Mount of Olives

The Mount of Olives or Mount Olivet is a mountain ridge across the Kidron Valley from the Old City of Jerusalem. It was on this mount where He wept over Jerusalem. “When He approached Jerusalem, He saw the city and wept over it.” (Luke 19:41). During Christ Jesus' final post-resurrection appearance, the disciples witnessed His ascension to heaven from the Mount of Olives. Immediately following Jesus’ ascension, two angels told the disciples on the Mount of Olives that “this same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11). According to the prophet Zechariah, Jesus will return not only in the same way but to the same place. In a prophecy related to the end times, Zechariah declares, “On that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives will be split in two from east to west, forming a great valley, with half of the mountain moving north and half moving south” (Zechariah 14:4).
For 3,000 years, the Mount of Olives has served as the burial site for the Jewish people. During the 1950s and 1960s, Muslim residents uprooted tombstones, plowed the land and used the gravestone markers for construction. To this very day, the Jewish cemetery is regularly robbed, vandalized and desecrated by Muslims. Mourners are frequently assaulted during funeral processions.
Ossuaries, or bone boxes, were extremely popular among the Jewish population during the Second Temple period and Jesus' time. Families would typically bury people in a linen shroud, and once the flesh had rotted away, the bones would be collected and placed in a limestone box.Read more