Being an archaeologist in the land of the Bible can sometimes be dangerous.
On April the 3, 1939 John Iliff-- curator of the Palestine Archaeological Museum--
was seriously wounded when he was shot just outside of his Jerusalem home.
The message being sent by a local terrorist group was loud and clear:
Stay out! You're not wanted here!
Just three years earlier, Professor Iliff had made an important discovery
that confirmed something found in the Bible.
That discovery had a threatening message of its own,
and one that makes a powerful connection between faith and fact.
In 1935, construction just outside the Lion's Gate in Jerusalem came to a screeching halt
when workers discovered the remains of a vaulted building dating back to the early Byzantine period.
John Iliff was called to the site, and he found that there was a Roman building
situated above the remains of an ancient tomb, possessing several shallow graves.
Above the graves, he discovered an ancient wall which contained
a stone fragment bearing a Greek inscription.
It had an eerily similar message to what would be sent to him just three years later
when terrorists would shoot him in the back. The inscription read:
"No man of another nation to enter within the fence and enclosure round the temple,
and whoever is caught will have himself to blame that his death ensues."
The craftsman who had originally chiseled the inscription used large letters
and painted them red so that its message could be easily seen.
This partial inscription was made easier to decipher
because of an earlier discovery made in 1871 by French archaeologist Charles Claremont Ganneau.
Ganneau had discovered a full and complete copy in the wall of a Muslim school near the Temple Mount.
These ancient artifacts came to be known as the Temple Balustrade Inscriptions
and they testify to an event and a place found in the Bible.
In approximately 19 B.C., King Herod the Great began remodeling and enlarging the temple
and he designed it with elaborate furnishings and grand buildings that took some 46 years to complete.
Proof for its existence can still be seen today in the remains of large building stones,
chiseled entry steps, elaborate cornices, and the mammoth retaining wall
that provided support for the platform on which the temple stood.
Both the Bible and the Jewish historian Josephus speak of a sanctuary located at
the center of this complex, with a Holy Place and the Holy of Holies.
This inner sanctuary is where Jewish sinners would come near to the presence of God,
make sacrifice for sin, and fulfill their vows and legal obligations.
We also know that this entire inner sanctuary was surrounded by massive walls and doors.
Outside the sanctuary, but located within this enormous temple complex,
was a court area for the Gentiles--
a place where non-Jewish visitors could enter, but were forbidden to go further.
It was at this location that an actual barrier existed,
separating Jews from non-Jews and about which Josephus said was,
"Three cubits high and of exquisite workmanship.
In this, at regular intervals, stood slabs giving warning,
some in Greek, others in Latin characters, of the Law of Purification to which that
no foreigner was permitted to enter the Holy Place."
With the discovery of the Balustrade Inscriptions made by Iliff and Ganneau,
we now know that a barrier around the inner sanctuary of the temple--
a wall of separation--actually existed.
Both Josephus and the Bible are correct.
In addition to Scripture being confirmed, we can also surmise that this wall
was likely the point of focus in the accusations made against the apostle Paul
about dishonoring the tradition of the Jews.
According to the book of Acts, when Paul came to Jerusalem to fulfill a personal vow at the temple,
he had arrived with Christian Gentile converts.
Later, he was accused of bringing those non-Jewish Christians
into an area of the temple reserved only for Jews, presumably beyond the balustrade--or wall of partition.
A riot ensued and Paul was arrested, tried, and eventually brought to Caesarea,
then Rome, where he was to stand on trial
over charges of being an insurrectionist and a violator of Jewish tradition.
While under house arrest in Rome, he wrote a letter to the church at Ephesus
discussing the nature of the church and the unity and peace to be practiced by all believers.
He also made reference to Christ destroying a middle wall of partition
that had divided Jew and Gentile.
Today, no such barrier exists.
It was finally destroyed by the Romans along with the entire temple in A.D. 70.
It was out of those ruins that the Balustrade Inscriptions were discovered
and reused as common building materials for Roman homes and buildings.
The destruction of the temple and the removal of the temple balustrade stand as a testament
to what Paul revealed about Jesus and His desire to remove any such barrier between Jew and Gentile.
The inscriptions found by Iliff and Claremont Ganneau
some 1900 years after the destruction of Jerusalem, not only testify to the Bible's claims of a temple,
but also to that of a wall of separation referred to by Paul in the book of Ephesians,
giving us, then, both confirmation of the Bible's reliability,
as well as a greater appreciation for Paul's prophetic words found in Ephesians 2:14.
The debris and standing structures from the Herodian Temple Complex,
along with a Balustrade Inscription are important finds that help us today
to make a connection between fact and faith, right here in the land of the Bible.