The whole scheme hinged, of course, on whether the pools were higher or lower than Jerusalem. Locating a point near Bethlehem from which both the reservoirs and Jerusalem were visible, they sighted on the temple through a hollow viewing cylinder and noted the angle described with a plumb line to the ground. Then, maintaining the same angle, they turned the tube toward the pools and tried to sight them. If blue sky or even the reservoirs themselves were sighted, then the area would be level with or lower than Jerusalem, making an aqueduct impossible.
The sighting showed a section of beige-colored terrain, broken by out-croppings of white limestone. Pilate looked through the tube, then sighted over it. “Yes!” he exclaimed. “I think it can be done.” The section observed was on a hillside well below the lowest of the three pools.
They hurried over to the limestone scars and calculated the vertical distance between them and the lowest pool. “About fifty-three or fifty-four cubits,” an engineer called. This was eighty feet higher than the temple.
“Is that enough fall for water flow?” asked Pilate.
“Oh, yes. If our aqueduct meanders, we might have no better than a 500-to-1 drop, but that will move water.”
“A fall of one cubit for every five hundred in length?”
“Yes.”
The next days were spent in verifying the preliminary survey and planning a route for the aqueduct. This proved difficult, since the terrain between the pools and Jerusalem was a natural obstacle course of hills and valleys, not to mention the town of Bethlehem, which lay directly across the proposed route.
“We’ll have to tunnel under Bethlehem,” Pilate decided.
The planned aqueduct would resemble a stone-lined ditch over much of the route, hugging the contours of the hills ranging toward Jerusalem and, therefore, winding and twisting until its length became twenty miles—to cover a direct distance of only seven. And then there was the final engineering problem of crossing the Valley of Hinnom into the city. The architects planned a traditional Roman arched aqueduct for this segment in order to “bridge hell,” as Pilate fondly put it, once he learned the significance of Gehenna.
After reconditioning Herod’s equally long upper aqueduct, which fed the pools, the entire water system with all its windings would extend more than forty miles. This length, plus the construction necessary within Jerusalem to prepare it for the happy onslaught of water, would make Pilate’s proposed aqueduct very expensive. Preliminary estimates showed that the costs would run several times that of the Tiberiéum in Caesarea. His problem, apparently, was less mechanical than fiscal.
The financing for construction projects in the provinces regularly came from local taxation, but there was no provision in the budget for Judea to cover an expense of this magnitude. Extra taxes would therefore be necessary. Pilate consulted with his fiscal officer and asked him to jot down the various taxes which Jews paid to Rome.
He was handed this list, with brief explanations:
tributum soli—land tax
tributum capitis—head tax
the annona—levy of grain and cattle to support the military
the publicum—customs duties, salt tax, sales tax, etc.
“Do you know which tax the Jews hate most?” the fiscal agent asked Pilate.
“The tribute, most likely.”
“No. The publicum, because it’s farmed out to the private tax-collecting companies.”
“Oh, yes, our friends the publicans, always collecting more than their quota and pocketing the surplus. Rome should never have resorted to that disgusting system…This is the whole tax picture, then?”
“Yes, our side of it. But the Jew must also pay his synagogue tithes and temple dues.”
“It seems fairly oppressive, this total tax load.”
The officer told Pilate that in Gratus’s administration, Judean resentment had spilled over into an appeal to Tiberius to lower the tribute, but he had not granted the request.
Against this background, Pilate thought it futile to increase taxes just when the Jews wanted them lowered. There was also a question of ethics. Was it justifiable to add to the tax load of someone in Caesarea for a local improvement in Jerusalem? The money, Pilate decided, would have to come from another source.
Toward the close of his stay in the Jewish capital, he invited Joseph Caiaphas and Rabbi Helcias to the Herodian palace in order to discuss the proposed aqueduct. As Pilate laid before them the architects’ routing and structural plans for the water system, the Jewish leaders seemed pleased. The high priest admitted that the shortage of water was particularly noticeable at the temple, the focus of activity in Jerusalem.
Then Helcias, the temple treasurer, added, “But I hope, Prefect, that the aqueduct can be built without increasing taxes. In fact, we look for a reduction.”
“That, gentlemen, is a final item we must discuss,” Pilate interposed. “According to our estimates, the aqueduct will cost 750 talents up to the point where it pierces the south wall of the city. Building an appropriate reservoir system for it in Jerusalem would be extra, of course.”
The sum gave his two guests pause.
“And this is assuming we use bargain labor,” Pilate added.
“But how will you raise the money?” inquired Helcias.
“I could do it by doubling the tribute for several years…”
“No! Not that,” blurted Helcias. “Or…pardon me, Excellency, it’s not for me to instruct the prefect of Judea, but—”
“That’s all right, Rabbi.” Pilate smiled. “The fact is, I agree with you. It would be wrong to increase taxes. I think you Judeans are taxed enough.”
Caiaphas and Helcias exchanged glances of relieved surprise, though the high priest sagaciously sensed that Pilate might be leading up to something.
“Therefore, I propose that the temple treasury defray the cost of the aqueduct.”
The rabbis were thunderstruck. For some moments not a sound was heard.
“Our treasury?” Helcias finally exclaimed. “You would touch the Sacred Treasury of the temple?”
“Not I. You would…as temple treasurer.”
“But why this source, Prefect?” Caiaphas challenged.
“A matter of ethics, which you, as high priest, should particularly appreciate. Now tell me, for what purpose is the temple treasury used?”
“For the support of the temple, of course; to pay for the sacrifices, priests’ and guards’ salaries, upkeep, repairs, and the like. Therefore it’s called the Corban, which means sacrifice.”
“All right. But don’t you have a large surplus of unexpended funds each year in the Corban, Rabbi Helcias?”
“Well, there is some surplus, but—”
“Come, come, Rabbi. I’m informed that adult male Jews all over the world provide a compulsory half-shekel tribute to the temple treasury, not just the citizens of Jerusalem. Add to that the votive offerings and gifts of gold which are lavished on the temple, and you have—I’m reliably advised—an annual income that approaches eight hundred talents.”
“It isn’t that much,” Helcias protested.
“Whatever it is, by now you’ve many times that amount accumulated in a vast store of wealth lying in your temple coffers and doing no one any good, least of all the Jerusalem which badly needs water.”
“Sacred money shouldn’t be used for such a purpose,” Caiaphas objected.
“Can you think of a better purpose, after the primary obligations of this treasury have been met? In this way, no one need pay higher taxes.”
“Couldn’t Rome underwrite such an expense?” Caiaphas suggested. “After all, she has our tribute money, and can you think of a better purpose for which the tribute might be used?”
“The tribute is spent for the protection given you by our military and for the normal costs of government.”