The Western Wall Tunnels

The portion of the Western Wall that you see on postcards, pictures, paintings, and books is the place where thousands of people come to pray. This is the location of both the women's and men's sections. This is the area that weddings, bar mitzvahs, and IDF ceremonies take place. Within the cracks between these stones, visitors place small scraps of paper with prayers on them.

Although many think of this portion of the Western Wall as "the Wall," it is in reality only one-eighth of the total length of the entire Western Wall. The rest of the Western Wall still stands, although much of it is underground. However, over the last thirteen centuries, Muslims have built homes throughout the area, with some of these homes abutting the Wall itself.

After the Six Day War in 1967, the Israeli Ministry of Religious Affairs decided to begin a project to expose the entire length of the Western Wall. It took them 20 years of digging to create the tunnels under the Muslim Quarter.

These tunnels are now open to the public, but only on pre-arranged, guided tours. During the early portion of the summer we heard that it can take up to two months to get reservations; by the end of summer, two-to-three day notice seemed to suffice.

Yesterday, we went on the tunnel tour and both the tour and the tunnels were awesome. A guide escorts you (in small groups of 10-30 people) through the tunnels. The guide did a wonderful job explaining the history of the tunnels, the history of the Temple, and your location in comparison to the Old City and the location of where the Holy of Holies once stood.

Many of the hallways were very narrow, but lighting and fans in the tunnels helped alleviate any claustrophobia. Also along the tour was a relatively large model of the Second Temple that has portions that move with a push of a button (held by the guide).

Along one side of the tunnels, you can see (and feel) the stones of the Western Wall. They were amazing because you can see the detail and care that was put into each of the exceptionally heavy stones when they were first created and placed in the Wall. The guide also points out the damage done to many of the stones by the Romans and you can see through a glass floor-plate how the Romans had shoved many of the stones off the Wall, shattering them when they hit the ground.

People pray at the well-known portion of the Western Wall, not because it is a wall or solely because of its history. They pray there because it is as close as they are allowed to get to the historical location of the Holy of Holies, the inner sanctum of the Temple. On the tunnel tour, visitors get to stand at the section of the Western Wall that was the very closest to the Holy of Holies. An amazing experience.

Once we reached the end of the tunnels, thus the end of the Wall, we turned around and headed back. Apparently, during the daytime (we were there in the evening), visitors can exit the tunnels into the Muslim Quarter and then walk back to the Jewish Quarter with an armed escort. I think I'm glad that I didn't have to make a decision about this for it was much nicer to just head back the way we had come and re-emerge from the tunnels at the very familiar section of the Wall where thousands of people were waiting to watch an IDF ceremony.