The Secret Tunnels of Hebron’s Cave of the Patriarchs

According to the Biblical narrative, the Cave of the Patriarchs, in Hebrew Me’arat ha-Makhpelah – the Double Cave, was the land mass purchased by Abraham some 3,700 years ago outside the ancient town of Hebron to serve as a multigenerational burial site. This famous piece of real estate would house the remains of his deceased wife Sarah, himself, Isaac and Rebecca, and Jacob and Leah, the Patriarchs and Matriarchs of the Jewish People.

Throughout Jewish history until modern times, Jews have travelled far and wide to pray at the graves of the righteous. Hebron’s Cave of the Patriarchs is perhaps the oldest and most ancient of these pilgrimage tombs. Visiting the site, instead of seeing a cave you see a colossal 2000-year-old building. The question scholars and explorers have asked over the millennia is where is the original cave that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were actually buried in?

The gigantic mausoleum is attributed to King Herod who constructed such sites as the city of Caesarea, the palaces and fortifications of Masada, the Western Wall, and the Temple Mount. In fact, the design, layout, and proportions of the building represent a miniature duplicate of the Temple Mount itself. The large ashlar stones on the outer wall, for example, match the style of stones in the Western Wall with a smooth surface and familiar Herodian margins.

The same Herodian margins can also be seen in certain parts of Masada, although formed out of plaster and not chiselled out of rock. All this high-end construction blocked out visibility of the original cave, if it was even there to begin with. Oddly enough, when surrounding the site, no original entrance can be found. The modern-day entrances are not from the Herodian period, but rather date to the 10^th century C.E. when the Arabs ruled the area and carved out cavities through the Herodian wall.

Men praying outside the Cave of the Patriarchs. Notice how the cut of the stones are similar to the stones of the Western Wall.

It's not necessarily unusual for an ancient mausoleum not to have an entrance. The pyramids of Egypt, for example, that housed the remains of the pharaohs also do not have entrances visible to the public. Some ancient tombs were originally built with entrances but were later sealed and covered by construction materials meant to conceal any sign of an opening. Some tombs had secret entrances and others fake entrances. The reason for all this structural obscurity was to delude potential thieves. Since it was common practice for ancient monarchs to bring their wealth and treasures with them into the grave, they had to take precautions to protect it, even posthumously. Evidently some of the ancients thought that they could buy their way into Heaven.

The missing cave of Abraham remained a mystery throughout the centuries. With the passage of time, the monumental building went through several alterations as Christian and Muslim empires controlled the site during various historical periods. Since the lower level of the structure (presumably where the cave was located) was inaccessible, decorative make-shift tombs were set up on the upper level that came to represent each one of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs. All visitors to the site over the past 1000 years paid homage to the Patriarchs exclusively on the upper level of the holy enclosure.

Inside the Cave of the Patriarchs, at the Hall of Sarah

Down a Dark Narrow Staircase

One of those visitors was none other than Benjamin of Tudela, a 12^th century Jewish explorer originally from Spain. In the course of his travels, he documented various Jewish communities across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa during the Middle Ages. While visiting the Land of Israel at a time when it was ruled by the Crusaders, he made a point of stopping by the city of Hebron. Like all religious and historical sites in the Holy Land, Hebron attracted much pilgrimage and tourism. As such, the Crusaders appointed custodians and local guides to direct the traffic and provide information to tourists. Benjamin testified that the guides informed guests to the site that the tombs on the upper level were in fact the authentic resting places of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, but if a Jewish tourist was present, he would be offered access to the “real tombs” in exchange for a special fee.

After paying the price, Benjamin was led to a room with an iron gate. Once opened, he descended down a dark narrow staircase holding a lit candle until he reached a large opening into an empty cave. He then saw a second opening into another empty cave and a third opening, but this time he claimed to have seen six sepulchres with the names of Patriarchs and Matriarchs written in Hebrew.

In the 13^th century, the Mamluks (an Islamic dynasty based in Egypt) drove the Crusaders out of the Holy Land and in its wake enacted strict laws against all non-Muslims, including Jews. Those laws consisted of new restrictions in accessing holy sites. Places like the Temple Mount in Jerusalem and the Cave of the Patriarchs became off-limits to Jews. Even though in previous periods of Muslim rule (prior to the Crusades) Jews were allowed to pray freely at these holy sites, the Mamluks made it illegal for Jews even to enter the sacred compounds. The situation remained legally binding for a period of exactly 700 years from the year 1267 until 1967 when the area was liberated by the IDF during the Six Day War.

The Sultan’s Sword

During the period of time that the Cave of the Patriarchs was off-limits to Jews, the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire that controlled the Land of Israel in the 17^th century was on a tour of his lands and paid a visit to Hebron. While visiting the Cave of the Patriarchs, he entered the Hall of Isaac and leaned over a hole that according to tradition leads directly to the resting place of the Patriarchs. While doing do, the Sultan’s golden sword that contained diamonds and precious stones slipped out of its socket and fell straight into the hole. Quickly, the Sultan ordered a soldier to be lowered into the hole by rope in order to retrieve his sword, but while doing so, loud screams could be heard.

After raising the soldier back up, he was dead. Another soldier was selected and the same thing happened.

A watercolour sketch by David Roberts, circa 19th century.

After several soldiers mysteriously lost their lives trying to retrieve the sword, local Arabs suggested that the Sultan recruit a Jew to do the job. Messengers were sent to the local Jewish community in Hebron to send a volunteer to the tomb or suffer mass execution. After much trepidation and prayer, the leader of the Jewish community at the time, Rabbi Avraham Azulai, volunteered himself for the task.

According to legend, after being lowered into the cave below, Rabbi Azulai encountered three bearded men who informed him that they were his Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Shocked, Rabbi Azulai expressed his desire to remain with his forefathers and not to return to the surface. The Patriarchs first refused his offer and informed him that he must return the sword to the Sultan. If not, the entire Jewish community of Hebron would be wiped out. But they also informed him that his request will also be granted: “In another seven days, you will be here with us.”

Elated, Rabbi Azulai picked up the Sultan’s sword and returned it to him. The Jewish community celebrated the survival of their rabbi and the good news he brought. For the next week, he taught his students the deepest teachings of Torah, both day and night. Seven days after leaving the cave, his soul departed and he was laid to rest. An interesting historical anecdote is that the name of the Sultan was Ibrahim (or Abraham in English).

The Girl Who Crawled Inside

Legends and stories about individual Jews visiting the secret passages in the complex were part of Jewish folklore for centuries. During the Six Day War in 1967, after the area came under Israeli control, Jewish explorers and archaeologists could analyze the site for the first time in modern times. Moshe Dayan, the Defense Minister in the late 1960s, was concerned that Arab riots would break out after Jews established a synagogue inside the Cave of the Patriarchs, which had been an exclusively Muslim shrine for the past 700 years. He was aware of the sealed staircase that led to the cave inside the Hall of Isaac, which at the time was being used as a mosque.

Assuming someone could get in there and discover another entrance to the cave without passing through the mosque, a status quo could be established where Muslims worship above and Jews below. That someone who would descend into the cave was 13-year-old Michal Arbel who happened to be the daughter of the head of the Shin Bet’s Jerusalem District, Yehuda Arbel. Since the hole was very narrow, it was much easier for a child to enter.

The hole inside the Hall of Isaac

After an Arab grenade attack targeted the Jewish population in October 1967, the authorities closed the site and Michal descended into the hole. Michal found herself at the top of a narrow staircase that led to a long tunnel at the end of which was a large room. Although she documented and photographed what she found in that room, including tomb stones and inscriptions in Latin and Arabic, she never found the cave itself.

Finding the Cave

It wasn’t until 1981 during selichot penitential prayers that a team of volunteers clandestinely chiseled through the rock and enlarged the opening, big enough for adult men to enter the underground staircase and passageway. Aware of earlier historical descriptions, both ancient and modern, the team proceeded down the narrow staircase, through the tunnel, and into the very same hall that Michal was in 14 years earlier. They understood that this was not the cave itself, but a room that could lead to one.

They searched for some type of door or opening mechanism which would have been typical of ancient tombs. They inspected the walls but came up blank. After a lengthy search through darkness and dust, a gust of wind suddenly hit them. It came from the floor. As they moved their hands on the floor, they noticed the perimeter of protrusion. It was a large stone! With great effort, the team gripped the stone and managed to pull it away revealing the secret passage they were hoping to find, not through the wall, but through the floor.

The vertical passageway led to two caves, one on top of the other. Alas, the Double Cave (machpela in Hebrew) had finally been uncovered. Both were covered with dirt and filled with human bones and pottery. Some of the pottery was extracted and later analyzed. All the earthenware jugs were dated to the First Temple period and originated in different parts of Judea indicated that the Double Cave may have been a religious pilgrimage site during the time of the Biblical kings.

This is not surprising. The Torah itself testifies that when Moses sent spies into the Land of Israel, “They went up in the south, and he came to Hebron…” (Numbers 13:22). The Talmud teaches that Caleb (one of the 12 spies) separated himself from the group to prostrate himself and pray at the graves of the Patriarchs in Hebron. For this reason, the area of Hebron was in fact given to Caleb as an inheritance (Judges 1:20). He was the first pilgrim to the site but he certainly wouldn’t be the last.

Out of reverence for the Patriarchs, it was decided not to extract the bones from the cave. Over the next few months and years, various experts entered the newly discovered Double Cave, including Dr. Zeev Yavin, chief archaeology officer for Judea and Samaria, as well as Doron Chen, a prominent lecturer in archaeology, and Professor David Ben Shlomo, head of the archaeology department at Ariel University. Independent reviews and scientific studies were published, all of which determined that what was discovered was indeed an ancient burial cave dated to the Middle Bronze Age, the period in which Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob would have lived.

Finding archaeological evidence for the existence of the Biblical cave was important and perhaps lends more legitimacy to Herod who clearly didn’t just build a massive mausoleum in a random location. Although the Cave of the Patriarchs was in fact built over the graves of our Biblical forefathers and foremothers, we should nevertheless remember the teaching of Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel (1^st century Jewish leader) that “the righteous require no monuments – their words are their memorials” (Talmud Shekalim 7a). In other words, the tombs of the righteous were not built for them, but for us, to visit a holy place where we can better connect with our Creator.