_The True Site of Calvary._--The question has been much debated whether
the Church of the Holy Sepulchre occupies the true site of Calvary or
not. We know that Jesus suffered and was buried at some spot outside
the city, for it was “as they came out” that they found Simon of
Cyrene, and compelled him to go with them to bear the cross. The Church
of the Holy Sepulchre is almost in the heart of the present city; but
we have to remember that at the date of the crucifixion the third wall
was not yet built. The first question to be settled is the course of
the second wall, and the point whether it included the site of the
church or not. In this connection the discovery of a portion of the
second wall, running north-west, along by the Greek Bazaar, was very
important: only it was not followed far enough to remove all doubt.
If we adopt Herr Schick’s line for the second wall, the Church of the
Sepulchre would be outside: but this is not enough. If the site were
within the second wall it could not be Calvary; if it was outside the
wall it may be Calvary or may not. The Church is closer to the wall
than we should expect the place of execution to be; and unless Calvary
were further away there would hardly seem to be reason enough for
pressing Simon of Cyrene into service to carry the cross.
But another discovery must be mentioned which has some bearing on
the question. A little way east of the church, on a piece of ground
belonging to the Russians, the excavators passed through the remains
of some bazaars which were known to have existed there in the middle
ages, and below these they came upon a Byzantine pavement, which
appears to be the one laid down by Constantine around the buildings
which he erected. Thus it becomes morally certain that the Church of
the Holy Sepulchre stands on the spot where Constantine built his
church, believing it to be Calvary. But between the days of Christ and
the days of Constantine there was time and room for mistake to arise.
Jerusalem was destroyed in the year 70, the Christians did not return
to it until eighty years after, and by that time it might be difficult
to identify the sacred sites. When Constantine came to build his
church he found the site occupied by a temple of Venus, a circumstance
which may argue the traditional sacredness of the site, but scarcely
the tradition that it had been the Jewish place of execution. Major
Conder says he could devoutly wish that the site may turn out not to be
genuine, because it is disgraced by the scenes that occur there.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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