Anointing stone

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Anointing stone with hanging lights above it, today's condition (since 1808)
Customs: wiping the anointing stone with white cloths

The anointing stone is a particularly venerated place within the Jerusalem Church of the Holy Sepulcher . Here, directly behind the entrance, the pilgrims commemorate the anointing of the body of Jesus after his removal from the cross, Joh 19,39-40  LUT . He is known by the following names: petra unctionis (Latin), ἡ ἁγὶα Ἀποκαθήλωσις i aghia Apokathilosis (Greek), Muchta'sal (Arabic). Today it is jointly owned by the denominations represented in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

history

12th Century

The area of ​​today's anointing stone was originally outside the church building, in the atrium .

The architects of the crusader era transformed the open atrium of the late antique basilica into a late Romanesque, cathedral-like building, the facade of which characterizes the entrance area of ​​the holy place to this day. However, the first visitors to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, consecrated on July 15, 1149, did not see an anointing stone at its current location. After passing through the main portal, one noticed on the right hand the tombs of the kings Gottfried von Bouillon and Balduin I. , behind them the Adam's chapel and the ascent to the Golgatha rock.

Anointing places in the excavation church

The pilgrim Saewulf wrote that before the Crusaders' renovations there was a Lady Chapel near the Calvary, where the anointing of the body of Jesus and his wrapping in sheets was commemorated. In the newly designed Crusader Church, this chapel was no longer available, and the place ( locus ) of the anointing was shown to the pilgrims in the middle of the canon choir (Katholikon) - without an anointing stone. This is where the “ navel of the world ” is worshiped today. A competing tradition moved the anointing to the Holy Sepulcher Aedicula , where a kind of stone bench ( lectus ) was displayed. The Church of the Holy Sepulcher of the Crusaders was designed as a pilgrimage center. The localization of the anointing in the choir room was therefore more advantageous for the participation of many people than the localization in the aedicula, in which only a few people had space.

Anointing stone in Constantinople

The absence of an anointing stone in Jerusalem was in some ways logical, for the Pantocrator Church in Constantinople had the anointing stone, a reddish plate the size of a man, as one of its most important relics. This stone was brought to Constantinople from Ephesus in 1169. After the conquest of Constantinople in 1204, this relic was seen by some crusaders and seems to have aroused the desire to be able to venerate such a stone themselves. However, the anointing stone relic remained in place until the fall of Constantinople in 1453 .

13./14. century

At the end of the 13th century - Jerusalem was under Saracen rule - pilgrims were shown an anointing stone in the entrance area of ​​the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. The first witness of this is Ricoldus , who made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1288: "They showed a stone where they put the body to wrap it in canvas and to provide it with spices so that they buried it."

Pilgrimage reports of the 14th century describe a flat plate at ground level, the area around this stone was paved with square black and white stones. According to some sources, the anointing stone had a greenish color (green porphyry ); it is obviously not identical to the anointing stone of today. But the black and white plaster is still there in remnants. Around 1330 Antoninus of Cremona mentioned not only the anointing stone, but also that it had the dimensions of the body of Christ: an important motif for piety. In the decades that followed, the anointing stone became an integral part of pilgrimage reports and one of the most significant places to be visited in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.

15th century

The Franciscan order conveyed the iconography of the anointing stone to Europe and associated it with a Marian motif.

The pilgrims report Felix Fabris shows how the biblical tradition of anointing itself was connected to the Marian tradition of grieving Mary, Joseph of Arimathea have had customize at his grave a polished marble table, which at his own funeral for washing and anointing of the body would serve should . This, like Joseph's burial chamber, was now available for the body of Jesus. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus prepared the body for burial. Mary put the head of Jesus in her lap, while Mary Magdalene sat at the foot of the bed.

16th Century

The tradition according to which the visible anointing stone is not the actual anointing stone, but rather covers it protectively, has been documented since the middle of the 16th century.

In 1588 Ferdinand III donated . a box-shaped, richly decorated attachment for the anointing stone, which would have made it possible to celebrate the Eucharist at this point. However, the Greek clergy of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher took legal action to prevent this metal attachment from being placed over the anointing stone. They argued that pregnant Jerusalem women could no longer kiss the stone according to the old custom, which could lead to an increase in miscarriages.

17./18. century

Cornelis de Bruyn wrote that the anointing stone was an elongated stone, raised about a foot above ground level and framed with an iron grating so that one does not walk over it. Since 1550 it has been covered with a gray marble slab so that the pilgrims cannot break off any more pieces.

The visible gray stone, which according to general opinion was a cover plate over the actual anointing stone, showed two coats of arms: the coat of arms of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and the coat of arms of the Seraphic Order . Elzearius Horn explained: the Franciscans had sole jurisdiction over this holy place and "because of the envious Greeks" had these coats of arms on the stone, as well as the low metal fence. Eight traffic lights are hung over the anointing stone, representing the following denominations:

  1. Armenians;
  2. Greeks;
  3. Copts;
  4. Abyssinian;
  5. Constantinople;
  6. Custody of the Holy Land (Franciscans);
  7. Syrians;
  8. Muscovites.

19th century

After the fire of 1808, this area of ​​the Holy Sepulcher was redesigned during the renovation. The gray stone (or the cover plate) with the two coat of arms of the Latins has since disappeared. There was now a new anointing stone. Titus Tobler described it as a freely accessible, 7¾ feet long and over 2 feet wide slab of yellowish, red-veined marble, on the edge of which a circumferential Greek inscription was attached.

liturgy

Orthodox Good Friday liturgy on the anointing stone

The anointing stone was included in the liturgy of Good Friday. In the 16th century, the Latins developed their own passion play to match the conditions within the Church of the Holy Sepulcher . Tobler described this station as follows:

Previously, a moving figure representing Jesus Christ had been removed from the cross and wrapped in a shroud. The procession of the Franciscans approached the anointing stone with this figure, which was covered with a white linen cloth; at the corners of the stone there were vessels with aromas. The figure was placed on the stone and a pillow tucked under its head. The celebrant sprinkled essences on the figure and lit incense. After a silent prayer and a short speech, the figure of Christ was picked up again and the procession marched with her to the Holy Sepulcher Aedicula .

This ritual is still performed today (video see web links).

regional customs

The anointing stone was worshiped by the believers through kisses and anointed with rose water . They brought cloth with them to measure the anointing stone and had their own shroud made according to these measurements.

Replicas

Salbhaus in Görlitz

Since the time of the Crusaders, replicas of the Holy Sepulcher have been made in Europe, which, according to the feeling at the time, authentically reproduced the Holy Sepulcher Aedicula in Jerusalem. These could expand into meditation landscapes, so-called Jerusalem plants.

The best-known example of a Jerusalem complex in Germany is the Holy Sepulcher in Görlitz . Since the venerated places were there in a garden, an anointing house was built for the anointing stone. "It is a simple housing with a canopy, the niche-like space of which contains the stone sculpture of a Lamentation of Mary ."

Web links

literature

  • Max Küchler : Jerusalem. A handbook and study guide to the Holy City , Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2007, ISBN 978-3-525-50170-2 .
  • Leonhard Lemmens OFM: The Franciscans in the Holy Land, Part 1: The Franciscans on the Sion (1336–1551) , Münster 1919.
  • Yamit Rachman-Schrire: Christ's unction and the material realization of a stone in Jerusalem . In: Renana Bartal, Neta Bodner, Bianca Kuhnel (Eds.): Natural Materials of the Holy Land and the Visual Translation of Place, 500-1500 . Routledge 2017, ISBN 978-1-4724-5177-4 . Pp. 216-230.
  • Michael Rüdiger: Replicas of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem during the Counter Reformation and Baroque. A contribution to the cult history of architectural devotional copies , Schnell & Steiner, Regensburg 2003, ISBN 3-7954-1600-0 .
  • Titus Tobler: Golgotha. Its church and monasteries. According to sources and viewing . St. Gallen and Bern 1851.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Titus Tobler: Golgotha . S. 344 .
  2. ↑ Max Küchler: Jerusalem . S. 463 .
  3. ↑ Max Küchler: Jerusalem . S. 450 .
  4. ^ Titus Tobler: Golgotha . S. 346 .
  5. ↑ a b c Yamit Rachman-Schrire: Christ's unction . S. 219 .
  6. ↑ Yamit Rachman-Schrire: Christ's unction . S. 222 .
  7. ↑ Passion, crucifixion and anointing. Retrieved July 22, 2018 .
  8. ↑ Ricoldus de monte Crucis: Liber Peregrinacionis. In: Peregrinatores medii aevi quatuor. P. 112 , accessed on July 22, 2018 .
  9. ↑ Yamit Rachman-Schrire: Christ's unction . S. 216 .
  10. ↑ Yamit Rachman-Schrire: Christ's unction . S. 220 .
  11. ^ Felix Fabri: Evagatorium in Terrae Sanctae . De loco illo, ubi corpus Christi inunctum fuit et linteamine vel sindone involutum.
  12. ^ Titus Tobler: Golgotha . S. 348 .
  13. ↑ Cornelis de Bruyn: Reizen van Cornelis de Bruyn door de vermaardste deelen van Klein Asia, de eylanden Scio, Rhodus, Cyprus, Metelino, Stanchio, & c., Mitsgaders de voornaamste steden van Aeggypt, Syrien en Palestina . The Hague 1698, p. 288-289 .
  14. ↑ Angelicus Maria Myller: Peregrinus in Jerusalem . Vienna / Nuremberg 1735, p. 163 .
  15. ↑ Elzearius Horn: Ichnographiae locorum et monumentorum veterum terrae Sanctae. In: Vat. Lat. 9233, pt.2. Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana, accessed on July 23, 2018 (image 49).
  16. ^ Titus Tobler: Golgotha . S. 345 .
  17. ^ Titus Tobler: Golgotha . S. 458 .
  18. ^ Titus Tobler: Golgotha . S. 457 .
  19. ^ Titus Tobler: Golgotha . S. 351 .
  20. ↑ Michael Rüdiger: Replicas . S. 121 .