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Gethsemane....
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Jesus Praying
on the Rock
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Gethsemani (Hebrew gat, press, and semen, oil)
is the place in which Jesus Christ suffered the
Agony and was taken prisoner by the Jews. Saint Mark (xiv, 32) calls it chorion, a "a place" or "estate";
St. John (xviii, 1) speaks of it as kepos, a "garden" or "orchard". In the East, a field shaded by numerous
fruit trees and surrounded by a wall of loose stone or a quickset hedge
forms the el bostan, the garden. The name
"oil-press" is sufficient indication that it was planted especially
with olive trees.
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According to the Greek version
and others, St. Mathew (xxvi, 36) designates
Gethsemani by a term equivalent
to that used by St. Mark. The Vulgate renders chorion by the word villa, but
there is no reason to suppose that there was a residence there.
St. Luke
(xxii, 39) refers to it as "the Mount of Olives",
and St. John (xviii, 1) speaks of it as being "over the brook Cedron".
According to St. Mark, the Savior was in the habit of retiring to this
place; and St. John writes: Judas also, who betrayed
him, knew the place; because Jesus had often
resorted thither together with his disciples".
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A place so memorable, to which all the Evangelists direct
attention, was not lost sight of by the early
Christians. In his "Onomasticon," Eusebius of
Caesarea says that Gethsemani is situated "at the foot of the
Mount of Olives", and he adds that "the
faithful were accustomed to go there to pray". |
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The oldest olive tree
inside the Garden
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St. Sylvia of Aquitania (385-388) relates that on Holy
Thursday the procession coming down from the Mount of Olives made a
station at "the beautiful church" built on the spot where
Jesus underwent the Agony. "From there", she adds,
"they descend to Gethsemani where Christ was taken prisoner" (S. Silviae
Aquit. Peregr., ed. Gamurrini, 1888, pp. 62-63). This church, remarkable
for its beautiful columns (Theophanes, Chronogr. ad an. 682), was
destroyed by the Persians in 614; rebuilt by
the Crusaders, and finally razed,
probably in 1219. |
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