1. Jews and "Zionism":
The modern city of Jerusalem has about 75,000 inhabitants, of whom over two-thirds are Jews. Until about 50 years ago the city was confined within its 16th-century walls, the doors of its gates locked every night, and even here there were considerable areas unoccupied. Since then, and particularly during the last 25 years, there has been a rapid growth of suburbs to the North, Northwest, and West of the old city. This has been largely due to the steady stream of immigrant Jews from every part of the world, particularly from Russia, Romania, Yemin, Persia, Bokhara, the Caucasus, and from all parts of the Turkish empire. This influx of Jews, a large proportion of whom are extremely poor, has led to settlements or "colonies" of various classes of Jews being erected all over the plateau to the North--an area never built upon before--but also on other sides of the city. With the exception of the Bokhara Colony, which has some fine buildings and occupies a lofty and salubrious situation, most of the settlements are mean cottages or ugly almshouses. With the exception of a couple of hospitals, there is no Jewish public building of any architectural pretensions. The "Zionist" movement, which has drawn so many Jews to Jerusalem, cannot be called a success, as far as this city is concerned, as the settlers and their children as a rule either steadily deteriorate physically and morally--from constant attacks of malaria, combined with pauperism and want of work--or, in the case of the energetic and enlightened, they emigrate--to America especially; this emigration has been much stimulated of late by the new law whereby Jews and Christians must now, like Moslems, do military service.
The foreign Christian population represents all nations and all sects; the Roman church is rapidly surpassing all other sects or religions in the importance of their buildings. The Russians are well represented by their extensive enclosure, which includes a large cathedral, a hospital, extensive hospice in several blocks, and a handsome residence for the consul-general, and by the churches and other buildings on the Mount of Olives. The Germans have a successful colony belonging to the "Temple" sect to the West of Jerusalem near the railway station, and are worthily represented by several handsome buildings, e.g. the Protestant "Church of the Redeemer," built on the site and on the ground plan of a fine church belonging to the Knights of John, the new (Roman Catholic) Church of the Dormition on "Mount Zion," with an adjoining Benedictine convent, a very handsome Roman Catholic hospice outside the Damascus Gate, the Kaiserin Augusta Victoria Sanatorium on the Mount of Olives, and a Protestant Johanniter Hospice in the city, a large general hospital and a leper hospital, a consulate and two large schools. In influence, both secular and religious, the Germans have rapidly gained ground in the last 2 decades. British influence has much diminished, relatively.
2. Christian Buildings and Institutions:
The British Ophthalmic Hospital, belonging to the "Order of the Knights of John," the English Mission Hospital, belonging to the London Jews Society, the Bishop Gobat's School and English College connected with the Church Missionary Society, 3 Anglican churches, of which the handsome George's Collegiate Church adjoins the residence of the Anglican bishop, and a few small schools comprise the extent of public buildings connected with British societies. France and the Roman Catholic church are worthily represented by the Dominican monastery and seminary connected with the handsome church of Stephen--rebuilt on the plan of an old Christian church--by the Ratisbon (Jesuit) Schools, the Hospital of Louis, the hospice and Church of Augustine, and the monastery and seminary of the "white fathers" or Freres de la mission algerienne, whose headquarters center round the beautifully restored Church of Anne. Not far from here are the convent and school of the Saeurs de Sion, at the Ecce Homo Church. Also inside the walls near the New Gate is the residence of the Latin Patriarch--a cardinal of the Church of Rome--with a church, the school of the Freres de la doctrine chretienne, and the schools, hospital and convent of the Franciscans, who are recognized among their co-religionists as the "parish priests" in the city, having been established there longer than the numerous other orders.
All the various nationalities are under their respective consuls and enjoy extra-territorial rights. Besides the Turkish post-office, which is very inefficiently managed, the Austrians, Germans, French, Russians and Italians all have post-offices open to all, with special "Levant" stamps. The American mail is delivered at the French post-office. There are four chief banks, French, German, Ottoman and Anglo-Palestinian (Jewish). As may be supposed, on account of the demand for land for Jewish settlements or for Christian schools or convents, the price of such property has risen enormously. Unfortunately in recent years all owners of land--and Moslems have not been slow to copy the foreigners--have taken to enclosing their property with high and unsightly walls, greatly spoiling both the walks around the city and the prospects from many points of view. The increased development of carriage traffic has led to considerable dust in the dry season, and mud in winter, as the roads are metaled with very soft limestone. The Jerus-Jaffa Railway (a French company), 54 miles long, which was opened in 1892, has steadily increased its traffic year by year, and is now a very paying concern. There is no real municipal water-supply, and no public sewers for the new suburbs--though the old city is drained by a leaking, ill-constructed medieval sewer, which opens just below the Jewish settlement in the Kidron and runs down the Wady en Nauru. A water-supply, new Sewers, electric trams and electric lights for the streets, are all much-talked-of improvements. There are numerous hotels, besides extensive accommodations in the religious hospices, and no less than 15 hospitals and asylums.
LITERATURE.
This is enormous, but of very unequal value and much of it out of date. For all purposes the best book of reference is Jerusalem from the Earliest Times to AD 70, 2 volumes, by Principal G.A. Smith. It contains references to all the literature. To this book and to its author it is impossible for the present writer adequately to express his indebtedness, and no attempt at acknowledgment in detail has been made in this article. In supplement of the above, Jerusalem, by Dr. Selah Merrill, and Jerusalem in Bible Times, by Professor Lewis B. Paton, will be found useful. The latter is a condensed account, especially valuable for its illustrations and its copious references. Of the articles in the recent Bible Dictionaries on Jerusalem, that by Conder in HDB is perhaps the most valuable. Of guide-books, Baedeker's Guide to Palestine and Syria (1911), by Socin and Benzinger, and Barnabe Meistermann's (R.C.) New Guide to the Holy Land (1909), will be found useful; also Hanauer's Walks about Jerusalem.
On Geology, Climate and Water-Supply:
Hull's "Memoir on Physical Geography and Geology of Arabian Petrea, Palestine, and Adjoining Districts," PEF; and Blankenhorn," Geology of the Nearer Environs of Jerusalem," ZDPV, 1905; Chaplin, "Climate of Jerusalem," PEFS, 1883; Glaisher, "Meteorol. Observations in Palestine," special pamphlet of the Palestine Exploration Fund; Hilderscheid, "Die Niederschlagsverhaltnisse Palestine in alter u. neuer Zeit," ZDPV (1902); Huntington, Palestine and Its Transformation (1911); Andrew Watt, "Climate in Hebron," etc., Journal of the Scottish Meteorological Society (1900-11); Schick, "Die Wasserversorgung der Stadt Jerusalem," ZDPV, 1878; Wilson "Water Supply of Jerusalem," Proceedings of the Victoria Institute, 1906; Masterman, in Biblical World, 1905.
On Archaeology and Topography:
PEF, volume on Jerusalem, with accompanying maps and plans; Clermont-Ganneau, Archaeological Researches, I, 1899 (PEF); William, Holy City (1849); Robinson, Biblical Researches (1856); Wilson, Recovery of Jerusalem (1871); Warren Underground Jerusalem (1876); Vincent, Underground Jerusalem (1911); Guthe, "Ausgrabungen in Jerusalem," ZDPV, V; Bliss and Dickie, Excavations in Jerusalem (1894-97); Sanday, Sacred Sites of the Gospels (1903); Mitchell, "The Wall of Jerusalem according to the Book of Neh," JBL (1903); Wilson, Golgotha and the Holy Sepulchre (1906); Kuemmel, Materialien z. Topographie des alten Jerusalem; also numerous reports in the PEFS; Zeitschrift des deutschen Palestine Vereins; and the Revue biblique.
On History:
Besides Bible, Apocrypha, works of Josephus, and History of Tacitus: Besant and Palmer, History of Jerusalem; Conder, Judas Maccabeus and Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem; Le Strange, Palestine under the Moslems (1890); C.F. Kent, Biblical Geography and History (1911). Bevan, Jerusalem under the High-Priests; Watson, The Story of Jerusalem.
E. W. G. Masterman