Research work was carried out continuously for 60 hours after, for the first time in 450 years, a marble slab was removed from the Holy Sepulcher in the Edicule - a chapel in the Jerusalem Church of the Resurrection of Christ.

As the scientific portal notes, the most revered place in the Christian world, the burial bed, is carved into the wall of a cave made of limestone. In 1555, according to scientists, the tomb was covered with marble lining in order to protect it from those frantic pilgrims who wanted to dismantle the funeral bed for souvenirs.

When specialists from the National Technical University of Athens, with the support of Israeli and Armenian colleagues, removed the marble cladding on the night of October 26, they first saw a large layer of stone debris underneath it. However, after continuing their work non-stop for 60 hours, the researchers found another marble slab underneath with a cross carved into its surface. Presumably this was made during the Crusades.

At the same time, the burial bed turned out to be completely intact, despite the fact that the walls of the cave in which it was located, as already mentioned, were destroyed along with the original building of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher at the beginning of the 11th century by order of the then ruler of Jerusalem, Caliph Hakim.

Members of the archaeological team brought the slab to the surface to clean and digitize it before reinstalling it in the Edicule.

"I'm absolutely amazed. My knees are shaking a little because I didn't expect it," archaeologist Fredrik Hiebert told National Geographic magazine at the site. “We cannot be 100 percent sure, but there seems to be clear evidence that the tomb was not damaged during all this time. After all, scientists and historians have been asking this question for many decades,” the researcher added.

In addition, archaeologists confirmed the presence of limestone in the walls of the cave inside Edicule, and also made a small window so that believers could see the shrine for the first time in several centuries.

The Bible says that after the crucifixion, the body of Christ was placed in one of the caves carved into the mountain for burial. It was there on the third day that his miraculous resurrection took place.

The earliest accounts of Jesus' burial come from the canonical Gospels, the first four books of the New Testament, which are believed to have appeared decades after Christ's crucifixion. However, the accounts found at the time consistently describe how Christ was buried in a rock tomb belonging to Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy Jewish follower of Jesus.

Jewish tradition prohibits burial within city walls, and the Gospels indicate that Jesus was buried outside Jerusalem, near the site of his crucifixion on Calvary. A few years after the burial, the borders of Jerusalem were significantly expanded so that Golgotha ​​and the nearby tomb were within the city.

It is also known that in the 4th century, the holy Queen Helen, Equal to the Apostles, ordered the beginning of excavations at Golgotha. As a result, a cross was found on which Jesus was allegedly crucified. The queen ordered the foundation of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher on this site.

According to Dan Bahat, Jerusalem's former chief archaeologist, "It is impossible to be absolutely certain that the site of the Holy Sepulcher is the burial place of Jesus, but we assume that there is no other site that can most likely lay claim to it."

Archaeologist Martin Biddle, who published a study of the tomb's history in 1999, believes that the only way to be sure that the Edicule actually contains the burial bed of Jesus Christ is to carefully analyze the data collected during the current research mission.

Archaeologists who examined the shrine of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem after the marble slab covering it was removed for the first time in 450 years found that the burial Bed of Christ remained intact. National Geographic magazine reported this on Monday.

The slab from the Holy Sepulcher in Old Jerusalem was removed on October 26 (for the first time in 450 years). Specialists from the National Technical University of Athens, with the support of Israeli and Armenian archaeologists, carried out research work in Edicule over the next 60 hours.

The Holy Sepulcher is a tomb carved into natural rock from the Second Temple period, which contains a stone burial bed (200 by 80 cm, height from the floor 60 cm). The current room, like the previous cave destroyed in 1009, is called the Holy Sepulchre. This room, located in the Edicule, symbolizes the cave in which the Body of Christ was buried. Only the bed itself, part of the cave walls and part of the entrance have survived to this day. By the middle of the 16th century, the bed was badly damaged by pilgrims who tried to break off a piece of the relic. To prevent these attempts, it was covered with a slab of white marble in 1555.

When scientists removed the marble lining and a layer of stone fragments from the coffin, they saw underneath another marble slab with a cross carved on its surface. Historians suggest that it was made during the Crusades.

The burial bed itself turned out to be completely intact, despite the fact that the walls of the cave in which it was located were destroyed along with the original building of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the 11th century.

Archaeologists then brought the slab to the surface to clean and digitize it before reinstalling it. “It's absolutely amazing. My knees are shaking because I did not expect this... We cannot say with one hundred percent certainty, but at first glance, there is clear evidence that the tomb has not been damaged during all this time. After all, scientists and historians have been asking this question for many decades,” said archaeologist Fredrik Hiebert in an interview with the magazine.

In addition, archaeologists confirmed the presence of limestone in the walls of the cave inside Edicule, and also made a small window so that believers could see the shrine for the first time in several centuries.

In the Gospels, we recall, it is reported that Jesus was buried outside of Jerusalem, not far from the site of his crucifixion on Golgotha. A few years after the burial, the borders of Jerusalem were significantly expanded so that Golgotha ​​and the nearby tomb were within the city.

In the 4th century, Saint Helen, Equal to the Apostles, ordered excavations to begin at Golgotha. As a result, the cross on which Jesus was crucified was found. The queen ordered the foundation of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher on this site.

Experts from Russia are still skeptical about the work in Jerusalem

In Jerusalem there is a grave where it is believed that Jesus Christ was buried after death on the cross. This news attracted everyone's attention. However, so far the information coming from the Holy City is very scarce. And even confused. We talked with experts about whether we can expect any significant discoveries.

After the crucifixion, Joseph from Arimathea asked Pilate to give the body of Christ. And “he laid him in his new tomb, which he had hewn out of the rock” - this is how the burial of Jesus Christ is described in the 27th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew.

According to the chronicles, later Saint Helena, the mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine I, found the site of the grave of the Son of God. The Church of the Holy Sepulcher has stood on this site in Jerusalem for many centuries. This is where the current excavations are taking place.

I have been to this sacred place for Christians several times, the last time quite recently. However, those photos and videos that can now be seen on the Internet and in the media leave me bewildered,” says Alexander Koltypin, director of the Scientific Center for Fundamental Research in Natural Sciences, Candidate of Geological and Mineralogical Sciences. – The fact is that I don’t understand where exactly the work is being done.

The core of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher is the cuvuklia - the inner underground chapel. In its depths there is a stone bed, on which, according to legend, the body of the Savior lay after burial.

But those “pictures” that are now broadcast by news agencies do not at all resemble the interiors of Edicule. It is much more likely that the workers lifted a marble slab over the Stone of Confirmation, which lies in the central vestibule of the temple (according to legend, the body of Christ was placed on this stone after he was taken down from the cross, and it was here that the body was prepared for burial, anointing it with myrrh and aloe – Auth.)... And the text of the Russian-language explanations published by us is very incomprehensible; perhaps some confusion arose during the translation from a foreign source.

It is reported that research remains to be done to identify the "original surface of the stone" on which Jesus' body lay. As a geologist, tell me, is it possible to use modern scientific methods to determine the age of this grave and make sure that the burial in it took place exactly 2 thousand years ago?

You can, of course, try to find and scrape off the crusts of mineral deposits formed on the stone walls and analyze them, but this is unlikely to give a satisfactory result in this case. After all, by geological standards, two millennia is a very short time interval. Carbon analysis could provide real help in dating, but for this it is necessary to find during the ongoing excavations at least a small fragment of carbon-containing material - a coal, a piece of wood that accidentally fell into the grave during those biblical events. The question is whether archaeologists will be lucky to make such a find...

The progress of the unique and at the same time strange archaeological operation to open the vaults of the crypt in the Church of the Resurrection of Christ in Jerusalem was also commented on by the famous researcher of oriental antiquities Viktor Solkin.

- Archaeologists are archaeologists, what do they want to find out for themselves in principle?

New Testament history worries many specialists, primarily from Israel, because they want to find some significant or simply noticeable confirmation of the events that we read about in the Gospels.

In the era of late antiquity and the Middle Ages, a large number of places were formed in Palestine that began to be considered holy; in particular, Empress Helena, mother of Emperor Constantine, during a pilgrimage to Palestine, discovered some evidence that one of the places she visited was the burial place of Christ.

Unfortunately, history has not conveyed to us the details of what exactly she found there, how she identified this place, and why she chose it. As a result, a decision was made, first as part of restoration work, then as part of a research project, to at least open the vaults to see what stone fragments might be there - what exactly attracted Elena’s attention?

Of course, with modern methods and attention to detail, some discoveries can be made there. But for now it is very, very early to talk about any real archaeological and scientific significance of this project.

- Why then everything?

In my opinion, there is an echo of a now very fashionable trend in archeology for a certain study of myths. Not from the point of view of evidence - whether the tomb of Christ was there or not, but so that there is some factual basis under the legend or religious dogma. It is clear that the reaction from religious leaders and the public will be ambiguous, especially since the press is greedy for bright headlines, such as the one that “The Holy Sepulcher has been opened”; and in general, any excavations in places sacred to different faiths are always problematic: penetrating objects of faith is a very difficult matter.

However, due to the fact that the project began as a restoration project, there will be benefits from it. The vault of the crypt will be preserved, put in order, and further studied. But that's all we're talking about for now...

- So, most likely, researchers will not find anything there?

I think yes. If fundamentally new finds are made related to historical burials that could have been at this place, then we will learn quite a lot about the forms of funeral ritual and the features of individual monuments in this region, characteristic of Roman times. But I repeat, if they find something. Maybe there are some kind of tombs there. And then we will clarify what the funeral ritual was in Judea in Roman times. And this is useful information. The project has just begun and needs to be monitored. But under no circumstances should we draw hasty conclusions.

At the end of October 2016, which is located in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the Old City of Jerusalem (Israel).

This happened for the first time since the mid-16th century, reports The International Business Times.

Why did scientists wait so long, and what prompted them to open the tomb in 2016?

Story

The Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem is the most revered shrine in the Christian world. Christians believe that the body of the crucified Jesus Christ rested for 3 days on a stone slab kept here. The slab (bed) measuring 2 x 0.8 meters was located in a cave carved into the rock - this is how the Jews buried their dead in the first century AD, writes “Popular Mechanics”.

In 326, Empress Helena, now revered as a saint by many Christian churches, undertook a pilgrimage to Golgotha. As a result of excavations carried out under her leadership, a cave with a burial and a cross on which, as Christians believe, Jesus Christ was crucified, 4 nails and a tablet with the inscription: IESUS NAZARENUS REX IUDAEORUM (“Jesus of Nazarene, King of the Jews”) were discovered. Elena founded a temple around the bed, where Christian pilgrims from all over the world began to flock. The temple looked like a domed marble chapel.

The room in the temple that has survived to this day symbolizes the cave in which the body of Christ was buried. Now there is the bed itself, part of the cave walls and part of the entrance. The former cave was destroyed in 1009.

The right to conduct Christian and Jewish worship in the temple founded by Helen became a powerful political instrument of the Middle Ages. The territory of Golgotha ​​changed hands many times, from Byzantine emperors to Arab rulers - and back. In 1009, the chapel was destroyed by Caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah; European Christians used this event as one of the main propaganda tools during the organization of the First Crusade. The crusaders built a new temple around the bed, preserving the supports of the chapel.

After this, Christians could freely conduct rituals and services near the Holy Sepulcher, even during periods when Jerusalem passed into the hands of Arab conquerors. During the earthquake of 1545, the sanctuary was badly damaged, after which the funeral Lodge was covered with a marble slab to protect it from pilgrims who wanted to take a piece of the relic with them.

The goal of scientists

The restoration of the temple began only in the 19th century, but a new earthquake in 1927 again destroyed the buildings around the Lodge. After World War II, a large-scale restoration of the entire temple complex, which had developed over centuries of construction and destruction, began, but even then the slab hiding the bed remained in place.

And only in 2016, archaeologists came to an agreement with 6 churches: Greek Orthodox, Catholic, Armenian, Coptic, Syrian and Ethiopian, to remove the slab from the tomb and study the burial bed.

Opening of the tomb.
Screenshot from video

The main question that experts have to answer is: why did Elena decide that it was here that the body of the crucified Christ rested?

“The marble slab had been displaced, and we were surprised by the large amount of rock material underneath,” said study participant Fredrik Hiebert of the National Geographic Society. According to him, there will be “a long scientific analysis to finally see the original surface of the stone on which, according to legend, the body of Christ was laid.”

Scientists note that analysis of the original rock can give them the opportunity to determine the original shape of the tomb, as well as the history of the formation of the object as one of the main symbols of Christianity.

Work on the restoration of the Holy Sepulcher is planned to be completed by the spring of 2017. The total financial costs will exceed $4 million. King Abdullah II of Jordan also donated funds for the restoration.

Scientists record all manipulations on video. It is expected that this material will later be used as a basis for a television documentary. So far, only one excerpt has been posted on the Internet, which depicts the rise of the slab.

Why was the Holy Sepulcher opened? October 29th, 2016

Remember, you and I once discussed this topic: And the other day I read news all over the media that archaeologists have conducted an autopsy of the tomb of Jesus Christ, which is located in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the Old City of Jerusalem. This happened for the first time since the mid-16th century.

However, in few places it is specified, why all this?

The Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem is the most revered shrine in the Christian world. Christians believe that the body of the crucified Jesus Christ rested on the stone slab kept here for three days. The slab (Bed) measuring 2 x 0.8 meters was located in a cave carved into the rock - this is how the Jews buried their dead in the first century AD. The first Christians began to venerate the places associated with the crucifixion and burial of Christ.

In 326, Empress (August) Helena, now revered as a saint by many Christian churches, undertook a pilgrimage to Golgotha. As a result of excavations carried out under her leadership, a cave with a burial was discovered. Other finds included a cross on which, as Augusta (and Christians around the world followed her to this day) believed, Jesus Christ was crucified, four nails and a tablet (title) with the inscription IESUS NAZARENUS REX IUDAEORUM, that is, “Jesus of Nazareth, King Jewish". According to the New Testament, Pontius Pilate personally nailed the title to the cross. Elena founded a temple (Edicule) around the bed, where Christian pilgrims from all over the world began to flock. The temple looked like a domed marble chapel.

The Holy Sepulcher is a Jewish tomb carved into natural rock from the Second Temple period. The body of Christ was laid on a stone funeral bed measuring 200 by 80 cm and a height of 60 cm from the floor. It is made of hewn stone slabs.

The room in the Edicule that has survived to this day symbolizes the cave in which the body of Christ was buried. Only the bed itself, part of the cave walls and part of the entrance have survived to this day. The former cave was destroyed in 1009.

The holy bed was covered with a marble slab to protect it from pilgrims who tried to break off and take away a piece of the relic. The current slab was laid in 1555, and since then the slab has never been removed. However, according to legend, one attempt was made: Muslims wanted to take a marble slab to decorate the mosque. But as soon as they tried to move it, a crack was discovered. Her sudden appearance stopped the Muslims, and the slab remained in place.

The right to conduct Christian and Jewish worship in the temple founded by Helen became a powerful political tool of the Middle Ages. The territory of Golgotha ​​changed hands many times, from Byzantine emperors to Arab rulers and back. In 1009, the chapel was destroyed by Caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah; European Christians used this event as one of the main propaganda tools during the organization of the First Crusade. The crusaders built a new temple around the bed, preserving the supports of the chapel.

After this, Christians could freely conduct rituals and services near the Holy Sepulcher, even during periods when Jerusalem passed into the hands of Arab conquerors. During the earthquake of 1545, the sanctuary was badly damaged, and then the funeral bed was covered with a marble slab. Which has never been raised since then. Serious restoration of the temple began only in the 19th century (then the Edicule of St. Helena was restored), but a new earthquake in 1927 again destroyed the buildings around the Lodge. After World War II, a large-scale restoration of the entire temple complex, which had developed over centuries of construction and destruction, began, but even then the slab hiding the bed remained in place.

It was only in 2016 that archaeologists agreed with six churches: Greek Orthodox, Catholic, Armenian, Coptic, Syrian and Ethiopian, to remove the slab from the tomb and study the burial bed. The main question that experts have to answer is: why did Elena decide that it was here that the body of the crucified Christ rested?

“The marble slab had been displaced and we were surprised by the large amount of rock material underneath,” said study participant Fredrik Hiebert of the National Geographic Society. According to him, there will be "a long scientific analysis, but we will finally be able to see the original surface of the stone on which, according to legend, the body of Christ was laid."

Scientists note that analysis of the original rock can give them the opportunity to determine the original shape of the tomb, as well as the history of the formation of the object as one of the main symbols of Christianity.

Scientists hope that the work will help lift the veil of secrecy over how St. Helena, the mother of Emperor Constantine, learned that this particular cave was the Holy Sepulcher and they want to restore the original appearance of the tomb.

Work on the restoration of the Holy Sepulcher is planned to be completed by the spring of 2017. The total financial costs will exceed four million dollars. King Abdullah II of Jordan also donated funds for the restoration.

Scientists record all manipulations on video. It is expected that this material will later be used as a basis for a television documentary. So far, only one excerpt has been posted online, which depicts the actual manipulation of lifting the slab.

sources