Ornan’s threshing floor—a broad, flat, hardened surface of stone or clay—stayed busy processing the recent harvest. But when an angel approached, all work stopped. His four sons ran and hid (a common response when people in the Bible sighted an angel). Ornan stood slack-jawed, too awed to move.

King David followed the angel and offered to buy Ornan’s property. David hoped to stop a terrible plague he caused by displeasing the Lord. Ornan offered the property for free, but David refused, insisting on full price. Ornan took the deal, David built an alter, and the Lord accepted his sacrifice with fire from heaven.

Several years later, Solomon built the first Jewish temple on the site of Ornan’s threshing floor (2 Chronicles 3:1). Invaders, first the Babylonians and later the Romans, eventually destroyed the Jewish temple and looted its contents.

Today the Temple Mount holds The Dome of the Rock, an Islamic shrine. Three major religions—Judaism, Islam & Christianity—all revere the old threshing floor and cling to its significance.

David purchased the property after his sin with the census led to the death of 700,000 men. Now it’s the most contested religious site in the world, as recent riots underscore. A long history of violence characterizes this one-time scene of harvest and hope.

A place birthed in bloodshed remains bathed in bloodshed.

2 Samuel 24 & 1 Chronicles 21 in week twenty-one of reading the Bible cover to cover

Photo shows Aerial views of the Temple Mount and parts of the Old City of Jerusalem