Jesus Tomb
Jesus Tomb Details
This photo is of a plaque just outside Jesus' tomb.
The plaque details Jesus' tomb from a top-down perspective. The somewhat blurry words on the right
of the photo are repeated and explained
below:
#1 - "Entrance to outer room, hewn in rock." This is the door visible in the previous photo.
#2 - "Low threshold to graves." This is just a step down to the right half of the tomb, which is slightly lower than the left half.
#3 - "Short low rock walls."
#4 - "Finished loculus (burial place)." This is where Jesus' body lay for 3 days.
#5 - "Pillow cut in rock." Instead of dropping off at a right angle, the rocky mass had been smoothed and sloped into a pillow for the head.
#6 - "Weeping chamber". This is a flat area intended for the mourners to sit and mourn while looking at the body on the other side of the short rock walls (#3).
#7: "Rough ledge."
#8: "Unfinished loculus." How do we know it was unfinished? The rocky mass on the right side had not yet been sloped and smoothed into a pillow (#5), indicating that the tomb was almost but not quite finished and therefore still new when it was used. This is a small but important detail since John 19:41 states that Jesus was laid in "a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid."
#9 - "Small window" (visible in the previous photo) that would have been covered when the stone door is rolled into place.
#1 - "Entrance to outer room, hewn in rock." This is the door visible in the previous photo.
#2 - "Low threshold to graves." This is just a step down to the right half of the tomb, which is slightly lower than the left half.
#3 - "Short low rock walls."
#4 - "Finished loculus (burial place)." This is where Jesus' body lay for 3 days.
#5 - "Pillow cut in rock." Instead of dropping off at a right angle, the rocky mass had been smoothed and sloped into a pillow for the head.
#6 - "Weeping chamber". This is a flat area intended for the mourners to sit and mourn while looking at the body on the other side of the short rock walls (#3).
#7: "Rough ledge."
#8: "Unfinished loculus." How do we know it was unfinished? The rocky mass on the right side had not yet been sloped and smoothed into a pillow (#5), indicating that the tomb was almost but not quite finished and therefore still new when it was used. This is a small but important detail since John 19:41 states that Jesus was laid in "a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid."
#9 - "Small window" (visible in the previous photo) that would have been covered when the stone door is rolled into place.