Hebrew → English transcript

I am standing here now, precisely on Independence Day,

taking advantage of the holiday, I decided to accept

the invitation of some

friends here at the Western Wall Heritage Foundation, and to see

this wonderful place, this amazing and moving place, beneath the Western Wall Plaza.

You see here above us, that is the Western Wall Plaza, Jews stand here and pray.

And since the coronavirus

they have had the chance to dig here, of course they put in serious support pillars,

and they are uncovering layer after layer of the ancient Jewish history here,

in the place where above us stood the Temple.

And the excavations are continuing, in the end

the intention is to reach the Wall itself from below. And what we see here

is one of the most exciting discoveries,

of course alongside many clay jars and lamps and so on,

here they discovered an original ritual bath from the Second Temple period,

exactly in accordance with halakha. Here are the steps, the stairs that lead to

the mikveh, there is a capacity here of forty se’ah, because before entering

the Temple one must purify oneself,

“ daytime immersion,”

sunset, according to all the purity laws. And here there is a channel that

channeled the rainwater straight into the mikveh pool, of forty seah.

A truly amazing discovery. Right next to it,

we see here an entrance to something that may have served,

a space that may have served as a synagogue.

we see here a beautiful space with arches,

with arches and even a mosaic floor, a truly original mosaic floor,

where our forefathers walked, close

to the Temple. A synagogue that apparently

was used for prayer near the Temple. And notice what we see here,

on the lintel of the entrance to the synagogue,

here we have a groove for a mezuzah. A mezuzah groove, there was a mezuzah here,

Jews passed here, I

do not know if they kissed it, if it was customary then to kiss the mezuzah,

but in any case they passed by the mezuzah on which was written

“ Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One.”

A small and moving glimpse

of the land where our forefathers walked.

Of course, the intention is to later establish here a large visitors center,

so that generations of Jews with God’s help,

we hope that the Temple will be built soon,

but until then we will merit to learn

About our past and yearning for the future of the people of Israel,

the Eternity of Israel will not lie.