Иса Мәсіхтің Төрткүлдік Жолы

Path taken by Jesus to his crucifixion

The Via Dolorosa (Latin for 'Sorrowful Way', often translated 'Way of Suffering'; طريق الآلام; ) is a processional route in the Old City of Jerusalem. It represents the path that Jesus took, forced by the Roman soldiers, on the way to his crucifixion. The winding route from the former Antonia Fortress to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre—a distance of about —is a celebrated place of Christian pilgrimage. The current route has been established since the 18th century, replacing various earlier versions. It is today marked by 14 Stations of the Cross,

The Via Dolorosa is not one street, but a route consisting of segments of several streets. One of the main segments is the modern remnant of one of the two main east west routes (Decumanus Maximus) through the Roman city of Aelia Capitolina, as built by Hadrian. Standard Roman city design places the main east west road through the middle of the city, but the presence of the Temple Mount along much of the eastern side of the city required Hadrian's planners to add an extra east west road at its north. In addition to the usual central north south road (Cardo Maximus), which in Jerusalem headed straight up the western hill, a second major north south road was added down the line of the Tyropoeon Valley; these two cardines converge near the Damascus Gate, close to the Via Dolorosa. If the Via Dolorosa had continued west in a straight line across the two routes, it would have formed a triangular block too narrow to construct standard buildings; the decumanus (now the Via Dolorosa) west of the Cardo was constructed south of its eastern portion, creating the discontinuity in the road still present today. The first reports of a pilgrimage route corresponding to the Biblical events dates from the Byzantine era; during that time, a Holy Thursday procession started from the top of the Mount of Olives, stopped in Gethsemane, entered the Old City at the Lions' Gate, and followed approximately the current route to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre; however, there were no actual stops during the route along the Via Dolorosa itself. (Today's Via Dolorosa extends westward from the western portion of that street.) Near the ruined Antonia Fortress and north of the Templum Domini precinct, Jehoshaphat Street led eastward to the Jehoshaphat Gate (near or at Lions' Gate on Lions' Gate Street), with the Valley of Jehoshaphat (near or in the Kidron Valley) beyond the gate. In the 14th century, Pope Clement VI achieved some consistency in route with the bull Nuper Carissimae, establishing the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land, and charging the friars with "the guidance, instruction, and care of Latin pilgrims as well as with the guardianship, maintenance, defense and rituals of the Catholic shrines of the Holy Land". Beginning around 1350, Franciscan friars conducted official tours of the Via Dolorosa, from the Holy Sepulchre to the House of Pilate—opposite the direction travelled by Christ in the Bible. The route was not reversed until c. 1517, when the Franciscans began to follow the events of Christ's Passion chronologically—setting out from the House of Pilate and ending with the crucifixion at Golgotha. From the onset of Franciscan administration, the development of the Via Dolorosa was intimately linked to devotional practices in Europe. The Friars Minor were ardent proponents of devotional meditation as a means to access and understand the Passion. The hours and guides they produced, such as Meditaciones vite Christi (MVC), were widely circulated in Europe. Necessarily, such devotional literature expanded on the terse accounts of the Via Dolorosa in the Bible; the period of time between just after Christ's condemnation by Pilate and just before his crucifixion receives no more than a few verses in the four Gospels. Throughout the 14th century, a number of events, marked by stations on the Via Dolorosa, emerged in devotional literature and on the physical site in Jerusalem. The first stations to appear in pilgrimage accounts were the Encounter with Simon of Cyrene and the Daughters of Jerusalem. These were followed by a host of other, more or less ephemeral, stations, such as the House of Veronica, the House of Simon the Pharisee, the House of the Evil Rich Man Who Would Not Give Alms to the Poor, and the House of Herod. In his book, The Stations of the Cross, Herbert Thurston notes: "Whether we look to the sites which, according to the testimony of travelers, were held in honor in Jerusalem itself, or whether we look to the imitation pilgrimages which were carved in stone or set down in books for the devotion of the faithful at home, we must recognize that there was a complete want of any sort of uniformity in the enumeration of the Stations." This negotiation of stations, between the European imagination and the physical site would continue for the next six centuries. Only in the 19th century was there general accord on the position of the first, fourth, fifth, and eighth stations. Ironically, archaeological discoveries in the 20th century now indicate that the early route of the Via Dolorosa on the Western hill was actually a more realistic path. The equation of the present Via Dolorosa with the biblical route is based on the assumption that the Praetorium was adjacent to the Antonia Fortress. However, like Philo, the late 1st century writer Josephus testifies that the Roman governors of Roman Judaea, who governed from Caesarea Maritima on the coast, stayed in Herod's Palace while they were in Jerusalem, carried out their judgements on the pavement immediately outside it, and had those found guilty flogged there; Josephus indicates that Herod's Palace is on the western hill, and it has recently (2001) been rediscovered under a corner of the Jaffa Gate citadel. Furthermore, archeological reconstruction has shown that prior to Hadrian's 2nd century alterations (see Aelia Capitolina), the area adjacent to the Antonia Fortress was a large open air pool of water.

Christian tradition holds that Jesus stumbled three times during his walk along the route; this belief is currently manifested in the identification of the three stations at which these falls occurred. Tradition holds that Mary, the mother of Jesus, set up stone markers at her home outside Jerusalem to retrace the steps of her son’s Passion, but the origin of the devotion in its present form is not clear. This narrative is included in the three Synoptic Gospels. The current traditional site for the station is located at the east end of the western fraction of the Via Dolorosa, adjacent to the Chapel of Simon of Cyrene, a Franciscan construction built in 1895. An inscription, in the architrave of one of the Chapel doors, references the Synoptic events. Prior to the 15th century, this location was instead considered to be the House of the Poor Man, and honoured as the fifth station for that reason; the name refers to the Lukan tale of Lazarus and Dives, this Lazarus being a beggar, and Dives being the Latin word for [one who is] Rich. Adjacent to the alleged House of the Poor Man is an arch over the road; the house on the arch was thought to be the corresponding House of the Rich Man. and the narrative of Lazarus and Dives is now widely held to be a parable.

A medieval Catholic legend viewed a specific piece of cloth, known as the Veil of Veronica, as having been supernaturally imprinted with Jesus' image, by physical contact with Jesus' face. By metathesis of the Latin words vera icon (meaning true image) into Veronica, it came to be said that the Veil of Veronica had gained its image when a Saint Veronica encountered Jesus, and wiped the sweat from his face with the cloth; no element of this legend is present in the Bible, although the similar Image of Edessa is mentioned in The Epistles of Jesus Christ and Abgarus King of Edessa, a late piece of New Testament apocrypha. The Veil of Veronica relates to a pre Crucifixion image, and is distinct from the post Crucifixion Holy Face image, often related to the Shroud of Turin. The current sixth station of the Via Dolorosa commemorates this moment when a woman is said to have wiped the sweat from Jesus' face with a cloth. The location was identified as the site of the encounter in the 19th century; in 1883, Greek Catholics purchased the 12th century ruins at the location, and built the Church of the Holy Face and Saint Veronica on them, claiming that Veronica had encountered Jesus outside her own house, and that the house had formerly been positioned at this spot. The church includes some of the remains of the 12th century buildings which had formerly been on the site, including arches from the Crusader built Monastery of Saint Cosmas. The present building is administered by the Little Sisters of Jesus, and is not generally open to the public.

The Eighth station commemorates an episode described by the Gospel of Luke, alone among the canonical gospels, in which Jesus encounters pious women on his journey, and is able to stop and speak to them. However, prior to the 15th century the final station in Jesus' walk was believed to occur at a point earlier on the Via Dolorosa, before this location would have been reached. The present eighth station is adjacent to the Greek Orthodox Monastery of Saint Charalampus; it is marked by the letters IC XC / Nika carved into the wall, and an embossed cross.

Each Friday, a Catholic procession walks the Via Dolorosa route, starting out at the monastic complex by the first station; the procession is organized by the Franciscans of this monastery, who also lead the procession. Acted re enactments also regularly take place on the route, ranging from amateur productions with, for example, soldiers wearing plastic helmets and vivid red polyester wraps, to more professional drama with historically accurate clothing and props. The seat of the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate in Jerusalem is located on the roof of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. At the entrance of the Patriarchate is a column with a cross on it, marking the 9th Station of the Via Dolorosa. In 1980 Pope Shenouda III of Alexandria (3 August 1923 – 17 March 2012) had forbidden Coptic faithful from traveling to Jerusalem on pilgrimage until the Israeli Palestinian conflict was resolved. However, despite the ban, dozens of Coptic pilgrims travel to Jerusalem every year, especially during the Easter holidays.