The Mount of Olives, also referred to as Mount Olivet, is
a mountain ridge east of the old city of Jerusalem, across the Kidron
Valley. Olive trees once covered the
area, hence the name Mount of Olives.
Many key events from the Bible, especially ones related
to the life of Jesus, occurred on the Mount of Olives. In the Old Testament, when King David was
fleeing from his son Absalom (2 Samuel 15:30), David walked up the Mount of
Olives weeping. King Solomon, in an
attempt to appease some of his many wives, built altars to the gods of the
Moabites and the Ammonites (1 Kings 11:7).
And by tradition, the prophets Haggai, Malachi, and Zechariah are all
buried on the Mount of Olives.
In the New Testament, there are many references to Jesus
and his disciples spending time on the Mount of Olives, and Jesus was arrested
in the Garden of Gethsemane. In Acts
chapter 1, Jesus ascends to heaven from the Mount of Olives, and according to
the prophet Zechariah, when Christ returns, he will stand on the Mount of Olives and it will split in two.
There is also a large Jewish cemetery (see next post) on
the Mount of Olives. According to Jewish
tradition, when the Messiah comes, the resurrection of the dead will begin
there.
And from the Mount of Olives you can see the eastern wall of the old city of Jerusalem and the Golden Gate, the Muslim Dome of the Rock Mosque, the Benedictine Abbey of Dormition, and various church steeples and Muslim minarets of old Jerusalem.
It was a chilly, wet, and windy morning when we were on the Mount of Olives, but hopefully you'll be able to what we saw.
The Church of Mary Magdalene
The Church of Mary Magdalene is a Russian Orthodox Church located on the Mount of Olives. In the Gospel of Mark, Mary Magdalene is noted as the first person to see Jesus after his resurrection (Mark 16:9). The church was built in 1886 by Tsar Alexander III to honor his mother. The church has seven distinctive, gilded onion domes, which were the popular building style in 16th and 17th century Russia.
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| Church of Mary Magdalene |
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| Church of Mary Magdalene |
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| Church of Mary Magdalene |
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| Church of Mary Magdalene
The Dome of the Rock
The Dome of the Rock is an Islamic shrine (not a mosque) built
over a rock, the Foundation Stone, which commemorates where Muslims believe Muhammad
began his famed Night Journey to heaven.
This same stone is believed by Jews to be the summit of Mount Moriah,
where Abraham took his son Isaac to be sacrificed. It is also believed that the 2nd
Temple (Herod’s Temple) was built on the same location, with the Holy of Holies
built over the Foundation Stone.
The
Dome of the Rock, called Israel’s most recognizable landmark, was built in in
691 CE, with gold-leaf added to the roof in 1959. The gold-leaf was refurbished in 1993 at a
cost equivalent to $8,200,000.00.
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| Dome of the Rock |
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| Dome of the Rock |
The Abbey of Dormition
There has been a church on this site since the 5th
century. The current building was built
between 1900 and 1910. According to
local tradition, the Virgin Mary died at this location, and the Last Supper was
held near this site. The Abbey is outside the walls of the old city, and the church steeple in the background, the Armenian Cathedral of St. James, is inside the city walls, in the Armenian Quarter.
The Golden Gate
The Golden Gate, in the eastern wall of the old city of Jerusalem, is also known in Hebrew as The Mercy Gate. Since medieval times the gate has been walled up and no one can enter through it. Originally walled up by Muslims in 810 CE, it was reopened by the Crusaders in 1102 CE, only to be resealed in 1187. The walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt in 1547 by Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent who again sealed the gate closed. It has never been reopened. Why was the gate closed? It was closed to prevent the Messiah from entering through it. As well, the Ottomans put a cemetery in front of the gate in order to prevent the precursor to the Anointed One, Elijah, from passing through the gate, thinking therefore the Messiah would not be able to pass through. Mistakenly the Ottomans thought that a Jewish priest (according to Islamic teaching Elijah is a descendant of Aaron and therefore a priest) could not enter into a graveyard. But I have a sneaky feeling that sealing the gate, and putting a cemetery in front, is not going to stop the Messiah!
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| This is a scale model of the Old City of Jerusalem, and Second Temple, that is on the grounds of the Israel Museum, showing the Eastern Wall and the Golden Gate. This would have been the view from the Mount of Olives in Jesus' day. |
Skyscrapers of their Day
A Panorama of the eastern wall of Old Jerusalem and the Kidron Valley
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| You can just barely see the golden top of the Dome of the Rock sticking up over the wall in the center of the photo, and the Golden Gate is to the right of that. |
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