Entering Gethsemane-Night of Terror

After the “Last Supper” observing the Passover in the upper room, Jesus felt heavy and led his Apostles to the Garden of Gethsemane over the bridge across the Kidron Valley to the east where He could be alone and pray.  The Passover is always celebrated at the full moon at the end of March and beginning of April, and the night was cold (see John 18:18).  Ancient manuscripts and stone foundations discovered at the bottom of several exploratory shafts dug in the mid nineteenth century offer evidence of a high narrow stone bridge crossing the Kidron Valley at the time of Christ.  At that time to even walk near a grave site was to be defiled and required ritual cleansing by the Priest.  Graves, both marked and unmarked, littered the bottom of the Valley.  The history of Jerusalem is a violent succession of conquerors for thousands of years.  Even when it stood as an independent state there was constant fighting and bloodshed.  The bottom of the Valley seemed to accumulate layers of the dead almost in proportion to the layers of broken stones and debris used by attacking armies to lay siege to the walls of Jerusalem. It would have been unthinkable to subject the olive oil and wine to be used in the Temple to such pollution!  So, according to the texts, a high, narrow stone bridge was built by the priests to provide a way to preserve the purity of the essential oils and wines as they were transported to the Temple.  This is the last of many of my own paintings featuring that bridge, and even this painting has been “updated” seven or eight times to more accurately depict discoveries my friends and I have made in the last few months. Special thanks to Dr. Vern Swanson of the Springville Museum of Art for his many contributions. I expect that there remain errors to be corrected in a subsequent work as more and more is learned about the time of the Atonement.