CC Travel Blog

Nov, 2008

This plain old oblivious red brick house is the last home of Mary. Before Jesus’ death, St. John promised Jesus that he would take care of Mary and indeed, he did. Built in the first centry A.D. after Jesus’ death, St. John and Mary hid in some hills to avoid prosecution. The location they hid can let them see the city so that they could be alarmed if anything happens.

Nobody knew about the house until a nun had some vision in the 1460’s. People tried to find out the house according to the vision but they couldn’t find anything. After the nun died, they finally found the house and it turned out that they were looking on the wrong hill for 30 years!

The house had a cistern outside, some calls it a baptistry pool, but it was not used as baptism at all.

On the house itself, the bottom layer of red bricks was the original found on the site. The house was broken when it was discovered and restoration work carried out to return the house to the original shape.

The house is quite small, with one small room as the original room. A bigger room was built to the left of the small room in the 9th A.D. As we entered the house, we first saw the bigger room, which has an altar with Virgin Mary’s statue.

To the right is the original room.

On the wall, a painting was framed. It is believed to the Mary’s face, the only real evidence of her look.

People lined up to visit this house and although Virgin Mary is heavily involved in the Christianity religion, there are a lot of Muslims visiting this place because the Muslim religion also believes that Mary is the prophet’s mother. On the site, there are displays of extracts from the Koran about Mary.

Personally, I am not sure the meaning of the house of Virgin Mary. After all, is she just a human being who has passed away many many years ago or is she some kind of saint or god? Either way, I think Mary role is more of a spiritual belief than any actual magic that still remains on the house. So why are people visiting? Perhaps just to find another place to pray? Or perhaps to see another historical site? For me, it’s probably the latter and the only thing I learned about the house is that Mary lived in a very small house with no kitchen or bathroom in 1st A.D. Mm, I wonder how come nobody addressed the reality of the living condition. Do we tend to ignore the reality when it comes to holy matters?