The grave of the prophets Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi on the Mount of Olives

Among the many shrines located on the Mount of Olives, there is one that does not have religious symbols. This is the so-called tomb of the prophets, where, according to Tradition, the ashes of three of the twelve minor prophets of the Bible - Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi - rest. When Archimandrite Antonin Kapustin acquired this place for the Russian Church in the 80s of the last century, the Turkish authorities approved the deal on the condition that there will be no Christian symbols in the cave, because it is revered by both Christians and adherents of Judaism.   Even in the Holy Land, it is very difficult to find a place comparable to the Mount of Olives in the degree of concentration of historical and cultural monuments - if not impossible. Strictly speaking, this is not a mountain in the usual sense, but a whole series of low mountains, located along the southeastern, eastern and northeastern sides of the Holy City, from which they are separated by the Kidron Valley. The most significant of the three peaks of this ridge is 826 meters high. At the western slopes of the Mount of Olives is Gethsemane - a place that is associated with the prayer of the Savior for the Cup, and with the betrayal of Judas. And from the south, the mountain range is bordered by the Mountain of Affliction, otherwise called the Mountain of Doom.



In many wars of the past, the Mount of Olives was considered a strategic position, the most favorable for an attack on Jerusalem. In peacetime, its slopes were planted with olive trees, or olives - hence the second name of the mountain: Olive. Interestingly, eight trees of this species grow here to this day - they can be seen in the Garden of Gethsemane. From the side of the Holy City, there is a view of many tombstones located on the slopes of the Mount of Olives - there are at least one hundred and fifty thousand of them in total! According to various estimates, this cemetery is from two and a half to three thousand years old. It is considered a great honor to be buried here: the book of the prophet Zechariah says that at the end of time the Messiah will rise to the Mount of Olives and it is from here that the resurrection of the dead will begin with the sound of Ezekiel's trumpet: “ Then the Lord will come out and take up arms against these nations, as he took up arms on the day of battle. And His feet will stand on that day on the Mount of Olives, which is before the face of Jerusalem to the east; And the Mount of Olives will split from east to west into a very large valley, and half of the mountain will move to the north, and half of it to the south. And you will flee to the valley of My mountains, for the valley of the mountains will extend to Asil; and you will run as you ran from the earthquake in the days Uzziah, king of the Jews; and the Lord my God and all the saints will come with him. '(Zech. 14: 4-5). Unfortunately, in the middle of the last century, when these places belonged to Jordan, many historical gravestones were damaged, or even completely destroyed - now the Arab residential quarter of Siluan is located on the site of the most ancient burials. But back to the days of the Old Testament. The grave of the prophet himself who uttered the divinely inspired prophecy - Zechariah - is located here. His ashes rests next to the ashes of two other prophets of the Bible: Haggai and Malachi, in the very cave, with the mention of which we began. The 'Tomb of the Prophets' or 'Tomb of the Prophets' is revered by both Jews and Christians, and, in addition, is one of the most visited places on the Mount of Olives.




Judging by the architectural style, the complex was erected in the first century AD, or, perhaps, a little earlier: at the turn of the era, the Jews adopted exactly this style of burials. Later, in the fourth and fifth centuries, Christians from different countries of the Middle East were buried in the cave - apparently on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. The graffiti on the walls suggests that in the cave followers of the faith of Christ from Syria, Mesopotamia and other countries have been reposed. Most of them are made in Greek, and represent parting words to the newly departed into eternal life. 'Rely on your faith in God, Dometila: there is not a single immortal human being!' - says one of them. The burial cave itself looks like concentric crypts with niches - according to various estimates, they contain from 36 to 40 burials. A steep and narrow staircase on the western side of the complex leads the pilgrims into a circular hall, eight and a half meters in diameter. Three gloomy corridors, 9 to 12 meters long, one and a half wide and three meters high, diverge from the hall. The corridors are interconnected by arcuate rings. One of these rings, the outer one, is the burial chamber. It is here that the ashes of the prophets Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi, who lived in the 6th-5th centuries BC, are located. Since we mentioned Zechariah above, we will start a short story about these three prophets with him. According to the description of Saint Epiphanius, dating back to the fourth century, the prophet Zechariah was a Levite and a native of Gilead. He came from the land of Babylon to Palestine in his old age. In the land of the fathers, he showed many miracles and uttered a number of important prophecies, the main of which we have cited above. In addition, he foresaw the birth of sons: Jesus - from the high priest Yosedek and Zerubbabel - from Salafiel. King Cyrus, he predicted the victory over Croesus. The destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the Kingdom of Israel, the 'Day of the Lord' and the coming of the King-Redeemer - all these prophecies told by Zechariah are associated for Christians with very specific persons and events. Having lived to a ripe old age, the prophet Zechariah was buried next to another prophet - Haggai.




The fate of the latter is in many ways similar to the fate of Zechariah. Just like him, Haggai was born in Babylonian captivity and came from the tribe of Levin, and also returned to the Holy Land, where he prophesied and admonished his compatriots - in particular, demanding the renewal of the construction of the Second Temple, which will be even more magnificent than the First, built Solomon - after all, it is in the new Temple that the Messiah will appear to people. Prophet Haggai explained to the Jews the failure of their labors and undertakings by negligence about the work of God - and he achieved what he wanted: he was the first to sing 'Hallelujah' when the temple was rebuilt. Important are the words of the prophet that He punishes those who neglect the glory of God with infertility (Hag. 1, 6; 9-11; 2, 16-17; 19). Haggai was the first prophet after the Babylonian captivity, who left their scripture in the form of a book of two chapters. As a member of a priestly family, he was buried on the Mount of Olives, next to the graves of other priests. The name of the third of the prophets, Malachi of the tribe of Zebulun, is translated as 'messenger.' In the Christian tradition, it is allegorically called the 'seal of the prophets', because chronologically it was the last not only among the twelve little ones, but also among all the prophets of the Bible in general. In the book he left behind, the prophet Malachi reproaches his compatriots, who returned from Babylonian captivity, for neglect in liturgical matters, for negligence in sacrifices, for leaving their lawful wives and lack of faith in the coming coming of the Lord. Malachaya prophesied not only about the Lord, but also about His Forerunner and the last Judgment (Mal. 3: 1-5; 4: 1-6) in the years when the Second Temple was already built, and therefore during the earthly life of Jesus Christ, the words this prophet was remembered not only by the apostles, but also by the scribes and ordinary people. Malachi left a book that was one of the prophetic books of the Bible and died young.

Thus, almost four dozen burials in the Tombs of the Prophets belong to three different time periods. The earliest - to the return of the Jews from Babylonian captivity and the construction of the Second Jerusalem temple, that is, in the VI-V centuries BC. Later - to the period from the 1st century BC to the 1st century AD. And, finally, the later ones - to the very end of ancient times, when the Tombs of the Prophets were already considered a revered place among Christians. Then oblivion came here for almost a thousand years - in connection with stormy, successive historical events: wars, conquests, migrations of peoples. Only at the end of the XIV century, the Tombs of the Prophets were, so to speak, rediscovered at the top of the slope of the Mount of Olives - and again became a revered place for believers, both Judaists and Christians. It is interesting that Archimandrite Antonin himself either did not believe, or deliberately did not focus on this fact, that the ashes of the prophets Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi rest on the plot he bought. In his letter to the Russian consul in Jerusalem, D. N. Bukharov, dated November 18, 1886, he writes: “of the same kind (ie, having an archaeological character) my acquisition, dating from 1883, is a burial cave on the western slope of the Mount of Olives , known from guides under the nickname 'The Coffins of the Prophet', which has no meaning, and is confined by archaeologists to the monuments of the pagan cult of the first inhabitants of the place. ' At the same time, precisely after the acquisition of this piece of land (then it was called Karm el-Kharab) Russian The church provided a convenient entrance to the tombs of the prophets and restored many details that had previously been destroyed for many centuries and prevented movement inside the caves. The purchaser's skepticism about the place belonging to the biblical history did not interfere with the improvement of the historical complex at all! In 1890, the caves were explored by the Augustinian archaeologist L.Yu. Vincent, who managed to establish a number of important details concerning, among other things, the dating of various parts of the complex up to the Christian burials of late antiquity. When Archimandrite Antonin died - and this happened in 1894 - a plot of land with a complex of burials was transferred to the name of the chairman of the Imperial Palestinian Orthodox Society, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich. In 1912, an employee of the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission, Hieromonk Hilarion, built a house here - now an Arab family lives in it, which looks after the site where the common shrine for two religions - Christianity and Judaism - is located: the Graves of the Prophets. Photo: LookAtIsrael.com V. Sergienko