For a trip through the Old City, it is best to buy any guidebook in Russian. They are sold everywhere, their price is from 20 to 50 shekels. The pilgrim goes to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre along the Via Dolorosa – the Street of Sorrow, the Way of the Cross, the last path of Jesus. From the palace of Caiaphas, the place where Jesus was sentenced to death, to Golgotha, the pilgrim's path is marked with stops. There are twelve in total. A detailed description of the "stations" on the Via Dolorosa can be bought near any small shop, the price of the booklet in Russian is 2 shekels.
It is good to be in Jerusalem in the heat, in the middle of summer. There are a few minutes at sunset when the city is especially illuminated by the sun. Molten gold floods the southern walls, the Western Wall, the light stones of the Kidron Valley. At the hour of the Last Judgment, a thin thread will be stretched across the valley, the dead will rise and walk along it.
The righteous will reach the Mount of Olives, and the sinners will fall. A little behind is Gehenna of Fire, the Hinnom Valley. Here, Jewish idolaters offered sacrifices to Moloch. They threw children into the red-hot belly of the copper idol and, to drown out the screams, blew into shofars – trumpets made of ram's horn. The valley forever became a symbol of horror and eternal torment; manure, garbage, and corpses of the executed were thrown into it. It was said: "In Gehenna... the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched" – to somehow quell the stench, bonfires constantly burned here. The bad reputation repelled, and the valley has survived to this day almost unchanged. The holy places are built up, the ancient geography is not traceable, but Gehenna – here it is, as it was, so it remains. Molten gold floods the walls of the Old City, but on Gehenna there is shadow; the valley is dark, even though it is on the southern side. Above is Mount Zion, built up with churches and synagogues. Its name comes from the word "desert." Jerusalem is "the city turned toward the desert." Here, under a red cover, is a stone sarcophagus, the tomb of King David, and on the "second floor" is the site of the Last Supper.
The light no longer blinds and does not drive into the shade. We drink cold freshly squeezed orange juice, as yellow as everything around. Behind the Dung Gate, an Arab sells Jewish bagels – beigels, which must be dipped in a spice mixed with salt – za'atar. "Two shekel!" the Arab shouts in Russian. He lives here; his main concern is the shekel, not the sunset. There are many merchants in the Old City, especially near Christian shrines. At first, this bothers and irritates, then you get used to it. In private conversations, Israelis sometimes let slip that the people of Israel have no need for Christian shrines, they tolerate them only so far. Just as Arabs in Egypt treat the pyramids, Turks treat Byzantine ruins – something foreign, but okay, as long as they pay pounds or liras. The last, warmest ray reflects from the dome of the Mosque of Omar – and the gold goes out, turns into dry cadmium, and then into dull cinnabar. The walled Mount Moriah is occupied by Muslim shrines. The "Dome of the Rock," the Mosque of Omar, is built over the rock from which the prophet Muhammad ascended to heaven on an angel-horse with a peacock's head. The rock tried to follow him, but the angel Gabriel stopped it, leaving the imprint of his hand on the stone.
A bus pulls up, and through turnstiles and metal detectors, Orthodox Jews pass into the square at the Western Wall for prayer. After the destruction of Solomon's Temple, once a year Jews were allowed to come to the wall and mourn its destruction. But the Wall is not the wall of the destroyed Temple, as many tourists think, but simply the place closest to where the Temple stood (and, we add, a place not occupied by Muslim shrines). Women and men pray separately. In the left, "men's" half, under an arch, is the entrance to a synagogue. A tourist can also approach the Wall, enter the synagogue, and even take photographs. The only condition is that you must cover your head, and not necessarily with a kippah; a baseball cap will do; a paper kippah can be taken from the attendant at the entrance.
It is also good to wander through the Old City without a specific route, just like that. It is divided into four quarters. The Jewish Quarter – the residence of the Orthodox – is renovated, restored; expensive shops are located in antique-style enfilades, and in the underground part, ruins from Roman times are open to tourists. The most visited part of the Muslim Quarter is the eastern bazaar. The trading streets are mostly covered and narrow. The Jerusalem bazaar is one of the most "oriental." Perhaps it is more exotic than the famous Cairo bazaar; you won't see such a thing in Central Asia, the Emirates, or Tunisia. In the bazaar, you can meet all sorts of people – Egyptians, Jordanians, Druze, Bedouins.
The Druze are adherents of the Muslim Ismaili sect. They are often found in northern Israel. A Druze wears a round black hat with a red velvet top, a short jacket, and loose trousers.
Bedouins are desert dwellers, nomadic herders. Camps with Bedouin tents are encountered along the roads of Israel. Entering a camp without the permission of the elder is forbidden. Anyone who accidentally ends up in the women's half of the tent faces death. A tour of the camp accompanied by the elder after bargaining will cost $20 plus small coins for a flock of barefoot children. But even a passionate lover of exoticism will find little of interest in a real Bedouin camp – sheep, goats, manure, dirt. The Bedouin's main wealth is not livestock, but sturdy tent pegs. In the desert, wood is scarce, so a bride comes to her groom with her own pegs. Bedouins consider other Muslims apostates, because the others have renounced the ideal of the nomad – poverty – and own property. Therefore, Bedouins serve in the Israeli army and, when the occasion arises, fight with other Arabs.
The Armenian Quarter is opposite the Tower of David and has been rebuilt and destroyed less than others. Armenian priests are unmistakably recognized even in the colorful Jerusalem crowd. With their whole appearance, they try to present themselves as bearers of some ancient wisdom and walk even more slowly than Egyptian pilgrims. The inhabitants of the Muslim and Christian Quarters are Arabs, and therefore there is much in common in this half of the Old City. Only in the Muslim Quarter can you suddenly come across mysterious cemeteries on the first floors of half-ruined houses. But both there and here, it smells equally of centuries-old dust, spices, tobacco, and sour old age.
The Muslim Quarter smoothly transitions into the Christian Quarter. The same shops, the same vendors, but just step aside into the deserted areas – and now you encounter Catholic monks – Franciscans, Benedictines, Cistercians, Greek priests, dark-skinned Copts with their strange crosses on their chests, gloomy black Ethiopians. Among the Arab cafes, Greek and even Polish ones appear. Here, surrounded by churches and monasteries of various Christian denominations, is the most important Christian shrine – the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
THERE, WHERE THE CHURCH IS
On a map, without outside help, it is difficult to find the Church. Neither domes nor walls are visible from anywhere. But just a moment ago the bazaar was noisy, colorful fabrics fluttered in the breeze, gold jewelry dazzled the eyes, Arab trinket sellers shouted and hawked their goods – and suddenly the pilgrim finds himself on a small paved square in front of the Church and understands – yes, this is it. Under the weight of the domes and massive walls, the Church has sunk into the ground over the centuries. Monasteries and random buildings cling to it from all sides, crowding it. There is no comparison with the Muslim complex on Mount Moriah. There is space, wealth, a sense of well-thought-out architecture, a calculated, deliberate pressure on the mind. After all, there is a place there where thousands of pilgrims can gather at once. In the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, there is neither special gilding nor spaciousness; the walls are made of ordinary hewn stones of different sizes, and between the stones are uneven, thick layers of cementing mortar. But this is the center of the Christian world.
Near the entrance, at the copper doors, stands an Arab. He differs from the rest of the frivolous crowd by his strict suit and noble bearing. Wajih Nusseibeh is the keeper of the keys. The denominations that share the Church have long entrusted the keys to a Muslim family to avoid quarrels and misunderstandings. The enmity between Christians is ancient and serious. In the middle of the last century, a silver star marking the birthplace of Jesus was stolen from the Grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem. The Catholics, of course, blamed the Orthodox. To this day, no one has thought to apologize for the slander, although Catholics lately do nothing but apologize for historical mistakes. At the gate is a cracked column. It is said that when the Orthodox were not allowed into the church, an earthquake occurred, the column cracked, and the doors opened by themselves. After these troubles, the idea arose to give the keys to neutral Arabs.
Adjacent to the Church are a Greek and a Catholic monastery; you can only enter them through the Church. But the monastery of the Ethiopian Church, which is on the roof of the Church, near the dome, is reached from a market street or through the Ethiopian chapel. Climbing up, along the way you can see Ethiopians praying. They have their own Bible; most of the religious tales are dedicated to the visit of King Solomon to the Queen of Sheba.
Inside the Church, right at the entrance, is the Stone of Anointing; here the body of Jesus taken down from the cross was placed, anointed with myrrh, and wrapped in the shroud. The stone itself is covered with a slab of pink slate stone.
To the right of the Stone of Anointing is the staircase to Golgotha. The rock on which Christ and the two thieves were crucified is enclosed by a chapel. In the chapel there are two altars – Orthodox and Catholic. Pilgrims kneel and touch the rock and the silver circle with a hole, the place where the cross was inserted. Black circles mark the holes from the thieves' crosses. Behind glass is a crack in the rock; it was formed by the shaking of the earth at the moment of the crucifixion. The crucifixion itself took place at the site of the Catholic altar. There is also a window – the former door to Golgotha, through which Emperor Heraclius brought in the Life-Giving Cross. Outside the window, below, is the Catholic Chapel of Adam; according to Catholic tradition, the skull of the first man is buried here.
The Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre is located in a huge domed rotunda. The chapel is built over the burial cave and consists of two sections. In the first, a piece of the stone that sealed the cave is kept in a marble vase. In the second, under a marble slab, is the Holy Sepulchre. Here they kneel, pray, and apply their pectoral crosses for consecration. It is said that miracles still occur in the Chapel of the Holy Sepulchre in our time. Believers hear mysterious sounds, and divine visions also occur. They leave here backing away, remaining facing the tomb. No more than two people enter the chapel at a time, so there is always a queue. At the entrance, an Orthodox priest sprinkles pilgrims with holy water. Pilgrims buy bundles of 33 candles at the entrance to the Church, light them to the left of the chapel, at the unquenchable lamps, and extinguish them in snuffers. These candles are given as gifts or lit at home, at Easter.
At the back wall of the chapel is the altar of the Copts or Armenians (a subject of a long and bitter dispute). Here pilgrims touch the part of the burial cave not covered with marble.
Behind the chapel is a half-ruined altar of the Syrians. The Armenians also dispute this, and therefore restoration work has been stopped. To the right of the altar, in the depths, are short rock catacombs – the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, in whose garden Jesus was buried. This place belongs to the Ethiopians.
To the left of the chapel is the Franciscan church and modernized Catholic altars. And directly in the center is the Greek Orthodox church, in the center of which the so-called "navel of the earth" is marked on the floor. Behind the Catholic part of the Church, in the depths, there is an ancient room with columns. This is Christ's Prison – an ancient cell where those condemned to death were held for a short time, including Christ and the two thieves.
The most ancient and deepest place is the Church of the Finding of the Holy Cross with Catholic and Orthodox altars. Here, in a niche carved into the rock underground, the Cross of the Lord was found.