A 2,000-year-old road—believed to have carried Yidden on their way to the Beis Hamikdash as they were being oleh regel—has been unveiled in Ir Dovid, just outside the walls of the Old City.
Stretching some 2,000 feet from Maayan Hagichon (Pool of Shiloach) to the footsteps of Har HaBayis, the road would have been traversed by Klal Yisroel during the Shalosh Regalim: Pesach, Shavuos, and Sukkos. According to archaeologists, this was the very road used by our ancestors to ascend to the Makom HaMikdash b’tahara after immersing in the mikveh.
“This is the road our ancestors—yours and mine—would have walked 2,000 years ago to go up to the Beis Hamikdash,” said Ze’ev Orenstein, Director of International Affairs at the Ir Dovid Foundation, in an interview with The Jerusalem Post.
The discovery came to light nearly by accident, when a sewage pipe burst in the area over a decade ago. What began as emergency infrastructure work quickly turned into a historic excavation. Years of archaeological digging and legal wrangling culminated in a landmark ruling from Israel’s High Court, declaring the site one of “national and international importance.”
Archaeologists uncovered not only the road itself—paved with enormous stone slabs and measuring up to 100 feet wide in places—but also a bustling commercial district that lined its route. Evidence of this includes ancient market stalls, weights, coins, and pottery shards. “It’s like the Machane Yehuda of the Second Beis Hamikdash era,” Orenstein quipped.
Beneath the road’s drainage channel was discovered broken oil lamps, pots, and bronze coins dating back to the Churban. Experts believe these belonged to Jewish fighters who hid in the underground passageways during the Roman siege of Yerushalayim during the Great Revolt of the 1st century CE.
“Ir Dovid predates even the Old City,” Orenstein noted. “This isn’t just history—it’s Tanach coming alive. These aren’t just stories we tell at the Seder or in shul. These are real places, real paths, real footsteps etched into the bedrock of our nation’s memory.”
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3 Responses
Thank you Mr. Orenstein for your enlightenment (and yes, I chose that word quite intentionally) in stating: “This isn’t just history—it’s Tanach coming alive. These aren’t just stories we tell at the Seder or in shul. These are real places, real paths, real footsteps…”
To be clear: The Torah doesn’t “come alive” because you uncovered a stone-paved road. Tanach doesn’t need validation by archaeology to be “real.” And what we do at the Seder and in shul is not “storytelling” – it’s mesorah and is life itself.
The Torah is very real and alive with or without shards of pottery, and our “storytelling” will etch our mesorah into the hearts of our children far more deeply than a few bronze coins that belonged to “Jewish fighters”. To suggest otherwise treads uncomfortably close to apikorsus.
Who knows:
Your point is well taken. However, I do disagree with you. You’re correct that we should be firm in our belief and faith without requiring evidence. This is ancient knowledge. But it helps when we find living proof. Not just because it takes our belief into the realm of factual knowledge, but because it enhances our belief in those areas where the evidence has not yet been discovered. And that makes these discoveries more than interesting. They actually confirm the truth, preventing the yetzer horah the possibility of making us question.
What’s Ir Dovid.