THE CHRISTIAN QUARTER

The Christian quarter, mostly inhabited by Christian Arabs, is located in the north-west of the city. It is calmer than its Muslim neighbour, although sometimes through religious processions. Then the human tide takes you, and you turn in your turn to follow the procession…

Here, some Christian communities are trying to many in good intelligence (which is far from always the case).

The district extends around the church of the Holy Sepulchre (open every day from 5 a. m. to 21 p. m. in winter), the main place of Christianity. This church was raised on the presumed site of Christ's tomb and on the one, neighbor, of his crucifixion, Calvary, or Golgotha. In the past, this place was outside the walls of the city and served as a place for executions. It was known as Golgotha (of gulgoleth gulgoleth), which means «the hill of the skull», on the one hand because its rounded shape resembled a skull, and on the other because the legend found the location where Adam's skull was buried.

The construction of the first basilica of the Holy Sepulchre began in 326, on the orders of Emperor Constantine. It was built on a th century Roman shrine and sanctuary which, according to the local tradition, was built on the very place where Jesus was crucified and buried. When the Roman buildings were demolished, several tombs carved in the rock were discovered.

Not much remains of the original Byzantine edifice which was burned and plundered by the Persians in 614, partially demolished, damaged by an earthquake in 808 and again demolished in 1009 by order of the caliph fatimide el-Hakem. One part was rebuilt by Byzantine emperor Constantin Monomaque in 1048, but essentially the present building is the result of reconstruction by the crusaders in the th century and subsequent renovations.

The Holy Sepulchre is divided between six Christian communities: Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopian and Syrian Catholics. Muslims, for whom Jesus is a prophet, are also represented. And as Christians crêpent the bun, the keys are entrusted to a Muslim since the th century!

In view of the multitude of pilgrims who are permanently there, the place unfortunately has an industrial side and, in some places, it is even difficult to enter a crossing.

Most visitors go through Via Dolorosa, the path that Christ would have borrowed by wearing his cross.