Jerusalem is arguably Christianity's most important city, during the time of the New Testament all the way up to today. Though control of the city has changed hands many times, its main role has been as the capital of Israel and the site of the Jewish temple, and indeed, Jerusalem plays an important role in the Old Testament history of Israel's founding and growth (Armstrong, 2005, p. 194). However, it serves a crucial role in the New Testament as well, where it is mentioned over one-hundred forty times, not only in the context of the literal city visited by Jesus and his disciples, but also in the form of New Jerusalem, the new city created by God in evelations (Morton, 2002, p. 769). By examining the importance of Jerusalem to Jesus' life as well as the state of the city today, one is able to better understand how the historical…...

mla

References

Armstrong, K. (2005). Jerusalem: One city, three faiths. New York: Random House.

Harris, S. (1998). The new testament: A student's introduction. New York: Mayfield Publishers.

Morton, R. (2002). The new jerusalem in the book of revelation: A study of revelation 21-22 in the light of its background in jewish tradition. The Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 64(4),

768-769.

Jerusalem
Some cities prove evocative enough to warrant a biography of their own, and Jerusalem is certainly one of them. Cities as ancient as layered as Jerusalem are more complex than any one person, for the entire gamut of human culture and history passes through their old walls. Like people, cities can also become profoundly insecure and even neurotic. In A oman in Jerusalem, the titular woman "believed in Jerusalem more than Jerusalem believes in itself," (236). It is not only Yehoshua's novel that underscores the significance of Jerusalem as a universal city. Jerusalem, a highly contested city, socially, politically, and culturally belongs to the world. Disputes over the est Bank and broader political conflicts reflect and draw attention to the importance of the ancient city of Jerusalem.

In A oman in Jerusalem, a powerful and subconscious longing for the city and its spiritual secrets is the theme of the work. Likewise,…...

mla

Works Cited

Messud, Claire. "Travels with Julia." The New York Times. 13 Aug, 2006. Retrieved online:  http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/13/books/review/Messud.t.html?pagewanted=print 

Yehoshua, A.B. A Woman in Jerusalem. 2004.

Moses led them to east of the Jordan and died without reaching the Promised Land. He relinquished leadership to Joshua, who led the people across the Jordan to conquer the Promised Land.
The rule of Israelites in the land of Israel began with the conquests of Joshua (ca. 1250 CE). The period from 1000-587 CE is referred to as the "Period of the Kings" (Israel Science and Technology Homepage, 2004). The most noteworthy kings during this time were King David (1010-970 CE), who made Jerusalem the Capital of Israel, and his son Solomon (Shlomo, 970-931 CE), who built the first Temple in Jerusalem.

In 587 CE, abylonian Nebuchadnezzar's army captured Jerusalem, destroyed the Temple, and exiled the Jews to abylon (modern day Iraq) (Israel Science and Technology Homepage, 2004). Jerusalem itself fell under siege in 586 .C.E. And was destroyed. Th the abylonians' attack was part of their campaign to stake…...

mla

Bibliography

Israel Science and Technology Homepage. (2004). Brief History of Israel and the Jewish People. Retrieved from the Internet at  http://www.science.co.il/About.asp .

McDowell, Josh and Don Stewart, Handbook of Today's Religions. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1983. Twelfth printing, June 1992.

AISH.com. (April, 2001). Crash Course in Jewish History. Retrieved from the Internet at  http://www.aish.com/literacy/jewishhistory/Crash_Course_in_Jewish_History_Part_22_-_The_End_of_Israel.asp .

Thus, the struggle within the city of Jerusalem and Israel itself has expounded itself to an international conflict between two dominating and conflicting political and religious systems.
As the fight for Jerusalem continues, one is left in awe to imagine so much effort placed in the acquisition and protection of one single city. Jerusalem, and its surrounding lands, is an ancient source of three of the world's dominant religions. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all lay claims to areas of the Holy Land and the struggle to reclaim it continues even today. The city is one with a long and checkered past, full of struggle and great battles for sovereignty of a variety of different people. With so much conflict, one has to wonder in Jerusalem will ever be truly at peace.

eferences

Barnavi, Eli. (2002). A Historical Atlas of the Jewish People. Schocken books: New York.

Gold, Dore. (2007). The Fight for Jerusalem:…...

mla

References

Barnavi, Eli. (2002). A Historical Atlas of the Jewish People. Schocken books: New York.

Gold, Dore. (2007). The Fight for Jerusalem: Radical Islam, the West and the Future of the Holy City. Regnery Publishing.

Laughlin, John C.H. (2006). Fifty Major Cities of the Bible. London: Routledge.

The Old Testament. The Revised Standard Version.

While this isn't considered definitive proof, many scholars have come to accept that a Jewish leader named David ruled in what is now Jerusalem.
Thousands of years of battle and torment occupied the land of Jerusalem after David's reign. The city was ruled at various times by Persians, Alexander the Great, the Romans, Muslims, the Turks, the ritish, and several other empires through history. Throughout these transitions of power, many of King David's ideas and plans came to fruition, demonstrating the lasting influence he had on that city. The Temple Mount, built by David's son Solomon and expanded into a fortress many years later, is still standing. The Western Wall of the Temple Mount is widely considered the holiest site in the city.

Jerusalem Today

Modern Jerusalem contains approximately 662,000 people (Jerusalem). It has been part of the independent state of Israel since 1947, and houses Jews, Christians, and Muslims. In the…...

mla

Bibliography

Ariel, David S. What Do Jews Believe? The Spiritual Foundations of Judaism. New York, N.Y.: Schocken Books, Inc., 1995.

Finkelstein, Israel and Neil Asher Silberman. David and Solomon: In Search of the Bible's Sacred Kings and the Roots of the Western Tradition. Free Press, 2007.

Gavron, Daniel. 2003. King David & Jerusalem: Myth and Reality. Available at:  http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/2000_2009/2003/9/King%20David%20and%20Jerusalem-%20Myth%20and%20Reality 

Jerusalem: History. Virtual Israel Experience. Available at:  http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vie/Jerusalem1.html

Empire to Empire: Jerusalem between Ottoman and British ule
Abigail Jacobson's From Empire to Empire: Jerusalem between Ottoman and British ule (2011) looks at much more than what is typically seen in books on Palestine during the First World War. While the majority of those books focus strongly on the British and their military campaign, Jacobson's book delves deeply into the other aspects of the city and how it moved through the pain and strife that the war caused it. These aspects of the war are generally ignored, even when a book specifically focuses on Jerusalem during that time period. This would indicate that most historians see Jerusalem as a place that was affected by British rule, and that saw the fall of the Ottoman Empire. However, these same historians see little else, in that Jerusalem appears to only matter in the context of who was controlling it or marching…...

mla

References

Cline, E. (2004) Jerusalem besieged: From ancient Canaan to modern Israel. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Jacobson, A. (2011). From empire To empire: Jerusalem between Ottoman and British rule. NY: Syracuse University Press.

Sebag Montefiore, S. (2011) Jerusalem: The biography, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.

Wasserstein, B (2002) Divided Jerusalem: The struggle for the Holy City. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.

The maps depict two roads that are outside of the city walls. The first road led to Jerusalem and was referred to as the Mons Gaudi located in the northwest (Boaz, 2001). The second road led away from Jerusalem into Bethlehem. The Mons Gaudi ended and Davids gate and it is also called the oad to the city (Boaz, 2001).
It is believed that most of the medieval gate was destroyed. The author explains that "two unusual and very fine Corinthian capitals of Frankish workmanship can be seen in secondary use in the blind arch to the east of the Ottoman gate, but their origin is unknown (Boaz, 2001)." The author also explains that it is quite possible that once the citadel was extended and cane to look like it currently does, Davids Gate was relocated and renamed Jaffa's gate. Today the gate is located further to the west than…...

mla

References

Boas, a.J. (2001). Jerusalem in the Time of the Crusades: Society, Landscape, and Art in the Holy City under Frankish Rule. London: Routledge.

Carlson, J.R. (1951). Cairo to Damascus (1st ed.). New York: Knopf.

Jerusalem's Gates. Retrieved July 12, 2008 at http://www.ariel.org/vjgates.htm

O'Connor, J. (2008) the Holy Land: An Oxford Archaeological Guide from Earliest Times to 1700. Oxford University Press

Jerusalem
Located east of Jordan River, the holy city of Jerusalem and its historic sacred atmosphere rest on the hills of the City of David. Its significance has spanned centuries -- millennia, in fact. Today it is viewed as a spiritual home to Christians, Jews, Orthodox and Muslim religions. ars have been fought over it, and God Himself has been condemned to death there by a Roman prelate and the mob that called for His blood. It was the scene of the birth of a proud people and the scene where the gates of Heaven were opened.

Jerusalem is known as the Holy City because it is where so many important events related in the Old and New Testaments took place. For instance, it is where the Davidic Covenant was made between God and David, in which God made a series of promises to David and to Israel -- the greatest…...

mla

Works Cited

Brown, Raymond E. An Introduction to the New Testament. NY: Doubleday, 1997.

Print.

"Balfour Declaration." Jewish Virtual Library. Web. 20 Mar 2016.

Sheen, Fulton. The Life of Christ. NY: Image Books, 2008. Print

Church of the Holy Sepulcher & the Crucifixion of Christ
Church of the Holy Sepulcher is the most important archeological site in Jerusalem and the importance of this building lies in Christian belief that this could be the place where Christ was crucified and buried. The building is being controlled by Christians of different denominations today and the keys to the Church remained with the Muslims for eights centuries. this demonstrates the power of one place to unite people of different backgrounds and faith. Church of Holy Sepulcher has witnessed many conflicts and has undergone many destructions and restorations, but it still is the one of those holy places in the world, which has become object of intense human devotion.

Jerusalem has always been the center of attention as an important religious lace for the followers of all three primary religions. It is because of this that Jerusalem boasts of a history,…...

mla

References

John L. Lyons, Jerusalem: Besieged by the Sacred. Vol. 12, The World & I, 03-01-1997, pp 60

Biddle, Martin. The Tomb of Christ. Gloucestershire: Sutton Publishing Limited, 1999.

Archaeological Fact Contradicts Tradition in Jerusalem., Morning Edition (NPR), 12-18-1995

Muslims' control of the keys, Florida Today, June 21, 1999

Alluding to "proofs" that God exists shifts the discussion from attempts to mobilize "Jerusalem" in the service of "Athens" to more religiously motivated projects to justify faith. The goal here may be to assuage one's own doubts, develop latent truths within the content of faith, or, more often, to convince others through a demonstration of logic or even rhetoric. In many cases, these arguments are persuasive to the extent to which they define the religious proposition as a limit or convergent case: For Aquinas, for example, God as first cause or first mover, or God as the ultimate telos or source of all philosophical confidence.

hile they may be rhetorically dazzling in effect, these arguments resolve to special pleading for faith as not entirely subject to secular categories of reason, as when Habermas defined God as that aspect of experience "that gives coherence, unity, and thickness to [a] life-world" that would…...

mla

Works Cited

The Holy Bible, New King James Version. New York: American Bible Society, 1999. Print.

Habermas, Jurgen. Legitimation Crisis. Trans. Thomas McCarthy. Boston: Beacon Press, 1975. Print.

James, William. The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature. Metairie, LA: Megalodon Entertainment, 2008. Print.

Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Practical Reason. Trans. Thomas Kingsmill Abbott. New York: Cosimo, 2008. Print.

Palestinian resident of East Jerusalem, I have grown up in a social environment and community rife with various significant conflicts: of culture, nationality, religion, and idealistic allegiances. As the product of a mixed European/Arab family with friends in both the Israeli and Palestinian communities, I have benefited from countless opportunities to observe and to contribute to the successful reconciliation of conflicting values and perspectives among my peers. My background has convinced me that what matters more than anything else in the human community is the committed pursuit of genuine peace and mutual respect and consideration among and between individuals, local, regional, and, ultimately, global communities.
At the same time, the relative quality of life of all of the individuals who are comprised by their respective societies is equally important. I that respect, my developmental social experiences have sensitized me to the tremendous need to improve specific components of my community.…...

Dome of the Rock The Temple held immense significance for the Jewish people and the Temple Wall still standing today but known as the Wailing Wall still serves as a symbol of the suffering of the Jewish people throughout time. The First Temple, built by Solomon, had been destroyed by the Babylonians in the 6th century BC. The Second Temple was constructed fifty years later under Cyrus the Great. It stood until 70 AD when the Romans razed it to the ground following the Jewish revolt. After that it was never rebuilt (Hamblin). However, Jerusalem remained a special place. It became the home of Christians and later of Muslims, who venerated it as the place where Mohammed started his night journey up to heaven (Islam, Al-Hamad). Because Jews and Muslims have two very different religions with different orientations, creeds, forms of worship and perspectives on God, the fact that both have…...

The European actions against the natives were in error, because they were committed by Protestant Christians, who, unlike Catholics or savages, should have known better and responded with higher forms of faith and feeling. The Indian atrocities were seen as inevitable, the result of "undesigned provocation" (even though esley acknowledges that the settlers are interlopers) rather than a response in defense of their land (ard, 1872).
Thus, although the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights may proclaim religious separation from all churches, America was actually founded by individuals seeking to create what today we would call a theocracy. Despite early amicable relations with the natives, eventually conflicts over territory caused the two populations to be hostile. The violence that ensued was justified by the religious rhetoric and beliefs of the Puritans, as they strove to create a New Jerusalem in a land that was inhabited by people whose civilization…...

mla

Works Cited

Atkins, Scott Eric. (2008) "Pilgrims and puritans." American Studies at the University of Virginia. Retrieved 25 Jan 2008 at  http://xroads.virginia.edu/~CAP/puritan/purhist.html 

Native Americans of North America." (2007). Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia Retrieved 25 Jan 2008 at http://encarta.msn.com

Religious tolerance in Colonial America (2008). Geocites. Retrieved 25 Jan 2008 at http://www.geocities.com/crownac/religious_tolerance.htm

Ward, Nathanial. (1647). "Against toleration." E-text of American History Told by Contemporaries. Vol. 1. pp. 393-96. Retrieved 25 Jan 2008 at  http://personal.pitnet.net/primarysources/ward.html

Also, because of the lack of land and the unwillingness for the Nobles to maximize the potential of the land,
instead relying on Muslim traditions and European feudal models,
agriculture was not as prominent. Because a large mercenary military was
needed for protection, there was therefore a need for a great deal of
tribute and taxation to hire and fund the military aspects of the Kingdom
of Jerusalem. Despite these factors which would contribute to a weaker
economy, the Kingdom of Jerusalem was in a tenuous economic position but
was able to prosper, especially in the 12th century, as a result of the
trade and the realization of the potential of trading in the Middle East.
This meant riches for the merchants, colonizers, Europeans, and nobles who
could not only tax those from other places, but bring in new and valuable
products to Europe. Thus trade was improved greatly between Europe and the
East and the Kingdom of Jerusalem brought much of…...

mla

Works Cited

Br?hier, Louis. "Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (1099-1291)." Catholic

Encyclopedia. 2007. New Advent. 28 Apr. 2007

.

Heidemann, Stefan. "Financing the Tribute to the Kingdom of Jerusalem."

School of Oriental and African Studies (2007). 28 Apr. 2007

.

For those like Ezra, such a situation threatened the very survival of the nation and faith itself. However, in addition to the idea of the "imperiled nation" embedded in the Jewish psyche during the time (and, perhaps during modern time as well), it also pointed to the lax state of Jewish life and ritual in Jerusalem during this period -- as well as the turmoil that must have existed at the time these reforms were implemented.
Although it might be imagined that at the very lease the social reform concerning mixed marriages would result in emotional turmoil -- it also resulted in real danger. This is because following his declaration that mixed marriage should be immediately dissolved, the Samaritans and other involved groups were understandably offended to a degree in which violent attack against the Jewish community became a real possibility. As a result, Ezra decided to embark on rebuilding…...

mla

Bibliography

Bible Web. "Ezra and Nehemiah." 2004. Retrieved from Web site on October 2, 2004 http://www.bibleweb.org/BibleOverview/bo12.htm

Donnel, J. Rabbi. "What Does God Pray?" (2004) Web site. Retrieved on October 2, 2004  http://www.tbsoc.com/sermons/donnellyk5763.html 

Mechon Mamre. "Ezra / Nehemiah -- translated from the Hebrew Bible" 2004. Retrieved from Web site on October 2, 2004  http://www.mechon-mamre.org/e/et/et35.htm 

Medial, D. "Ezra." Web Page. 2002. Retrieved from Web site on October 2, 2004, from http://www.medialdea.net/historyguy80538/ezrajerus.htm

Thesis Statement:

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict exemplifies the dynamic of "the oppressed become the oppressor," where the once-oppressed Israelis, after gaining statehood, have now become the oppressors of the Palestinians.

Argument Outline:

Introduction:

Begin with a brief historical overview of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the establishment of Israel in 1948.
Highlight the initial displacement and oppression of Palestinians by the Israeli state.

Historical Oppression of Palestinians:

Describe the systematic discrimination and marginalization of Palestinians under Israeli occupation, including land confiscation, restrictions on movement, and economic deprivation.
Discuss the human rights violations committed by the Israeli military and security forces.
Provide evidence from historical documents and....

I. Introduction
A. Overview of the topography of Palestine
B. Importance of understanding the geographical features of the region

II. Physical features of Palestine
A. Mountain ranges
1. Judean Mountains
2. Samarian Mountains
B. Coastal plains
1. Mediterranean coast
2. Gaza Strip
C. Jordan Valley
1. Rift Valley
2. Dead Sea
D. Negev Desert
1. Arid climate and desert landscape

III. Impact of topography on human settlements and land use
A. Agricultural practices in different regions
1. Terracing on mountain slopes
2. Irrigation in the Jordan Valley
B. Influence on historical and cultural development
1. Importance of Jerusalem as a central highland city
2. Bedouin communities in the desert

IV. Challenges and opportunities posed by the topography
A. Water scarcity in desert regions
1.....

Outline of an Essay on the Topography of Palestine

I. Introduction
A. Definition and significance of topography in understanding Palestine's history and culture
B. Overview of Palestine's geographic location and boundaries
C. Thesis statement: The topography of Palestine has played a crucial role in shaping its history and the lives of its people

II. Major Geographic Regions
A. Coastal Plain
1. Western boundary of Palestine along the Mediterranean Sea
2. Fertile soil for agriculture and strategic location for trade
B. Galilee Hills
1. Northern region of Palestine, characterized by rolling hills
2. Important agricultural and religious center
C. Jordan Valley
1. Steep....

## The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: A Contested Land with a Complex History

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one of the most protracted and intractable disputes in the world. At its core is the question of who has the legitimate right to the land that is now Israel and the Palestinian territories. Both Israelis and Palestinians have deep historical and religious ties to the land, and both sides have suffered greatly in the conflict.

The conflict has its roots in the late 19th century, when European Jews began to immigrate to Palestine in large numbers. This influx of Jewish settlers led to tensions with the....