March 9, 2019
Day 4: Shabbat Shalom! After a late breakfast we packed our lunch of broccoli, red pepper and cucumbers with Lebanese Hummus, challah and butter, and headed back to the Old City on an adventure to look for secret places. To say that we met our objective is an understatement and has left me still trying to wrap my brain around it all.
We started in the Christian Quarter of the Old City. Joanie had been researching places to go and things to see and the first place that we wanted to find was described to her as a quiet underground pool built adjacent to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Here's where I'm going to give you all a bit of history/Bible lesson before going on. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre was built over a former temple that was dedicated to Jupiter or Venus after Emperor Constantine, who had recently converted to Christianity, sent his mother Helena to find the tomb of Jesus. There is some debate about whether or not it actually contains the 'real' tomb of Jesus, especially since it's been built and restored several times over and the ruins of the actual old city of Jerusalem are buried at least 10 feet below the existing city. Regardless, this 'pool' was actually an ancient cistern used in the construction of the church and, if the tomb of Jesus was truly under the church, lay directly next to it.
After wandering aimlessly between the Christian and Muslim Quarters, looking for the Via Dolorosa because we knew that the cistern was near the Station 9 (Supposedly the location where Jesus fell the 3rd time ) but we were having a difficult time finding the Via Dolorosa because of the crowds.
Eventually we caught up with a tour group who were following the stations (singing and carrying a small faux wood cross that could not possibly have even loosely resembled the genuine one). We followed them a while and eventually found the cistern! It was guarded only by a priest and there was next to nobody there. We quickly discovered that the acoustics were incredible so Joanie and I sang a lovely version of Shalom Malechim (my mom lost her voice and even those acoustics weren't helping her). It was awesome and felt much more fulfilling than the craziness of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre only a few feet away.
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| Where the short monks live, I guess. |
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| Resting my feet outside the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. We never actually entered the church this trip. |
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| My mom said I couldn't get up there. I said, "Hold my phone..." |
The next place on our list was so obscure that it didn't even have a place on any map. In fact, this place has been all but purposely erased from existence. Joanie only found it because she was researching places where to go in Jerusalem and this little video popped up that talked briefly about a location on Mt Zion where the first Christian church - led by Jesus's brother James, met in secret. Feeling like we were going on a wild goose chase, we searched behind the buildings where it is said that the Last Supper took place (on the second floor of a modern building today? Not likely...). We eventually found what looked like a giant cage in the middle of a run down park area, with a field of goats and sheep grazing nearby. As we got closer to the cage, we looked down and saw the most amazing thing: an ancient staircase that led down to rooms complete with a 'mikvah' (spiritual bathing place) and a stone table. The cage had a lock on it, but we were able to reach our hands inside and take pictures. However, just then a man approached us. We thought we were in trouble but he asked us if we knew what we were looking at. We told him that we had heard that it was the first Christian church and he confirmed that it was. He asked us if we wanted inside and we couldn't believe it. He unlocked the door for us and we went inside. It was so amazing! There were multiple underground rooms that each had an escape hatch should they be caught by Roman soldiers. The man explained that there used to be more. He showed us his phone where he had personal photos of mosaics and other rooms that went much farther than what is currently there. He also showed video of those rooms being bulldozed over by Jewish Authorities who had found Christian symbols and wanted to erase this place from history. When I offered this man money for the lesson and allowing us into the ruins he declined and simply said that he wants people to know that this special place exists. The whole experience still has my head spinning.
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| It just looked like a cage in the middle of an old park |
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| First Christian church |
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| Field where ruins were bulldozed over and now the sheep and goats graze |
Afterward, we popped into the St James Cathedral in the Armenian Quarter and that was an experience in and of itself. It was only open from 3 - 3:30 so we decided to see what it was all about.
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| St. James Cathedral |
The second we walked in we couldn't help but recognize the difference between the humble underground church and this sprawling majestic sanctuary. A priest wearing a black hood screamed in broken English at people sitting down crossing their legs. The incense was so thick that it gave me a headache. Some men entered wearing all black began to chant, and quite honestly it was creepy and made me uneasy. We didn't stay long...
Sigh...this is a long post and we hadn't even gotten to lunch time yet!!
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| I have no words... |
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| Windmill |
I'm just going to finish up by saying that we managed to find all of our secret places and are now resting up at the hostel. Tomorrow we will begin our Northern Israel tour so we'll say goodbye to Jerusalem for a few days. If you managed to hang in here for this entire post kudos!
Miles walked: 10.01
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