Time has an interesting article discussing how politics and archaeology mesh (not well) in Jerusalem.

The Jerusalem syndrome is a psychological disorder in which a visit to the holy city triggers delusional and obsessive religious fantasies. In its extreme variety, people wander the lanes of the Old City believing they are biblical characters; John the Baptist, say, or a brawny Samson, sprung back to life.

Archaeologists in the Holy Land like to joke that their profession is vulnerable to a milder form of the syndrome. When scientists find a cracked, oversize skull in the Valley of Elah, it can be hard to resist the thought that it might have belonged to Goliath, or to imagine, while excavating the cellars of a Byzantine church, that the discovery of a few wooden splinters might be part of the cross on which Christ died. This milder malady is nothing new. In the mid-19th century, British explorers who came to Jerusalem with a shovel in one hand and a Bible in the other used the holy book as a sort of treasure map in the search for proof of Christianity’s origins. (See a video of archaeology digging up controversy in Jerusalem.)

Now an extreme case of the willful jumbling of science and faith is threatening Jerusalem’s precarious spiritual balance. It could not come at a worse time: Israeli-Arab peace talks have stalled; Israel has a hawkish government disinclined to compromise; and radical Islamist group Hamas remains powerful among Palestinians. Any tilt in Jerusalem’s religious equilibrium could create a wave of unrest spreading far beyond the city’s ramparts. Eric Meyers, who teaches Jewish studies and archaeology at Duke University, says: “Right now, Jerusalem is a tinderbox. “

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New research has found that the Ancient Greeks deliberately built their temples to face the rising Sun.

Although it has long been known that most of these shrines face east, some academics have questioned whether this alignment reflected a deliberate plan. Critics of astronomical theories have pointed out that some temples face north, south or west, and argue that their orientation was not important to the Greeks.

Dr Salt’s research, however, indicates that the predominant east-west alignment is almost impossible to explain by chance, and probably followed a religious convention founded on astronomy. Temples laid out in accordance with astronomical phenomena could have highlighted the role of gods and goddesses as arbiters of nature, or helped priests to interpret celestial omens. They could also have helped in observations needed to calibrate the religious calendar.

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A ritual bath, used by Jewish pilgrims coming to the Temple Mount, has been found in Jerusalem.

The bath is located next to the Temple Mount, the compound in Jerusalem’s Old City where two Biblical Temples stood. The second was destroyed by Roman legions in 70 A.D.

The Israel Antiquities Authority says the stone bath was likely used for ritual purification by pilgrims who came to the Temple three times a year.

Similar ritual baths are still used by Jews for purification.

Researchers are theorizing that many Mayan pyramids were built to make “raindrop” music to communicate with their rain god.

Take for example, Mexico’s El Castillo pyramid in Chichen Itza. As visitors climb the colossal staircase, their footsteps begin to sound like raindrops falling into a bucket of water as they near the top.

The discovery of the raindrop “music” in another pyramid suggests that at least some of Mexico’s pyramids were deliberately built for this purpose.

Archaeologists in Newfoundland and Labrador are searching for the remains of a 510-year-old church; what could be the oldest Christian site in the New World.

In the outline for a book she never completed, Prof. Ruddock claimed to have found documents detailing the establishment of a church at Carbonear — the name of which she believed has evolved from an Italian friar, Giovanni Antonio de Carbonariis, known to have accompanied Cabot on his 1498 voyage to Newfoundland.

Historians generally believe Cabot perished during the voyage, and little was accomplished by any of the ships involved in the expedition.  But Prof. Ruddock’s sketchy references to a New World church built as early as 1498 has electrified Prof. Jones and other researchers.