27 July 2011

It was another mob day through the Old City. Only this time, instead of clogging the streets of the Jewish Quarter, we clogged the streets of the Christian Quarter. I know how it feels to be on the outside of these 'mob' groups; I avoid tourist groups at all costs because they are impossible to get through or to get around. But I am slowly realizing that there isn't much a group can do about taking up an entire street. The streets of the Old City were not constructed for large groups. During our tour throughout the Christian Quarter we had the opportunity to visit six different churches: Terra Sancta, John the Baptist's, St. Mark's, Alexander Newsky, Lutheran Church of the Redeemer, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It was a busy but amazing day.

The Roman Catholic Church has several representatives in Jerusalem: the Papal Nuncio, the Latin Patriarch, and an official of the Franciscan monastic order who bears the title "Custos Terra Sancta". After the Greek and Latin Christianities split in 1054 AD, each church kept a patriarch in Jerusalem to oversee its interests. The Crusaders conquered Jerusalem in 1099, expelling the Greek Patriarch and giving exclusive jurisdiction over Christian sites to the Latin Patriarch. In 1187 AD the Kurdish Muslim leader, Saladdin, took Jerusalem and readmitted the Greek Patriarch into the city and awarded him a share in the key Christian sites. In the same year, the Crusaders (accompanied by the Latin Patriarch) withdrew to a fortified enclave at Akko; when Akko fell, succeeding Latin Patriarchs resided in Rome until 1847. Meanwhile, Francis of Assisi (1182-1226) founded the Franciscan Order, the mandate of which became preaching Christianity worldwide, including in the Holy Land. Franciscans began to distinguish between the old Crusader objective of Latin Christian political domination of the Holy Land and the new Franciscan objective of Latin Christian custody of Christian sites in the Holy Land for worship purposes. St. Francis himself traveled through Egypt, Syria, and Palestine, asking major rulers to let Franciscans pray at Holy Land Sites. After Akko fell in 1291 AD, Franciscans remained in Muslim-ruled Palestine to maintain the Christian shrines. The Franciscan Custos Terra Sancta became the local Roman Catholic community's effective leader.
In 1557, the Franscicans bought an ex-Georgian convent; there they built up the complex known as Terra Sancta. The complex grew to include a monastery with a cloister, a chapel (St. Saviour's), a school, and a hostel for pilgrims. Most European Christian pilgrims visiting Jerusalem stayed in the hostel of the Franciscan Terra Sancta complex. This hostel preserves the names of some of the pilgrims who carved their names on a stone or on a door. One of the several names appearing on the door is "Hyde", perhaps carved there by Orson Hyde. (It is, at any rater, very likely that Elder Hyde stayed in teh Franciscan hostel during his visit to Jerusalem in October 1841.) In 1847, the Pope sent the Latin Patriarch, Joseph Valerga, to reside in Jerusalem. The new division of labor endowed the Patriarch with general responsibility for the Catholic Church's interests in the Holy Land and the Custos Terra Sancta with specific responsibility for maintaining Christian holy places. The Latin Patriarch still maintains the responsibility for the Catholic Church in the Holy Land. When we arrived at the complex, we went straight into the chapel where we spent time singing songs until a Franciscan Brother arrived to give us a quick tour. He arrived late because he was at mass, but that didn't stop us from taking the tour. He spoke only Spanish, so we had a translator, but I chose to listen to the Spanish; it was amazing how much I understood! (I later learned that he is from Mendoza, Argentina...which is no where close to Rio Gallegos - where Mike is currently serving.)

John the Baptist's Church is a small Greek Orthodox Church in the Christian Quarter. To get inside the courtyard, you have to enter through a tiny door in the wall. It is rarely open, but through the powers of Brother Huntington, he called ahead and made sure that a nun would be there to let us in. I am very glad he did so. The church was beautiful. Two summers ago, I went to Greece with my family and while there, I fell in love with Greek Orthodox churches. The colors, the architecture, the artwork they use is beautiful, especially the greens and blues they use. After taking a few pictures, we went down to the crypt beneathe the church. The crypt had actually been turned into a chapel (the bodies had been removed...or so we were told). I have never been one for crypts, but I survived - the memory of the church's beautiful interior lingering in my mind.

Aramaic-speaking Monophysite Christians have maintained a shrine church commemorating the Last Supper and other New Testament events: the Church of St. Mark. In part to assert the primacy of Antioch over urban rivals and in part to rid themselves of Greek domination, by the Fifth Century AD Aramaic-speaking Christians of Syria espoused monophysitism and were declared heretics at the Council of Chalcedon. These Syrian Christian, centered in Antioch and Damascus, proceeded to form their own national church. Trying to stamp out this Syrian Orthodoxy, the Byzantines drove its adherents into the Syrian Desert, where Arab trives were converted, monasticism flourished, and Bishop Jacob Baradeus secretly ordained more than 100,000 new bishops and priests. Because of his role in perpetuating it, Syrian Orthodoxy has often be called "the Jacobite Church". After Muslim Arabs seized Syria-Palestine from the Byzantines in 636 AD, the Syrian Orthodox Church flourished under Arab-Muslim dynasties until the First Crusade inaugurated a long period of decline. Syrian Orthodoxy's headquarters in Jerusalem are at the Church of St. Marks, who present restoration of a Crusader-era edifice is located on the site of a Fourth Century AD Byzantine chapel. Like many church buildings in Jerusalem, St. Mark has long functioned as a shrine to commemorate New Testament Events. The Syrian Orthodox regard this place as having been the home of Mary - the mother of Mark, the site of the Last Supper, and the place where the Apostles and disciples were filled with the Holy Ghost at Pentecost.
When we first arrived at the church, we sat in the chapel and listened to a nun tell her story of conversion. While I do not agree with much of what was said, the Spirit was in that room. She knows that Jesus Christ is her Savior; she knows that His Spirit is on the Earth. No church, other than the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, holds the fulness of the Gospel, but that doesn't mean that other churches don't have parts of the Gospel. This could not have been more true than today as I listened to her share her conversion to the Savior, Jesus Christ. As she finished, she sang to us the Lord's Prayer in Aramaic and then gave us a chance to go down to the Upper Room - the traditional site of the Last Supper. Whether this was the true site or not, it was nice to reflect back on the last night of Christ's life.

The Alexander Newsky Church is a Russian Orthodox Church in the middle of the Christian Quarter, one that 'shares' an eastern wall with the original Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It contains some of the most beautiful artwork I have ever seen. We didn't do much in this church besides take pictures. We discussed the architectural connections to the Holy Sepulchre; Brother Judd also shared a tradition of the "eye of the needle" being a hole in this churches wall. After taking pictures, we left the church bound for the Church of the Redeemer...however, it was closed! (I visited the church later in the day with friends, not to worry!) So we went down to the church's cloister to rest and eat lunches. I chose to get a falafel from a vendor across the street instead of face another pita sandwich! It was definitely the better choice!

The Holy Sepulchre, the traditional site to mark the places of Christ's crucifixion and burial, has been treated by Christians as Jerusalem's spiritual center. Roman Catholics and several Eastern denominations (including Greek Orthodox and Armenian Apostolic) share the complex. In the early 2nd Century AD, the site of the present church had been a temple of Aphrodite. Emperor Constantine I ordered in about 325 AD that the temple be demolished and the soil - which had provided a flat surface for the temple - be removed, instructing Macarius of Jerusalem, the local Bishop, to build a church on the site. Constantine directed his mother, Helena, to build churches upon sites which commemorated the life of Jesus Christ; she was present at the construction of the church on the site, and involved herself in the excavations and construction. During the excavation, Helena is alleged to have rediscovered the True Cross, and a tomb. According to Eusebius, the tomb exhibited a clear and visible proof that it was the tomb of Jesus. Just as the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem (also founded by Constantine and Helena) commemorated the birth of Jesus, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre would commemorate his death and resurrection. Constantine's church was built as two connected churches over the two different holy sites, including a great basilica, an enclosed colonnaded atrium with the traditional site of Golgotha in one corner, and a rotunda which contained the remains of a rock-cut room that Helena identified as the burial site of Jesus.
The inside of the Holy Sepulchre seems almost scatter-brained. With so many different chapels and shrines, it is difficult to find your way around the building. However, it is anything but scatter-brained. When you first walk into the Holy Sepulchre, there is a staircase to your right that leads up to the place of crucifixion. From this point, you can walk down a different set of stairs to the Stone of Unction, the tradition site where Joseph of Aramathea prepared Jesus' body for burial. From this Stone, the sites around the church change to the different chapels of the different denominations. However, if you walk down the path to the right from the stone, you pass a set of stairs that leads down to Helena's Chapel, the traditional site of Christ's burial. It was amazing to walk around church, viewing the different artwork and architecture of the different chapels. Because this church is a pilgrimage site for many Christian faiths, it was highly crowded. So, making plans to come back early in the morning, I left the church with Andrew, Julie, Jacey, T.C., Justin, and Megan to explore a new area of the city.

Before leaving the walls of the Old City, we stepped inside the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer. We decided to pay the five shekels to climb its tower; the view was amazing. You could see every point of the Old City! After climbing back down the 180 stairs, we entered into the chapel where we found Cyrstal and Morgan singing Hymns. We joined in on a few songs before departing for the Field of Blood: the traditional site of the death of Judas Iscariot. To get to the field, we were told (by Dan) to walk down past the City of David. As we walked, the hill got steeper and steeper. T.C. and I both noted the joy it would be to climb back up this hill. As we neared the bottom, the monastery came into view - the monastery near the Field of Blood. Unfortunately, both the monastery and its chapel were closed to visitors so we turned back around...and had no idea where the Field of Blood. After exploring a few tombs beneathe the monastery, we decided to walk farther down the hill. However, this did not lead us to the field. Rather, we had walked into a very residential area...one with no tourists and with confused residents staring at us. After walking and walking, we finally turned around and began our climb back up the Kidron Valley. Taking a different road, we walked past Absalom's Pillar and the Church of the Nativity and eventually made our way back up the Jerusalem Center. It was, indeed, an adventure. I don't think I will be going back there, but it was part of the Jerusalem experience, right?

I spent the evening catching up on homework (and blogs) and going to bed early. After a day of walking and walking, I was exhausted and just wanted to sleep. So that is exactly what I did.