For the more than one million Christians who visit Jerusalem each year, a recent discovery — the remains of what’s believed to be the palace where Jesus was tried by Pontius Pilate — has stirred excitement and drawn tremendous historical interest, according to
The Washington Post.
Archaeologists, working on an expansion to the Tower of David Museum, discovered an abandoned building beside the museum in Jerusalem’s Old City. The "suspected remains" of the palace are believed by many historians, archaeologists and religious scholars to be the site of Jesus' trial and his sentencing to death, a key part of the New Testament, according to the Post.
There have long been debates about where the trial took place, fueled by different interpretations of the Gospels.
Christian scriptures state that Jesus of Nazareth was brought before Pilate in the "praetorium," a Latin tern for a general’s tent with a Roman encampment, according to the Post.
"Some say Pilate’s praetorium would have been in the military barracks, others say the Roman general would probably have been a guest in the palace built by Herod."
But today, experts are convinced that Herod’s palace was on the city’s western side, where the Tower of David Museum and the Ottoman-era prison stand.
"For those Christians who care about accuracy in regards to historical facts, this is very forceful," Yisca Harani, an expert on Christianity and pilgrimage to the Holy Land, told the Post.
"For others, however, those who come for the general mental exercise of being in Jerusalem, they don’t care as long as [their journey] ends in Golgotha — the site of the Crucifixion."
University of North Carolina at Charlotte archaeology professor Shimon Gibson told the newspaper that there’s "little doubt" that Jesus' trial took place within Herod’s palace compound.
"In the Gospel of John, the trial is described as taking place near a gate and on a bumpy stone pavement — details that fit with previous archaeological findings near the prison,"
he said.
"There is, of course, no inscription stating it happened here, but everything — archaeological, historical and gospel accounts — all falls into place and makes sense."
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