This course, the Fall and Rise of Jerusalem, is based on my book with the same name. The book was based on my PhD thesis, presented to the Senate of Tel Aviv University in January 1997 under the supervision of my teacher Nadav Na'aman. I can tell you that I submitted this thesis only because it was the time to do it. Most of my teachers were quite satisfied with it, but I was not. Even if the general picture was clear to me, I saw the many problems and holes in the picture of Judah in the sixth century BCE and thought that many of them can and should be filled. This is the reason why I was waiting with a Hebrew version of my book until 2001, trying meanwhile to base more the archaeological and geopolitical aspect as well as the biblical discussion. I submitted the Hebrew version of the manuscript of my book to the publisher, Yad Ben Zvi in Jerusalem, in 2001 only because it was the right time to do it, and even if the book was accepted for publication, it actually was published in April 2003. I was not satisfied from the results. I still saw the many problems and holes in this picture of Judah in the sixth century BCE and thought that many of them can and should be filled. This is why I was waiting with the English edition of my book until 2004, trying meanwhile to base more the biblical part of the book as well as the historical sections and the demographic evaluations. The overall picture was presented in the book, but even though I choose to end the book with a series of questions on subjects that are still open. Some of them should be the subject of further research, and some of them should probably wait for future developments and future finds. This course presents another stage in my research of Judah and the Judaeans in the sixth century BCE. In the last ten years, I excavated at Ramat Rahel in order to gain more information of the archeology and the history of Judah in the sixth century BCE. Together with my colleague Professor David Vanderhooft of Boston College, we started the Yehud Stamp Impressions and published a heavy book on this subject. With my students and colleagues, I read a lot, wrote a lot, discussed this subject on different occasions. And especially taught many courses and seminars on these subjects both in Tel Aviv University, my university, and at Heidelberg University in Germany. I feel that I am ready to go one further step in my long time connection with the sixth century BCE and prepare this course. When I started to prepare my research for teaching in this course with a main goal of presenting an overview synthesis on the history of Judah and the Babylonian rule, I knew that I have two options; to focus on the half empty cup or to focus on the half full cup. Focus on the half empty cup means to show the gaps in our knowledge, the caution we should treat the different archaeological and historical details, and avoiding the over all synthesis because of all this. Focusing on the half full cup means to know all this. And to treat separately each one of the different fields of research, the biblical, archaeological, and historical material, and to try to exhaustively study each one of them without letting the other field affect the research of the other one. But with a clear purpose to get to a point when a positive summary can be done and then a synthesis. And bear in mind that it can be that I misunderstood some details, that I misinterpreted others. That it can be that future discoveries will change our knowledge and perspective of some of the parts in this big puzzle, and maybe even the way we should see the entire picture. However, I feel that we have enough information and we are in the right time to try to go one step forward and present the synthesis. I'm sure that if and when I will teach this material in two, five or ten years from now with better understanding of the material, with more knowledge, and even maybe with new finds, the historical and archaeological reconstruction might be different. However, this is the best I can do in this phase of my understanding of this fascinating period in the history of Judah and the Judeans. I would like to thank my student Ido Koch for their enormous work invested in front of and behind the curtain. I would also like to thank Nadav Stark for the forcing power of this project in Tel Aviv University. Pablo Arcuschin and Omri Roth made an amazing work in filming and editing inside and even outside the studio. I would like also to thank to my colleagues that took part in this course, and agreed to lecture, each one on a special subject. Dr Yuval Gadot, Professor Konrad Schmid, Dr Cynthia Edenburg, Professor Yoram Cohen, and Professor David Vanderhooft. Last but not least, I would like to thank each one of you, the students in this course for going with me such a long way, crossing together hard times of Assyrian-Babylonian conquest, surviving destructions and deportations. Developing hopes for return and finding ourselves at the end in this tiny province with many hopes and expectations, learning about the glorious past, and looking for a brighter future.
