Here and There Blog

Just looking at a map and descriptions, you see a lot of "site of death or place of burial or tomb of" churches/structures/gardens. A couple places have claim to Jesus. Since I only made it to one, let's take a look. The Church of the Holy Sepulcher is not only for Jesus. Various sections are claimed by Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, and Coptic Christians. The place is huge and quite fascinating. So many events claimed to have taken place on this spot and eventually a church was built up and over the land. On my visit several sections were under reconstruction and others were important to someone but had either no signs or descriptions. So here are the three that stand out for Jesus. 1) This might be the site is where he was crucified. There's a hole in the rock that was made for hangings in general. It would have been on a hill since there are markers in town that show the original city floor and it's quite below this. On each side of this cross, you can...

Mount of Olives - I was walking outside the old city walls in the hope of finding the Lion Gate entrance back in that would put me by a couple of churches that I wanted to see.  Some of the gates you go right in and others have security checks. My goal was no more security checks having done two already. (I failed to find what I was looking for and went back in via security check.) But I looked across and thought "hey, that's famous! It's the big Jewish cemetery at Mount Olivet!" And it was.  This is iPhone fail where I wished I had a real camera with me. Below: Also on the Mount - to the right is the Church of St. Mary Magdalene with the onion domes. The building on the lower left is Gethsemane where the Basilica of Agony might have been built over a rock where Jesus prayed before his death.  Some of this geography isn't making logical sense with all the churches claiming this and that but the tons of tour buses bring people in and solidify the story. Back...

The Al Aqsa Mosque is the holy spot in the old city for the Muslims. Situated to one side of the Western Wall this close proximity and need to share space isn't always peaceful. What was new to me was how much the Crusaders influenced this area when they were occupying it from 1099 for the next 9 decades. In this photo below, the bottom left corner shows people going to the Western Wall. Separation is only the walls and the winding walkways. On the other side of the Western Wall is the Dome of the Rock which is a shrine build over a sacred rock where Muslims believe the Prophet Mohammad ascended to heaven. Walk 10 minutes from here and you'll find where Jesus took a similar trip. Looking out to the city beyond the walls from one of the lookout points. The area on this side of the old city is undergoing archaeological excavations. Even today there's more to be found underground

Jerusalem was a stopover on an unexpected work trip. With only a 20 hour layover and most of it at night, I had one sunset and one early morning to run around as much as possible. First impressions on this post - I came in at the Tower of David. Pretty imposing structure. Even though I'm across the street, it's still large. Street wandering took me to this alley with colorful mosaics. Sometimes the path isn't a path at all but narrow and shared with cars.  This was after hours so very few cars passed by. Even though the religious quarters are separate, there is a lot of mixing of heritage sites. Mosque nearing sunset.