On
a typical Passover Day during Jesus' lifetime, the city of Jerusalem
would be filled with pilgrims, spilling out onto the surrounding
hillsides in make-shift lodging. Jesus would have seen a scene like this
at least once a year while growing up.
The
temple faces East (facing the sunrise). The "camera" is looking
North-West, across the Kidron Valley. (I could not get Gemini/nano
banana to be more accurate with the image; you'll have to use your
imagination a little bit.)
As a
pilgrim (unless you're "somebody"), you aren't allowed to enter in
through the closest, Eastern Gate. You have to go to the South end and
enter through the Huldah Gates tunnel. But before that, you'd have to
stop at the Pool of Siloam or one of the specially-constructed mikvah
"baptistries" and immerse yourself to purify yourself before entering
the temple. You'd also make sure your clothing was clean/purified.
When
you emerge from the Huldah tunnel, you'd come out into the court of the
Gentiles, where everyone is welcome (and where the shops and
money-changers were). To your right would be the Porch of Solomon, where
the very first church of Christ met on a daily basis. This was a large
open-air covered space, with a roof held up by 120 columns so thick it
took three men to wrap their arms around one.
To
your left would be a low wall separating the Gentile's Court from the
Women's Court. This wall had signs all along it forbidding, in three
languages, Gentiles to pass, upon pain of death. Paul used this "middle
wall of partition" as an analogy in Eph 2:14, to help explain that
Gentiles are now welcomed into God's community.
Further
left of that was another wall separating the Court of Women from the
Court of the Israelite Men. The men could pass through a door in this
wall to watch the altar activities (which took place in the Court of
Priests). A set of steps arranged on a semi-circle before this doorway
is where the Levitical choirs and musicians would stand to sing and to
play their instruments.
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