Series: Walking around Jerusalem

—Our walk around Jerusalem is now complete as we stand before what is arguably the most photographed gate in the world and without doubt the oldest gate in the Old City’s walls. In 1999 our tour group was able to get within a few feet of this double gate from the outside. Although protected by a small iron fence, some of our group members nevertheless jumped the fence so that they could touch the gate, but these days you can’t get anywhere near it. Also called the Golden Gate (this is a story for another day) or the Gate of Mercy (the southern gate) and Repentance (the northern gate), it was built approximately seven hundred years after the time of Jesus directly over the remains of an earlier gate used to enter the temple courtyard. 

—Jews believe that one day the Messiah will enter through this gate to redeem them. Christians accept Jesus as the Messiah, and many believe that it was through this very gate that he entered on Palm Sunday and that he will reenter at his second coming. Muslims believe that the final resurrection and judgment will take place here, and so this gate holds enormous significance for all three faiths.

—The gate was sealed by the Arabs in 810 A.D. to deny unsupervised access to the Temple Mount to unbelievers although the gate was unblocked during the Crusader period each year for the celebrations of Palm Sunday and the Exaltation of the Cross. At the close of the Crusader period in the late twelfth century the gate no longer served any religious or practical purpose and it has remained closed to this day.

—Daniel McCabe