"NARRATOR:" "Gods descending to" "Earth... converging on the same hallowed ground... a holy shrine built to mark the landing... of a meteorite... and sacred caves whose walls are lined with images of strange, half-human beings." "Allahu Akbar." "NARRATOR:" "Are holy sites around the world the product of man's reverence for God... or are they the result of contact with ancient space travelers?" "GEORGE NOORY:" "There's no question that these monuments might have had some kind of E.T." "intervention." "They're just too immense, too perfect to be constructed by ancient mankind." "GIORGIO A. TSOUKALOS:" "Yes, it was human beings who built this place but with technology given by extraterrestrials." "NARRATOR:" "Millions of people around the world believe we have been visited in the past by extraterrestrial beings." "What if it were true?" "Did ancient aliens really help to shape our history?" "And if so, how did they influence the creation of mankind's sacred places?" "It is perhaps the most sacred site in all of humanity, the place where three of the world's most prominent religions..." "Christianity, Judaism and" "Islam... all converge." "It is the heart and soul of what is called the Holy Land." "Temple Mount, Old City," "Jerusalem, and this 35-acre plateau, surrounded by ancient walls, has been considered sacred for thousands of years." "ROBERT MULLINS, PhD:" "The" "Temple Mount is sacred to Jews and Christians because it's at this spot that Abraham bound" "Isaac and prepared to sacrifice him in Genesis 22." "For Muslims this site is sacred because it's from the Rock, where the Dome of the Rock today stands, that Muhammad ascended into Heaven." "PHILIP COPPENS:" "What we have on the Temple Mount really is a mixture of three religions, and each one of them has got an aspect to it which makes the place even more important, but in origin really what we have is" "a place where God touched down on Planet Earth, and ever after, this is the place where communications with the afterlife or the divine realm is to be made." "NARRATOR:" "Each year millions of pilgrims come to Temple Mount to worship God and celebrate holy occasions." "But why?" "In the tenth century B.C., King" "David and the Israelites chose this rocky high ground to build a great temple." "MARVIN MEYER, PhD:" "This was the site that David, the great king of Israel, had conquered, and so it already had a kind of a blessing about it because this was where the people of Israel were destined to center their" "lives in this sacred kind of place." "MICHAEL COOGAN, PhD:" "According to the Bible, King" "David, who had just made" "Jerusalem his capital, wanted to build in it a house for the" "Lord, but for reasons that aren't entirely clear, he didn't do so, and it was his son" "Solomon who built the First" "Jewish Temple." "NARRATOR:" "Completed in 957" "B.C. by David's son King" "Solomon, the Temple was said to house the Ark of the Covenant, the sacred chest believed to have contained the stone tablets on which the Ten Commandments were written... but according to many ancient astronaut theorists, the Ark also may have" "contained a power source of extraterrestrial origin." "ERICH VON DANIKEN:" "In the" "Bible, you read about the Ark of the Covenant." "Moses was ordered to go to the" "Holy Mountain, and the Lord gave" "Moses instruction to construct the Ark of the Covenant." "As we know later, the Ark of the" "Covenant was something very, very dangerous." "COOGAN:" "Solomon installed it in the Temple and it served as the focal point of the Temple in its innermost room, the holy of holies, into which only the chief priest, the high priest could go." "MULLINS: it's in this innermost sanctum, the holy of holies, where God was viewed as resident, so in a sense, the Ark of the Covenant was God's throne in the holy of holies and the" "place where God reigned from" "Jerusalem." "NARRATOR:" "According to the" "Talmud, a central text of" "Judaism, King Solomon possessed a magic ring with a special symbol called the Seal of" "Solomon, today known as the Star of David." "MEYER:" "This special ring would allow him to accomplish things beyond what mortals could usually accomplish, and part of what he could do with that ring with the seal on it was control the demons, and that gave him a" "kind of power and an ability in the construction of that temple that others would never have had." "NARRATOR:" "According to" "Islamic text, King Solomon also had a magic carpet of green silk, sufficient for his throne and all his forces to stand on." "TSOUKALOS:" "Now, magic carpets... do they exist?" "Of course not." "So what was it that our ancestors tried to describe in those stories?" "DAVID CHILDRESS:" "So where was he getting these strange powers?" "Was he really in contact with extraterrestrials who had literally given him a spacecraft to fly around in?" "NARRATOR:" "After studying the intricate geometry and design of" "Solomon's Temple, even Sir Isaac" "Newton questioned if the king had built the Temple with" ""secret knowledge."" "BILL BIRNES, JD, PhD: it was very highly advanced architecturally, catching certain kinds of light, being very precise in its astronomical alignment, and the question for modern scholars and architects is, what was the level of" "technology available to King" "Solomon that allowed him to design and lay out the Temple according to these principles?" "MEYER:" "There's a text, as a matter of fact, called the" "Testament of Solomon, that suggests that Solomon didn't only use mortal builders and architects, but he brought in demons." "He forced them to do some of the labor because demons are especially strong." "NARRATOR:" "Might an advanced energy source within the Ark of the Covenant have allowed King" "Solomon to wield immense power, and might that power have had an extraterrestrial origin?" "After King Solomon's Temple was destroyed in the sixth century" "B.C. by the Babylonians, a" "Second Temple was built on the same site in the first century" "B.C. by King Herod the Great." "According to the New Testament, it was this Second Temple that played a significant role in the life of Jesus of Nazareth because it was here that Jesus chased out the moneylenders, an event which led to his crucifixion and death at the" "hands of both the Jews and the" "Romans." "And it was also nearby, on the" "Mount of Olives, that Jesus reportedly rose from the dead and ascended bodily into Heaven." "REVEREND BARRY H. DOWNING:" "When we get to the story of" "Jesus, we find that his disciples believe that he ascended into Heaven and then someday he would return." "So this idea of the extraterrestrial reality, of which Jesus is part, is something that the biblical tradition says, "Yes, you can, you can buy that."" "NARRATOR:" "But might Jesus, like King Solomon before him, really have been connected to an otherworldly reality, as ancient astronaut theorists suggest?" "REVEREND MICHAEL J.S. CARTER:" "The topic of ascension, when dealing with extraterrestrial contacts, is a common one because we have Jesus ascending in the New Testament." "These stories give credence to the fact that there is some type of technology that is lifting up human beings into a craft, into a waiting ship." "NARRATOR:" "Nearly six centuries after the Second" "Hebrew Temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D., Persian invaders built yet another holy shrine on the site... the Dome of the Rock, known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary." "COOGAN:" "This magnificent seventh-century architectural monument of Islam was built over a huge outcrop of bedrock which, according to Muslim tradition, was the site from which Muhammad had been taken up into Heaven by" "God." "MEYER:" "In fact, there is a hole in the rock showing the exact route that Muhammad took when he ascended into Heaven, to" "Allah, to have a vision of the divine, and to return back once again to this very site." "So for Muslims the Dome of the" "Rock is a very significant and a very sacred place." "NARRATOR:" "According to the" "Islamic Koran, the rock from which Muhammad ascended is called the Foundation Stone." "This rock is believed by religious scholars to have also been the very stone beneath the" "Ark of the Covenant and the holy of holies in Solomon's Temple." "COPPENS:" "This is where God came down to Earth and where certain people actually are said to have made contact with God, so this is a piece of rock which is of such importance because of the fact that something of the" "divine manifested itself there." "TSOUKALOS:" "That stone signifies the coming together of the kingdoms of Heaven and" "Earth." "The problem is, we've forgotten that whoever visited us in the past wasn't God, but it was extraterrestrials." "NARRATOR:" "Some ancient astronaut theorists believe that" "Temple Mount was one of the earliest intergalactic gateways." "But could space travelers really have landed here tens of thousands of years ago?" "CHILDRESS: it seems that the reverence for the site of" "Jerusalem may stem from it early on being some kind of a spaceport, a gigantic landing pad for extraterrestrials, and that's why King Solomon built his temple there, and then later the Muslims built the Dome of" "the Rock." "NARRATOR:" "Might Temple Mount really be the place where ancient aliens first made contact with early humans?" "And might its spiritual significance help provide proof of its unique extraterrestrial history?" "Perhaps further evidence may be found only a few hundred miles away in the heart of the Muslim world." "(whistle blows)" "NARRATOR:" "Saudi Arabia, the heart of the Middle East." "Allahu Akbar." "NARRATOR:" "In a narrow valley 50 miles inland from the Red Sea lies Islam's holiest city Mecca." "Here, in the year 570, Muhammad, the founder of Islam, was born, considered by Muslims to be a prophet and the messenger of" "God." "COOGAN:" "At that time, Mecca was a prosperous commercial center, a port from which goods brought from India and farther away in Asia were transported over land north to Damascus and by sea to Egypt." "It was in this commercial center that the Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation." "MEYER: if you want to encounter Muhammad, if you want, in a way, to meet with his ideas, one of the greatest places to go is to go to Mecca." "BIRNES:" "Muslims pray in the direction of Mecca five times a day, so certainly as a holy shrine, it is the center of the" "Earth, a Heaven's gate where the opening of Heaven takes place, and that's why it is so revered." "NARRATOR:" "In the center of" "Mecca lies the Grand Mosque, the largest and holiest place of worship for Muslims... and at the heart of the Grand Mosque is the Kaaba, a cube-shaped granite structure measuring 43 feet high by 36 feet wide." "According to Islamic tradition, the Kaaba was built approximately in 2000 B.C. by" "Abraham, a figure who serves as patriarch to both Muslims and" "Jews." "MEYER:" "In the Bible it is said that Abraham had a couple of children, and his first son was Ishmael and his second son was Isaac, and it is said in" "Islam that Abraham and Ishmael were in fact the two that came to build the Kaaba." "NARRATOR:" "Covered by black silk and embroidered in gold, the Kaaba is the most sacred structure in Islam." "Nearly three million Muslims make a pilgrimage to the Kaaba every year, a journey known as the hajj." "MEYER:" "Every Muslim, if he or she can do so, sometime in a lifetime is obliged to go on a pilgrimage, or the hajj, to" "Mecca, in a way, to walk in the footsteps of Abraham and of" "Ishmael, to walk in the footsteps of Muhammad." "MULLINS:" "The main ritual performed at the Kaaba is for pilgrims to enter into the enclosure where the Kaaba is, that cubicle structure, and circumnavigate the Kaaba seven times in a counterclockwise direction." "MEYER:" "In one part of that building there is a black stone that is imbedded in the side of the building, and nobody knows exactly where it came from, but the legend is that it came down from the sky." "It was brought down by an angel and found its way into this particular location of the shrine." "COOGAN:" "There's another tradition that suggests that this rock had been worshipped long before Muhammad's time and that it is in fact an ancient meteorite... which for ancient peoples would have been a sign from a god or gods." "MULLINS:" "Now, during the time that they're encircling the" "Kaaba seven times, if they are able, they should try to kiss the meteorite stone, but because of the numbers of people, especially in recent times, that's impossible, so the practice is that if you're" "unable to kiss the stone, you should point towards the stone." "That shows your respect for the stone and your veneration of it." "NOORY:" "People believe that, of course, it was a meteorite that fell from the heavens that they have been able to keep." "Some of it is in small fragments." "It's broken away, but they've kept it intact with this silver lining structure around it." "It is a magnificent artifact." "NARRATOR:" "Might the Black" "Stone really be a meteorite, as many scientists and scholars believe?" "If so, what does that say about the historical... and possibly metaphysical... origins of the" "Islamic faith?" "CHILDRESS: it's kind of strange really that all the" "Muslims are all praying towards" "Mecca and to this black stone that's there." "There are stories that the Kaaba in Mecca is radiating some kind of energy... that it energizes people and increases their spirituality and health." "Perhaps it's coming from this meteorite, this black stone of extraterrestrial origin." "NARRATOR:" "Today, because of its intense spiritual significance in the Islamic world... any forensic examination of the" "Black Stone is strictly forbidden." "As far as Muslims are concerned, the Black Stone simply" ""descended from paradise."" "VON DANIKEN:" "Archangel" "Michael descended from the sky, and Michael gave Abraham an information in a written form... and this information was sealed into a stone, and this stone is today's Kaaba." "It is said it is a stone from" "Heaven." "NOORY:" "The ancients possessed an ability to look toward the heavens in order to get their divine guidance." "This could very well be another one of those cases." "NARRATOR:" "According to researchers, the position of the" "Kaaba is precisely aligned with the rising of the star Canopus, the cycles of the moon, and the summer and winter solstices." "But just how... and where... did the ancients obtain such an advanced knowledge of astronomy?" "MARTELL:" "Just as the planets are revolving around the sun, the knowledge of traveling around the Kaaba was a symbolic reference for knowledge of astronomical alignments taking place at that time." "TSOUKALOS:" "In Islam, we have stories of winged angels that have descended with lots of light and a lot of wind and the earth trembling." "So what was described there wasn't necessarily a quote-unquote "divine encounter," but a flesh-and-blood extraterrestrial encounter." "NARRATOR:" "Might the Kaaba's interplanetary alignment suggest that ancient Muslims may have possessed secret knowledge?" "(people singing)" "And might their veneration for the Black Stone really serve to commemorate an ancient encounter with extraterrestrial beings?" "As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned, the answer to both these questions is a resounding yes." "And they point to further proof in a series of caves located halfway around the world." "NARRATOR:" "Western India." "April 28, 1819." "While hunting tigers just outside the village of Ajanta," "British officer John Smith discovers 29 elaborate cave temples carved into the side of a rocky cliff overlooking the" "Waghora River." "Believed to have been constructed in 200 B.C., the caves' architecture and artwork reveal new insights into the origins of India's mysterious sacred past." "ALMOHAMMADI:" "Ajanta is unique in the sense that these are the most ancient Buddhist caves of" "India." "Here they started the work from 200 B.C., and this work continued till the end of 6th century A.D." "CHILDRESS:" "As you walk in to the Ajanta Caves you see all kinds of temples carved out of solid rock, niches and alcoves, even statues." "But it's all been carved out of one giant block of rock." "NARRATOR:" "Visited yearly by thousands of Buddhist worshipers, the caves are considered sacred even to this day." "Built as holy shrines and temples by devoted monks, they contain numerous places of worship... complete with paintings and sculptures depicting the life and times of the Supreme Buddha, often referred to as the Enlightened" "One." "EFURD:" "There are many different sculpted subjects at Ajanta." "Many of the sculptures are of the Buddha." "In addition to those sculptures, there are various depictions of other mythological beings." "These are called Jatakas." "These Jatakas show these previous lives, and these lives could be related to, say, the" "Buddha being born as an animal, being born as a deity, or being born as a human." "NARRATOR:" "Even today, modern engineers are baffled as to how the caves could have been cut from the 70-foot-high granite cliffs more than" "2,000 ago." "EFURD:" "These caves were created through the removal of stone, literally tunneling into the surface of the rock." "Rock was removed, it was chiseled away, taken out, and any interior space that you see at the caves today, were created through this removal of stone." "Any architectural details that one finds at the site, any sculptures, they're actually carved from the same piece of stone, which is the mountainside itself." "NARRATOR:" "According to researchers, the Ajanta complex is significant because of the deliberate positioning of the caves around the cliffs... an arrangement that reveals an unusually advanced understanding of celestial activity." "EFURD:" "The caves are carved into this horseshoe bend, and are oriented in various directions." "Some are oriented towards the west, others to the south, and some are oriented to the east so that they are oriented towards the rising sun." "It does seem to be the case that ancient peoples in India were very much interested in the universe and the relationship of heavenly bodies." "NARRATOR:" "Evidence of the cave sculptor's precise knowledge of celestial movements can be found in two particular caves." "Each contains large stupas, or dome-shaped structures featuring" "Siddhartha Gautama, the supreme Buddha and spiritual teacher who founded Buddhism." "EFURD:" "Cave 19 is oriented towards the winter solstice, and what this means is that on the day of the winter solstice, the morning sunlight would filter through this large window on the facade and the sunlight itself would illuminate the" "stupa." "This is also true of Cave 26 at" "Ajanta." "It's oriented towards the summer solstice, and so on the day of the summer solstice, that light would filter and strike the stupa within it." "CHILDRESS:" "Now, this would have been very difficult to do, itself, because you're cutting solid rock from inside of a cave." "So you would need some pretty high-tech gear in order to tunnel and build and chip away inside of solid rock in order to really be perfectly oriented to the solstice." "NARRATOR:" "Might the Ajanta" "Caves have been constructed with the aid of advanced alien technology, as ancient astronaut theorists believe?" "If so, might they also have been considered sacred by the locals because of their connection to early extraterrestrial visitors?" "MARTELL:" "Many ancient astronaut theorists look at the stupa and say it's a symbolic reference for the power of flight." "Many times it's symbolically shown with a young Buddha placed in there, and it almost looks like he could be manipulating some type of controls within the stupa." "The stupas were always used as a way for Buddha to ascend or descend into the heavens." "And so we do see stupas in this artwork, very possibly saying that the Buddha was going into space." "NOORY:" "There was an obsession of ancient human beings to depict things that they saw." "And I think they did it with carvings on caves and depictions and sculptures and monuments... because that's what they saw." "They were duplicating what they saw." "But what they depict are very strange things." "CHILDRESS:" "They depict gods and half animal/half god type figures." "So you have here what seems to be some kind of special subterranean temple that's built for extraterrestrials or some kind of space gods." "BIRNES:" "What were the" "Buddhist monks seeing?" "Could the Buddhist monks have been helped by some kind of an extraterrestrial presence?" "TSOUKALOS:" "The ancient astronaut theory suggests that if we find paintings or carvings of half man/half animals, that that means that those creatures at one point really existed, because they were genetically created by extraterrestrials." "NARRATOR:" "The sculptures and wall paintings at Ajanta are some of the oldest surviving works of art from ancient India." "But was their elaborate construction really the result of early human contact with space travelers?" "If so, might there be additional evidence of stone-carved shrines in other regions of the world?" "Evidence that might provide the clues to our own origins." "NARRATOR:" "Lalibela, Ethiopia." "Hidden from view within this mountainous African landscape lie 11 churches carved entirely from a single block of stone." "TSOUKALOS: if you approach" "Lalibela, you don't even see anything." "But the moment you get closer, all of a sudden the ground opens up... and you have these huge, magnificent churches that have been cut out of the bedrock." "COPPENS:" "So, really, rather than building, Lalibela was cut from the rocks... from upstairs to downstairs." "So really what you have is an amazing engineering feat, which literally topples everything we know about building techniques." "NARRATOR:" "Religious ritual is central to the life of Lalibela." "Each year nearly 21,000" "Christian pilgrims come to worship." "GERVERS:" "Ethiopian" "Christianity is much more directly tied to the Old" "Testament than the Christianity practiced in the Western world today." "Christianity was introduced to" "Ethiopia at about the same time it was introduced to Western" "Europe, to France, for example." "Interestingly enough, that of all the Christian world," "Ethiopia is the only place where they have these monolithic churches." "NARRATOR:" "Mainstream archaeologists believe the churches were carved as early as the 12th century." "But engineers who have studied the design of the churches have concluded that their construction is scientifically inexplicable." "CHILDRESS:" "When you see the churches at Lalibela, you can see that they're using what would probably have to be power tools." "Anytime you're cutting hard stone, you're looking at specialized cutting tools, you need iron tools." "Even today we would have to use power saws and grinding wheels and chisels." "NARRATOR:" "But if, as ancient astronaut theorists believe, the churches of Lalibela could not have been made without modern technology, then who, or what, built them?" "GERVERS:" "Now, according to the story, the life of King" "Lalibela, which is written down in the 15th century, the angel" "Gabriel came to King Lalibela and took him off to the heavenly" "Jerusalem, where he had a conversation with God, and God said that he wanted him to go back and build these churches." "So he came back and had them constructed, he had them hewn out of the rock." "It took years to complete the job." "It was 24 hours a day, but" "Lalibela had the help of the angels." "BIRNES:" "So, according to legend, angels came down from" "Heaven and at night did the work that the human beings could not do because they were sleeping." "So there were actually two shifts of workers at the rocks of Lalibela." "One, human beings working during the day, and the other, extraterrestrial beings working at night, doing the night shift." "TSOUKALOS:" "To me, that is a very fascinating story, because in my opinion, angels do not exist." "Angels were merely a misinterpretation of flesh-and-blood extraterrestrials who descended from the sky with means of technology." "And that is what these quote-unquote, "angels" used." "NARRATOR: if the churches of" "Lalibela were constructed with the help of celestial travelers, why?" "Was it to worship God?" "Or was it to honor some other mystical... or extraterrestrial... being?" "According to the Kebra Nagast, the ancient holy book of Ethiopian Christians, the Hebrew Ark of the Covenant... the gold box containing the" "Ten Commandments... was transported to Ethiopia from" "Jerusalem sometime in the 9th century B.C." "GERVERS:" "The child of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba was named" "Menelik I, and he is attributed with being the first king of" "Ethiopia." "When he was 22 years old, he said to his mother, the Queen of" "Sheba, that he wanted to meet his father, and so she arranged for him to go to Jerusalem to do that." "And he spends an extended period of time there, and got to know the young noblemen of his age." "And the night before they left, they went into the temple and they took the Ark of the" "Covenant, and together Menelik with these noble boys made their way off back to Ethiopia." "Could the Ark of the Covenant ever have resided in Lalibela?" "There is no historical reason to believe it could have, but in legend you do hear that there was a time when it was in" "Lalibela." "COPPENS:" "Now, interestingly enough, in Lalibela there is an altar, which is in the exact dimensions of the Ark of the" "Covenant." "And then the question is really, what if some of the churches in" "Lalibela at some point might not have shielded the Ark of the" "Covenant as well?" "NARRATOR:" "According to the" "Ethiopian Orthodox Church, the" "Ark no longer resides within the churches at Lalibela but instead lies 200 miles north in the city of Aksum." "CHILDRESS:" "Even today there's a special temple that's guarded by the Ethiopian priests, and no one else is allowed inside it, and it's said that the Ark of the Covenant is kept inside of this church." "VON DANIKEN:" "And there is one big cathedral, it's called the" "Cathedral of the Holy Virgin" "Mary in the city of Aksum, and down there is a tunnel, and under this tunnel are the remains of the Ark of the" "Covenant." "This is known, this is not a secret." "I have been there." "NARRATOR:" "Is it really possible that the Ark of the" "Covenant might still be hidden deep within the cathedral at" "Aksum?" "If so, why has it been concealed for so long?" "According to ancient astronaut theorists, the extraterrestrial source of the Ark's legendary power will return one day to reclaim it, and some believe the return will happen at the same sacred place where alien beings first arrived." "NARRATOR:" "Eastern Lebanon." "The Bekaa Valley." "Here at this archaeological site stand the ruins of Heliopolis, built in the fourth century B.C." "by Alexander the Great to honor" "Zeus." "But beneath the Corinthian columns and remnants of both" "Greek and Roman architecture lie the ruins of a site that is much, much older." "According to archaeologists, it dates back nearly 9,000 years." "The ancient city of Baalbek, named after the early Canaanite deity Baal." "HANAN CHARAF:" "Baal is the god of life, the god of the sky, the god of the sun." "He was the god that was venerated on the site of Baalbek during the Canaanite and the" "Phoenician times." "MULLINS:" "And so, because it was already sacred to the god" "Baal, then later the Greeks and the Romans then would build temples on this very same spot." "NARRATOR:" "Archaeological surveys have revealed that the enormous stone foundation that lies at the base of the site dates back tens of thousands of years." "CHARAF:" "Baalbek, as we know from the archaeological evidence, must have existed during the Neolithic Period, between 6000 to 8000 years or even 9000 years B.C." "NARRATOR:" "But even more significant to ancient astronaut theorists is their belief that the colossal stone platform may once have served as a landing pad for space travelers." "(garbled radio transmission)" "CHILDRESS:" "We don't know why" "Baalbek was chosen as this specific site." "It may well be some kind of special power place." "But what was originally there before the Roman temple was this spaceport platform that was apparently used for extraterrestrials coming and going on Planet Earth." "NARRATOR:" "As evidence, researchers point to the gigantic megalithic stones incorporated into the foundation, each weighing between 800 to 1,200 tons and perfectly fitted together." "COPPENS:" "This is the real mystery of Baalbek... how these stones came to be there, why they were placed there, and specifically how they were transported into place because some of the stones are of such magnitude that modern machinery" "is incapable of putting them there, but somehow our ancestors were able to do this." "TSOUKALOS:" "Some have suggested that this stone alone weighs in excess of 1,200 tons." "How was it moved there?" "Because obviously it's situated on top of these stone rows that we can find down here, which means that this stone had to be lifted and then set on top of these stones down here." "CHARAF:" "And because these stones were gigantic, ancient people assumed that extraterrestrial or unknown forces brought them to the site itself." "BIRNES: it is one of the oldest, oldest megalithic sites on the planet and it has these huge stones laid out in a precise geometrical shape at a time when the prehistoric people who would have lived there, who" "would have gone to the Bekaa" "Valley in Lebanon would have no concept of how to move stones of that nature." "NARRATOR:" "But if the moving, hoisting, and setting of such massive stones was so incredibly difficult, then who... or what... placed them there?" "And perhaps more importantly, why?" "COPPENS:" "We know that the ancients always went to power places and Baalbek clearly is one of them." "It is a place where the gods were worshipped, where the gods were said to be present, and so when it comes to Baalbek, this platform was built there for a reason." "For what purpose it was used is a question we can't answer at this moment in time, but what we do know is that whatever was happening there had a great religious significance to them and was linked with worshipping" "deities... deities which clearly are of an otherworldly origin." "NARRATOR:" "Is it possible, as ancient astronaut theorists believe, that Baalbek had been considered a sacred place for tens of thousands of years because it was where extraterrestrial beings first arrived on Earth?" "The answer may have been found on excavated clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform script, written nearly 5,000 years ago by the earliest known human civilization, the Sumerians of" "Mesopotamia." "MARTELL:" "What's really interesting about Baalbek is it's always been known as the landing place." "There's an actual text from" "Sumerian times called "The Epic of Gilgamesh."" "Gilgamesh actually claims to have seen rockets descend and ascend from Baalbek, the landing place." "NARRATOR:" "A comparison between Baalbek, Lebanon and" "Jerusalem's Temple Mount reveals a striking resemblance between their massive stone platforms." "Might they have been built for the same purpose... to support the weight of spacecraft?" "COPPENS:" "Hopefully at one point archeology will be so open-minded that they actually want to explore this further." "NOORY:" "We may never get the answer, but at least trying to find out what happened, I think, is what drives all of us." "NARRATOR:" "Did otherworldly forces really descend from the heavens at the world's holiest places?" "It may be that the world's faithful already know the truth, or perhaps the truth will be withheld until some day in the future." "Captioning sponsored by" "AE TELEVISION NETWORKS" "Captioned by" "Media Access Group at WGBH access.wgbh.org"