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DIVINITY SCHOOL
TROWBRIDGE LIBRARY

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GIFT OF

GEORGE

M.

MURRAY

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FROM '

"MP"

LIBRARY OF

WILLIAM
D.
MURRAY
GO
LITERARY LANDMARKS

OF

JERUSALEM

LAURENCE HUTTON
AUTHOR OF " LITERARY LANDMARKS OF LONDON '
" LITERARY LANDMARKS OF EDINBURGH "
" CURIOSITIES OF THE AMERICAN STAGE "

ILLUSTRATED

NEW YORK
HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
1895

Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers.

All rights reserved.

TO
WILLIAM COOPER PRIME
WHO FIRST MADE JERUSALEM REAL TO ME
THIS VOLUME
IS CORDIALLY INSCRIBED

ILLUSTRATIONS

bethlehem ....
plan of ancient jerusalem
plan of modern jerusalem
potter's field . . .
wailing wall of the jews
the church of the virgin
tomb of david . .
house of martha and mary
Absalom's tomb . . .
the pool of siloam . .
damascus gate
the tower of antonia
via dolorosa 
rachel's tomb 
david's well 
shepherd and sheep . ,
the tomb of lazarus . . .
church of the ascension
garden of gethsemane
church of the holy sepulchre
place of the skull. . .

PAGE
Frontispiece 13 1318
21 26
2931333537 39
43 4647 5i5559
61
65
69

INTRODUCTION

THIS book is written to fill a serious want,
and a want which I myself felt seriously dur
ing my visit to Jerusalem. Although the
literature relating to the Holy Land is enor
mous in quantity and very varied in quality,
there is devoted to the Holy City no single
work which will tell one, on the spot, exact
ly what one wants to know, and which, at
the same time, is small enough to hold in
one's hand or to carry in one's pocket.
The full-page illustrations with which the
volume is enriched are, with a few excep
tions, the work of Mr. Frank V. Du Mond,
who went to Jerusalem in the spring of
1894 for the especial purpose of making
them.

By permission the smaller cuts, scattered
throughout the text, are taken from Dr. Will
iam M. Thomson's The Land and the Book,
while the plans of Ancient and Modern Jeru
salem are taken from Dr. M. G. Easton's
Illustrated Dictionary of the Bible, to both
of which authorities I am indebted for much
invaluable information. Laurence Hutton.
Easter Day, 1895.

LITERARY LANDMARKS OF
JERUSALEM

Flan of Modern Jerusalem.

THOSE who go to Je
rusalem with faith are
likely to have their faith
strengthened; those who
go to Jerusalem with
out faith are apt to
bring something very
like faith away. The
Christian Messiah, to
the ordinary mind the
world over, is an idea, a

i6

myth, a sentiment, or a religion. In Jeru
salem he becomes a reality. If he was not
of divine origin he was at least a Man ; the
only perfect human being who ever lived ;
and he lived for a time in Jerusalem.
The Mohammedans, as well as the Jews
and the Christians, consider Jerusalem a
Holy City. To the followers of the Prophet
it comes next to Medina, after Mecca ; to
the Christians it is not exceeded in holiness
even by Rome ; and to the Hebrews it is
the one Holy City in the world.
The altitude of Jerusalem is always a sur
prise to the visitor who comes here for the
first time. He knows, of course, that it is a
mountain city, and that it was built upon
Mount Zion and Mount Moriah ; but he
does not realize, until he makes the gradual
ascent,that it is about twenty-six hundred feet
above the level of the Mediterranean, and
nearly four thousand feet above the surface
of the Dead Sea. As high on the one side
as the Catskill Mountain House ; as high on
the other as the crater of Mount Vesuvius.
Jerusalem is a city of surprises. It is, apart

17
from its sacred associations, an intensely in
teresting spot even to travellers who are al
ready saturated with the hitherto unfamiliar
and surprising charms of Cairo, Athens, and
Constantinople. Its size can best be ex
pressed by the statement that the journey
round about the outside of its walls may
be made by an ordinarily rapid walker in
the space of an hour. Its houses are small,
irregular in shape, squalid, and mean. Its
streets, if streets they can be called, are
not named nor numbered ; they are steep,
crooked, narrow, roughly paved, never clean
ed, and in many instances they are vaulted
over by the buildings on each side of them.
Never a pair of wheels traverse them, and
rarely is a horse or a donkey seen within the
walls. The halt, the maimed, and the blind,
the leprous and the wretchedly poor, form
the great bulk of the population of Jerusa
lem, and with the single exception of the
Hebrews, they are persistent and clamorous
beggars. Trade and commerce seem to be
confined to the bare necessities of life, and
to dealers in beads and crucifixes. There is

i8

but one hotel within its walls ; and the only
vender of anything like luxuries in the place
is a Turkish merchant, who displays in his

* - ^.z, yy~.

POTTER'S FIELD

little, doorless, windowless shop a small as
sortment of silver charms, trinkets, and
bric-a-brac to the gaze of the passers-by.

19
His customers, of course, are the pilgrims
who come to see and not to worship.
Jerusalem is unique as a city in which ev
erything is serious and solemn and severe.
It has no clubs, no bar-rooms, no beer-gar
dens, no concert-halls, no theatres, no lecture-
rooms, no places of amusement of any kind,
no street bands, no wandering minstrels, no
wealthy or upper classes, no mayor, no alder
men, no elections, no newspapers, no print
ing-presses, no book stores, except one out
side the walls, for the sale of Bibles, no
cheerfulness, no life. No one sings, no one
dances, no one laughs in Jerusalem ; even
the children do not play.
The Jews, it is said, form almost two-
thirds of the population of the city. They
occupy a section which covers the greater
part of the eastward slope of Zion ; and the
Jewish Quarter is the most wretched in the
whole wretched town. Its inhabitants are
quiet and subdued in bearing; they make no
claims to their hereditary rights in the Royal
City of their kings ; they simply and silently
and patiently wait. The Wailing Wall of

2o

the Jews, so wonderfully painted by Vere-
schagin, is, perhaps, the most realistic sight in
Jerusalem to-day. In a small, paved, oblong,
unroofed enclosure, some seventy -five by
twenty feet in extent, and in a most inacces
sible portion of the town, is the mass of an
cient masonry which is generally accepted as
having been a portion of the outside of the
actual wall of the Temple itself. Against
these rough stones, every day of the week,
but especially on Friday, and at all times of
the day, are seen Hebrews of all countries,
and of all ages, of both sexes, rich and poor
alike, weeping and bewailing the desolation
which has come upon them, and upon the
city of their former glory. Whatever may
be their faith, it is beautiful and sincere ; and
their grief is actual and without dissimula
tion. They kiss the walls, and beat their
breasts, and tear their hair, and rend their
garments; and the real tears they shed come
from their hearts and their souls, as well as
from their eyes. They ask for no back
sheesh ; they pay no attention to the curious
and inquisitive heretics and Gentiles who

23
pity while they wonder at them. They read
the Lamentations of Jeremiah and the
mournful words of Isaiah ; they wail for the
days that are gone ; and they pray to the
God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the
God of Jacob that they may get their own
again. About one -sixth of the inhabitants of
Jerusalem are followers of Mohammed.
They believe in the prophets of the Old
Testament, in the Christ of the New Testa
ment, and in their own Prophet, whom they
consider, of course, the greatest of them all.
Their chief sanctuary here is the Dome of
the Rock, commonly known to travellers as
the Mosque of Omar, standing on the site of
Solomon's Temple. The enclosed space on
Mount Moriah is called by the Moslems the
Haram, or Sacred Place, and in their minds
it is peculiarly associated with Mohammed
himself, for the dome, the most prominent
of its many buildings, covers that mass of
Jerusalem limestone which to Jew and Gen
tile and Moslem alike is the most interesting
rock in the world. Upon this rock, accord-

24
ing to very ancient tradition, Abraham wor
shipped and was ready to offer up Isaac as a
sacrifice. Upon it David erected an altar.
Upon it Elijah and the Messiah prayed ; and
from it, once, Mohammed ascended up into
Heaven. It is said to hang suspended in the
air seven feet above the ground ; and the
present Turkish custodians affirm, in the
most solemn tones, that its visible supports
of masonry are merely placed there in order
to support it in event of the removal of the
miraculous power which supports it now.
In a cavern at its base Mohammed is said
to have rested, after making his super-hu
man, and super-equine, journey from Mecca
to Jerusalem in a single night ; and from
thence, on a celestial steed furnished by the
Archangel Michael, he is believed to have
passed through a still visible hole in the rock
to the upper world ; the rock following him
until it was stopped in its flight by the an
gel, and left, as we now see it, floating in the
air !
Under this rock, it is said, still rests the
Ark of. the Covenant.

25
The mosque is a great and an imposing
building of complex architecture, and it is
more interesting, naturally, to the Christian
because of its site than on account of it
self. Lepers in Jerusalem still form a commu
nity of their own, existing, not living, near
the Jewish Quarter. We saw them in all
their unhappy repulsiveness, inside as well
as outside the walls ; but we found them in
greatest numbers, and most persistent in
their crying for alms, at the entrance to
what is called the Tomb of the Virgin, at
the foot of the Mount of Olives. Mary, the
Mother of Jesus, is supposed to have died
in the house of John — and from that hour
[the hour of the Crucifixion] that disciple
took her into his own home, — but the place
of her death or burial are nowhere recorded.
Concerning Joseph, there is no mention in
the Bible after the time when the Christ dis
puted with the doctors when the Child was
twelve years of age. Because Mary alone
was present at the feast of the marriage in
Cana of Galilee, and because Joseph is not

26

represented as having been present during
any of the scenes of the Crucifixion, it is
conjectured that he died before Jesus en-

THE CHURCH OF THE VIRGIN

tered into the public ministry. Where he
died, of course, is unknown.
The Church of the Virgin lies very near

27
to what is called the Garden of Gethsemane.
It is a sepulchre and chapel combined ; and
here the guides show one not only the
tombs of Mary and Joseph; but those of
Anna and Joachim, the mother and father
of Mary. They are some fifty feet below
the surface of the surrounding earth ; and
there is a further tradition here that it was
upon this spot that all the sins of Peter were
forgiven him.
The Literary Landmarks of Jerusalem are
among the most important, the most inter
esting, and the most sacred in the whole his
tory of the literature of the world. David,
perhaps, wrote some of the immortal Psalms
as he looked from the roof of his palace
upon the slopes of the Mount of Olives,
with the blue hills of Moab and the silver
gleam of the Dead Sea in the distance.
Here were written, perhaps, the Songs of
Solomon. Here Ezra may, perhaps, have
written the Chronicles and his own books of
prophecy. Here, perhaps, Nehemiah in
dited the book that bears his name. Here,
perhaps, Isaiah wrote. Here, no doubt, Jer-

28
emiah uttered his words of warning, and
here, no doubt, he wrote his Lamentations.
Here Paul and the evangelists preached.
Here, without doubt, was written the Gen
eral Epistle of James ; and here were ut
tered many of the most beautiful words of
Jesus. These are the Literary Landmarks which
survive the crash df empires and the march
of Time, which cause the eye to fill and the
heart to throb ; which made Jerusalem the
most imposing, the most memorable place I
ever visited. Like the figure of Jesus him
self, dim, obscure, confused by dogma and
creed, there is about Jerusalem, to me, an
inexplicable fascination which cannot be ex
tinguished by any rationalistic reasoning I
can command.
Now David was ruddy, and withal of a
beautiful countenance and goodly to look to ;
he was the eighth, and youngest, son of
Jesse, a citizen of Bethlehem, and in his
youth he kept the sheep of his father. He
slew Goliath in the valley of Elah, some fif
teen miles southwest of his native town.

zg
He fled from Saul to Ramah, about five
miles due north of Jerusalem, where tradi
tion says he wrote the sixth, seventh, and
eleventh Psalms. The City of David, in
which he dwelt and where he was buried,
was identical with Mount Zion. His tomb,
so called, with that of Solomon, is on the
south side of Mount Zion, and is still point
ed out by the guides. It was known to Pe
ter, for on the day of Pentecost that Disci-

TOMB OF DAVID

30
pie, standing up with the eleven, lifted up
his voice and said unto them, Men and
brethren, let me freely speak unto you of
the patriarch David, that he is both dead
and is buried, and his sepulchre is with us
to this day.
The tomb is described, by one who has
seen it, as an immense sarcophagus in a
room comparatively insignificant in its di
mensions, but very gorgeously furnished by
the Moslems, under one of whose mosques
it stands. Admission to it is not granted by
its present custodians. In this building, by-
the-way, says tradition, is the large upper
room in which the disciples made ready the
Passover, and where they afterwards received
the miraculous gift of tongues ; and near
here is believed to have stood the- house of
John, to which the mother of Jesus went
after the scenes of the Crucifixion, the
house of Caiaphas, the High Priest, and a
cell in which Jesus spent the last night of
his earthly life.
The tomb in which David is said to have
laid Absalom, hewn from the solid rock, and

33

ornamented with Ionic pillars, lies in the
Valley of Jehosaphat, east of the city, and
easy of access from St. Stephen's Gate.

ABSALOM'S TOMB

Now Absalom in his lifetime had taken
and reared up for himself a pillar which is

34
in the King's Dale ; for he said I have no
son to keep my name in remembrance, and
he called the pillar after his own name ; and
it is called to this day Absalom's place.
What are known as the Tombs of Zachariah
and St. James stand, to this day, close to the
so-called Absalom's Pillar, although there is
no authority for the designation of any of
them. Absalom's Tomb is certainly of a
much later period than David's time. Not
far to the south of these lie innumerable
graves of Hebrews of more modern days,
and still further south the valley is joined
by the Valley of Hinnom, on whose south
ern side is Aceldama, the Potter's Field.
On the summit of Mount Moriah, oppo
site the Pillar of Absalom, was the eastern
front of the Temple, a cloister of magnificent
proportions. This was, doubtless, Solomon's
Porch, where Jesus walked. Underneath
this and the southern part of the Haram are
the vast and massive vaults which support
the level area of the Temple enclosure, and
which in Crusading times received the name,
still given them, of Solomon's Stables. There

flH0I-»fi5^r**N

"Vi:" - ~ _>.
Es^is* ^jPH
5ER---. " -
W&2&L3
THE POOL OF SILOAM
is a vague tradition that Solomon had a res
idence on the hill, and here, perhaps, the
Canticles were written. Solomon was bur
ied, according to tradition, by his father's
side ; and near the base of the Mount of
36
Olives, in the rocky cliff below the Pillar of
Absalom, is a monument which the guides
point out as the tomb of Solomon's wife.
Ezra, the scribe, who was not only a wri
ter but an editor, is supposed to have lived
for thirteen years in Jerusalem ; but the
places of his death and his burial are now
unknown. Nehemiah came to Jerusalem
some years after Ezra, and was there associ
ated with him. This is one of the earliest
recorded instances of literary collaboration.
According to tradition, Isaiah was put to
death by Manasseh, by being confined in the
trunk^of a tree and sawn asunder with it ; and
at the south of the city, close to the Pool of
Siloam, is an unusually large mulberry-tree,
which the guides point out as marking the
spot of his singular execution. It was to
the Pool of Siloam, it will be remembered,
that the man was sent that was born blind.
He went and washed, and came seeing.
Jeremiah is the only one of the prophets
who has left anything like a visible Land
mark behind him in Jerusalem. The Grotto
of Jeremiah is on the slope of the hill, just

37
outside the Damascus Gate, which is de
scribed later as the supposed Golgotha. This
grotto is a cavern extending more than an
hundred feet under the cliff. Its roof is
supported by heavy columns, and beneath

ty '¥

DAMASCUS GATE

are deep cisterns, in one of which the proph
et is said to have been confined. The guides
point out, in this cave, the tomb of Jere
miah, and assure us that here the Lamenta
tions were written. And so Jeremiah abode
in the court of the prison until the day that
Jerusalem was taken ; and he was there
when Jerusalem was taken. But where the

38
prison stood no one knows, and that Jere
miah died in the prison, or in Jerusalem, the
Scriptures do not say.
There is no special reason to believe that
any of the Gospels were written here ; and
Paul's associations with Jerusalem are some
what slight. It is possible that he studied
here under Gamaliel ; he was certainly here
when Stephen was stoned, according to tra
dition, just outside St. Stephen's Gate; and
some years later, standing on the stairs of
the Castle, he beckoned to the people with
his hand, and spoke unto them in Hebrew,
saying the words which are contained in the
opening verses of the twenty-second chapter
of the Acts of the Apostles. After the se
rious disturbances which took place, he was
sent into Caesarea, and he never saw Jerusa
lem again.
It is said that the Castle to which Paul
was brought was the barracks of the Roman
soldiers, in the Fortress of Antonia, at the
northwest corner of the Temple area ; and
the present Saraya, or Governor's Residence,
with its square tower and gloomy arch span-

THE TOWER OF ANTONIA

41
ning the Via Dolorosa where it begins its
winding course at the traditional house of
Pilate, is supposed to occupy an angle of
this fortress. It is fully described, as it
originally stood, in the works of Josephus.
In the middle of the second century Justin
Martyr spoke distinctly of the birth of the
Messiah as having occurred in a grotto near
Bethlehem, because there was no room for
them in the inn. Justin became a Christian
in the year of our Lord one hundred and
thirty-two. He was born, no doubt, within
a century of the event itself. The great
story may have come to him directly from
those who saw the Messiah in the flesh. I
have known men and women who knew
Washington, and Washington died nearly a
century ago. The cave near Bethlehem of
which Justin wrote was pointed out to the
mother of Constantine, its tradition having
been kept alive by resident Christians at
Jerusalem ; and over it Helena erected a
church. Even the doubters, and there has
been a noble army of them, concede this.
If the Christ Child was born at all, why was

42
he not born here and cradled in the manger
still shown as his? How can a man whose
infant lips were taught to pray the noblest
form of speech that infant lips can try, and
at his mother's knee, forbear to pray here if
he ever prays at all?
Whatever may be the uncertainty as to
the spot in Bethlehem where he was born
and cradled, there can be no question about
Bethlehem itself. It is the same Bethlehem.
David was born in Bethlehem, and there
he was anointed by Samuel. Bethlehem
was the scene of the story of Ruth, Naomi,
and Boaz; and the visit to Bethlehem on
that memorable Sunday morning, with all it
meant and implied, was the very greatest
Sabbath day's journey we ever made.
Bethlehem lies about five miles to the
south of Jerusalem, and the journey on
horseback, or in the wretched carriages of
the country, can be made in about an hour
and a half from the Jaffa Gate. The trav
eller, on his way, gets a glimpse of the Dead
Sea in the distance, and he passes Da
vid's Well and Rachel's Tomb. And David

VIA DOLOROSA

45
longed and said, Oh that one would give
me drink of the water of the well of Bethle
hem, which is by the gate ! And the three
mighty men broke through the hosts of the
Philistines and drew water out of the well
of Bethlehem that was by the gate, and
brought it to David. And near the north
ern entrance to the town is still shown what
is said to be this very well. And Rachel
died and was buried in the way to Ephratah,
which is Bethlehem ; and Jacob set a pillar
upon her grave ; that is the pillar of Rachel's
grave unto this day. And to this very day
does Rachel's Tomb still stand where Jacob
laid her. All the doubters agree in this. It
is a small, square, white building, with a
dome, beneath which is a pile of plaster-
covered masonry — Rachel's grave. Its tra
dition seems never to have been broken.
The descendants of Joseph and of Benjamin
are scattered now over the face of the earth,
but here still rests the mother of them all.
A good woman, worth waiting and serving
for, has been waiting here for Israel all
these seventy times seventy years.

RACHEL S TOMB

The Church of the Nativity is a square
building with tall Corinthian columns sup
porting a ceiling which is said to have been
made from the wood of the Cedars of Leba
non. The Grotto of the Nativity is a crypt
beneath the church. A large silver star in
the marble pavement marks the spot upon

49
which the worshippers believe the Child
was born ; and near by is the manger in
which they say he was laid. Everything
about it is richly ornamented with precious
metals and brilliant mosaics ; lamps of gold
and silver shed a feeble light above it ; there
is nothing to suggest the stable of an inn ;
but, nevertheless, the effect is most impres
sive, and while I stood there I believed it
all. In a cave, hard by, lived Jerome ; and
here is shown his tomb. Jerome believed
in the sacred authenticity of this spot, and
his own connection with Bethlehem and
this church seems to be undoubted. Here
he remained for many years ; and here he
wrote, and here he made his translation of
the Bible — a Literary Landmark, certainly, in
ecclesiastical history.
Bethlehem itself is a picturesque little vil
lage, built upon the ridge of a hill ; and it is
peopled to-day almost entirely by Christians,
who are respected by their neighbors for
their industry and integrity. The men are
manly and robust ; the younger women are
4

50
comely and graceful, as a rule ; and, as com
pared with their sisters in Jerusalem and in
the country round about, they are attractive
in their dress and in the silver ornaments
which they wear in profusion ; perhaps as
Ruth herself wore them so many years ago.
If, as is said, Samuel is the author of the
beautiful book of Ruth, it is not impossible
that he wrote it here. He certainly got
here the inspiration for it, and here he cer
tainly laid its scenes. The field in which
David fed his father's sheep, the field of
Boaz, and the Field of the Shepherds, where,
watching over their flocks by night, was
brought to them glad tidings, were pointed
out to us by the guides ; and they were not
among the least interesting of the things we
saw here, nor was a Good Shepherd, clad in
the costume of the first century, and carry
ing across the Shepherd's Field a weary
lamb in his arms, one of the pictures which
we will ever forget.
There is no record of the Christ having re
turned to Bethlehem after Joseph arose and
took the young child and his mother by

SHEPHERD AND SHEEP

53
night and departed into Egypt, nor of his
having been in Jerusalem at all until he was
twelve years of age, when he was found by
his parents in the Temple sitting in the
midst ofthe doctors, both hearing them and
asking them questions. His next recorded
visit to Jerusalem was at a feast of the Pass
over many years later, when he drove the
money-changers out of the Temple, per
formed many miracles, and uttered his fa
mous discourse to Nicodemus. Again in
Jerusalem he cured the impotent man at the
pool called Bethesda, by the sheep-market,
and testified concerning John the Baptist.
At least four pools in the outskirts of the
city claim now to be the Pool of Bethesda :
the so-called Fountain of the Virgin, in the
Valley of the Kedron, having what appears
to be the strongest foundation of truth, be
cause of the intermittent flow of its waters.
For an angel went down at a certain season
into the pool and troubled the water ; and
the impotent folk, blind, halt, withered, lay
there waiting for its moving. This Fountain
of the Virgin supplies the Pool of Siloam,

54
south of Jerusalem, and some eighteen hun
dred feet distant.
Once more in Jerusalem, Jesus taught pub
licly in the Temple ; and the Jews mar
velled, saying, How knoweth this man let
ters, having never learned, and many of the
people cried, of a truth this is the Prophet,
while some sought to take him ; but no man
laid hands on him, because his hour was not
yet come. On the next journey to Jerusa
lem he stopped at Bethany, where he was
entertained by Mary and Martha. The pres
ent Bethany is a poor, small, semi-deserted
village on the southeastern side of the
Mount of Olives, on the road to Jericho, and
about two miles from Jerusalem. Martha
must have let very little things trouble her,
for the stone foundations of the house shown
as hers could have supported none but a
small edifice. Hard by is the supposed
house of Simon the Leper, and the so-called
Tomb of Lazarus, which is hollowed in the
rock, and a number of feet below the ground.
We read of the Teacher after this as being
more than once in Jerusalem before the last

57
and memorable journey here. From Beth-
phage, near to Bethany, just before the close
of his earthly career, he entered the Holy
City sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal
of an ass, and a great multitude followed
him. . At even he went out to Bethany, and
he lodged there for some nights ; returning
always to Jerusalem by day, and passing by
the shortest road, that which leads to Geth-
semane and over the Mount of Olives.
The plot of ground which the guides point
out as Gethsemane is now enclosed by a high
wall, and is laid out in a formal, ugly man
ner. It contains a few very ancient olive-
trees, and lies a short distance across the
Kedron, east from St. Stephen's Gate. The
antiquaries cast doubts upon its authenticity,
and Dr. Thomson places the actual scene of
the Agony in a secluded vale several hun
dred yards further towards the northeast.
Concerning the Mount of Olives there
seems to be no reasonable question. It is
the only thing which the doubters have really
left to us. Jerusalem has been destroyed
and rebuilt — man made it, and man re-made

58
it — but the Mount of Olives, the work of
God, remains unchanged through all these
ages. Its sides are still covered with the
olive-trees which give it its name, and it
rises about two hundred feet above the level
of and a mile or two to the east of the city.
It has four peaks, one of which is called the
Mount of Ascension, from the tradition that
here, on the way to Bethany, after the Cru
cifixion, he lifted up his hands and blessed
his disciples ; and it came to pass, while he
blessed them, that he was parted from them
and carried up into Heaven. With no spot
on earth is the Christian Messiah so famil
iarly or so pleasantly associated as with the
Mount of Olives ; and as I looked at it from
a distance, and as I walked over it, perhaps
in the very paths he trod, I believed it all.
It is not necessary to tell here the rest, or
the end, of the awful story. They mocked,
buffeted, insulted, and abused him. A rob
ber was preferred to him, and was released.
And so they led him out and crucified him.
The Via Dolorosa, the way he trod when
he carried the cross, is not a street, but a

CHURCH OF THE ASCENSION

continuation of sections of streets marked by
the faithful, nobody knows how many years
ago, with the fourteen Stations of the Church
of Rome. More than once we followed him
from the so-called Chapel of the Scourging
to the supposed Place of Crucifixion. Every
thing, in the course of ages, has been altered ;
the level of the roadway, if it is the road
way, has undoubtedly been raised many
feet ; of all the traditions of Jerusalem the
present Via Dolorosa is the most vague and

6o
the most improbable ; but nevertheless I
followed his footsteps, I put my shoulder in
the hole where his shoulder is supposed to
have rested, I placed my hand upon the al
leged prints of his hand when the weight of
the tree was too great for him, and he fell
against the wall ; and, for the time, I be
lieved it all. It may be all tradition, and all
false ; but to a man brought up upon the
teachings of the New Testament as accepted
by a good father and a good mother, it was
awfully real. And I believed it all !
The question of the true sites of the holy
places of Jerusalem is one which will never
be answered. Volumes have been written
upon the subject, doctors have disagreed and
will always differ, and who can now decide.
whether the Sepulchre was without or within
the walls, and where the walls were? The
accepted site of the Sepulchre was fixed
upon by the mother of Constantine before
the middle of the fourth century ; and for
fifteen centuries and a half it has been the
object of the reverence and the worship of
millions of devout Christians, for whose sake,

GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE

63
if for no other, it is worthy of all respect.
Entering it even as a doubter, either of its
own truth or the truth of the beautiful le
gend it illustrates, one cannot help being
greatly moved by the absolute absence of
doubt expressed in the faces and in the atti
tudes of those who do believe in it. We saw
it for the first time on the day of our arrival
in Jerusalem, and at dusk ; and every day
during our stay in Jerusalem did we return,
at dusk, to sit, and look, and think. It may
not be the Spot of Spots, but to us it was
then, and is still, the most impressive spot
we ever saw ; and as long as we live we will
never forget the scene as it first impressed
us. Hundreds of worshippers of every vari
ety of Christian sect were present, hundreds
of lamps of silver, and gold, and the pre
cious metals, were shedding over it all that
dim religious light which has become a by
word, but which was here more than a real
ity ; and on all sides was exhibited absolute
and beautiful faith. What a Man he must
have been, if he were nothing more, to have
come from such an obscure place, of obscure

64
and even of uncertain parentage, and to have
left as a legacy such a tremendous and over
whelming influence upon the whole world
for two thousand years ! Verily the shrines
and the show-places of Venice and London
and Rome and Pompeii and Athens and
Egypt are nothing to this.
The so-called Calvary and Tomb, and ev
ery sacred spot connected with the awful
events of the Crucifixion, are contained un
der one vast, irregular roof, in a series of
churches and chapels called The Church of
the Holy Sepulchre. Within its precincts
no Jews are admitted, and no Jew probably
ever seeks or cares for admission. The
Greeks, the Copts, the Syrians, the Roman
Catholics, have each their own particular
place of worship, and the Protestants have
none at all. The lion and the lamb live not
in harmony together here, and the disciples
of the Prince of Peace are kept from violent
warfare with each other only by the presence
of an armed band of Mohammedan guards in
the Church of the Holy Sepulchre itself. Oh,
Jerusalem ! Jerusalem !

CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE

67
Immediately facing the entrance of the
Church is the Stone of Unction, so said,
upon which the body of the Saviour was laid
and prepared for burial ; on the right are the
holes in which the three crosses are said to
have stood ; we are shown here, also, what is
said to be the Pillar of Flagellation ; a cave
in which our Lord was confined immediately
before his death ; the seat upon which he sat
and was derided, was crowned with thorns,
and was hailed King of the Jews ; the spot
upon which he stood when he showed him
self to his Mother after the Resurrection ;
the spot upon which he stood when he ap
peared to the Magdalen ; and the rock that
was rent in twain. But the place to which
we went first and last, and oftenest, and at
which we lingered longest, was the Tomb.
The historians give the figures of its length
and its breadth and height ; artists have
painted it ; cameras have photographed it ;
hundreds of travellers have described it in
print ; millions upon millions of men and
women have seen it, and have prayed before
it, and have wept upon it ; millions upon

68
millions of lips have been pressed against it ;
its history is the merest tradition ; nobody
knows that it is true, and yet, standing by it,
overpowered by the atmosphere of the place
and by the sincerity of those who kneeled or
lay prostrate before it, I believed it all !
Many and various have been the theories
as to the exact sites of the places of Cruci
fixion and Entombment. It has been con
tended that the Mosque of Omar was erected
over the spot where the Cross stood ; that
Golgotha was outside the walls, near to, and
north of, St. Stephen's Gate ; and that the
little hill north of the Damascus Gate, con
taining the so-called Cave of Jeremiah, is the
true Place of the Skull. This last spot was
believed by General Charles George Gordon
to have been Golgotha, and it is the subject
of an exhaustive paper from the pen of Rev.
Haskett Smith, published two or three years
ago in Murray's Magazine. And it must be
confessed that the arguments of Dr. Smith
seem rational and almost conclusive.
The hill stands in a most conspicuous
position at the junction of two old roads :

PLACE OF THE SKULL

7i
one, skirting it to the west, connects the
Jordan and the Mediterranean; the other,
leading northward, was, and is, the direct
thoroughfare to Galilee, Samaria, and Da
mascus. If the so-called Ecce Homo Arch,
or any part of its foundation, be near the
spot, as tradition asserts it is, where Pilate
said unto them, Behold the man, it is not
impossible that the Christ passing under it
might have borne his burden thence to, and
through, the Damascus Gate. This hill, Dr.
Smith says, is known to the Jews of the
present day as the Hill of Execution and the
House of Stoning; they look upon it as an
accursed spot, and they spit upon it as they
pass it by. Above all, the crest of the hill is
manifestly skull-shaped, and from a little dis
tance the form of the skull is distinctly seen,
the hollows where were the eyes, the nasal
bone, and the jaws all being prominent in
the landscape. And when they were come
unto a place called Golgotha, that is to say,
a Place of a Skull, they crucified him.
At the western base of this hill, which Dr.
Smith believes to be Calvary, in a garden on

72
the Damascus road, and only a short distance
from the summit of the mound, has lately
been discovered a tomb which antiquaries
assert to have been hewn out in the rock, at
or about the beginning of the Christian era.
It is unfinished, and yet it has every appear
ance of having been occupied, and Dr. Smith
accepts it as the actual new tomb of Joseph
of Arimathea, in which he laid the body of
Jesus, which he had begged from Pilate.
This hill as we saw it first, on our return
from the Mount of Olives, certainly startled
and impressed us. It seemed to be what we
had come to see. But nevertheless we went
back to the spot accepted by Helena, and by
so many, many sincere worshippers. And in
the dusk we stood, and looked, and I be
lieved it all !

INDEX

Absalom's Tomb, 30-34.
Aceldama, 34.
Antonia, Fortress of, 38-41.
Bethany, 54, 57, 58.
Bethesda, Pool of, 53.
Bethlehem, 28, 41-50.
Bethpage, 57.
Calvary, 37, 64, 68.
Cave of Jeremiah, 36-38, 68.
Cave of Jerome, 49.
Chapel of the Scourging, 59.
Church of the Nativity,
46-49.
Church of the Sepulchre,
60-68, 72.
Church of the Virgin, 25-
27.
City of David, 29.
Damascus Gate, 37, 68, 71.
David's Tomb, 29.
David's Well, 42-45.
Dead Sea, 16, 27, 42.
Dolorosa, Via, 41, 58-60.
Dome of the Rock, 23.
Ecce Homo Arch, 71.
Elah, Valley of, 28.
Ephratah (see Bethlehem).

Field of Boaz, 50.
Field of the Shepherds, 49.
Fountain of the Virgin, 53
Garden of Gethsemane, 26
57-
Gate, Damascus, 37, 68, 71
Gate, Jaffa, 42.
Gate, Stephen's, 33, 38, 57
68.
Gethsemane, Garden of, 26
57-
Golgotha, 37, 64, 68.
Grotto of Jeremiah, 36-38
68.
Grotto of the Nativity, 46-
49-
Haram, 23-25, 34.
Hill of Execution, 71.
Hinnom, Valley of, 34.
House of Caiaphas, 30.
House of John, 30.
House of Mary and Martha,
54-
House of Pilate, 41, 71.
House of Simon the Leper,
54-
House of Stoning, 71.
Jaffa Gate, 42.

74

Jehosaphat, Valley of, 33.
Jeremiah's Grotto, 36-38,
68.
Jewish Quarter, 19, 25.
Kedron, Valley of, 53.
King's Dale, 34.
Moab, 27.
Moriah, Mount, 16, 23.
Mosque of Omar, 23-25,
68.
Mount of Ascension, 58.
Mount Moriah, 16, 23.
Mount of Olives, 25, 27, 35,
54, 57-58, 72.
Mount Zion, 16, 19, 29, 34.
Olives, Mount of, 25, 27, 35,
54, 57-58, 72.
Omar, Mosque of, 23-25, 68.
Pillar of Flagellation, 67.
Place of the Skull, 37, 64,
68.
Pool of Bethesda, 53.
Pool of Siloam, 35-36, 54.
Potter's Field, 34.
Rachel's Tomb, 42-45.
Ramah, 28-29.
Saraya, 38.

Sepulchres, Church of, 60-
68, 72.
Siloam, Pool of, 35-36, 54.
Solomon's Porch, 34.
Solomon's Stables, 34-35.
Solomon's Temple, 20, 23,
34, 53, 54-
Solomon's Tomb, 29, 35.
Stephen's Gate, 33, 38, 57,
68.
Stone of Unction, 67.

TempleTomb of
Tomb of
Tomb of
Tomb of
Tomb of
Tomb of
Tomb of
Tomb of
Tomb of

20, 23, 34, 53, 54.
Absalom, 30-34.
Christ, 64-68, 72.
David, 29.
James, 34.
Lazarus, 54.
Rachel, 42-45.
Solomon, 29, 35.
the Virgin, 25-27.
Zachariah, 34.

Valley of Elah, 28.
Valley of Hinnom, 34.
Valley of Jehosaphat, 33.
Valley of Kedron, 53.
Via Dolorosa, 41, 58-60.
Wailing Wall, 19-23.
Well of David, 42-45.
Zion, Mount, 16, 19, 29, 34.

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