How Herod Moved Gigantic Blocks to Construct Temple Mount - The BAS Library
Login
Home > Magazines > BAR > May/June 1981

How Herod Moved Gigantic Blocks to Construct Temple Mount

Megaliths used by Herod for wall of Temple Mount were heavier than giant stones of Stonehenge or Pyramids

By Murray Stein

A single ashlar—46 feet long, 10 feet high and 10 feet deep—is described by Michael Zimmerman in the accompanying article (“Tunnel Exposes New Areas of Temple Mount”) on the Rabbinical Tunnel adjacent to the Temple Mount. This single stone in the wall of the Temple Mount weighs 415 tons! The largest megalith at Stonehenge, by comparison, weighs a mere 40 tons. And the “pebbles” which the Egyptians used to build the pyramids were a lightweight 15 tons. The 46-foot ashlar in the Rabbinical Tunnel is not alone. Other similar ashlars, 39 feet long (350 tons) and 36 feet long […]

You have already read your free article for this month. Please join the BAS Library or become an All Access member of BAS to gain full access to this article and so much more.

Join the BAS Library!

Already a library member? Log in here.

Institution user? Log in with your IP address or Username

Footnotes

1.

This would explain why the horizontal measurement h (in the drawing below) is about 8” greater than the vertical measurement v. These measurements were made using an electromagnetic device which emits a high frequency signal. Part of this signal is reflected back from the rear surface of the stone at a rate which is constant for that particular material. The time the signal takes to return to the source is proportional to the thickness of the rock. The measurements obtained by this technique are no more than two percent in error.