Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Religious Studies – Anthology
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From one of those three crosses found by Helena came most of the pieces of the
‘True Cross’ venerated in numerous c hurc hes and c athedrals throughout the world.
What purports to be the t it ulus c an also st ill be seen in Rome’s Basilic a of Sant a
Croc e in Gerusalemme, a puzzling piec e of work wit h an insc ript ion just
decipherable as ‘Jesus the Nazarene, King of the Jews’, written in Aramaic, Greek
and Latin (see John 19: 19). The authentic ity of this has to be c onsidered doubtful;
likewise probably the piec es of the c ross, though no one c an be sure.
But in view of the early attested marking of the spot with the Temple of Aphrodite
(known to have been built by the Emperor Hadrian), there is a more than
reasonable c ase for ac c epting the Churc h of the Holy Sepulc hre as genuinely
enshrining the one-time tomb in whic h Jesus’ body was laid. Although ac c ording to
the gospels Jesus’ tomb was located outside Jerusalem’s walls, by Helena’s time
these walls had been rebuilt, the reputed tomb being found inside them. There
must, therefore, have been something very c ompelling about the loc ation for
Helena to have ignored the gospels’ clear descriptions. As archaeologist Dr Kathleen
Kenyon disc overed in the 1960s, the Churc h of the Holy Sepulc hre site was outside
the c ity walls of Jesus’ time, and would seem to have been within a quarry then
being used for burials.
Frustratingly, however, Constantine the Great’s engineers c ut away the roc k into
whic h the tomb had been set, leaving it first free standing, and then before the end
of the fourth c entury surrounded by a rotunda within a grandiose c hurc h. This
church and the tomb alike subsequently became subjected to sometimes
exhaustive Moslem attacks so that today almost every vestige of how it looked if
and when Jesus was laid in it has been lost. This has prompted many Christian
pilgrims to turn instead to the altogether more authentic-looking ‘Garden Tomb’,
whic h General Gordon of Khartoum, on visiting Jerusalem in 1883, suggested might
have been the true one used for Jesus. Loc ated just a short walk nort h of Old Cit y
Jerusalem’s Damascus Gate, this is today beautifully maintained as an
interdenominationa l plac e of prayer, though as even its guides admit there is very
lit t le evidenc e in favour of it having been t he original.
But the real question is: what happened to Jesus’ body as laid in the true tomb,
wherever this was, and whatever it looked like? According to every available early
source, Jesus died on the c ross at the hands of the world’s most effic ient
exec utioners, the Romans. Before his body was taken down from the c ross the
Roman governor Pontius Pilate reportedly sent a senior offic er to ensure that he
was genuinely dead (Mark 15: 45). The author of the John gospel observed that in
order to leave nothing to c hanc e a lanc e was plunged into his c hest, whereupon
blood and a watery fluid oozed out (John 19: 34). Ac c ording to the Matthew
gospel’s author, a guard was even mounted and official seals affixed to the
entrance stone in order to prevent any possibility of trickery (Matthew 27: 66).
Because the Matthew gospel alone tells the story of the guard, also of a ‘violent
earthquake’ and of the ‘angel of the Lord’ rolling away the entranc e stone, it is
probably safest to regard these as pious embroideries by an author demonstrably
over-fond of t he mirac ulous. It is equally impossible t o know quit e what t o make of
the differing ac c ounts of the young man or men enc ountered at the tomb (Mark 16:
5; Luke 24: 4), exc ept that the benc h on whic h Jesus’ body would have been laid,