Once you’re past the palace, you go to enter the Tunnels that Hezekiah dug. Okay, he probably didn’t dig them all by himself but you get the point. Lol Before I start talking about the tunnels, maybe I should talk about the history of the tunnels and Hezekiah! Hezekiah was a great king that reigned in Jerusalem for 29 years. He became kind when he was 25 years old. His mothers name was Abijah the daughter of Zachariah. Hezekiah did what was right in the eyes of YHVH, according to all that his father David had done. Hey, Hezekiah is David’s son?! Yes! I never knew that till a few weeks ago! So, in the first year of his reign in the first month, he opened the doors of the house YHVH and repaired them. So basically he restored the temple in his first year as King. After the temple was restored, we sent out a letter to all of Israel, Judah, Ephraim and Manasseh saying that they should come to the house of YHVH at Jerusalem to keep the Passover to YHVH of Israel. They had agreed to keep the Passover in the second month for they could not keep it in the first month (when Passover is really kept) because a sufficient number of Priests had not consecrated themselves, nor had the people gathered together at Jerusalem. Before Hezekiah died, he dug the tunnels at the Upper Gihon where the water came through to the city which is on the west side of the City of David. He dug the tunnels to divert the water to the City of David so the Syrians couldn’t get to the water. You see, the Syrians were going to attack the City of David. So they were camped all around the City. But without any water, they couldn’t survive! Hezekiah prospered in all his works. You can read more about Hezekiah and his works in the Bible! Look in the books Kings and Second Chronicles.
Now there are 2 different tunnels you can go through. There is a dry one and a wet one. Mom, Benjamin, Elijah and I all went in the dry one and Dad and Nolan went in the wet one. The dry one was dug by Kind David to attack the city in the first place before it became King David’s City and the Wet one was the one King Hezekiah dug to divert the water into the city. The Dry one has really tall ceilings and is very narrow. The second one is very wet and had lower ceilings and is also narrow. I just can’t imagine what the workers were thinking while digging through the tunnels…they probably hoped that they wouldn’t collapse on them! I know that’s what I would have thought! They probably had to work by candlelight and with a low amount of oxygen. Just think, what if there were Syrians on the other side while you were digging through! Now that’s a thought! But they were fine and made it through safely. They got the water running through to the city. Once finished our unguided tour in the City of David, we headed to our other tour under the ground next to the Wailing Wall! Now, that’s a tour I will never forget! And yes we did have a guide this time ;) Before we got to go on our tour, we have to go through the Wailing Wall area to get to our tour. There was barley anyone there!! I could just go right up and touch the wall and pray! It was so amazing! We happened to arrive at the wall tours about an hour to and hour and a half early. There isn’t much to do other than stand and wait around. We noticed there was a lot of IDF soldiers there! I thought that it was probably for an event of some sort. It ended up being when the IDF swear into the military! It was so cool! But I thought to myself, these young people are ready to give their lives for this country! I also thought they are only 2 years older than I am! That’s not much older! Wow…to me it’s really amazing! Just on that day there were probably 80 – 100 new soldiers being swore into the military! Both men and women. The first few soldiers that went up to get swore into the military all saluted to the front guy, but one of the girls saluted wrong so the general guy corrected her in front of everyone! You could tell she was a new soldier. To me, it was cute! ;)
Finally it was time for our Kotel Tour! The Kotel tour is the tour under the ground next to the Wailing Wall. Our group wasn’t very big but we had an excellent guide! My goodness! All the history behind the wall and the temple is absolutely (loss for words here…) well full of history I guess! The wall goes all the way back to the era of the Maccabees! You can look down through this glass hole in the floor and see the era from Maccabees! You look like 50 feet down! You realize how much the ground has been brought up over the centuries. Now, the stone slabs to make up the wall were 15 feet wide and 40 feet long!!! Now that’s a big chunk of rock! The wall is like some 150-180 feet tall from the original ground up to were it stands now! That must have taken forever to build...okay not forever because it’s done and we are living thousands of years later. Anyways back to the Kotel Tour! While next to the wall, our guide said this to the group which to me is very powerful. She said, when saying the Shema out of Israel you face Israel, when in Israel you face Jerusalem and when in Jerusalem you face the Holy of Holies. We were standing about 20-30 feet away from the Holy of Holies! That’s the closest I’ve ever been to it in my LIFE! Knowing that the temple once stood on the other side of the wall and now the pathetic dome of the rock on top it’s an eye sore! I wish the temple was still standing tall and beautiful! Stupid Romans had the courage to burn and destroy the most holy place on earth! It’s heartbreaking! You can still see some of the design in the wall from King Harrods time! Once further into the Kotel, you run across 3 stone slabs waiting to be put into place! These stones were never used! They were going to be for the floor next to the wall! 2000 year old stone floor slabs never used and are still waiting to be used! Stunning, eh?! Across from the stone floor slabs there are these pillars still standing! You realize that the roof wasn’t really that tall! But it probably was in its time! I thought to myself, the sky probably used to seem SO much further away 2000 years ago! Wow…to me that’s amazing knowing that the ground has been brought up so much since the roman’s existed! 
Okay, back to the destroying for the Temple. Before it was destroyed King Josiah (he was a good king) hid the Ark of the Covenant. No one knows where though! People have tried to find it but all of their systems have failed or something prevented it from being found. My theory is that YHVH will reveal and restore it when its time. The Ark is SO holy that you have to be SOOOOOOOOOO careful to handle it the right way. You need Levite Priests who are cleansed and pure in order to transport it from one place to the other! Just think! I might have been standing 20-30 feet away from THE Ark of the Covenant! The most Holy thing! It has the two stone tablets of the 10 commandments and Aaron’s staff in it!! Can you imagine?! I know I could barley fathom knowing that I was closer to it than I have ever been before in my LIFE! It was a powerful and moving tour.
That night after all of our touring was done, we went out for supper! It was my birthday supper!! WOOT! All of this happened on the 23 of November ;) We had a great supper in Jerusalem and then headed back to Tiberias. We really had an amazing day! Thank you Father! <3
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