(City of *David). The capital of the modern State of *Israel. After King *David had captured the fortress from the Jebusites (*II Samuel 5), he made it his capital. His son, King *Solomon, placed the *Temple there and it remained the capital of the *Southern Kingdom until its capture by the Babylonians in 586BCE. Through the period of the *exile, the Jewish people kept alive the hope of return and, in the Persian period the Temple was rebuilt and Jerusalem became again the centre of the cult.
King *Herod greatly enlarged the Temple in the 1st Century BCE, but, apart from the *Wailing Wall, it was almost entirely destroyed in the Jewish revolt of 70CE. After the *Bar Kokhba revolt of 132, the city was renamed Aeolia Capitolina and *Jews were forbidden to live there. In the Muslim period this ban was lifted and Jerusalem became a place of *pilgrimage for the Jews as well as for Christians and Muslims. The longing to return to the land of Israel and particularly to Jerusalem was expressed regularly in the *liturgy particularly at the *festival of *Passover—the *seder actually concludes with the words, ‘Next year in Jerusalem.’ The city was partitioned between Jew and Arab in 1948 when the State of Israel was created, but the Arab part (including the Wall) was captured in the Six Day War in 1967. The united city was then declared the Israeli capital. (See also *ZION).
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