Mount Zion

After the Mount of Olives we had to hurry over to the Jerusalem side of the valley, to Mount Zion which was above the old city of David and against the walls of the old city.

I believe that the picture above is the Teaching Steps as we drove by.

I think I showed this photo before.  It shows a rooftop overlooking the city of David in the valley.

We were in a hurry fr the things we visited that morning.  We had been scheduled to have Mass in the afternoon at St Peter in Gallicantu.  But, the Vice President of the United States put a crimp in our plans.  We had to be off of Mount Zion by 11:30am and we had a couple of places to see.  The bus parked and we had to walk through the lanes by the old wall to the Church of the Dormition of Mary.

Our guide told us that this wall of the old city has the mark of gunfire from one of the wars in recent history.

I think I had read that somewhere in this vicinity was a traditional upper room site.  Our guide and priests never mentioned that and I had to check with my guidebooks when I got home to be sure that I remembered that detail.  Lots of places are not very authentic in the Holy land and our guides decided that this was not a place we would be able to see.

Instead of the Upper Room, we concentrated on the Dormition of Mary.  In the basement of the church was a representation of the Blessed Virgin Mary's falling asleep or death.  It was a very dark basement.  I don't like to use flash for a variety of reasons, but to see anything the flash was necessary there.

So, with the flash we can see the dormition of Mary.  There is a tradition that Mary lived the rest of her life in Jerusalem and died there.  But, I have also read about Ephesus in Turkey with a little house that was where Mary lived with John.  So, here or there, Mary lived somewhere.

Even with a flash this picture is dark.   There were beautiful mosaics on the ceiling.

Around the room there were alcoves with icons of Mary and Jesus.

Above on the ceiling where the representation of Mary was there was a beautiful mosaic of Christ.

I was finally able to get a picture of it.  Jesus eyes speak to me in this icon.

I don't know what this is, but it looked old and was behind a fence.  I have not been able to find out, but I will keep looking in books.  It was in the lower level of the Church of the Dormition.

And hurry, hurry, we had to get to another place before the Israeli Army kicked us off Mount Zion because of the Vice President's impending visit. I think he was visiting the Western Wall which we were close to.  At least he was our vice president, if it had been some other country, maybe it would have been more upsetting.

And another look at the wall of the old City.

We weren't headed far.  It was sort of across the street and down the way a bit.

We were headed to this church. St Peter in Gallicantu.  The rooster crows for St Peter.  You know the story.  The courtyard of the High priest Caiaphas.

We got to take a quick look in the modern church where we should have had Mass at 1:30.

It was a pretty church.  Our priest told us that there was a display about forgiveness, but I didn't get to see it.  We had some stairs to climb.

We looked down this covered hole.  It went down to an ancient cistern.  This was traditionally the cistern of the house of the High Priest, Caiaphas.  The dry cistern was where Jesus was traditionally said to have been held after he was scourged. In those days there was no escape from a cistern unless a rope was lowered.

Stairs have been carved in the rock so that pilgrims can climb down to see the place..

So we climbed down into the pit.  The pit where Jesus was held before His crucifixion.

It was a finished surrounding to this stairway to the cistern.  It seemed surreal.

This was a place along the way down. 

And at the bottom we gathered, got quiet and prayed.  This may have been the actual place where Jesus was held the night before He died.  And even if it wasn't this exact place, it was a place like this.

I had an inspiration while I stood there praying.  This was a place to leave the hurts, pain, sorrow over the mistakes in my life.  This was the pit where these bad feelings belonged.

So, I make a practice of mentally climbing down all of these stairs when I am confronted with bad feelings over things that have hurt, that still hurt.  I can leave these in the pit.  I can't carry them back out.

We climbed back up and went to the courtyard of the High priest where Peter denied Christ.

The statue portrays the story.  People who live around there know the church and the story and they have roosters.  I heard the roosters crow at least 3 times.

I am not so sure what this plaque shows, but it was also in the courtyard of St Peter in Gallicantu.

Apparently there was an earthquake or I was leaning as I took this picture.   Forgive the lean.  I want to say to him, think, St Peter, think!

It was spitting rain on us and time for lunch since we had to get out of there before the vice president got there, so Our guide gathered us and loaded us up to head through Jerusalem to find a place for lunch.

There were some graves along the way on Mount Zion. 

I think I stuck this picture in with the Mount of Olives in an earlier day, but this is where it belongs. Either this or the picture below is where I believe Schindler of Schindler's List is buried.

The guide told us, but I can't remember anyone else and I didn't write it down.  A cemetery.

That building is dedicated to prayer.  I am not sure which religious group is connected with it, but our guide identified it as a place of prayer.  And we drove and drove though Jerusalem traffic to find lunch.