7. Jerusalem in the Gospels. — The earliest Gospel incident connected with the city is the foretelling to Zacharias in the Temple of the birth of John the Baptist (Lk P'^) ; the second, the arrival of the Magi to inquire in the city where the 'king of the Jews' was born (Mt 2'"'"'). Shortly after this occur the purification of the Virgin Mary and the presentation of Jesus in the Temple (Lk 2---^) ; and some twelve years later the first (?) Passover of Jesus in the Holy City and the inci- dent of His staying behind to discuss with the doctors in the Temple (Lk 2-"-'»). After this, with the exception of one brief scene in the Temptation (Mt 4^), the Synoptics are silent regarding any events in the city untO the last week of His life. It is clear that Jesus rather avoided the city, and that the city was hostile to Him. It was Jerusalem as the centre of Jewish religious life which alone drew Jesus there; almost exclusively His being there was connected with attendance at a feast ; and, with the single exception of the incident at the Pool of Bethesda, all His doings were, till the last week, in the courts of the Temple. In the Fourth Gospel there is mention of a Passover at which Jesus cleansed the Temple, and later had His discourse with Nicodemus (Jn 2'^ 3'""'). Then a year and a half after, while He was attending the Feast of Tabernacles, occurred the incidents of the adulteress and the blind man ( Jn 7'- 8*"- 9"-)i end- ing in an attempt to arrest Him and a threatened stoning. A little later in the year, at the Feast of Dedication, He appeared in the Temple and was again threatened with stoning (Jn 10--"''"). After the raising of Lazarus at Bethany, Jesus deliber- ately avoided entering the city, but shortly after- wards He determinately turned His face towards it, with the consciousness that suft'ering and death inevitably awaited Him there (Mk 10'-'*').
Wlien at last the step of return to the metropolis had been taken and the triumjihal entry into the city (Mt 2P-", Mk IV''", Lk 19-"-", Jn 12'=-") and the second cleansing of the Temple (Mt 21"-"', Mk IP', Lk lO''^' ■"') had occurred, Jesus seems to have gladly withdrawn Himself night after night from the turmoil of the city to the quiet of the village life of Bethany, out of sight of the sad and tragic city over which He couUl but weep (Lk lO-"-"). The night of His arrest seems to have been tho first in ihat fateful week He spent in the iimii.'iliii.' .iiMioHsof the city. Then during the
clo-ii L ,]:,\. ,. teaching by the miracle of the
fi^t]. i Ml Jl --. -Mk 11-"-^) and by parable (the \\iLkLa Uiisbaiidmen, the Ten Virgins.nlie
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Sheep and the Goats), as well as by direct predic- tion, to enforce tlie lesson that judgment on tlie city and the nation was nigh at hand. The wicked- ness and hypocrisy of the city led to the sterner denunciations of the scribes and Pharisees by One who considered that their doom was practically sealed (Mt 23). Only in the incidents of the widow's mite (Mk 12*'-", Lk 21'-') and in the coming of the Greek strangers to Jesus (Jn 12^-'") is there any sign of this lifting of the heavy clouds of approach- ing tragedy. The efforts of Pharisees, Sadducees, and la^vyers to catch Him in some political in- discretion or unorthodoxy in His teaching were alike foiled, and at length the leaders of the Jews made their unholy compact witli the traitor Judas.
As the first day of Unleavened Bread drew nigh, the disciples were sent into the city to prepare the Passover. The scene of this incident is to-day pointed out as an upper room (50 feet by 30 feet) near the modern Zion gate of the city ; tradition, according to Epiphanius, records that this was one of the few buildings ^^ liioh escaped destruction by Titus. It is certainly on the site, even if it is not the actual room, referred to by Bishop Cyril of Jerusalem in the middle of the 4th cent, as the place where the disciples were assembled on the day of Pentecost. Arculf is the first (about A.D. 685) to point it out as the C'cenaculum. Since 1561 the buildings, with the traditional tomb of David adjoining, have been in the hands of the Moslems.
After the Supper, Jesus withdrew with His dis- ciples to the Garden of Gethseraane. The fact that He crossed the Kidron points to some spot on the lower slopes of the Mount of Olives, and tradition since the 4th cent, has fixed on one which is now preserved as a garden by the Franciscans. If the site of the Caenaculum is correct, it is prob- able that Jesus reached Gethsemane along the line of the paths now running outside the S. wall of the city, leaving the city south of the Temple.
After arrest, Jesus was taken by the soldiers to the palace of the high priest in the Temple precincts. Probably the procession followed the general direction of the road which to-day runs from Gethsemane to St. Stephen's gate, though there are indications that in ancient times this road was more direct than it now is. In the early morning He was brought before Pilate in the Prfetorium, and he in turn sent Him (Lk 23'"") to Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee, who happened to be in Jerusalem at the time. The natural place where Herod would have his quarters would be in some part of his father's palace on the W. hill, and it may well be argued by those who think it more likely that the Pra-toriuni was in the same en- closure, that it is hardly probable that Pilate would have lightly risked sending Jesus twice through the streets when so many Galikeans were about the city.