- Chapel of the Franks—a blue-domed Roman Catholic crusader chapel dedicated to Our Lady of Sorrows, which once provided exclusive access to Calvary. The chapel marks the 10th Station of the Cross (the stripping of Jesus' garments).
- A Greek Orthodox oratory and chapel, just beneath the Chapel of the Franks, dedicated to St. Mary of Egypt.
- Various entrances to Armenian, Greek Orthodox, and Ethiopian Orthodox chapels.
- A small Greek Orthodox monastery, known as Gethsemane Metoxion, located to the side of the church.
- The tomb of Philippe D'Aubigny (Philip Daubeny, d. 1236)—a knight, tutor, and royal councilor to King Henry III of England and signer of the Magna Carta—one of the few tombs of crusaders and other Europeans not removed from the Church after the Muslim recapture of Jerusalem in the 12th century, sheltered by a wooden trapdoor in the parvise. A stone marker was placed on his tomb in 1925.
- The Catholicon – On the east side opposite the Rotunda is the Crusader structure housing the main altar of the Church, today the Greek Orthodox catholicon. The second, smaller dome sits directly over the centre of the transept crossing of the choir where the compas, an omphalos once thought to be the center of the world (associated to the site of the Crucifixion and the Resurrection), is situated. Since 1996 this dome is topped by the monumental Golgotha Crucifix which the Greek Patriarch Diodoros I of Jerusalem consecrated. It was at the initiative of Gustav Kühnel to erect a new crucifix at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem that would not only be worthy of the singularity of the site, but that would also become a symbol of the efforts of unity in the community of Christian faith.
- Prison of Christ – In the north-east side of the complex there is The Prison of Christ, alleged by the Franciscans to be where Jesus was held. The Greek Orthodox allege that the real place that Jesus was held was the similarly named Prison of Christ, in their Monastery of the Praetorium, located near the Church of Ecce Homo, at the first station on the Via Dolorosa. The Armenians regard a recess in the Monastery of the Flagellation, a building near the second station on the Via Dolorosa, as the Prison of Christ. A cistern among the ruins near the Church of St. Peter in Gallicantu is also alleged to have been the Prison of Christ.
- Greek Chapel of Saint Longinus – The Orthodox Greek chapel is dedicated to Saint Longinus.
- Armenian Chapel of Division of Robes
- Greek Chapel of the Derision – the southernmost chapel in the ambulatory.
- Chapel of Saint Helena – between the first two chapels are stairs descending to the Chapel of Saint Helena.
- Chapel of Vardan Mamikonian – on the north side of the Chapel of Saint Helena is an ornate wrought iron door, beyond which a raised artificial platform affords views of the quarry, and which leads to the Chapel of Saint Vartan. The latter chapel contains archaeological remains from Hadrian's temple and Constantine's basilica. These areas are usually closed.
- Chapel of the Invention of the Holy Cross – another set of 22 stairs from the Chapel of Saint Helena leads down to the Roman Catholic Chapel of the Invention of the Holy Cross, believed to be the place where the True Cross was found.
- The Franciscan Chapel of St. Mary Magdalene – The chapel indicates the place where Mary Magdalene met Jesus after his resurrection.[43]
- The Franciscan Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament (or Chapel of the Apparition) – in memory of Jesus' meeting with his mother after the Resurrection.
- The Syriac Orthodox Chapel of Saint Joseph of Arimathea and Saint Nicodemus. On Sundays and feast days it is furnished for the celebration of Mass.
- The Church of the Holy Sepulchre features prominently in the 2016 crypto-thriller The Apocalypse Fire by Dominic Selwood.
- In the 2016 video game Dark Souls III, the abandoned tomb of the boss and character Aldrich strongly resembles, and is probably based on, the edicule of the Holy Sepulchre
The Church of the Holy
Sepulchre[b] (Arabic: كَنِيسَةُ
ٱلْقِيَامَة Kaneesatu al-Qeyaamah; Greek: Ναός της Αναστάσεως Naos tes Anastaseos; Armenian: Սուրբ Հարության տաճար Surb
Harut’yan tač̣ar; Latin: Ecclesia
Sancti Sepulchri;[c] also called
the Church of the Resurrection or Church
of the Anastasis by Orthodox Christians) is a church in
the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem, a few steps away from the Muristan. The church contains, according to traditions
dating back to at least the fourth century, the two holiest
sites in Christianity: the site where Jesus of Nazareth was crucified,[1] at a place
known as "Calvary" or
"Golgotha", and Jesus's empty tomb, where he is said to have
been buried and resurrected. The tomb is
enclosed by the 18th-century shrine, called the Aedicule (Edicule). The Status
Quo,
a 250-year old understanding between religious communities, applies to the
site.
Within the church proper are the last four (or, by
some definitions, five) Stations of
the Via Dolorosa,
representing the final episodes of Jesus' Passion. The church
has been a major Christian pilgrimage destination since its creation in the fourth
century, as the traditional site of the Resurrection of Christ, thus its
original Greek name, Church of the Anastasis.
Today, the wider complex accumulated during the
centuries around the Church of the Holy Sepulchre also serves as the
headquarters of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, while control of the church itself is shared between several Christian denominations and secular entities in complicated
arrangements essentially unchanged for over 160 years, and some for much
longer. The main denominations sharing property over parts of the church are
the Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox and Roman Catholic, and to a
lesser degree the Egyptian Copts, Syriacs and Ethiopians.
Meanwhile, Protestants,
including Anglicans,
have no permanent presence in the Church. Some Protestants prefer The Garden Tomb, elsewhere in
Jerusalem, as a more evocative site to commemorate Jesus' crucifixion and
resurrection.
Construction
According to Eusebius of Caesarea, the Roman emperor Hadrian in the 2nd century AD built a temple dedicated
to the goddess Venus in order to bury
the cave in which Jesus had been buried. The first Christian emperor, Constantine the Great, ordered in about 325/326 that the temple be
replaced by a church. During the building of the Church, Constantine's
mother, Helena, is
believed to have rediscovered the tomb (although there are some discrepancies
among authors). Socrates Scholasticus (born c. 380), in his Ecclesiastical History, gives a full description of the discovery.
Constantine's church was built as two connected
churches over the two different holy sites, including a great basilica (the Martyrium visited
by Egeria in
the 380s), an enclosed colonnaded atrium (the Triportico) with the traditional site of Golgotha in
one corner, and a rotunda,
called the Anastasis ("Resurrection" in Greek), which contained the
remains of a rock-cut room that Helena and Macarius identified
as the burial site of Jesus.
According to tradition, Constantine arranged for the
rockface to be removed from around the tomb, without harming it, in order to
isolate the tomb; in the centre of the rotunda is a small building called
the Kouvouklion in Greek or the Aedicula in
Latin, which encloses this tomb. The remains are completely enveloped by
a marble sheath placed some 500 years before to protect the ledge from Ottoman
attacks. However, there are several thick window wells extending through the
marble sheath, from the interior to the exterior that are not marble clad.
They appear to reveal an underlying limestone rock, which may be part of the
original living rock of
the tomb.
The church was built starting in 325/326, and was
consecrated on 13 September 335. From pilgrim reports it seems that the chapel
housing the tomb of Jesus was freestanding at first, and that the Rotunda was
only erected around the chapel in the 380s.
Each year, the Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates the anniversary of the consecration of the
Church of the Resurrection (Holy Sepulchre) on 13 September.
Damage and destruction
This building was damaged by fire in May of 614 when
the Sassanid Empire, under Khosrau II,
invaded Jerusalem and captured the True Cross. In 630, the Emperor Heraclius restored it and rebuilt the church after
recapturing the city. After Jerusalem came under Arab rule, it remained a
Christian church, with the early Muslim rulers protecting the city's Christian
sites. A story reports that the Caliph
Umar ibn al-Khattab visited the
church and stopped to pray on the balcony; but at the time of prayer, he
turned away from the church and prayed outside. He feared that future
generations would misinterpret this gesture, taking it as a pretext to turn
the church into a mosque. Eutychius added that Umar wrote a decree prohibiting
Muslims from praying at this location. The building suffered severe damage due
to an earthquake in 746.
Early in the ninth century, another earthquake
damaged the dome of the Anastasis. The damage was repaired in 810 by Patriarch Thomas. In the year 841, the church suffered a fire. In 935, the Orthodox Christians prevented
the construction of a Muslim mosque adjacent the Church. In 938, a new fire
damaged the inside of the basilica and came close to the rotunda. In 966, due
to a defeat of Muslim armies in the region of Syria, a riot broke out and was
followed by reprisals. The basilica was burned again. The doors and roof were
burnt, and the Patriarch John VII was
murdered.
On 18 October 1009, Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah ordered the complete destruction of the church
as part of a more general campaign against Christian places of worship in
Palestine and Egypt. The damage was extensive, with few parts of the
early church remaining. Christian Europe reacted with shock and
expulsions of Jews (for example, Cluniac monk Rodulfus Glaber blamed
the Jews, with
the result that Jews were expelled from Limoges and other French towns) and an impetus to
later Crusades.
Reconstruction
In wide-ranging negotiations between the Fatimids and
the Byzantine Empire in 1027–8, an agreement was reached whereby the new Caliph Ali az-Zahir (Al-Hakim's
son) agreed to allow the rebuilding and redecoration of the Church. The
rebuilding was finally completed with the financing at a huge expense by
Emperor Constantine IX Monomachos and Patriarch Nicephorus of Constantinople in
1048. As a concession, the mosque in Constantinople was
re-opened and the khutba sermons
were to be pronounced in az-Zahir's name. Muslim sources say a by-product
of the agreement was the recanting of Islam by many Christians who had been
forced to convert under Al-Hakim's persecutions. In addition, the Byzantines,
while releasing 5,000 Muslim prisoners, made demands for the restoration of
other churches destroyed by Al-Hakim and the re-establishment of a Patriarch in Jerusalem. Contemporary sources credit the
emperor with spending vast sums in an effort to restore the Church of the Holy
Sepulchre after this agreement was made. Despite the Byzantines spending
vast sums on the project, "a total replacement was far beyond available
resources. The new construction was concentrated on the rotunda and its
surrounding buildings: the great basilica remained in ruins." The
rebuilt church site consisted of "a court open to the sky, with five small
chapels attached to it." The chapels were to the east of the court
of resurrection, where the wall of the great church had been. They
commemorated scenes from the passion, such as the location of the prison of
Christ and of his flagellation, and presumably were so placed because of the
difficulties of free movement among shrines in the streets of the city. The
dedication of these chapels indicates the importance of the pilgrims' devotion
to the suffering of Christ. They have been described as 'a sort of Via Dolorosa in
miniature'... since little or no rebuilding took place on the site of the
great basilica. Western pilgrims to Jerusalem during the eleventh century
found much of the sacred site in ruins." Control of Jerusalem, and
thereby the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, continued to change hands several
times between the Fatimids and the Seljuk Turks (loyal to
the Abbasid caliph in Baghdad)
until the arrival of the Crusaders in 1099.
Crusader period
Many historians maintain that the main concern
of Pope Urban II,
when calling for the First Crusade, was the threat
to Constantinople from the Turkish invasion of Asia
Minor in response to the appeal
of Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos. Historians agree that the fate of Jerusalem and thereby the Church of
the Holy Sepulchre was of concern if not the immediate goal of papal policy in
1095. The idea of taking Jerusalem gained more focus as the Crusade was
underway. The rebuilt church site was taken from the Fatimids (who had
recently taken it from the Abassids) by the knights of the First Crusade on 15 July
1099.
The First Crusade was envisioned as an armed
pilgrimage, and no crusader could consider his journey complete unless he had
prayed as a pilgrim at the Holy Sepulchre. Crusader Prince Godfrey of Bouillon, who became the first crusader monarch of Jerusalem, decided not to use the title "king"during his lifetime, and declared himself
"Advocatus Sancti Sepulchri" ("Protector [or Defender] of the
Holy Sepulchre"). By the crusader period, a cistern under the former basilica was rumoured to have
been the location where Helena had found the True Cross, and began to be
venerated as such; although the cistern later became the "Chapel of the
Invention of the Cross," there is no evidence of the rumour before the
11th century, and modern archaeological investigation has now dated the
cistern to 11th century repairs by Monomachos.
According to the German clergyman and orient pilgrim
Ludolf von Sudheim, the keys of the Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre were in hands
of the "ancient Georgians" and the food, alms, candles and oil for lamps
were given them by the pilgrims in the south door of the church.
William of Tyre, chronicler
of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, reports on the renovation of the Church in the
mid-12th century. The crusaders investigated the eastern ruins on the site,
occasionally excavating through the rubble, and while attempting to reach the
cistern, they discovered part of the original ground level of Hadrian's temple
enclosure; they decided to transform this space into a chapel dedicated to
Helena (the Chapel of Saint Helena), widening their original excavation tunnel into a
proper staircase. The crusaders began to refurnish the church in a Romanesque style
and added a bell tower. These renovations unified the small chapels on
the site and were completed during the reign of Queen Melisende in 1149, placing all the Holy places under one roof for the first
time. The church became the seat of the first Latin Patriarchs, and was also the site of the kingdom's scriptorium. The church was lost to Saladin, along with the rest of the city, in 1187,
although the treaty established after the Third Crusade allowed
for Christian pilgrims to visit the site. Emperor Frederick II (r. 1220–50) regained the city and the church
by treaty in the 13th century while he himself was under a ban of
excommunication, with the curious consequence that the holiest church in
Christianity was laid under interdict. The church seems to have been largely in Greek
Orthodox Patriarch Athanasius II of Jerusalem's hands, ca. 1231–47, during the Latin control of
Jerusalem. Both city and church were captured by the Khwarezmians in 1244.
Later periods
The Franciscan friars renovated it further in 1555, as it had
been neglected despite increased numbers of pilgrims. The Franciscans rebuilt
the Aedicule, extending the structure to create an ante-chamber. After
the renovation of 1555, control of the church oscillated between the
Franciscans and the Orthodox, depending on which community could obtain a
favorable "firman"
from the "Sublime Porte"
at a particular time, often through outright bribery, and violent clashes were
not uncommon. There was no agreement about this question, although it was
discussed at the negotiations to the Treaty of Karlowitz in 1699. In 1767, weary of the squabbling, the
"Porte" issued a "firman" that divided the church among
the claimants.
A fire severely damaged the structure again in 1808,
causing the dome of the Rotunda to collapse and smashing the Aedicule's
exterior decoration. The Rotunda and the Aedicule's exterior were rebuilt in
1809–1810 by architect Nikolaos Ch. Komnenos of Mytilene in the then current Ottoman Baroque style. The fire did not reach the interior of the Aedicule, and
the marble decoration of the Tomb dates mainly to the 1555 restoration,
although the interior of the ante-chamber, now known as the "Chapel of
the Angel," was partly rebuilt to a square ground-plan, in place of the
previously semi-circular western end. Another decree in 1853 from the
sultan solidified the existing territorial division among the communities and
set a "status quo"
for arrangements to "remain forever," causing differences of opinion
about upkeep and even minor changes, including disagreement on the
removal of the "Immovable Ladder," an
exterior ladder under one of the windows; this ladder has remained in the same
position since then.
The cladding of red marble applied to the Aedicule by
Komnenos has deteriorated badly and is detaching from the underlying
structure; since 1947 it has been held in place with an exterior scaffolding
of iron girders installed by the British authorities. A careful renovation is undergoing, funded by a $4 million gift
from King Abdullah II of Jordan and
a $1.3-million gift from Mica Ertegun.
The current dome dates from 1870, although it was
restored between 1994–1997, as part of extensive modern renovations to the
church which have been ongoing since 1959. During the 1970–1978 restoration
works and excavations inside the building, and under the nearby Muristan, it
was found that the area was originally a quarry, from which white meleke limestone was struck. To the east of the Chapel of Saint Helena, the excavators discovered a void containing a
2nd-century drawing of a Roman ship, two low walls which supported the
platform of Hadrian's 2nd-century temple, and a higher 4th-century wall built
to support Constantine's basilica. After the excavations of the early
1970s, the Armenian authorities converted this archaeological space into
the Chapel of Saint Vartan, and created an artificial walkway over the quarry
on the north of the chapel, so that the new Chapel could be accessed (by
permission) from the Chapel of Saint Helena.
In 2016, restoration works were performed in the
Aedicule. For the first time since at least 1555, marble cladding which
protected the estimated burial bed of Jesus from vandalism and souvenir
takers was removed. When the cladding was first removed on October
26, an initial inspection by the National Technical University of Athens team showed only a layer of fill material
underneath. By the night of October 28, the original limestone burial bed was
revealed intact. This suggested that the tomb location has not changed through
time and confirmed the existence of the original limestone cave walls within
the Aedicule. The tomb was resealed shortly thereafter.
Entrance and parvis
See also: Immovable Ladder
The entrance to the church, a single door in the
south transept—through
the crusader façade—is
found past a group of streets winding through the outer Via Dolorosa, by way of a
local souq in
the Muristan.
This narrow way of access to such a large structure has proven to be hazardous
at times. For example, when a fire broke out in 1840, dozens of pilgrims were
trampled to death.
Historically, two large, arched doors allowed access
to the church. However, only the left-hand entrance is currently accessible,
as the right door has long since been bricked up. These entrances are located
in the parvis of
a larger courtyard, or plaza.
Also located along the parvis are a few smaller
structures and openings:
Broken columns—once forming part of an arcade—flank
the church's front, which is covered in crusader graffiti mostly consisting
of crosses. In
the 13th century, the tops of the columns were removed and sent to Mecca by
the Khwarezmids.
The church's bell
tower is located to the left of
the façade. It is currently almost half its original size.
The historic Immovable Ladder stands
beneath a window on the façade.
On the south side of the altar, via the ambulatory, is a stairway climbing to Calvary (Golgotha), traditionally regarded as the site
of Jesus' crucifixion and the most lavishly decorated part of the church. The
main altar there belongs to the Greek Orthodox, which contains the Rock of
Calvary (12th Station of the Cross). The rock can be seen under glass on both
sides of the altar, and beneath the altar there is a hole said to be the place
where the cross was raised. Due to the significance of this, it is the most
visited site in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The Roman Catholics (Franciscans) have an altar to the side, the Chapel of the
Nailing of the Cross (11th Station of the Cross). On the left of the altar,
towards the Eastern Orthodox chapel, there is a statue of Mary, believed by
some to be miraculous (the 13th Station of the Cross, where Jesus' body was
removed from the cross and given to his family).
Beneath the Calvary and the two chapels there, on the
main floor, there is the Chapel of Adam. According to tradition, Jesus was
crucified over the place where Adam's skull was buried. According to some, at
the crucifixion, the blood of Christ ran down the cross and through the rocks
to fill the skull of Adam. The Rock of Calvary appears cracked through a
window on the altar wall, with the crack traditionally claimed to be caused by
the earthquake that occurred when Jesus died on the cross, while some scholars
claim it to be the result of quarrying against a natural flaw in the rock.
Stone of Anointing
Just inside the entrance to the church is the Stone
of Anointing (also Stone of the Anointing or Stone of Unction), which
tradition believes to be the spot where Jesus' body was prepared for burial
by Joseph of Arimathea. However, this tradition is only attested since the crusader era
(notably by the Italian Dominican pilgrim Riccoldo da Monte di Croce in 1288), and the present stone was only added
in the 1810 reconstruction.
The wall behind the stone is defined by its striking
blue balconies and tau
cross-bearing red banners (depicting
the insignia of the Brotherhood of the Holy Sepulchre), and is decorated with lamps. The modern mosaic
along the wall depicts the anointing of Jesus' body.
The wall was a temporary addition to support the arch
above it, which had been weakened after the damage in the 1808 fire; it blocks
the view of the rotunda, separates the entrance from the Catholicon, sits on
top of the now-empty and desecrated graves of four 12th-century crusader
kings—including Godfrey of Bouillon and Baldwin I of Jerusalem—and is no longer structurally necessary. There is a
difference of opinion as to whether it is the 13th Station of the Cross, which others identify as the lowering of Jesus from
the cross and locate between the 11th and 12th stations up on Calvary.
The lamps that hang over the Stone of Unction,
adorned with cross-bearing chain links, are contributed by Armenians, Copts, Greeks and Latins.
Immediately to the left of the entrance is a bench
that has traditionally been used by the church's Muslim doorkeepers, along
with some Christian clergy, as well as electrical wiring. To the right of the
entrance is a wall along the ambulatory containing, to the very right, the
staircase leading to Golgatha. Further along the same wall is the entrance to
the Chapel of Adam.
Rotunda and Aedicule
The Rotunda is
located in the centre of the Anastasis, beneath the larger of the church's two
domes. In the center of the Rotunda is the chapel called the Aedicule, which contains the Holy Sepulchre itself. The
Aedicule has two rooms, the first holding the Angel's Stone, which is believed
to be a fragment of the large stone that sealed the tomb; the second is the
tomb itself. Possibly due to the fact that pilgrims laid their hands on the
tomb and/or to prevent eager pilgrims from removing bits of the original rock
as souvenirs, a marble plaque was placed in the fourteenth century on the tomb
to prevent further damage to the tomb.
Under the status quo, the Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Armenian Apostolic Churches all have rights to the interior of the tomb, and all
three communities celebrate the Divine Liturgy or Holy Mass there daily.
It is also used for other ceremonies on special occasions, such as the Holy Saturday ceremony
of the Holy Fire led
by the Greek Orthodox Patriarch (with the participation of the Coptic and
Armenian patriarchs). To its rear, in a chapel constructed of iron latticework upon a stone base semicircular in plan, lies
the altar used by the Coptic Orthodox. Historically, the Georgians also retained
the key to the Aedicule.
Beyond that, to the rear of the Rotunda is a
rough-hewn chapel containing an opening to a chamber cut from the rock, from
which several kokh-tombs radiate. Although this space was discovered
recently, and contains no identifying marks, many Christians
believe it to be the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, and it is where the Syriac Orthodoxcelebrate their Liturgy on Sundays. To the right of the Sepulchre on
the northwestern edge of the Rotunda is the Chapel of the Apparition, which is
reserved for Roman Catholic use.
From May 2016 to March 2017, the Aedicule underwent
restoration and repairs after the Israel Antiquities Authority declared the structure unsafe. Much of the $3
million project was funded by the World Monuments Fund.
East of this is a large iconostasis demarcating the Orthodox sanctuary before which
is set the throne of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem on the south side facing the throne of the
Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch on the north side.
Further to the east in the ambulatory are three
chapels (from south to north):
North of the Aedicule
South of the Aedicule
The three Greek Orthodox chapels of St. James the Just, St. John the Baptist and of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste, south of the rotunda and on the west side of the
front courtyard originally formed the baptistery complex of the Constantinean church. The
southernmost chapel was the vestibule, the middle chapel the actual baptistery, and the north chapel the chamber in which the
patriarch chrismated the
newly baptized before leading them into the rotunda north of this complex.
Syriac Compound
On the far side of the chapel is the low entrance to
two complete 1st-century Jewish tombs. Since Jews always buried their dead
outside the city, this proves that the Holy Sepulchre site was outside the
city walls at the time of the crucifixion. There is a tradition that Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were
buried here.
Status quo
The Sultan's firman (decree) of 1853, known as the
"status quo",
pinned down the now permanent statutes of property and the regulations
concerning the roles of the different denominations and other custodians.
The primary custodians are the Greek Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic, and Roman Catholic Churches,
with the Greek Orthodox Church having the lion's share. In the 19th century,
the Coptic Orthodox, the Ethiopian Orthodox and the Syriac Orthodox acquired lesser responsibilities, which include shrines and other
structures in and around the building. Times and places of worship for each
community are strictly regulated in common areas. The Greek Orthodox act
through the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate as well as through the Brotherhood of the Holy Sepulchre. The Roman Catholics act through the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land.
The establishment of the 1853 status quo did not halt
controversy and sometimes violence, which continues to break out occasionally.
On a hot summer day in 2002, a Coptic monk moved
his chair from its agreed spot into the shade. This was interpreted as a
hostile move by the Ethiopians, and eleven were hospitalized after the
resulting fracas.
In another incident in 2004, during Orthodox
celebrations of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, a door to the Franciscan chapel was left open. This
was taken as a sign of disrespect by the Orthodox and a fistfight broke out.
Some people were arrested, but no one was seriously injured.
On Palm
Sunday, in April 2008, a brawl broke
out when a Greek monk was
ejected from the building by a rival faction. Police were called to the scene
but were also attacked by the enraged brawlers.On Sunday, 9 November 2008, a
clash erupted between Armenian and Greek monks during celebrations for
the Feast of the Cross.
No one controls the main entrance. In 1192, Saladin assigned door-keeping responsibilities to the
Muslim Nuseibeh family.
The wooden doors that compose the main entrance are the original, highly
carved doors. The Joudeh Al-Goudia family were entrusted as custodian to
the keys of the Holy Sepulchre by Saladin in 1187.
Despite occasional disagreements, the religious
services take place in the Church with regularity and coexistence is generally
peaceful. An example of concord between the Church custodians is the recent
(2016–17) full restoration of the Aedicule.
Connection to Temple of Aphrodite
The site of the Church had been a temple of Aphrodite
before Constantine's edifice was built. Hadrian's temple had actually been
located there because it was the junction of the main
north-south road with one of
the two main east-west roads and directly adjacent to the forum(which is now the
location of the (smaller) Muristan); the forum itself had been placed, as is
traditional in Roman towns, at the junction of the main north-south road with
the (other) main east-west road (which is now El-Bazar/David Street). The
temple and forum together took up the entire space between the two main
east-west roads (a few above-ground remains of the east end of the temple
precinct still survive in the Alexander Nevsky Church complex of the Russian Mission in Exile).
From the archaeological excavations in the 1970s, it
is clear that construction took over most of the site of the earlier temple
enclosure and that the Triportico and Rotunda roughly overlapped with the temple building
itself; the excavations indicate that the temple extended at least as far back
as the Aedicule, and the temple enclosure would have reached back slightly
further. Virgilio Canio Corbo, a Franciscan priest and archaeologist, who was
present at the excavations, estimated from the archaeological evidence that
the western retaining wall, of the temple itself, would have passed extremely
close to the east side of the supposed tomb; if the wall had been any further
west any tomb would have been crushed under the weight of the
wall (which would be immediately above it) if it had not already been
destroyed when foundations for the wall were made.
Other archaeologists have criticized Corbo's
reconstructions. Dan Bahat,
the former city archaeologist of Jerusalem, regards them as unsatisfactory, as
there is no known temple of Aphrodite matching Corbo's design, and no
archaeological evidence for Corbo's suggestion that the temple building was on
a platform raised high enough to avoid including anything sited where the
Aedicule is now; indeed Bahat notes that many temples to Aphrodite have a
rotunda-like design, and argues that there is no archaeological reason to
assume that the present rotunda was not based on a rotunda in the temple
previously on the site.
Location
The Bible describes Jesus's tomb as being outside the
city wall, as was normal for burials across the ancient world, which were
regarded as unclean. Today, the site of the Church is within the current
walls of the old city of Jerusalem. It has been well documented by
archaeologists that in the time of Jesus, the walled city was smaller and the
wall then was to the east of the current site of the Church. In other
words, the city had been much narrower in Jesus' time, with the site then having
been outside the walls; since Herod Agrippa (41–44) is
recorded by history as extending the city to the north (beyond the present
northern walls), the required repositioning of the western wall is
traditionally attributed to him as well.
The area immediately to the south and east of the
sepulchre was a quarry and outside the city during the early 1st century as
excavations under the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer across the street
demonstrated.
The church is a part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site Old City of Jerusalem.
Influence
From the 9th century, the construction of churches
inspired in the Anastasis was extended across Europe. One example
is Santo Stefano in Bologna, Italy, an agglomeration of seven churches
recreating shrines of Jerusalem.
Several churches and monasteries in Europe, for
instance, in Germany and Russia, and at least one church in the United States
have been modeled on the Church of the Resurrection, some even reproducing
other holy places for
the benefit of pilgrims who could not travel to the Holy Land. They include
the Heiliges Grab of Görlitz, constructed between
1481 and 1504, the New Jerusalem Monastery in Moscow Oblast, constructed
by Patriarch Nikon between 1656 and 1666, and Mount St. Sepulchre Franciscan Monasterybuilt by the Franciscans in Washington, DC in 1898.
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