east face of the old wall. In after times it would be called in Scripture the King's Pool, because it was appropriated and used by Solomon's successors, just as Solomon's Palace is called the king's house in Neh. iii. 25. This pool would be within the protected suburb. Nehemiah continues, "But there was no place for the beast that was under me to pass." Why? Because here we have two walls in a narrow space, and the destruction of both of them had filled the valley with debris. "Then I went up by the brook (nachal, the Kedron) and viewed the wall: and I turned back and entered by the Valley Gate, and so returned."
The Rebuilding of the Walls and Gates.—Nehemiah decides that the walls can be and shall be rebuilt; and he parcels out the work among forty-six of the principal people, who each have their retainers. The work is sacred, and is appropriately begun by the high priest, who naturally selects a spot near the Temple—the Sheep Gate of the city wall, which would seem to have been about mid-way between the north-eastern and north-western corners of the temple area of that time. The description of the repairs takes us westward, or to the left, and carries us all round the city to the same point again. "Then Eliashib the high priest rose up with his brethren the priests, and they builded the Sheep Gate; they sanctified it, and set up the doors of it; even unto the tower of Hammeah[1] they sanctified it, unto the tower of Hananel." These two towers, we may suppose, with Mr Lewin and Herr Schick, already occupied the site of the future Antonia. In fact they were parts of the Baris or Castle where Nehemiah himself intends to reside (Neh. ii. 8, where the Hebrew word is the Birah).
- ↑ In the Authorised Version it is Meah, in the Revised Version Hammeah. It might be translated Tower of the Hundred.
