01x22 - Biblical Epicentre

[bunniefuu]

[music]

I'm going on an adventure.

There's only one way to figure it all out.

Unzip the archeology. Make it naked.

[music]

Mooo

I'm calling him.

He's coming.

Mooo

[SIMCHA]A few years ago, a cow was born in Israel.

Her name was Melody.

She was special.

She was pure red.

From nose to tail.

And that got a lot of people excited.

Rabbis from Jerusalem,

Pentecostal Pastors from Oklahoma, CNN reporters,

everyone took an interest in Melody.

Why?

Because they all wondered:

Was Melody a sign of the apocalypse?

That's because Melody was connected to here:

[SIMCHA]Most scholars believe that

the great Jewish Temple once stood

here on the Temple Mount.

Jewish and Christian prophecies say that rebuilding the Temple

will signal the end of days.

But there are a few problems with building the Temple.

You can't build it

unless those who walk its grounds are purified.

And the Torah, the five books of Moses says

that can only be done with the ashes of a pure red heifer,

ritually sacrificed.

The last kosher red heifer appeared years ago.

And so, there was a bit of excitement when Melody was born.

Did Melody's birth mean the end was nigh?

Well we can't answer that question

without answering few others.

So, we'll get back to Melody in a bit. But first,

there's another problem with trying to build a Temple here.

Something's there already.

Muslims believe that from here the prophet Mohammed

ascended to heaven to receive instruction on prayer.

This is the crux of the problem:

The holiest site in Judaism

is also the third most important site in Islam.

Make no mistake, people die for this piece of real estate.

For thousands of years Jews, Babylonians, Romans, Muslims,

Crusaders all shed blood,

each wanting to control this piece of land.

[SIMCHA]As they die today.

How will these rival claims, Jew and Muslim, co-exist?

And, how does an archaeologist work

in such a complicated environment?

Does this man hold the solution?

Yes, I spoke with some of the people and they say,

it's too good.

We want a w*r, we want fight, we want bombing.

What are you?

You are solving the problem.

So, it's so simple to be so.

It doesn't work.

It's too good.

[SIMCHA]Now a quick lesson: temple history.

The Bible says King Solomon built a temple , years ago.

For Jews it was God's House on earth.

The temple's legendary treasures included

the arc of the covenant and the Ten Commandments.

But those treasures disappeared

when the Babylonians sacked Jerusalem.

Within a century, the Israelites started re-building.

By the time of Jesus the temple was one of

the world's great buildings.

But it fell again when the Romans att*cked in AD.

So, why is there no archaeology

to prove Solomon's temple ever existed?

Well, this isn't an easy place to dig.

This is Dan Bahat.

He doesn't work on Islamic sites.

The nearest he gets is digging round the edges.

So he is taking me into a tunnel just outside the Temple Mount.

This is one of the most exciting points in the Western Wall.

We are standing.

We are touching now a stone,

which is the largest building stone

ever found in this country.

It weighs metric tonnes,

which is enormous.

I believe inside here there is a vault,

lets say an underground storage place or something of the like.

So wait a minute, wait a minute,

so if you're telling me that on the other side of this

are sub-structures to the holiest place on earth,

why aren't you blasting through the wall

and trying to be an Indiana Jones

and find all sorts of treasures.

A few reasons.

We are with very good relations with the Muslims here.

I cannot go more into details but we are in good relations.

By we you mean the archaeologists?

Me.

So we are with very good relations with the Muslims,

they know what we are doing

and the pre-text that we don't go under the Temple Mount.

[SIMCHA]Behind these stones

there could be a year-old vault.

The prospect is tantalizing.

But Bahat can't open it.

Because here, archaeology can be a matter of life and death.

In this tunnel was opened to make a fire exit.

Right over there, the exit to this tunnel

created a whole big riot.

Yes, the mosque.

They thought this tunnel was under their mosque.

It was exactly so.

Of course, you can imagine.

I would be upset if I saw a Muslim

digging under my synagogue.

[SIMCHA] The tunnel does not

go under the dome but distrust led to:

Israeli soldiers were k*lled in those riots

and another Palestinians.

This was a blood bath.

It was it was, it was a real terrible thing.

All over an opening to this tunnel.

Yes, that's Jerusalem.

[SIMCHA]Muslim and Jew both lay claim

to this sacred piece of land.

Both have d*ed for it.

But what if there was an archaeological solution

to the conflict?

This is Tuvia Sagiv.

Author of a revolutionary theory.

I just realized something.

You can be a big peacemaker if you are right.

We can live together, the Arabs and the Jewish people.

You will be in the left and the right

and we will be in the center.

[SIMCHA]You cannot achieve Middle East peace

without deciding the fate of the Temple Mount.

This man thinks he has a solution.

So this is the meaning of a solution

maybe it can cause if we do not find a solution:

the third world w*r.

Okay, so let's just review it a second.

We're looking right now

which is the dome of the rock, this gold dome, right?

Exactly.

The conventional wisdom

is that was built over the holy of Hollis

in the ancient Jewish temple.

This is the traditional way of thinking.

Right.

[SIMCHA]Sagiv challenges tradition.

He's an architect.

But he has a hobby.

The Temple Mount.

And he's reached a revolutionary conclusion

about the location of Solomon's Temple.

Maybe the conclusion is

that maybe it is here but not in the Dome of the Rock.

And we have to ask ourselves where is a rational place

in which we can put it.

[SIMCHA]That's right.

Sagiv says the temple didn't stand where the dome is.

His theory is complex

but it boils down to three main pieces of evidence.

. Architectural footprint

. Infrared photography and

. Waterflow.

We find that one of the problems in the temple

was supply of water for the holy bath of the high priest

and also to clean the court from the blood.

From all the sacrifices.

Exactly.

And a lot of animals were sacrificed

and there was a lot of blood in the court

and they have to clean it.

[SIMCHA]This takes us back to Melody.

The Temple's most important function was sacrifice.

And there was lots of it.

So much so that the priests needed an aqueduct

pumping water into the temple to wash away the blood.

Archaeologists think they found the aqueduct.

But if the temple stood where the dome is here.

And the aqueduct flowed from here.

We have a problem.

Sagiv calculates the aqueduct is metres lower

than the dome of the rock.

Water doesn't flow uphill.

The conclusion?

It means that we have to lower the level of the temple.

In order that this water will supply water, to the court.

And then it means that it can't be in the dome of the rock.

Because there's a rock there.

There is a rock there, then it must be in another place.

But anyhow, in this place, it's impossible.

[SIMCHA]Sagiv's theory runs against most archaeologists,

rabbis, and historians.

But what about Muslim sensibilities?

Adnan Husseni runs the Islamic Trust

overseeing the Dome of the Rock.

I asked him about the future of the mount.

This is a mosque for Muslims to pray.

When we speak about a mosque for Muslims to pray,

Muslims, they don't go to a church,

to a synagogue to participate with any pray, you know.

But, what about the history,

and the temple, and all that?

But if you wanted to bring the history back,

there is many things should be changed.

And I think if everything would be changed back

according to the history,

it's nonsense,

it's not logic, really.

Peace can never be achieved by looking for the history.

[SIMCHA]Ah but history says there was a temple here.

I'm not even talking about the Jewish one.

I'm talking about another temple.

A pagan one.

And it's at the heart of Sagiv's plan.

[SIMCHA]There is a tradition

of building holy sites on top of each other.

Conquistadors planted churches over Mayan temples.

Hindu's and Muslim's battle over who was the chicken

and who the egg.

Even the Vatican sits atop the pagan temple

of Cybele and Attic.

So it would make sense for the Dome of the Rock

to be built over the Jewish Temple.

This tradition leads us to Sagiv's next piece of evidence.

Architectural footprint:

Holy places have traditions and I agree with you

and we know this archaeologically.

People don't just come and build a holy place.

Even if, whatever religion they are,

if they are building a church,

or a mosque, or a synagogue.

There is a tradition.

Now, the fact is you have two mosques,

how is it possible

that they ignored the holy place of the temple

and they built two mosques

exactly where the temple wasn't.

How was that possible?

I will try to show you.

You have an answer for this.

Yes.

[SIMCHA]The Jewish temple fell.

The Romans built their own pagan temple on the site.

That temple is long gone.

But the same architect built another temple in Lebanon.

This is the aerial photograph

this is the aerial of Jupiter temple.

[SIMCHA]The same builder, the same era,

and even dedicated to the same god, Jupiter.

So we can speculate.

The Lebanon temple may be a model

for the missing Roman temple on the mount.

And guess what happens when we compare

the layout of the Jupiter temple and the temple mount.

[SAGIV] I put together the Al-Aksa mosque,

and the dome of the rock, the Jupiter temple.

And look - it's the same thing.

So maybe what we see here is the ruins of the Jupiter temple,

which are Arabs and they decided to cover it with Muslim dress

and make it into a mosque.

So just before I get as excited as you are,

I just want to understand.

You are saying

when the Muslims built their holy places,

they did build it on the ruins of of the pagan holy places,

but it was not the Jewish temple.

-It was the pagan project.

It was the pagan roman project.

-Exactly.

[SIMCHA]So where did the Jewish temple go?

The holy of Hollis?

Well we get the answer straight from the horse's mouth.

Historians say the roman temple had a horse's statue

in between the two main temple buildings.

And where the statue used to stand in the courtyard.

Exactly.

That's where the trees are.

That's where the Jewish holy place was.

Exactly, and it was the sign.

If you want to know where is the place of the holy

ask where is the place of the horse,

and to put the horse on the holy of the holy

means I conquer the Jewish temple.

[SIMCHA]There's a debate in Israel.

Is the temple simply a metaphor?

Will God build a physical temple?

Or will it be built by man?

I went to meet one man,

who sees it as his personal responsibility

to clear the ground for the third Jewish temple.

Coming back to the temple mount is a historical justice.

The Arab occupation of the temple mount of Jerusalem

is finished.

[SIMCHA]This is Gershon Salomon fifteen years ago.

Marching on the Temple Mount.

It's been fifteen years, you haven't changed.

[SIMCHA]This is Gershon Salomon now.

He leads the Temple Mount Faithful.

A group dedicated to rebuilding the Temple

the Romans knocked over years ago.

I asked him how he could build the temple

where the dome now stands.

Take the dome of the rock and the Al-Aksa mosque,

and the government will do it

as a great favor for the Muslims.

Put them in a big envelope and mail them back to Mecca.

Mail them. -Mail them.

You don't mean literally.

Yeah.

See, in Egypt the ancient temples-

-were moved when they built the Aswan Dam.

Tens, sometimes hundreds of km from the original place.

Why not here?

So you wanna move those Muslim holy places,

rebuild the temple, trigger the end of days,

and we all live happily ever after.

Not only I want, God wants.

[SIMCHA]Solomon's marches

usually number a couple dozen followers.

But fervor outweighs numbers.

In rumours spread among Palestinians

that Gershon Salomon was marching

to the dome of the rock.

Riots erupted and people d*ed.

The thr*at of v*olence, politics and religion

prevent us from digging in this holy ground.

So Sagiv took to the air for the next piece of evidence:

infrared.

You had Israeli police- -Yes.

In a helicopter -In a helicopter.

Take infrared sh*ts.

Exactly and now I want to show you the pictures

and you yourself will decide do we see something here

or it's nonsense.

Maybe

Ok. Maybe Tuvia is imagining it all.

Exactly.

Because Tuvia says that it's under the trees.

Yes.

[SIMCHA]Infrared cameras read heat.

Different objects reflect heat in different ways.

This allows infrared cameras to reveal

what the naked eye cannot see.

So if we look at a photo from early in the morning,

when things are cool,

you can see that the floor is clear and white.

Right. No shadows. -No shadows.

[SIMCHA]But look what happens at night

after the land has been heated all day

by the Jerusalem sun.

And look what happens in the middle of the night.

Oh my god. That's amazing.

You see here the trees and in-between them

you have straight lines.

And the width of the lines-

Yeah, you are talking about the in-between-

In-between you see lines, you see straight lines.

See this is metres, metres and metres.

The width of the temple walls was cubic,

which means about metres.

Each wall was meters wide.

Exactly.

And I say maybe I'm not sure what we see here

is the reflection of the walls of the temple.

Ok.

Wait a minute, wait a minute,

You see that is the Al-Aksa mosque

and that's the Dome of the Rock and you're saying ok,

it has got to be there somewhere and it can't be that high.

Exactly.

And the only place it might be is-

Under the trees.

Exactly, and more than that-

Wait a minute if it's under the trees

that means that the Western Wall actually is-

-Unbelievable what we are talking now.

It means that I came to the conclusion

that the temple is here.

And what comes out that the Jewish people

during the last years are coming exactly to this place,

which is vis-a-vis the holy of the holy according to my theory.

The only thing separating them

from the temple is the wall.

[SIMCHA]We were heading off when suddenly,

I realized Sagiv's plan for peace would actually wreak havoc.

[SIMCHA]I was saying good-bye to Sagiv

when I realized something.

Something shocking.

I just realized something.

According to your theory, if you are right,

and you showed me that everything can be peaceful

because the Muslims can have the dome of the rock.

Yeah.

This beautiful design where everybody's happy.

The Jews have the temple.

The Muslims have the dome.

The Christians can go to either site wherever they please.

Everything is nice and beautiful, except you have

actually broken down the holiest place in Judaism,

the Western Wall, to make room to go where you say the temple is.

Yes.

Because in a moment my theory will be proved

and you will understand.

It means that there will be no objectionpto break this paganic wall.

Now you this pagan wall.

When you say let's smash it,

let's take a big ball and smash it down,

some people might have a problem with that.

Why do you pray here?

Because that's the connection with the temple.

Well you know what? Then move.

Smash the wall because it is not important.

Because what is important is the space behind it.

Exactly.

OK controversial yes.

[SIMCHA]Has Sagiv found a path to peace?

Gershon Salomon and Adnan Husseni don't agree on much,

but they do agree on three things:

. It's the land under the dome of the rock that is sacred.

. They cannot share it.

And . Tuvia Sagiv.

Let me tell you first that he's a nice guy.

But I am so sorry to disappoint you.

It has no- It don't make sense.

I've not another word, nonsense.

And the fact that in the midst of the temple mount

which exists, the dome of the rock,

a Muslim building and a mosque. It scared people.

How can we remove it?

We shall make as you say it nuclear w*r.

No, but I don't think he was motivated-

You're saying he was motivated by fear.

Why don't I find a space where there is no Muslim.

On the Temple Mount can exist only one thing,

one building, the house of God, the temple.

This is the word of God.

[SIMCHA] And how does Tuvia's plan-

The Muslim's up top and the Jews below look to the Muslims?

In other words it's not ideas which respect the place.

I mean underneath.

If you play underneath the place

you're not respecting the place.

This place is built on rock.

If you will play underneath you will demolish it.

Let's deal with things.

It's a very important place,

it's a very beautiful place, enjoy it as a beautiful place.

Let us enjoy our religion in this place.

Let's not mix things.

Mixing things in such sensitive places is dangerous.

[SIMCHA]Finally, a consensus.

Everyone agrees.

No to Tuvia Sagiv's plan.

[SIMCHA]Now, back to Melody.

The pure red heifer, ushering in the end of days.

The Torah says the pure red heifer

must be three years old

at the time of the sacrifice.

Her ashes used to purify those who work in the temple.

So what became of Melody?

Things were going according to plan.

Rabbis were keeping a watchful eye.

A year went by.

Then at the age of eighteen months,

Melody sprouted a tuft of white hair on her tail.

The end of days was put on hold.

Guys I'm a vegetarian.

I'm a friend.