The Roman Emperor Titus assigns one wall to each of the four commanders who serve him. ... They do so by way of the Western Wall: the most sacred site for Jews around the world.
To understand the importance of the Western Wall, one must first understand the meaning that the Temple held. ... This concept of Shekhina, the “intangible presence of God,” inside the Holy of Holies is essentially what gives this place its name. ...
It was believed that the Western Wall was spared because of the Divine presence that rested so nearby. ... It is therein deduced that, “In the First Temple the Ark of the Covenant had stood at the western wall of the Holy of Holies, perhaps in a special niche created to house it” (Ben-Dov, Naor, Aner 24). ... It is generally accepted that what was left of the western wall of the Temple did not withstand the test of time. ... “The existing traditions about the Western Wall of the Temple were transferred to the Western Wall of the Temple Mount, in order to endear it to the Jews and make it the foremost accepted Jewish holy place (Ben-Dov, Naor, Aner 34). In other words, it is not the Western Wall of the Temple itself that has evolved as the most holy structure for Jews around the world. But rather, it is a portion of the Western Wall that encompasses the Temple Mount. ... Jews assigned holiness to the exterior of the Western Wall only after the walls of the actual Temple fell.
The Western Wall was made of enormous stones weighing anywhere between two tons and one hundred tons. ... It is hard to imagine the construction of such a wall considering the immense size of each building block. ... The feel and the composition both play a role in the purpose of The Wall that operates today.
In the shift from the holiness of the Temple to the holiness associated with The Western Wall, some of the rituals undertaken at the Temple were lost but some were preserved. There are no longer animal sacrifices that occur at the base of the Western Wall as there once were at the alter in the Temple. ... There is certainly closeness to God that is felt by many Jews when visiting The Wall.
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