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In the books of Kings and Chronicles we find a passing statement about one of the storied marks of King Hezekiah’s reign—that he “channeled the water down to the west side of the City of David” (2 Chronicles 32:30, NIV). Did you know that this was not a simple task, but a monumental undertaking of which we can still see the remains of today?

Following the fall of the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 722 BC at the hands of the Assyrians, King Hezekiah knew that his kingdom would eventually be a target for Assyrian conquest. Since Jerusalem’s main water source was comparatively vulnerable, Hezekiah decided he needed to create a tunnel from the Gihon spring deeper into the city to secure Jerusalem’s water supply.

What King Hezekiah did next was an enduring marvel, employing two separate teams of workers to dig from two different ends of the new tunnel, mapping their way as best they could to find a point where the two tunnels met. As each team listened to the sounds of the other team through the rock, they eventually connected the two tunnels into one, completing a nearly 1,800-foot-long project much quicker than expected!

Over time, the connection with the biblical narrative of the tunnel was lost, even as the tunnel was continually explored from the 17th to 19th centuries. Then, in 1880, the 16-year-old son of the famous hymnist Horatio Spafford was playing in the waters when he notices a piece of rock with ancient writing on it.

Under further review, it was revealed that the Paleo-Hebrew script not only told the story of the building of the tunnel but was dated to 700 BC. This was around the exact time when Sennacherib would have sieged the city, positively identifying this tunnel as the one the Bible tells us about!

When the discovery was made, the Ottoman Empire ruled over the land of Israel, and the inscription was moved to the empire’s capital of Istanbul, Turkey. Today it can be found in the Istanbul Archeological Museum Galleries. However, for those who have a little bit of adventure in them, they can still venture through the rushing waters of the winding tunnel as they journey into the city. It is here that they can experience firsthand the relatively untouched remains of this monumental undertaking by one of the greatest kings of the Bible!