The Garden Tomb

Outside the walls of the old city, right next to Jerusalem's Sultan Sulliman Bus Terminal, lies a very peaceful and serene garden, believed by many Protestants to be the site where Jesus was buried (and rose from the dead) after his crucifixion. Adjacent to this garden is a rock outcropping, looking a bit like a skull. Each of the Gospels state that Jesus was brought to the place of the skull to be crucified. In Aramaic, and Hebrew, this place was called Golgotha. In John 19:17 it reads "Carrying the cross by himself, he went to the place called Place of the Skull (in Hebrew, Golgotha). There they nailed him to the cross."

As you'll see in a later post, the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches believe a site inside the old city walls is the place of Jesus' crucifixion and burial (now built over by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre) . But in the mid 1800's biblical scholars from Great Britain and Germany identified a rocky hill outside the old city walls, north of the Damascus Gate, as Skull Hill - Golgotha! In the late 1800's several tombs were discovered just below the crest of the hill, as well as a cistern and a wine press, items generally found in a garden. In John 19:41-42 it reads "The place of crucifixion was near a garden, where there was a new tomb, never used before. And so, because it was the day of preparation for the Jewish Passover and since the tomb was close at hand, they laid Jesus there."

We really don't know exactly where Jesus was crucified and buried, but this location certainly seems like a possibility.

This photo, showing Skull Hill, was taken in the early 1900s. The eyes of the "skull" are to the right of the large cave at the left of the photo.

The "eyes" of the skull

Compare this photo, with the large cave on the left, to the photo from the early 1900s

How the site really looks today, with the parking lot for the Sultan Sulliman Bus Terminal

A pine tree growing in front of the tomb, near what would have been the dirt road in the photo from the early 1900s. Our guide pointed out that in the 1st century, when the Romans crucified someone, they wanted it to be an example to the people of the power of Rome. Therefore the archaeologists who discovered the site speculated that Jesus was probably not crucified on top of the hill, but at street level, where everyone could see him and Rome could make its point.

The tomb

Inside the tomb

On the wall, in the center of the tomb

The excavated wine press. One of the reasons the archaeologists believe this could be the location of the garden tomb, rather than the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.