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Mount of Olives

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The Mount of Olives (also Mount Olivet, הר הזיתים, Har HaZeitim; جبل الزيتون, الطور, Jebel ez-Zeitun, Jebel et-Tur, "Mount of the Summit") is a mountain ridge to the east of Jerusalem. It is named for the olive groves on its slopes and is associated with many religious traditions.

At the foot of the mountain lies the Garden of Gethsemane. In the Book of Zechariah, the Mount of Olives is cited as the place where the dead will be resurrected in the days of the Messiah. For this reason, Jews have always sought to be buried there, and from biblical times until today, the mountain has been used as a Jewish cemetery. There are an estimated 150,000 graves on the Mount, including the tombs of biblical figures such as Zechariah and Avshalom. Many important rabbis from the 15th to the 20th centuries are buried there, among them Abraham Isaac Kook, the first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel. Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin is buried on the Mount of Olives.

Roman soldiers from the 10th Legion camped on the Mount during the Siege of Jerusalem in the year 70 CE, which led to the destruction of the city.

When the Mount of Olives was controlled by Jordan between the 1948 Arab-Israeli War and 1967, tombstones from the cemetery were used to build roads and army latrines. King Hussein permitted the construction of the Intercontinental Hotel at the summit of the Mount of Olives together with a road that cut through the cemetery which destroyed hundreds of Jewish graves, some from the First Temple Period. Some fifty thousand Jewish graves out of a total seventy thousand were destroyed or defaced during the nineteen years of Jordanian rule. After the Six-Day War, restoration work began, and the cemetery was re-opened for burials.

The Arab neighborhood of at-Tur is located on the mountain's summit.

Biblical references

The Mount of Olives is first mentioned in connection with David's flight from Jerusalem through the rebellion of Absalom (2 Samuel 15:30), and is only once again mentioned in the Old Testament, in Zechariah 14:4. It is, however, frequently alluded to (I Kings 11:7; II Kings 23:13; Nehemiah 8:15; Ezekiel 11:23).

It is frequently mentioned in the New Testament (;26:30, etc.). The road from Jerusalem to Bethany runs over the mount as it did in Biblical times. According to the Bible, it was on this mount that Jesus stood when he wept over Jerusalem.

Jesus is said to have spent a good deal of time on the mount, teaching and prophesying to his disciples (Matthew 24-25), including the Olivet discourse, returning after each day to rest (Luke 21:37), and also coming there on the night of his betrayal ().

This mount, or rather mountain range, has four summits or peaks: (1) the "Galilee" peak, so called from a tradition that the angels stood here when they spoke to the disciples (Acts 1:11); (2) the "Mount of Ascension," the supposed site of that event, which was, however, somewhere probably nearer Bethany (Luke 24:51, 52); (3) the "Prophets," from the catacombs on its side, called "the prophets' tombs;" and (4) the "Mount of Corruption," so called because of the "high places" erected there by Solomon for the idolatrous worship of his foreign wives (I Kings 11:7; II Kings 23:13).

The Mount of Olives is also the site of the prophecy of Zechariah and Ezekiel's theophany.

Cultural references

Christ on the Mount of Olives is the title of an oratorio by Ludwig van Beethoven, and of a painting by Caravaggio.

Landmarks

Notable people buried on the mount

Image gallery

References

External links



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Last updated on Thursday March 13, 2008 at 21:21:53 PDT (GMT -0700)
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