A Very Holy Day

I promised a continuation of the stuff I did last weekend, so here’s a quick update before I get into my Eilat trip. On Saturday I caught up on most of the touristy/obligatory Jerusalem things to do that I have not yet visited this trip, almost all of which are Christian holy sites. My friend Cody had two friends visiting so I tagged along with them to first the Mount of Olives. This is the site of Jesus’ resurrection and where Jews believe the Messiah will come. That’s why there’s a huge Jewish cemetery on the hill—Jews believe that when the Messiah comes, those who are buried there will be resurrected first because they are actually physically present. We were able to walk from Mount Scopus (where campus is) to the Mount of Olives since they’re actually on the same ridge. Our first top was the Church of the Ascension, which is actually a relatively new Lutheran church with a very high bell tower. We climbed the tower (or Kircheturm as the sign said, much to my german delight) several hundred steps and witnessed an incredible view of Jerusalem to one side and the West Bank to the other. Our next stop was a sort of hut that houses the spot from where it is said Jesus ascended into Heaven. It’s now controlled by Muslims because it’s within the grounds of a mosque. There’s this stone inside where supposedly you can see Jesus’ footprint. Frankly it was kind of a bizarre, boring place, but oh well.

From there we went to the Church of the Our Father. This is supposedly where Jesus learned the Our Father and where he taught the disciples the prayer. I don’t know how people chose this specific place for these things to have occurred, but whatever. The church was beautiful. It was a small chapel with very beautiful grounds, but the coolest part was that they had translated the Our Father/Lord’s Prayer (if you’re Catholic or Protestant) into what had to have been every single language on earth. There were tiles with the prayer all over the walls of the grounds and it was really fun walking around seeing all the different types of scripts and alphabets and even just the huge number of languages that exist. Naturally I took pictures of/with the languages of significance to me. They even had the prayer in Braille in several different languages. It was very very cool.

Next we walked through the huge cemetery a bit, making our way down to the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus went to pray on the night before he was crucified. That’s one of my favorite place in Jerusalem because it’s beautiful and subtle as opposed to so many of the other churches and holy sites that are super gaudy and ostentatious. Unfortunately, though, I was kind of disappointed with this visit because there were so many people and huge tour groups that I felt like I couldn’t really enjoy it and soak it in and be at peace. But I can always go back, and I’m actually interested to see what the place is like during Holy Week. I bet it’s crazy.

(The Mount of Olives also affords the most beautiful view of the Old City of Jerusalem)

After delicious humus in the Old City (there’s a place called Chumus Lina that I went to three times in three days this weekend…it’s that good—and people just kept wanting to go when I was with them, so I went three times with three groups of people. Not my choosing, but I didn’t complain) we went to Mount Zion, which lies right outside the Zion Gate of the Old City. Mount Zion is the site of Dormition Abbey (a gorgeous building), the room where the Last Supper was supposed to be held, and the Tomb of King David. There is also a cemetery on Mount Zion where Oskar Schindler is buried, so we naturally payed him a little visit. On the other side of Mount Zion is the valley of Gehenna, which is widely considered to be biblically connected to the place of Hell. So I gazed into Hell for a bit and decided I was alright staying up on Mount Zion for the time being.

(Last Supper room)

All in all, it was a very full and productive day of site seeing. I’m still checking things off my to do in Jerusalem list and getting to the end, surprisingly enough! It’s time to start exploring more outside of Jerusalem, which brings me to this weekend in Eilat!!! I’ll have that post up soon (pictures are on facebook though already if you want a preview of what’s to come). Thanks, as always, for reading!!