Bible Study Baby Sacrifice Remains Buried on Golgatha

KIM LAWTON, correspondent: During Holy Week, Christians remember the familiar story of Jesus's death and resurrection. Simply exactly where does that story take place? The Bible offers but a few clues.

REV. Mark MOROZOWICH (Catholic University of America): The Gospels weren't really written to tape a history. They were written to provide a testimony of faith.

LAWTON: According to the New Testament, Jesus was crucified at a spot outside Jerusalem called Golgotha, which in Aramaic ways "place of the skull." The Latin discussion for skull is calvaria, and in English many Christians refer to the site of the crucifixion as Calvary. The Gospel of John says there was a garden at Golgotha, and a tomb which had never been used. Since the tomb was nearby, John says, that'south where Jesus'southward body was placed. The Gospel writers say the tomb was owned by a prominent rich man, Joseph of Arimathea. They describe it as cut out of rock, with a large stone that could exist rolled in front of the archway.

Father Marker Morozowich is acting dean of the School of Theology and Religious Studies at the Catholic Academy of America.

MOROZOWICH: At the fourth dimension of Jesus, when he was crucified, he was not really a significant feature in State of israel. I hateful, certainly there was jealousy, certainly he had his followers. But there was no church that was built immediately upon his death or to mark his resurrection.

LAWTON: In the 4th century, as Emperor Constantine was consolidating the Roman Empire under Christianity, his mother, St. Helena, traveled to Jerusalem. Co-ordinate to tradition, she discovered relics of the cantankerous upon which Jesus had been crucified. The spot had been venerated by early Christians, and she ended it was Golgotha. Constantine ordered the construction of a basilica, which became known every bit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

MOROZOWICH: Now people throughout history accept debated was it actually there, or was it here? Traditionally in that fourth century time that was and so amazing, they found this rock and this tomb not far from one another as we run into even today in the church yous know they're just a short distance from one some other.

LAWTON: Over the centuries, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was destroyed, rebuilt and renovated several times. There have been numerous power struggles over who should control information technology, and even today, sometimes violent squabbles can pause out among the several Christian denominations that share jurisdiction. Merely it is considered ane of the holiest sites in Christianity, a massive place of pilgrimage and intense spiritual devotion. At the entrance, visitors can kiss the Stone of Unction which, according to tradition, marks the identify where Jesus' body was washed for burial. The dark chapel commemorating the crucifixion is in one upper corner, and the place marking the tomb on the other side.

MOROZOWICH: What more of a moving place to walk in Jerusalem, the place of the crucifixion, to meditate at Golgotha where Jesus Christ died, the identify where he rose from the tomb. So they are very beautiful and very moving moments when a person can have a very deep human relationship with God.

LAWTON: During Holy Week in particular, the Holy Sepulchre is the middle for special devotions, such every bit the Holy Fire ritual, where flames from inside the tomb area are passed among the candles of worshippers.

MOROZOWICH: The bishop brings out the lite from the tomb and this illuminates and plays on this whole sense of the light of the world coming forth once again.

LAWTON: But despite the history and devotion, some question whether that indeed is the true spot. Some Christians, including many Protestants, believe Jesus could accept been crucified and buried at a different place in Jerusalem known every bit the Garden Tomb.

STEVE Span (Deputy Manager, The Garden Tomb): The tomb was discovered in 1867. For hundreds of years before that it had lain buried under stone and rubble and earth and things had grown on top of it.

LAWTON: Steve Bridge is deputy manager at the Garden Tomb, which is located but outside the Old City'southward Damascus Gate. He says this site was promoted in the tardily nineteenth century by British General Charles Gordon, who argued that the hillside with the features of a homo skull could exist bodily crucifixion site.

BRIDGE: When we're looking, now we're looking side on, and you tin can see possibly what looks similar the two centre-sockets there on the rock face. The Bible tells us Jesus was crucified exterior the urban center walls at a place called Golgotha, which but means the skull, and and so many people believe that Skull Hill is Golgotha, the identify of the skull where Jesus died.

LAWTON: This Skull Hill looms over an ancient garden, with cisterns and a vino printing, which could indicate that it was owned by a wealthy person. In the garden was a tomb, hewn from the stone.

BRIDGE: The tomb itself is at least two-thousand years old. Many engagement it equally older than that. But it'south certainly non less than 2,000 years erstwhile. It'due south a Jewish tomb, information technology'due south definitely a rolling rock tomb. That means the archway would be sealed by rolling a large stone beyond.

LAWTON: Inside the tomb is a 1300-year-old marking of a cantankerous with the Byzantine words "Jesus Christ, the Beginning and the End."

BRIDGE: And so there's burying space for at least two bodies, probably more. That, again, matches the bible description. It was a family unit tomb that Joseph had built for himself and his family.

LAWTON: Span says Christians are securely moved by this visual image of where Jesus may have been placed afterward he was taken down from the cross.

Bridge: On that day, as far equally people were concerned, that was the end of the story, that was the stop of ane that they had hoped would be the Messiah, because a expressionless Messiah is no good. Merely three days afterward, we believe God raised Jesus to life and that was the start of what we now call Christianity of class.

LAWTON: According to Bridge, the Garden Tomb is not trying to gear up a competition with the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

Span: In that location's no uncertainty that historically, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, has the show on its side, and we certainly wouldn't want to do or say anything that would advise that we think they're wrong about the site or that we call up that we're correct. What we say we have here is something that matches the Bible description.

LAWTON: And Span says, for him, it doesn't ultimately matter where the actual place is.

Bridge: That's very secondary to Jesus himself, who we believe he is, and why he died, and, you lot know, on that score the states and the Holy Sepulchre would be exactly the same, telling the same story but on a dissimilar site.

LAWTON: Begetter Morozowich agrees that, especially at Easter fourth dimension, Christians should focus more on what Jesus did, rather than on where he may have done information technology.

MOROZOWICH: Where he walked is very, very of import. At the same time though, we know that Jesus is more this historical figure that walked the earth, and in his resurrection, he transcends all of that. So he is equally real and present in Mishawaka and in Washington, DC equally he is in Jerusalem.

LAWTON: I'one thousand Kim Lawton reporting.

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Source: https://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/2012/03/30/march-30-2012-where-was-jesus-buried/10645/