In the tomb

.

This, my friends, is THE picture for today, the day Christians call Holy Saturday.
The day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday when Jesus lay in a dark tomb, hidden away, here in my country, in Jerusalem.
Although not a Christian I can't help but wonder what the feeling of Christians is on this heavy day. 

I entered this silent, dim, empty 18th century church in rural Austria alone.
How stunned I was to suddenly discover a life-sized dead "body" lying below the altar.
Such a life-like statue! 

It was almost too life-like.

And look here -- how often do you see a pieta with Mary holding his hand?

A Way of the Cross ends on top of Mount Calvary, with three crosses as the final station.

The old Baroque church is called in German Kalvarienbergkirche.
Next to it was built (in 1984) the Franziskusgemeinschaft, the communal farming community where I volunteered last October-November.
It was a wonderful experience, all of it.
.
(Linking to inSPIREd Sunday.)

The Holy Sepulchre

.
Happy Passover to my fellow Jews.
And for my Christian friends, photos from the Holy Sepulchre.

The edicule (the structure built around the tomb) seen from above.

At ground level.

And inside, the tomb itself.
.

A day of waiting. The Epitaphios

.

I always think that for my Christian friends Holy Saturday must be the saddest day of the religious year.
As a Jew I can't even bear to imagine what it must be like, thinking of one's lord and master lying alone in a cold and dark tomb.
All the more so for the original disciples, for they did not know that Easter would come so soon, if at all.

My two photos are from the seldom-visited Greek Orthodox church Viri Galilei, on the Mount of Olives.

Orthodox Wiki explains the epitaphios:

The Epitaphios (Greek: Επιτάφιος, epitaphios, or Επιτάφιον, epitaphion; Slavonic: Плащаница, plashchanitsa; Arabic: نعش, naash)
is an icon, today most often found as a large cloth, embroidered and often richly adorned, which is used during the services of Great Friday and Holy Saturday .
 It also exists in painted or mosaic form, on walls or panels.
. . .
The icon depicts Christ after he has been removed from the cross, lying supine, as his body is being prepared for burial.
The scene is taken from the Gospel of St. John 19:38-42.

Shown around him, and mourning his death, may be his mother (the Theotokos; John the beloved disciple; Joseph of Arimathea; and Mary Magdalene, as well as angels. Nicodemus and others may also be depicted.

Usually, the troparion of the day is embroidered around the edges of the icon:

The Noble Joseph, taking Thy most pure body down from the Tree and having wrapped it in pure linen and spices, laid it in a new tomb.

. 

UPDATE 2018: See more about the epitaphios here:
https://russianicons.wordpress.com/2018/02/25/two-plashchanitsa-inscriptions/

.

A world turned on its head

.

The Church of St. Alexander Nevsky in the Old City yielded two photos for James' Weekend Reflections.
.

Floor tiles are reflected by the special glass protecting the sides of this ancient stone structure.
If you look into the glass on top of it, you see this:

Two tiers, up to the ceiling, of paintings, winding all around the sanctuary and then some!
.
Some are life-sized depictions of Russian Orthodox saints.
The others are illustrations starting at the Mount of Olives, followed by the Stations of the Cross, and ending with the Resurrection. The famous 19th century artist N. Koshelev painted them.
.
I have the feeling that the upside down cross reflects the suddenly topsy turvy inner world of the disciples on this Holy Saturday long ago. Yesterday they had lost their Master, today he was in the grave, and they did not realize that the next day would bring resurrection. They thought they had lost everything.
.

The Alexander Nevsky church was built in 1896 over important archaeological discoveries found in 1858, including what is believed to be the Judgment Gate.
Christians believe that Jesus passed through this city gate on the way to Calvary.
.
For decades this building was decaying because of a lack of money and was not often open.
Now it has been restored and is open all day. But not many pilgrims or tourists seem to know this, and this very special church is mostly empty.
Next time you are in the Holy City, do pay it a visit.
.

A shadow over Golgotha

.
The Church of the Holy Sepulchre even yielded up a shadow for Hey Harriet's Shadow Shot Sunday--a shadow of a hanging lamp, a shadow hanging over the walls of Jerusalem
.
on the wall mosaic that was made for the Millennium 2000 celebrations and Pope John Paul II's visit to the church.
.

The other side of the huge mosaic shows the anointing or unction of the body for burial.

Pilgrims customarily kneel and kiss the Stone of Unction, believed to be the place where Jesus' body was anointed with oils and spices.

The marble slab was brought here in 1810 to protect the original stone underneath.

The pilgrims rub the stone with a cloth, trying (I assume) to collect any drop of oil that may have fallen when the lamps were filled.

Some place jewelry or belongings on the stone for a minute, for luck.

.

.

If you would like to see more of the Holy Sepulchre today, on this day of waiting that will soon end and turn into Easter, please click on my "Holy Sepulchre" label for other posts.

.

An impressive panoramic tour of the vast church can be viewed at http://www.360tr.com/kudus/kiyamet_eng/index.html (although its creator's notes are a bit strange).

.

Below in the darkness, but shielded

A dark flower (that appears, briefly, in the secret places of our woods always around Holy Week). For the Orthodox Christians, now under the heaviness of "Good" Friday and Holy Saturday.
.

The light is coming

Not much longer now. Soon the bowed-down shall rise up.

From the grave

From a tombstone in the international cemetery which is adjacent to the Templers' Cemetery on Emek Refa'im Street.
I thought its message could be appropriate for this somber Great and Holy Saturday when Christians wait quietly for mourning to be transformed into joy. For them the "day of the entombed Christ" means much prayer, fasting, and watchful expectation.
I can imagine it is a difficult day, being just after crucifixion and not yet at resurrection. To describe the feeling of this day, and of Holy Week, the Greeks needed one special word: xarmolipi. It conveys joyful-sadness.