in
the seed. When once we have discovered this truth as a certain fact of
life and history, our estimate of the relative greatness of things is
revolutionised. The map and the census then cease to answer our most
pressing questions. The excellence we look for must be spiritual--vigour
of faith, self-abnegation of love, passion of zeal.
[173] Neh. xi. 1.
As we follow Nehemiah round the circuit of the walls the more special
features of the city are brought under our notice. He begins with the
"Sheep Gate," which was evidently near the temple, and the
construction of which was undertaken by the priests as the first piece
of work in the great enterprise. The name of this gate agrees well
with its situation. Opening on the Valley of the Kidron, and facing
the Mount of Olives and the lonely pass over the hills towards
Jericho, it would be the gate through which shepherds would bring in
their flocks from the wide pasturage of the wilderness. Possibly there
was a market at the open space just inside. The vicinity of the
temple would make it easy to bring up the victims for the sacrifices
by this way. As the Passover season approached, the whole
neighbourhood would be alive with the bleating of thousands of lambs.
Rich associations would thus cluster round the name of this gate. It
would be suggestive of the pastoral life so much pursued by the men of
Judah, whose favourite king had been a shepherd lad; and it would call
up deeper thoughts of the mystery of sacrifice and the joy of the
Paschal redemption of Israel. To us Christians the situation of the
"Sheep Gate" has a far more touching significance. It seems to have
stood near where the "St. Stephen's Gate" now stands; here, then,
would be the way most used by our Lord in coming to and fro between
Jerusalem and Bethany, the way by which He went out to Gethsemane on
the last night, and probably the way by which He was brought back "as
a sheep" among her shearers, "as a lamb" led to the slaughter.
Going round from this spot northwards, we have the part of the wall
built by the men of Jericho, which would still look east, towards
their own city, so that they would always see their work when they got
their first glimpse of Jerusalem as they passed over the ridge of the
Mount of Olives on their pilgrimages up to the feasts. The task of the
men of Jericho ended at one of the northern gates, the construction of
which, together with the fitting of its ponderous bolts and bars, was
considered enough for another group of builders. This was called the
"Fish Gate." Since it faced north, it would scarcely have been used by
the traders who came up from the sea fisheries in the Mediterranean;
it must have received the fish supply from the Jordan, and perhaps
from as far as the Sea of Galilee. Still its name suggests a wider
range of commerce than the "Sheep Gate," which let in flocks chiefly
from neighbouring hills. Jerusalem was in a singularly isolated spot
for the capital of a country, one chosen expressly on account of its
inaccessibility--the very opposite requisite from that of most
capitals, which are planted by navigable rivers. Nevertheless she
maintained communication, both political and commercial, with distant
towns all along the ages of her chequered history.
After passing the work of one or two Jewish families and that of the
Tekoites, memorable for the painful fact of the abstention of the
nobles, we come to the "Old Gate." That a gate should bear such a name
would lead us to think that once gates had not been so numerous as
they were at this time. Yet most probably the "Old Gate" was really
new, because very little of the original city remained above ground.
But men love to perpetuate memories of the past. Even what is new in
fact may acquire a flavour of age by the force of association. The
wise reformer will follow the example of Nehemiah in linking the new
on to the old, and preserving the venerable associations of antiquity
wherever these do not hinder present efficiency.
Next we come to the work of men from the northern Benjamite towns of
Gibeon and Mizpah,[174] whose volunteer service was a mark of their
own brotherly spirit. It should be remembered, however, that Jerusalem
originally belonged to the tribe of Benjamin. Working at the northern
wall, in accordance with the rule observed throughout that all the
Jews from outlying places should build in the direction of their own
cities, these Benjamites carried it on as far as the districts of the
goldsmiths and apothecaries,[175] whose principal bazaars seem to have
occupied the north quarter of the city--the quarter most suitable for
trade, because first reached by most travellers. There, however--if we
are to accept the generally received emendation of the text mentioned
in the margin of the Revised Version--they found a bit of wall that
had escaped destruction, and also probably the "Ephraim Gate," which
is not named here, although it existed in the days of Nehemiah.[176]
Inasmuch as the invasions had come from the north, and the recent
Samaritan raid had also proceeded from the same quarter, it seems
likely that the city had been taken on this side. If so, the enemy,
after having got in through a gate which they had burnt, or through a
breach in the wall, did not think it necessary to waste time in the
heavy labour of tearing down the wall in their rear. Perhaps as this
was the most exposed quarter, the wall was most solid here--it was
known as "the _broad_ wall." The wealthy goldsmiths would have been
anxious that their bazaars should not be the first parts of the city
to entertain a marauding host through any weakness in the defences.
The next bit of wall was in the hands of a man of some importance,
known as "the ruler of half the district of Jerusalem";[177] _i.e._,
he had the management of half the land belonging to the city--either a
sort of police supervision of private estates, or the direct control
of land owned by the municipality, and possibly farmed for the time
being on communal principles.
[174] Neh. iii. 7.
[175] Neh. iii. 8.
[176] Neh. viii. 16.
[177] Neh. iii. 9.
Still following the northern wall, we pass the work of several
Jerusalem families, and so on to the potteries, as we may infer from
the remark about "the tower of the _furnaces_."[178] Here we must be
at the "Corner Gate,"[179] which, however, is not now named; "the
tower of the furnaces" may have been part of its fortifications.
Evidently this was an important position. The manager of the second
half of the city estates and the villages on them--known as "his
daughters"--had the charge of the work here. It was four hundred
cubits from the "Ephraim Gate" to the corner.[180] At this point the
long north wall ends, and the fortifications take a sharp turn
southwards. Following the new direction, we pass by the course of the
Valley of Hinnom, leaving it on our right. The next gate we meet is
named after this ravine of evil omen the "Valley Gate." It would be
here that the poor children, victims to the savage Moloch worship, had
been led out to their fate. The name of the gate would be a perpetual
reminder of the darkest passage in the old city's history of sin and
shame. The gate would face west, and, in accordance with the
arrangement throughout, the inhabitants of Zanoah, a town lying out
from Jerusalem ten miles in that direction, undertook the erection of
it. They also had charge of a thousand cubits of wall--an
exceptionally long piece; but the gates were fewer on this side, and
here possibly the steepness of the cliff rendered a slighter wall
sufficient.
[178] Neh. iii. 11.
[179] 2 Chron. xxvi. 9; Jer. xxxi. 38.
[180] 2 Kings xiv. 13.
This long, unbroken stretch of wall ends at the "Dung Gate," through
which the refuse of the city was flung out to the now degraded valley
which once had been so famous for its pleasure gardens. Sanitary
regulations are of course most necessary. We admire the minuteness
with which they are attended to in the Pentateuch, and we regard the
filthy condition of modern eastern cities as a sign of neglect and
decay. Still the adornment of a grand gateway by the temple, or the
solid building of a noble approach to the city along the main route
from the north, would be a more popular undertaking than this
construction of a "Dung Gate." It is to the credit of Nehemiah's
admirable skill in organisation that no difficulty was found in
filling up the less attractive parts of his programme, and it is even
more to the credit of those who accepted the allotment of them that,
as far as we know, they made no complaint. A common zeal for the
public good overcame personal prejudices. The just and firm
application of a universal rule is a great preventative of complaints
in such a case. When the several bands of workers were to undertake
the districts opposite their own houses if they were inhabitants of
the city, or opposite their own towns if they were provincial Jews, it
would be difficult for any of them to frame a complaint. The builders
of the "Dung Gate" came, it would seem, from the most conspicuous
eminence in the wilderness of Southern Judæa--that now known as the
"Frank Mountain." The people who would take to such an out-of-the-world
place of abode would hardly be such as we should look to for work requiring
fineness of finish. Perhaps they were more suited to the unpretentious task
which fell to their lot. Still this consideration does not detract from the
credit of their good-natured acquiescence, for self-seeking people are the
last to admit that they are not fit for the best places.
The next gate was in a very interesting position at the south-west
corner, where the _Tyropoeon_ runs down to the Valley of the Kidron.
It was called the "Fountain Gate," perhaps after the one natural
spring which Jerusalem possesses--that now known as the "Virgin's
Fountain," and near to the Pool of Siloam, where the precious water
from this spring was stored. The very name of the gate would call up
thoughts of the value of its site in times of siege, when the fountain
had to be "sealed" or covered over, to save it from being tampered
with by the enemy. Close by is a flight of steps, still extant, that
formerly led down to the king's garden. We are now near to Zion, in
what was once the favourite and most aristocratic portion of the town.
The lowering of the top of Zion in the time of the Maccabees, that it
might not overlook the temple on Mount Moriah, and the filling up of
the ravines, considerably detract from the once imposing height of
this quarter of the city. Here ancient Jerusalem had looked
superb--like an eagle perched on a rock. With such a fortress as Zion
her short-sighted citizens had thought her impregnable; but Nehemiah's
contemporaries were humbler and wiser men than the infatuated Jews who
had rejected the warnings of Jeremiah.
The adjoining piece of wall brings us round to the tombs of the kings,
which, according to the custom of antiquity, as we learn from a
cuneiform inscription at Babylon, were within the city walls, although
the tombs of less important people were outside--just as to this day
we bury our illustrious dead in the heart of the metropolis. Nehemiah
had been moved at the first report of the ruin of Jerusalem by the
thought that his fathers' sepulchres were there.
From this spot it is not so easy to trace the remainder of the wall.
The mention of the Levites has given rise to the opinion that Nehemiah
now takes us at once to the temple again; but this is hardly possible
in view of his subsequent statements. We must first work round by
Ophel, the "Water", the "East," and the "Horse" Gates--all of them
apparently leading out towards the Valley of the Kidron. Levites and
Priests, whose quarters we are gradually approaching, and other
inhabitants of houses in this district, together with people from the
Jordan Valley and the east country, carried out this last piece of
work as far as a great tower standing out between Ophel and the corner
of the temple wall, a tower so massive that some of its masonry can be
seen still standing. But the narrative is here so obscure, and the
sites have been so altered by the ravages of war and time, that the
identification of most of them in this direction baffles inquiry.
"Mark ye well her bulwarks." Alas! they are buried in a desolation so
huge that the utmost skill of engineering science fails to trace their
course. The latest great discovery, which has simply revolutionised
the map by identifying the _Tyropoeon_ with the Old Testament
"Valley of Hinnom" or "Tophet," is the most striking sign of these
topographical difficulties. The valley itself has been filled up with
masses of rubbish, the sight of which to-day confirms the dreadful
tragedy of the history of Jerusalem, the most tragic history on
record. No city was ever more favoured by Heaven, and no city was ever
more afflicted. Hers were the most magnificent endowments, the highest
ideals, the fairest promises; hers too was the most miserable failure.
Her beauty ravaged, her sanctity defiled, her light extinguished, her
joy turned into bitterness, Heaven's bride has been treated as the
scum of the streets. And now, after being abused by her own children,
shattered by the Babylonian, outraged by the Syrian, demolished by the
Roman, the city which stoned her prophets and clamoured successfully
for the death of her Saviour has again revived in poverty and
misery--the pale ghost of her past, still the victim of the oppressor.
The witchery of this wonderful city fascinates us to-day, and the very
syllables of her name "JERUSALEM" sound strangely sweet and ineffably
sad--
"Most musical, most melancholy."
It was fitting that the tenderest, most mournful lament ever uttered
should have been called forth by our Lord's contemplation of such a
city--a city which, deeming herself destined to be the joy of all the
earth, became the plague-spot of history.