The Gihon Spring and the temple 1 kings 1:32-39 King David sent Solomon down to the Gihon Spring on the East of the City of David where Zadok the Priest Anointed Solomon King. 39And Zadok the priest took an horn of oil out of the tabernacle, and anointed Solomon. And they blew the trumpet; and all the people said, God save king Solomon. So, yes, the tabernacle and Ark was at the Gihon Spring, on the threshing floor that David bought! This place is right on the edge of the Kidron valley! Ezekiel 47:1,2 says the Gihon Spring will gush out from beside the altar in the Millennial temple. This also makes it obvious since the Gihon is the ONLY spring in Jerusalem, that the alters of all of the temples were next to the Gihon to wash the blood of hundreds of animal sacrifices down into the Kidron on Holy Days. Josephus makes it clear in his Wars book 5 ch5/1 (and antiquities book 15 ch11) that the SouthEast corner of the Temple mount tower was in the deepest part of the Kidron valley, walls over 300 cubits (450 foot) high.. Elsewhere saying this tower was 600 foot on a side. This in no way represents todays temple mount. Gihon Spring The Importance of the Gihon Spring https://www.biblicaltheology.com/Research/MartinE01.html The Gihon Spring is the only spring within the city limits of Jerusalem. We have the eyewitness account of a person from Egypt named Aristeas who viewed the Temple in about 285 B.C.E. He stated quite categorically that the Temple was located over an inexhaustible spring that welled up within the interior part of the Temple.4 About 400 years later the Roman historian Tacitus gave another reference that the Temple at Jerusalem had within its precincts a natural spring of water that issued from its interior.5 These two references are describing the Gihon Spring (the sole spring of water in Jerusalem). It was because of the strategic location of this single spring that the original Canaanite cities of "Migdol Edar" and "Jebus" were built over and around that water source before the time of King David. The Gihon Spring is located even today at the base of what was called the "Ophel" (a swelling of the earth in the form of a small mountain dome) once situated just to the north and abutting to "Mount Zion" (the City of David). So close was the Ophel Mound to the City of David that David began to fill in the area between the two summits with dirt and stones (calling it the Millo or "fill in") to make a single high level area on which to build his city and later the Temple.6 David’s son Solomon completed the "fill in" between the two summits and called that earthen and rock bridge the Millo.7 Solomon then built the Temple on the Ophel Mound directly above the Gihon Spring. This Ophel region became known as a northern extension of "Zion." This made the Temple so close to the City of David (where the citadel or akra was located) that Aristeas said a person could look northward from the top of the City of David and could easily witness all priestly activities within the Temple precincts.8 The area of the Dome of the Rock, however, is 1000 feet north of the original City of David and is much too far away for anyone to look down into the courts of the Temple. Also, there has never been a natural water spring within the Haram esh-Sharif. That fact alone disqualifies the area around the Dome of the Rock from being the site of the former Temples. The Ark of the Covenant and the Gihon Spring Most people have not noticed an important geographical indication in the Scriptures. When David took the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem he made a special tent (tabernacle) for it and pitched it over the Gihon Spring.9 For the next 27 years of David’s reign (and for the first eleven years of Solomon – that is, for 38 years) the Ark remained in this particular tent at and over the Gihon Spring. That is where Solomon was crowned king.10 This led the Jewish authorities to demand that all later kings of Judah be crowned at a spring. "Our Rabbis taught: Kings are anointed only by the site of a spring."11 As an example, when Joash was made king, the Scriptures show his crowning was in the Temple itself beside the Altar of Burnt Offering where the laver of Solomon was positioned to provide spring water from the Gihon Spring located underneath the Temple platform.12 So, Joash (like Solomon) was crowned next to the Gihon Spring. Indeed, the Psalms show consistently that the Temples (called "God’s Houses") had to have spring waters emerging from their interiors. Notice Psalm 87:1-3 and 7. Compiled by Lewis