Magness, the Temple Mount, and the NYT

TEMPLE MOUNT WATCH: One of the scholars interviewed for that New York Times article on the Temple Mount and the Judean/Jewish temples thereon, archaeologist Jodi Magness, has published a letter in the Times in response to the article: The Temple Mount in Jerusalem. With reference to it see also:

NY Times Source Slams Article on Temple Mount (CAMERA).

Scholar Rips NYT for Disputing Jewishness of Temple Mount ( Washington Free Beacon)

Professor Magness originally sent in a longer letter, but the Times required it to be pared down for publication. Joe Lauer has already circulated the original, longer letter on his e-mail list, but, with Professor Magness's permission, I publish it here as well:

To the Editor;
As one of the specialists interviewed for and quoted in "Historical Certainty Proves Elusive at Jerusalem's Holiest Place" (8 October 2015), I am writing to set the record straight.
The question of the existence and location of two successive temples on Jerusalem's Temple Mount is not nearly as contested as the reporter who wrote the article suggests. During a telephone conversation that lasted over an hour, I explained to the reporter as follows:
1) Literary/historical sources leave little doubt that there were two successive ancient temples in Jerusalem dedicated to the God of Israel, the first destroyed in 586 B.C.E. and the second destroyed in 70 C.E.
2) These same sources, as well as archaeological remains (e.g., the Temple Mount platform as it exists today, which is a product of Herod's reconstruction), indicate that these temples stood somewhere on the Temple Mount.
3) The only real question, then, is where exactly the temple(s) stood on the Temple Mount. I explained to the reporter that the site of the Dome of the Rock is the most likely spot for various reasons, despite the lack of archaeological evidence/excavations.
I told the reporter that one would have to be an "extreme skeptic" to doubt the existence of these temples, and that this would be comparable to those who question the existence of an historical Jesus. I also told him that I do not know of any legitimate or credible scholars who doubt the existence of the two temples or who deny that they stood somewhere on the Temple Mount.
I don't know why the reporter chose to present the information the way he did, but the article misrepresents the views of a majority of scholars who specialize in the history and archaeology of Jerusalem.
Sincerely,
Jodi Magness, Ph.D.
Kenan Distinguished Professor for Teaching Excellence in Early Judaism
Department of Religious Studies
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

So, let us sum up. The reporter, Rick Gladstone, who wrote the article "Historical Certainty Proves Elusive at Jerusalem’s Holiest Place" in the New York Times, had detailed, accurate information about the scholarly state of the question concerning the ancient temples in question. He had this, minimally, from Professor Jodi Magness and Dr. Matthew J. Adams, director of the Albright Institute. Nevertheless, Mr. Gladstone wrote and published the original article to assert, incorrectly, that whether there were Jewish temples on the Temple Mount was "an explosive historical question," one "which many books and scholarly treatises have never definitively answered." In so doing he redistributed the quotations from Dr. Adams such that it appeared, erroneously, that Dr. Adams was saying that the question whether the temples ever existed, at least on the Temple Mount, was "an academically complex question."

It is good that the Times issued a small correction and it is good that they published at least a much abbreviated version of Professor Magness's letter. But the article has still done a lot of damage at a time when political tensions over the Temple Mount are very high. Many people will not see the corrected version of the article or Professor Magness's letter, and much of the information in her original letter has been removed — notably the parts that make clear that she said the above at length to the reporter.

If the New York Times does this poorly on a politically charged story about which I happen to know something and the background of which I happen to be able to track down, it is hard for me not to wonder what might be going on in other politically charged stories in the Times which I am not in the position to check up on. Who knows? I blog. You decide.

The previous two posts on this story, which along with this post document everything in detail, are here and here.

UPDATE (14 October): More here.