Gethsemane Olive Tree
Gethsemane Olive Tree Trunk
Olive trees are resilient plants. After a couple of centuries, an olive tree
stops producing olives and the olive branches wither. But if the withered
olive branches are
broken or cut away, new branches sprout and the olive tree starts to produce
olives again. One olive tree in Magliano in Italy's Tuscany region is touted
to be 3500 years old.
This macabre trunk belongs to a Garden of Gethsemane olive tree that is said to be 2000 years old. Just behind this olive tree is the Gethsemane Franciscan monastery that enshrines a large flat rock on which, according to the friar in charge of the Gethsemane monastery, Jesus prayed on that fateful night. When pressed for Biblical evidence of Jesus having prayed on that rock or any other rock in Gethsemane for that matter, the friar conceded that that detail had been added by his tradition.
The last chapter of the Bible ends with a stern warming about adding to the Bible: "For I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book." (Revelation 22:18-19)
This macabre trunk belongs to a Garden of Gethsemane olive tree that is said to be 2000 years old. Just behind this olive tree is the Gethsemane Franciscan monastery that enshrines a large flat rock on which, according to the friar in charge of the Gethsemane monastery, Jesus prayed on that fateful night. When pressed for Biblical evidence of Jesus having prayed on that rock or any other rock in Gethsemane for that matter, the friar conceded that that detail had been added by his tradition.
The last chapter of the Bible ends with a stern warming about adding to the Bible: "For I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book." (Revelation 22:18-19)