A common complaint on a tour of Israel is about how often we don’t know the exact spot things took place. We aren’t even certain where Jesus was crucified or buried or resurrected.


The “traditional” Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the Christian Quarter was built where Constantine’s mother, Queen Helena, discovered three wooden crosses. But then, in 1883, General Charles Gordon of the British Army was convinced the traditional site did not match John’s account that Jesus was crucified outside the city walls. On one of his frequent explorations, he found a burial tomb cut out of the rock, an ancient winepress and cistern signifying a garden from the first century, and a nearby outcrop known historically as the “Place of the Skull” (Golgotha in Aramaic).


Today, the place is known as the Garden Tomb, and while the British ministry overseeing the property in the Arab section of Jerusalem claims no certainty, it is a place to meditate and take communion and remember, “He is not here, he is risen indeed.”