The Temple and the Sabbath Day

Both ancient rabbinical sources and Josephus Flavius describe the custom of blowing a trumpet to announce the beginning of the Sabbath.

In the picture: In excavations conducted by Prof. Benjamin Mazar at the foot of the Temple Mount, a stone was found that once stood at the top of the southwestern corner of the Mount. On the stone, an inscription was written in Hebrew, damaged at the end. One suggestion for a translation after filling in the damaged part is: “To the place of the trumpeting to [declare the beginning of the Sabbath].”

This tradition of announcing the beginning of the Sabbath continues to this day with the sounding of a siren in the city’s Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods.