Travel Adventures with Bob Hare: Ephesus Turkey: Eastern Mediterranean Odyssey

Library of Celsus, Ephesus

Our third and fourth in-port on our 10-day cruise on the Norwegian Cruise Line Ship Jade were two fascinating Turkish landmarks: Ephesus and Istanbul. As with Greece, Turkey was a new country for me as for my wife Tricia-Rose and sister Janice, Brother-in-Law Ron, and friends John and Marg. Unlike our other in-port explorations, we booked this day-trip through the ship as the logistics of getting the six of us from the port of Izmir to Ephesus was a bit complex. Given that we missed seeing the newly excavated upper class houses on the hillside in order to get the hard sell at a Turkish rug factory, I think I'll avoid such bus tours in the future. But we still had a rich day of touring two sites: The House of Mary and most importantly, Ephesus, one of the best preserved ancient sites on the Mediterranean. Our first stop was the House of Mary.

House of Mary

The House of Mary is a small but popular pilgrimage site with a curious story. It is reported to be the last home of the Virgin Mary after she was brought there by the Apostle John after Christ's crucifixion and resurrection. The Apostle John, who was the only disciple brave enough to witness Christ's crucifixion, wrote in John 19: 26-27, "When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, 'Woman, here is your son.' Then he said to his disciple, 'Here is your mother.' And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home." Jesus' last words were to secure the earthly and emotional well being of his mother and John.

According to Wikipedia this is how the House of Mary was found:

At the beginning of the 19th century, Anne Catherine Emmerich, a bedridden Augustinian nun in Germany, reported a series of visions in which she recounted the last days of the life of Jesus, and details of the life of Mary, his mother. Emmerich was ill for a long period of time in the farming community of Dülmen but was known in Germany as a mystic and was visited by a number of notable figures.

One of Emmerich's visitors was the author Clemens Brentano who after a first visit stayed in Dülmen for five years to see Emmerich every day and transcribe the visions she reported. After Emmerich's death Brentano published a book based on his transcriptions of her reported visions, and a second book was published based on his notes after his own death.

One of Emmerich's accounts was a description of the house Apostle John had built in Ephesus for Mary, the mother of Jesus, where she had lived to the end of her life. Emmerich provided a number of details about the location of the house, and the topography of the surrounding area:

“

Mary did not live in Ephesus itself, but in the country near it. ... Mary's dwelling was on a hill to the left of the road from Jerusalem, some three and half hours from Ephesus. This hill slopes steeply towards Ephesus; the city, as one approaches it from the south east seems to lie on rising ground.... Narrow paths lead southwards to a hill near the top of which is an uneven plateau, some half hour's journey.

”

Emmerich also described the details of the house: that it was built with rectangular stones, that the windows were high up near the flat roof and that it consisted of two parts with a hearth at the center of the house. She further described the location of the doors, the shape of the chimney, etc.

On October 18, 1881, relying on the descriptions in the book by Brentano based on his conversations with Emmerich, a French priest, the Abbé Julien Gouyet, discovered a small stone building on a mountain overlooking the Aegean Sea and the ruins of ancient Ephesus in Turkey. He believed it was the house described by Emmerich and where the Virgin Mary had lived the final years of her life.

The Roman Catholic Church has never pronounced on the authenticity of the house, for lack of scientifically acceptable evidence. It has, however, from the blessing of the first pilgrimage by Pope Leo XIII in 1896, taken a positive attitude towards the site. Pope Pius XII, in 1951, following the definition of the dogma of the Assumption in 1950, elevated the house to the status of a Holy Place, a privilege later made permanent by Pope John XXIII. The site is venerated by Muslims as well as Christians. Pilgrims drink from a spring under the house which is believed to have healing properties. A liturgical ceremony is held here every year on August 15 to commemorate the Assumption of Mary.

Pope Paul VI visited the shrine on July 26, 1967, and Pope John Paul II on November 30, 1979. Pope Benedict XVI visited this shrine on November 29, 2006 during his four-day pastoral trip to Turkey.

Ephesus

From Wikipedia:

Ephesus was an ancient Greek city, and later a major Roman city, on the coast of Ionia, near present-day Selçuk, Izmir Province, Turkey. It was one of the twelve cities of the Ionian League during the Classical Greek era. In the Roman period, Ephesus had a population of more than 250,000 in the 1st century BC, which also made it one of the largest cities in the Mediterranean world.

The city was famed for the Temple of Artemis (completed around 550 BC), one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Emperor Constantine I rebuilt much of the city and erected new public baths. Following the Edict of Thessalonica from emperor Theodosius I, the temple was destroyed in 401 AD by a mob led by St. John Chrysostom. The town was partially destroyed by an earthquake in 614 AD. The city's importance as a commercial center declined as the harbor was slowly silted up by the Cayster River (Küçük Menderes).

Ephesus was one of the seven churches of Asia that are cited in the Book of Revelation. The Gospel of John may have been written here. The city was the site of several 5th century Christian Councils.