JERUSALEM AREA BY AREA - Jerusalem and the Holy Land - page 77

The Western Wall y
Western Wall Plaza. Map 4 D4.
@ 1, 2, 38. 7 ^ on Sabbath.
Chain of the Generations Centre
Tel [phone].

WORSHIP AT THE WESTERN WALL
The Western Wall Plaza
functions as a large,
open-air synagogue
where groups gather to
recite the daily, Shabbat
(Sabbath) and festival
services of the Jewish
faith. Special events are
also celebrated here, such
as the religious coming
of age of a boy or girl
(Bar or Bat Mitzvah).
Some worshippers visit the wall daily to recite the entire
Book of Psalms; others, who believe that petitions to God
made at the wall are specially effecti v e, insert written
prayers into the stones. On Tisha B'Av, the ninth day of A
the month of Av, which falls in either July or

# 8am-8pm
Sun-Thu, 8am-noon Fri. Visits must
be booked in advance. ¢ Jewish
hols. & 8 compulsory. Western
Wall Tunnel Tel [phone]. l

# 8am-evening Sun-Thu; 8am-
12:30pm Fri. Visits must be booked
in advance. ¢ Jewish hols. & 8
compulsory. www .thekotel.org

Prayers inserted into gaps between
the stones of the Western Wall

A massive, blank wall A

built of huge stone blocks,
the Western Wall (Ha-Kotel
in Hebrew) is Judaism's
holiest site, and the plaza
in front of it is a permanent
place of worship. The wall
is part of the retaining wall
of the Temple Mount and
was built by Herod the Great
during his expansion of the
Temple enclosure (see
pp44-5) . The huge, lower
stones are Herodian, while
those higher up date from
early Islamic times.
During the Ottoman period,
the wall became where
Jews came to lament the
destruction of the Second
Temple. For this reason it
was for centuries known as
the Wailing Wall.
Houses covered most of
what's now the Western Wall
Plaza until relatively recently.
When the Israelis gained
control of the Old City after
the 1967 war, they levelled
the neighbouring Arab district.

A August, a fast
is held commemorating the destruction of both Temples
(see pp42-5) . People sit on the ground reciting
the Book of Lamentations and liturgical
dirges called kinot . Since the plaza is
essentially a public space, conflicts arise
over such issues as the relative size of the
men's and women's sections and the wish of
non-Orthodox groups to hold services in which
men and women participate together.

Orthodox Jew at prayer beside the Western Wall

Non-Jews can approach
the wall, provided they dress
appropriately and cover their
heads (see pp298-9) .
At the left-hand corner of
the men's prayer section is
Wilson's Arch (named after a
19th-century archaeologist).
Now contained within a
building that functions
as a synagogue, it originally
carried the Causeway to the
Temple. From the arch,

archaeologists have dug the
Western Wall Tunnel to ex-
plore the wall's foundations.
It follows the base of the
outside face of the Temple
wall along a Herodian street,
below today's street level, and
emerges on the Via Dolorosa.
The Chain of the Generations
Centre tells the story of the
Jewish people. Access to this
and the Tunnel is by tour
only; book well in advance.

The Western Wall Plaza, with the men's prayer section to the left and women's to the right