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Jerusalem has its unique place as focus of religion, history, wars in God's name and ethnic traditions. Its identity consists of layers upon layers--truth, myth and hearsay, archeology, historical records and unsolved mystery. Simon Goldhill, professor at Cambridge, tries to peel them away one by one and bring them all to light, a difficult and uncertain task. Yet his book may be your best guide to making sense of it all. He certainly knows his subject and has studied it in depth. The book con
Whatever sense of longing one leaves with after reading Goldhill’s extensive, yet concise tour through Jerusalem, the reader will have probably felt a strange affinity to the complex system of buildings and ideologies, politics and religion, art and pious frauds. Goldhill taps into the imaginative abilities of his readers—the same imaginative abilities which often have endowed Jerusalem and its sites with so much significance—in order to guide them through a spiraling tour of Jerusalem. This to
I read this after my first trip to Israel, in July. I was there for a religious studies conference. In a week there I visited the Old City three times, got good and lost in the western part of the city (Karen Havesod Blvd., etc.), stumbled into an anti-Netanyahu demonstration, and was overwhelmed by the museum. We also visited Jaffa, Haifa, and Acre. And the day before I was set to leave I picked up the Goldhill in the little book store near the American Colony Hotel. The woman in the store knew...
This book is a kind of tour of Jerusalem's architectural landmarks with lots of historical commentary thrown in, focusing heavily (but not exclulsively) on churches (although it does cover some Christian/Muslim/secular buildings as well). I mostly found it interesting, but sometimes it had a bit too much architectural jargon for my taste. Some interesting facts I learned: 1. Christians have had a very mixed attitude towards the Temple Mount over the years. During the late Roman and early Byzanti...
Very good book on history and architecture of Jerusalem.
Deeply wish I had found this book before my visit to Jerusalem!
Review title: Stones crying outI went to the library with a newer book on the history of Jerusalem on my wish list, but when I got to the shelf and saw how many pages it was I realized I didn't want to tackle it. Then I saw Gladhill's more compact combination of history, travel guide, archaeology and architecture, and I am glad I did. I have never been to Jerusalem and am reaching the stage and age of life where (never say never but . . . ) all things still being possible, many things probably w...
A fascinating architectural/tour history of famous Jerusalem landmarks, as well as a sharp discussion of the highly contentious politics of archeology there. The last section, on modern Jerusalem, feels oddly truncated and slightly unbalanced, but his discussions of the growth and development of (as well as recent discoveries revealing the extent of truth in some bible stories) Jerusalem are great, and his section on the competing imperial building projects staining the Victorian city is outstan...
So I couldn't finish reading this. For one, it wasn't the most interesting book I've read, but probably more importantly, I had to cancel a trip to the Holy Land so it was just too depressing to read.
