Was There a Temple in Jerusalem? - The BAS Library
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Home > Magazines > Bible Review > October 2003

Was There a Temple in Jerusalem?

Wartime reports from Palestine mask the truth.

By Ronald S. Hendel

Truth is the first casualty in war. We have seen this recently, in the bizarre and often hilarious lies of the Iraqi Minister of Information during the war in Iraq. Now there are Web sites devoted to the sayings of “Baghdad Bob,” along with T-shirts and other memorabilia. It also seems that the Bush administration lied to us about the nuclear threat posed by Saddam Hussein’s regime, relying on a report that the CIA knew was forged. This is disappointing, but perhaps not surprising. Lies in wartime are nothing new, though we often expect better. In the Middle East, […]

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Endnotes

1.

From Charles Enderlin, Shattered Dreams: The Failure of the Peace Process in the Middle East, 1995–2002, reviewed in The New York Times Book Review, Sunday May 4, 2003, p. 11.

2.

From the Commentary of Tabari (10th century C.E.), quoted in F.E. Peters, Jerusalem: The Holy City in the Eyes of Chroniclers, Visitors, Pilgrims, and Prophets from the Days of Abraham to the Beginning of Modern Times (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), p. 181.

3.

From the Muthîr al-Ghiräm (14th century), quoted in Peters, Jerusalem, p. 189.