Jerusalem Besieged. From Ancient Canaan to Modern Israel

Currents in Theology and Mission, June, 2007 by Ralph W. Klein

Jerusalem Besieged. From Ancient Canaan to Modern Israel. By Eric H. Cline (University of Michigan, $19.95 paper). The author tallies some 118 conflicts in and for Jerusalem in the last 4,000 years, but this book focuses primarily on ten of those, ranging from David and Nebuchadnezzar in the Old Testament period, the Maccabean wars, the Jewish revolts of the first and second centuries, the arrival of Islam, the crusaders, the Ottomans, and three chapters devoted to battles of the twentieth century.

As C. notes in the final chapter, "Those who fought for Jerusalem down through the ages thought that they alone had a God-given right to the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sherif and the surrounding city," and "It is likely that the history of Jerusalem will continue to be used and misused by political and military leaders in the propaganda of present and future conflicts." There are twenty-four maps and ten full-color paintings by the nineteenth-century artist David Roberts. RWK