Announcing Sabbath During the Second Temple
Under the southwest corner of the Temple Mount complex, between the Western Wall and the Southern Wall, a pile of large stones can be seen. These stones were located on the Temple Mount itself and were part of the buildings of the Second Temple complex. During the conquest of Jerusalem in the year 70 AD, the Romans tried to destroy the temple complex. They must have discovered that it is difficult to destroy Herod's massive structure, built of large stones. In their frustration (?) the Romans threw stones over the Temple Mount's infrastructure railing. For hundreds of years the Ophel Garden area was covered in dirt. When it was excavated, piles of stones were found in it, including a corner stone with an inscription in Hebrew: “To The Trumpeting House”.
In the Talmud it is stated that while the temple existed, it was customary to blow a trumpet (Shofar ?) in order to announce the beginning and end of Sabbath. The caller, who apparently had a position in the Temple, would go up "on a high roof in the city" and would call in order to "vacate the people from work in the fields", "vacate the city and shops" and "light the candles" (Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Shabbat, page 35, page 2). Additional calls were made at the end of Sabbath in order to mark the time when work is permitted. Josephus Flavius also testifies in his book The Wars of the Jews "and the last [tower] was erected above the top of the Pastophoria, where one of the priests stood of course, and gave a signal beforehand, with a trumpet at the beginning of every seventh day, in the evening twilight, as also at the evening when that day was finished, as giving notice to the people when they were to leave off work, and when they were to go to work again.” (History of the Jewish War with the Romans, 4, 9, 12).
The location of “the trumpeting house” was not clear until the stone was uncovered in 1971. Part of the stone contains a "niche" which suggests that it was a platform on which the caller stood and would announce, right from here, the beginning and end of Shabbat, two thousand years ago. The original stone is on the site, but the inscription was removed from it by the Antiquities Authority and is kept in the Israel Museum. A copy was placed instead.
Additional sources:
https://www.imj.org.il/he/collections/191539-0
https://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%91%D7%99%D7%AA_%D7%94%D7%AA%D7%A7%D7%99%D7%A2%D7%94#cite_note-2
https://www.sefaria.org.il/The_War_of_the_Jews.4.9.12?lang=he&with=all&lang2=he
https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2850/pg2850-images.html#link42HCH0009
https://har-habait.org/articleBody/30625
(Anecdote authored by: דניאל)
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