The westernmost of the three gates of the north wall of the Azara. It carries the chamber of the Beit HaNitzotz on its upper floor. Its gate structure is hollow: twenty steps rise inside it from the terrace of the Cheil up to the level of the Azara.
Dimensions
- 20 amot high × 10 wide
- gate structure 20 amot wide, projecting 12 amot from the wall
- twenty steps within the gate structure, from the Cheil to the Azara
- the westernmost of the north gates
Sources
- Middot 1:5“שֶׁבַּצָּפוֹן, שַׁעַר הַנִּיצוֹץ… שֵׁנִי לוֹ, שַׁעַר הַקָּרְבָּן. שְׁלִישִׁי לוֹ, בֵּית הַמּוֹקֵד”
- Middot 2:6“וּלְעֻמָּתָן בַּצָּפוֹן סְמוּכִים לַמַּעֲרָב”
- Rambam, Hilchot Beit HaBechirah 5:5“כָּל שַׁעַר מֵהֶן הָיָה רָחְבּוֹ עֶשֶׂר אַמּוֹת וְגָבְהוֹ עֶשְׂרִים אַמָּה”
Project decisionTour's choice: the gate structure of 20 × 12 amot and its twenty steps have no source — nothing says where one climbs from the terrace of the Cheil to the level of the Azara. Middot 2:6, where Abba Yossi ben Chanan calls the north gates “near the west,” does not name Sha'ar HaNitzotz: the tour makes it the westernmost by reading the order of Middot 1:5 (Nitzotz, Korban, Beit HaMoked) from west to east. The sources give this order, not the spacing: the gates are spread evenly.