The Great Temple of Petra is currently being excavated by M. S. Joukowsky (Brown University) and a five-year report was published in 1998. It has a typical conservative temple façade architecture: four columns in antis and a pitched roof covered with tiles, which was probably combined with a pediment on the façade. The narrower spaces between the columns and the antae (rectangular pilasters that flank the façade) suggest the known angle contraction of the doric order, hence the reconstructed triglyph frieze. If so, it would look a lot like the neighboring Qasr el-Bint. Its proportions are much lighter than those of the Qasr el-Bint, but the craftsmanship is much poorer.

The interior contains a colonnade of the triclinium type, used in the palaces of Herod the Great of Judea. The lack of a doorwall in the first phase, unusual to a temple—a taboo space—resembles similar types of Hellenistic triclinia (assembly halls) and the early basilica at Pompeii. Perhaps, both the cult and the Nabataean king were housed under the same roof. It is one of the mysteries in the archaeology of Petra. With the current information as it stands, we cannot know if the Great Temple was a temple or a palace or both, as the seat of a deified king.

During the second major construction phase (iIllustrated above), a small theater (odeion?), with a seating capacity of approximately 600 persons, was built inside the "cella", and the spacings between the porch columns were blocked with intercolumnar walls, creating an enclosed space. In this phase, the previously open colonnaded pronaos (front porch) accommodated the parascaenium (backstage) of the odeion. The resulting screened/blind façade was perfectly acceptable within the context of Petraean and traditional Nabataean architecture. The screened/blind intercolumniations of the rock-cut façades inside Petra were always a reference material in their own right and may have influenced the morphology of the large free-standing monuments. Also, one must keep in mind that the Nabataean temples at Khirbet et-Tannur and Khirbet Edh-Dharih had half-columns built up against their façade walls, thus having an appearance similar to that of the Great Temple of Petra.

In the image at right, which is merely an attempt to visually explore the possibilities of reconstruction of the Great Temple’s façade, the intercolumnar walls stand approximately 6.5 m high—only about half the height of the columns—and serve perfectly their function as screens. This solution of partially blocked intercolumniations was commonly used in the temples of classical (Ptolemaic to Trajanic) Egypt. The details of the doorframe and the bronze lattice/balustrades on top of the screen walls, although purely hypothetical, were common in the classical world. They serve an additional purpose here, though, by allowing one to visualize, measure, and compare the variations in the intercolumnar openings and the angle contraction based on the number of lattice units allowed per opening. Each square in the latticed balustrade measures 0.70 m wide; thus each opening can be represented from center to corners with 8, 5 and 4 such units.