A Trip to the Orient: The Story of a Mediterranean Cruise

by Robert Urie Jacob

These people from the North, long-haired, heavy-bearded, long-booted, heavy-coated men, and short-frocked, heavy-shod women had come there, we could plainly see, on a holy pilgrimage to the tomb of their Savior, believing and trusting in the reality of everything they saw. At the Stone of Unction they prostrated themselves and kissed the stone slab, and as they rose we could see the shaggy-bearded men wiping away the tears with their rough hands. Then, with uncovered heads, they slowly approached the entrance to the Sepulchre, bowed down, crossed themselves, knelt inside, and after kissing the marble tomb, backed out, bowing and crossing themselves until well away from the tomb.

"The people of other nationalities outwardly show more reverence for the sacred places than do those of our own country," commented my companion. "The guards have just censured that group of Americans on the other side of the room. I could not hear what was said, but the actions of the guards spoke louder than words, and I noticed that the loud talking ceased at once."

The party of Americans came laughing and chatting toward the Sepulchre and entered the tomb without any appearance of reverence in their manner,—a striking contrast to the devout Russian pilgrims. Other Americans, however, following, entered the tomb silently, and came out with a look of awe upon their faces. One of these told us that he had placed some postal cards and letters on the tomb to be blessed by contact with it before mailing them to his friends. Another had taken some bunches of flowers and laid them on the tomb for the same purpose before pressing them for souvenirs. A party of Germans stood near us for awhile, apparently arguing in low tones over some statement of the guide, and then quietly and with uncovered heads advanced and entered the Sepulchre. Some Italians knelt for a long time before the door, and Africans, Greeks, and natives of countries unknown to us, bowed or crossed their foreheads or breasts before the entrance. No other nationality, however, showed such zeal and intensity of feeling as did the Russian peasants.

On Saturday afternoon we visited the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to be present at the special service held on that day. We found that the number of guards at the door had been doubled, and that companies of armed Turkish soldiers had been stationed within to preserve order in the assembled throng of sight-seers and worshipers and to keep a passage-way open through which the expected processions might pass. Pushing our way through the crowd we obtained a good position behind some Syrian women and children who, attired in gala costumes, held unlighted candles in their hands. At the Place of Sepulchre the oriental lamps above the door and the candles in the huge candlesticks had been lighted for the special service, brilliantly illuminating the marble front of that small building and bringing into clear relief every detail of the carved ornamentation. In the Greek Chapel the golden lamps and the candles at the altar were burning, and the chapel was ablaze with reflected glory.

"They are coming," whispered some one as the tramping of feet on the stone floor was heard.

A procession of Greek priests in gorgeous garments, swinging censers of smoking incense and bearing aloft a golden cross, marched to the Sepulchre, made obeisance there, then proceeded slowly around the building several times and entered the Greek Chapel where a short service was held. After the Greeks had left the building, a procession of Armenian priests appeared clad in black silk robes and peculiar looking black silk hoods draped over their heads. They were led by a venerable Patriarch arrayed in a magnificent embroidered robe. The Patriarch knelt and kissed the Stone of Unction, then the procession marched singing to the Sepulchre, which they entered, two priests at a time. After this part of the ceremony was concluded the priests marched singing three times around the room, while a bell in the gallery merrily clanged an accompaniment. When the Armenians had withdrawn, a procession of Roman Catholics entered singing. The chanting was accompanied softly by an organ in an adjoining chapel. The censer bearers waved their smoking bowls until the whole place was fragrant with the odor of the incense. Tonsured monks with sandaled feet, in gowns of brown, girt with hempen cord; censer bearers, cross bearers, brazier bearers, and choir boys in white embroidered surplices and skirts of scarlet; priests in black; bishops in purple; and higher dignitaries in capes of fur and long-trained robes,—all these marched round and round bearing lighted candles and chanting the ritual to the strains of the organ, and then proceeded toward the Latin Chapel. Our Syrian neighbor and her children lighted their candles and joined other worshipers with candles in the rear of this procession, and we followed to the Chapel where all knelt for service.

DAVID STREET IS ONLY HALF A MILE IN LENGTH.

Palestine appeared to us to be a land where history and tradition were so curiously mixed that it was difficult to know where history ended and tradition began. During our tramps around the city of Jerusalem and its vicinity the guides pointed out the spring where the Virgin Mary washed the clothes of the infant Jesus in the same way that we saw other women in the East washing clothes on the banks of public streams; the hill of evil counsel where the avaricious disciple had been tempted by gold to betray his Master, and the field where the horror-stricken traitor ended his life; the place just without the Gate of St. Stephen where the sainted Stephen knelt and prayed for his persecutors until the stones cast by the infuriated Jews crushed out his life; the spot where the Apostle James was beheaded, commemorated by the church of St. James which now stands on that location; the large room outside the Zion Gate in which the Lord washed the disciples' feet and partook of the Last Supper; the tomb of the wayward, long-haired Absalom, and the mausoleum that covers the resting-place of his father, King David; the footprint of Jesus in the rock and the hole made by His staff on the Mount of Olives; the imprints of the Savior's feet in the rocky floor made during the time of the scourging; the site of the house in which the Virgin lived with the disciple John after the Crucifixion.