ALLEGED PROFANATION.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 294, 6 May 1911, Page 5

ALLEGED PROFANATION.

RELIC - HUNTERS IN THE HOLY LAND. By Cable—Press Association—Copyright. London, May 4. One of the promoters of Catpain Parker's expedition regards the Jerusalem story as a fabrication. He says the party is working half-a-mile from the Mosque of Omar. A private letter states that the secrecy of the digging operation aroused the fanaticism of the attendants of the mosque, who tried to lynch Sheik Khalil, believing that he, being in charge of the sacred places at night, had been bribed by the explorers. Constantinople, May 4. A special commission has been appointed by the Porte to investigate the Omar Mosque matter. Great alarm was caused on April 21 by reports that the mosque had been profaned and the Governor's life threatened. Everything is now quiet. THE POOL, THE ARK, AND THE MOSQUE. The Pool of Siloam is probably indentical with the King's Pool. The name survives in Silwan, the name of the village which occupies the steep slopes of the Valley of the Kidron. The whole area is riddled with cave dwellings, cisterns, rock-cut steps, and ancient tombs. Some of the caves have apparently served the purposes successively of tombs and chapels, and to-day they are dwellings or store houses. The famous Siloam tunnel, 1700 ft. long, runs in a serpentine course, and opens in the Tyropoeon Valley under the name "Spring of Siloam," to pour its waters into the pool known as Birket-es-Silwan, or the Pool of Siloam. Close to the lower opening of the tunnel was found in 188 a Hebrew inscription giving an accountof the completion of the work. Although undated, there is every reason to believe that this is a contemporary account of Hezekiah's work, and, if so, it is the oldest Hebrew inscription known. The original Pool of Siloam, of which the present Birket occupies but a part, was excavated by Dr. F. Bliss, and was shown to have been a rock-cut reservoir, and just outside its edge was found a flight of ancient rock-cut steps, probably those mentioned in the Book of Nehemiah. The Ark of the Covenant was the chest containing the tables of the Covenant. Its final home was in the inner sanctuary of the Temple of Solomon. There is no further mention of the Ark in the historical hooks of the Bible. Whether it was among "the treasures of the house of the Lord" carried off by Shishak (about 930 8.C.), or whether it was still in its place in the days of Jeremiah, and was ultimately destroyed by the soldiers of Nebuchadnezzar (587 8.C.), it is impossible to say. There was no ark in the Temples of Zerubbabel and Herod. The Mosque of Omar stands on the site of the Temple in Jerusalem. Beneath the dome is the sacred rock upon which it is held that Abraham: was about to sacrifice Isaac. The mosque was originally a very early Byzantine Church, but it has been much modified by the Mohammedans.